So I saw this today on my favorite blog website, shabbyblogs.com, and it just describes me perfectly don't ya think?

I will do absolutely anything to avoid laundry!  I just despise it for some reason.  In fact a basket full of unfold clothes sits in front of me slowly cooling down and wrinkling.  When this happens I just throw it back in the dryer to "unwrinkle it"  (really its just so I can ignore it more easily- "out of sight out of mind")

On an even more depressing note (yes more depressing than laundry) I have jury duty Wednesday :(

It should be an interesting experience to say the least...I'll let you know how it goes

I also found this little cutie on the same blog website!

He is my way of asking you to follow me!  Let me know you read my blog....also feel free to comment! 

Till next time- rae

Baking Fever

Well the Pioneer Woman has done it again.  It never fails that when I read her blog or even glance at her cookbook I'm overwhelmed with the desire to make yummy foods.  So one can only imagine what happened after I actually got to meet Ree Drummond herself, yes in person! (I'll come back to this heavenly experience in a minute!)  Well after that meeting I had no choice but to succumb to my compulsion and spend an entire day baking and cooking on Monday...which anyone who knows me know that an entire day of baking is unheard of in my life, come to think of it this was the first one.  I made delicious granola bars with trial mix and chocolate chips (chocolate makes all things better and is worth its added calories!)

After granola bars I moved on to dark chocolate peanut butter cookies.  Now you all know I despise peanut butter, but its just so darn good for you and everyone else likes it so I'm trying to overcome my abnormality with it.  The only way I could see to do that was to add chocolate of course.  I'm sad to report it didn't quite work...I guess chocolate can't make everything better after all...

 They only needed a few ingredients which is always a plus with me!

At least they looked pretty!  

(if you chill the uncooked dough in the freezer before baking and then scoop it with an ice cream scoop they stay thick like the delicious bakery ones!)

These bad boys were my favorite creations of the day!

German Chocolate cake mix cookies

They are heavenly!

(and only 4 ingredients...even better!)

okay, lets go back to the woman that made this all possible, The Pioneer Woman!  Love her!  If you don't know her then you are majorly missing out on life! Okay so now that you have a basis on how much I love this lady you have a feel for what it was like to meet her!

Did I mention we were the FIRST people in line to meet her?!  I completely clammed up!  

We also got to meet her husband, Marlboro Man (not the cigarette guy, he's dead)

He was nice enough to tell Katie about his single farmhand, Josh.  Next time we meet him we are leaving Katie's number with him for Josh.  Its happening.

Well this is all I have for now.  And I can't end with a better topic and Pioneer Woman and Marlboro Man- and if you haven't been to thepioneerwoman.com Go. Now.  Then go buy both of her books.  You will thank me. 

Till next time ~Rachel

Starting Over

Okay, so lets just ignore my blogging track record from this point forward.  What little track record there was that is.  I'm starting over, turning over a new leaf, and all those other phrases that accompany new year's resolutions.  So I used to think that I had nothing to blog about, I mean who really reads this besides my mom, right?  But then I began reading other people's blogs more and more  (specifically THE Pioneer Woman- love her!)  and I realized that there are some interesting stories in my life to write about....or maybe this is just my inner english major dying to be used, either way, I'm blogging again!

So the biggest update in my life is the newest member of our family!  Little P.J.

Here is a picture of her when we first brought her home!  She was around 5 pounds and a ball of energy!

Don't worry she grows into her ears.  A little.  I mean hopefully...

Fast Forward 3 months and she is 17 pounds! 

So precious.

Okay well I'm going to leave off here because a) I want to keep some stuff to talk about tomorrow b) I have to clean (aka throw laundry into closets) and c) I'm in a baking mood and must go to kroger and buy all ingredients and start before the mood hibernates for the next few months

till next time (whenever that may be) ~rachel

Halloween Funtivities!

Okay so I know its been a loooooonnnnnggggg time since I've been on here, but I slightly forgot about it until some friends mentioned they kept checking for updates only to find none.  So thanks to Danielle I'm back and hope not to forget again!

Well this weekend was a fun filled weekend of fall/halloween shindigs!  Friday night was a Flannel with Friends party complete with tons of flannel and a bonfire.  Now the premiss was that everyone was supposed to wear flannel, unfortunately I had none but other people in attendance really stepped it up with some great flannel pieces.  I really hope this becomes an annual event!

Saturday night Paul and I went to a wedding shower for Sally Coe and Nathan McBride.  It was so nice to go to a shower where I wasn't the center of attention and I didn't have to worry about knowing who everyone is, and Paul loved not having to walk around talking to people we didn't know and thanking everyone for being there.  Needless to say, it was nice to be A guest and not THE guest of honor.  This shower was especially fun because we got to dress up in costumes.  Now Paul and I had planned on a few great options (including princess Di and her arab boyfriend) we couldn't pull them off and we ended up going back to our trusty 80's outfits. I didn't get a picture but others did and I'll post it when I get it.

Yesterday was the final day of fall festivities.  I went to the Shirlwood house and we make pumpkin bread and watched dawson's creek...it was wonderful!  I came home all excited to see all of our trick or treaters, but sadly we only had a few...which is shocking for our neighborhood.  I think next year we need to install some more lights so our house looks like people are home!

Overall it was a fun weekend and I love that its finally getting cool!  It feels like fall!

Oh the "Joys" of Being a Home Owner...

Well not even two months into married life we received the home owner's initiation gift not once but twice...
I'll tell you of the second one first since its the smaller one...almost even a no biggie compared to our first adventure!  It happened on Saturday about 2 weeks after the first "initiation" when we came home to find this:

and it was no small feat to move either (although I don't know actually how heavy it was because I watched those manly men move it from the nice cool side of the window from the comfort of the couch...But they say it was hard and I believe them because it took three of them just to get it off the roof and it's still laying in the flower bed haha!  But hey, at least we have firewood for the winter!

Now the biggie, I am going to start out with a picture since they are worth a thousand words

Now I couldn't get a picture of the hole, but you can imagine how big it is with all that insulation...(which there was more I couldn't get in the picture!)  But let me go back to the beginning.  It all started with just a few drops of water on the kitchen floor which quickly turned into flooding in the equivalent of a gallon an hour!  Well we managed to figure out that it was the AC (which happens to be in the most inconvenient spot in the attic, hidden behind a wall of insulation!) so we turned off the ac and went to paul's parents...When they finally repaired the ceiling a week later the drywall was still wet! It was such a mess (as you can see from above)  But thankfully it is all fixed now and hopefully between the ceiling and the tree we are ahead of the game in regards to home ownership mishaps!

Home Sweet Home

Well life as a married couple is wonderful!  The only regret would be waiting this long to become one!  Our first order of business as a married couple was to make the house our home!  Paul put enough trust in me to let me pick the color we would paint the living room and I chose green.  And this green isn't just a plain green, its what our friends affectionately refer to as "Kermit the Frog" green, but fear not it actually turned out okay!  Once we got all of the furniture in the color was much more soothing.

But from painting this whole room ourselves we learned the value of paying someone else to do it!

Thankfully we didn't have to do  much to the kitchen, I just added so pops of color on the counter.

Here's the other side of the kitchen looking into the dining room.  The little black buffet on the left is going to go to the guest room with baskets on the shelves for storage.

Now Paul was gracious enough to let us paint get a couch in the room before he abandoned all decorating whims to move on to the fish tank.  Now this fish tank was quite a feat to move in.  We built the stand ourselves (with the help of my handy dad) and it weighs over 200 pounds so once we picked its spot it is staying there till we die, because now that it has all the water and rock in it, it weighs over 1,000 pounds!  But I must say, it looks marvelous!  It is so soothing to come home to the sound of trickling water and just watch.  We have learned that even fish have personalities! Its adorable!

Now the next big task to tackle was the office, and boy was it ever a task!  During the wedding and moving process this became the catch all room.  It was utter chaos!  But after a few hours of dedication and perseverance I came out alive and with an organized office!

My favorite part is the built in shelves to hold little knick-knacks!

An a helpful organizational tool was an old hanging shoe rack that I used to hold art supplies, camera chargers and other small (often lost) things. 

Decorating our house together was such a fun experience and really solidified the reality that we are married because at first it just did not feel real!  But now we have a routine to things and life is wonderful!  

Enjoying our real simple kind of love!