PB&J's for Dinner

Happy, Happy Friday!!

First, I would like to say that I have been super lazy this week.  Not for any reason, what so ever, just because I have no drive to do anything...Dinner's this week have been so basic and just plain silly.  In fact, I've had PB&J for dinner twice this week.  Yep, I am that lazy wife this week.  I've had ideas for blog postings all week long, but never got them up.  Even yesterday's post about TV was very minimal and lets face it, not very interesting at all.  

Second, I would like to say a Congratulations to my friend Ali!  She has been patiently waiting for her house to be built and today is signing day!  I am so excited for her family and excited to hopefully see the completed house sometime this weekend!!  :) 

Top Left: Andy and Keeley cuddling on the couch, Awwww!

Bottom Left: My fall/Halloween decor!  

Top Right: Taking the Keeley on a walk.  She is so happy!

Middle Right: New fall kitchen towels.

Bottom Right: Keeley and Smokey sitting next to each other.  Why you ask? Because I was eating ice cream! :) 

Linking up with Lauren for High Five for Friday!

AND

Linking up with April at A Liz Adventures Darci at The Good Life, Christina at Carolina Charm, and Natasha at Hello! Happiness

Fall was here this weekend

What a fantastic fall weekend it has been around my house this weekend!  You can't beat a weekend filled with amazing weather (highs of 75 degrees) and windows open.  It was nice to get some fresh air flowing in my house.  I even got a compliment from the Jimmy John's driver that my house smelled good.  I wasn't even burning a candle or cleaning at that moment.  I guess that means that we are not smelly people, LOL!  

Friday - dinner was the ever lovely PB&J.  Sometimes you just want a PB&J for dinner and that's OK by me.  :)  The rest of the evening, like always, was spent watching TV and relaxing.  I did manage to get in a quick walk with Keeley also.

Saturday - my sister was attending her first ever school dance, her Freshman homecoming.  I was so excited for her.  I went over to my parents house to help her get ready, but before she got dressed and we fixed her hair, we watched some old home movies shot by my dad.  It was great seeing all the old videos of us kids younger.  I have a bunch of photos I took on my good camera, but haven't downloaded them yet.  Once I do, I will post them on here.  For now, you will have to do with an iPhone camera photo.   My dad was the drivers for some of the 12 girls who met up for photos and dinner together.  My Mom and I joined my Dad for dinner at Applebee's (we didn't want to leave him alone) and then I was back at home by 8:30 PM.  I am such a wimp when it comes to late nights now.  Sad, but true!  

1. This is me 4 years ago in Las Vegas at the Bellagio hotel garden (TimeHop app)

2. My beautiful sister

3. I LOVED her dress!  It was gorgeous!

4. Me and my sister.  She is so beautiful!!

Sunday - as you all know, at least one weekend day is spent cleaning.  Sunday was my cleaning day.  Laundry and picking up (no vacuuming yet, the drywall is being put up in the basement and it's pointless to vacuum when drywall dust is being brought upstairs constantly over the the weekend).  My plan is to vacuum tonight after work.  I decided that I wanted a couple mum plants for my front porch and to decorate the front porch in my Halloween attire!  So planting and decorating I did!   :)  I also decided to trim our front bushes down.  It was well needed!  We grilled dinner that night (burgers, corn on the cobb, and potato packets).  I spent the rest of the evening finishing up laundry and watching the Emmy's.  

1. My mom made a new recipe that I am going to review for you all.  It was so good!

2. My first ever PSL (Pumpkin Spice Latte) = AWESOME!!

3. My Halloween pumpkins on my entertainment center

4. My "before" fall decorations

5. My "after" fall decorations!  I love it!

My Halloween doormat and Smokey dying to go outside!

My orange Halloween lights all lit up at night!

Rainy days make you tired

Last night we were expecting a cold front to come through with storms and rain.  Right on cue, the storms came through and poor Keeley was frightened.  So for about an hour I was trying to calm her down in the middle of the night.  My way of calming her down in the middle of the night, petting her over and over again.  I am pretty sure I am a pro at petting her in my sleep.  Smokey also came to cuddle with us last night, it was a full house in our bed!  I am so glad that it is Friday today, mostly because no work for two days!  

One -  Oh how I love the puppy cuddles that come from this dog!  She is the sweetest most loving dog I have ever met in my entire life.  Yes, she isn't perfect, and yes she has had accidents before, but who hasn't!

Two -  New iOS 7 for the iPhone!  So far, I am loving it!  I took a before and after photo and am glad I did!  So funny to see the differences.  It is taking some getting use to, but in all, I do love it.

Three -  Last night we made a trip to Sam's for some things.  We ended up spending under $100 dollars there!!  Ok so my final total was $99.00, but still, it is under $100!  :)  I picked up a new blanket for the couch and am in LOVE with the thing!  I know I haven't mentioned this before, but I am blanket junkie!!  Smokey even got some cuddles in with the new blanket last night.  No complaints from him.

Four -  A cold front came through last night.  Lots of rain and cooler weather, I can handle that!  I think the Halloween decorations may be going up with weekend now that we are having some cooler weather in the area!

Five -  New shirt and jeans for work today (Friday)!  I picked the shirt up at Target on the clearance rack for 50% off ($6.00) and the jeans at Old Navy for $20.00 (On sale for $25 plus a 20% off coupon and free shipping!).  The shoes are black Nike's, nothing new about them.  I know that I am not the most fashionable person out there, but I try with my clothes.  

Linking up with Lauren for High Five for Friday!

AND

Linking up with April at A Liz Adventures Darci at The Good Life, Christina at Carolina Charm, and Natasha at Hello! Happiness

Sometimes you just want a donut

1. I'm not going to lie, I have been craving donuts for 2 weeks now, but have resisted until this morning (my husband is giving me a look as he reads this, and will probably follow up with, "I want donuts!".....) I stopped by QT this morning for 2 donuts and an iced tea (the tea is for lunch).  Shame on me, but sometimes you just want a donut or two!  It's all about moderation, it's OK every once in awhile!  :) 
2. I confess, I did not go to bed at 9 PM like I had planned last night, it was more like 10 PM.  Andy and I have been re-watching "Big Band Theory" and I really wanted to watch the last episode of season 2!  
3. The sun is shining at the moment and the heat has come back to St. Louis!  87 for the high Wednesday and 91 for the high Thursday.  Go away warm weather (I can't believe I just typed that!)
4. I went to the dentist yesterday and am happy to report, NO CAVITIES!
5. Tonight I am trying out a new recipe from The Country Cook called Bubble Up Lasagna.  We shall see how it comes out.  I normally love all of The Country Cook's recipes, so I am hoping to not be disappointed!
6. I was bumming this morning that on my iPhone the iOS 7 wasn't available yet.  I guess we are waiting for Apple time and not when we are ready for it.  It was suppose to be released today 9/18 and I still have yet to see the update come up on my phone.  I just googled "Apple ios7 release date and time".  Found out, it wont be posted until 10 AM PST (which is after 12pm here in St. Louis).  I'm always nervous to download a new OS onto my phone because of all of the glitches.  Here's hoping all of those glitches are worked out first before releasing this to the public!! (Que husband's comment, "This is why Android is better".)
7. I really dislike the following question: "How was your summer"   My summer was absolute crud and then when you tell people it wasn't good, then they ask why and you have to go into detail and then I get sad and it's just not a good combo.  I know it's a nice question to ask, but I'd rather not lie and say it was good, but i'd also rather not go into detail of my crummy summer.  It's like working in retail and someone asks how you are doing today (this question you are asked over 100 times a day).  Do you really want to answer, "Awful".  Heck yes, but do you really say that?  No, because you don't want to go into detail.  UGH!
8. I'm am wanting to try a Pumpkin Spice Latte (PSL) because everyone and their mom is talking about how amazing they are.  I still have yet to work the nerve up for one.  I saw that McDonalds has their own version too!  Wimp, I know I am!
9. My friend Ali's house is completing construction next Friday and I am so excited for her and her family!!  Can't wait to see the finished outcome!
10. As I look above at all of my items for today, I realize every single one of them is called a "FIRST WORLD PROBLEM".  

On that note, I am ever thankful for my husband, the fur-babies, my family and friends.  

Puppy cuddles last night in bed while I was blogging and watching TV.

She has an AMAZING life!!

Linking up with Megan over at In This Wonderful Life for a Wednesday treat of:

Currently on 9/17/13

Currently….

Listening to: 19 Kids and Counting on the TV.  I'm not going to lie, I am in jammies and in bed blogging while watching TV,  It's a tough life, but someone has to do it.  :) 

Reading: Just finished the book "Where we Belong" by Emily Griffin.  It was good but I wasn't a fan of the ending

Planning: on turning everything off and going to sleep at 9 PM tonight.  I think the gloomy day along with 2 really busy days at work have taken the energy out of me.

Eating: nothing, but I do have a bottle of water on my nightstand.  Dinner was the ever delicious Mater Soup and Grilled Cheese

Loving: The weather!  I am so glad that Fall is here!!!  Also loving the puppy cuddles in bed, even though she looks so depressed because we haven't been on our nightly walk since Friday night.  Poor puppy!

A Mizzou kind of weekend

How was your weekend?  Mine, was awesome as usual, but went by way too fast.  The weather did finally cool off a bit on Friday and we even saw some rain on Sunday {WOOHOO!}  

Friday - The ever fun night was filled with taking both cars to Dobbs for oil changes and tire rotations.  I know, I know, please hold in your excitement for that!  HA!  The night was also filled with an evening walk with Keeley and TV watching, a usual for us.  The photo to the right is of me sitting in the parking lot at Dobbs waiting for Andy.  He picked me up on his way home.  After my car was finished with the oil change, we dropped his car off and had it serviced also.  It is the easiest way to get both cars taken care of at the same time.  I also had a coupon for $17.95 oil changes!  I love saving money, I just need to stop spending it...

Saturday - I slept till 10:30 AM without a sleeping pill and it felt great!!  I guess I really did need to catch up on some sleep.  I then spent the morning/afternoon cleaning the house and getting laundry completed.  I was on a mission because I was spending my Sunday in Columbia, Missouri seeing my brother Jack.  We had the windows open the whole day, it was nice to finally air out the house.  Dinner that night we met up with Andy's parents at Dewey's Pizza.  It was delicious as always, I expect nothing less of that place.  Of course I could not forget to post photos of my fur-babies up!  Smokey decided to take a nap in Andy's dresser.  So funny!  There is Smokey and Keeley enjoying some fresh air with the windows open.  Keeley decided she needed to enjoy the a car ride this weekend.  This was when we went to pick up Andy's car at Dobbs Saturday morning.  She is too funny!

Sunday - That morning my parents, sister, brother and I went out to Columbia, Missouri to Mizzou to visit with my brother Jack at college.  We ate lunch in the cafeteria that is connected to his dorm {I can see why it's called the Freshman 15.... they have so many choices of food, all you can eat at that too!}  The food actually wasn't too bad either, I choose a grilled cheese, a small serving of french fries, a side salad and some chocolate chip cookies.  I wasn't expecting anything fancy from the grilled cheese, I took one bite of it and holy cow it was so good!  The perfect amount of crispness to it!!  Yes, I cannot believe I am that excited over a grilled cheese!  We took a nice LONG stroll around campus (around 7500 steps were counted on the FitBit just for our tour).  We then took Jack to get some groceries, another pair of tennis shoes, and out to dinner at Shakespears Pizza.  Being the good wife I am, I brought home a huge pizza for the husband!  :)  In all a great day spent with family.  

1. On the road again, this time to Columbia, MO

2. Joe in the car playing on the gameboy

3. Woohoo, were almost there!

4. Jena being silly

5. My dad, Jack and Joe hooking up a printer in Jack's room

6. Me sitting on Jack's bed.  It was so high up, I don't know how he jumps up on his bed everyday like that.  It showed how old I am getting!

7. Me and the sister

8. Jena and Jack figuring out how to open Jack's mailbox

9. How many people does it take to open a mailbox?  Answer: 5!  LOL

1. Joe and Jack

2. Joe, Jack and me

3. Joe, Jena, Jack and me

4. Mom, Joe, Jena, Jack and Dad

5. Jack taking us on our tour

6. The Mizzou flag above the president's building

7. A cool etched Tiger in the bookstore

8. Me and Jena in front of the tiger that she really really wants {It's only $250.00}

9. Me on the tour

1. Jack and me

2. Joe, Jena, Jack and me

3. Jena, Jack, and Joe

4. This building is a memorial to WWI.

5. My mom with her new Mizzou Mom sweatshirt

6. Me in front of the Columns

7. The Tiger Stadium!

8. Me and Jena at dinner

9. Pizza, it's what's for dinner!

Never Forget

Fair warning, this post may be will be all over the place today.  For that, I apologize in advance.   I plan on lumping What I Ate Wednesday and Midweek Randoms together.  I didn't want to post a bunch of separate posts for just today, I'd rather just write them all together.

• I have been sleeping like crud lately and it's getting frustrating to say the least.  Monday night I went to bed with a headache, turned the TV off at 9 PM and was out like a light.  Tuesday at work was miserable with how tired I was.  I had 2 sodas in my office that I keep for when I need a pick me up, put them in the fridge, opened one to drink and noticed that it went bad.  Yes, soda in a can goes bad.  Bummer!   Last night I zonked out at 9:30 PM and still this morning I am so exhausted.  I am not a huge caffeine drinker, just a cup of coffee in the morning and maybe an iced tea in the evening.  I've tried PM pills before on the weekends, but I find that when I sleep in a whole bunch on the weekends, my next week for work is thrown off and I lose whatever sleep I gained.  It's a never ending cycle and I don't even have kids yet!

• Working out has not been happening lately...just being lazy about it, I guess. I do make sure to take Keeley out on a walk every night.  It's been just so hot here lately that I have no desire to walk around a lot.  Cooler weather should be coming to St. Louis this week, so I think I am going to start taking up walking at work again.  I really need too at least!

• Last night for dinner we grilled.  I picked up some chicken breast that I marinated, some corn on the cobb and decided to make some "potato packets".  It was pretty easy to make and they actually turned out so good!  Recipe to come tomorrow along with my Pumpkin Apple Muffins!

• Today marks the 12th anniversary of September 11th.  Over the weekend I noticed a lot of TV stations playing tons of 9/11 shows and documentaries and wondered why.  Duh Jess, 9/11 is coming up fast.  On 9/11/2001 I was 16 years old, a sophomore in high school.  I was in my first period class English with my best friends.  We heard rumblings in the hallway about a plane crashing into a building but didn't find out what was really going on until after that class was over.  My Dad was in Chicago that day for work and I had fears of him being there.  I called my Mom from the pay phone at school (go ahead and laugh..) to make sure that Dad was OK.  Obviously he couldn't get home by plane but somehow managed to get a rental car to come home the next night.  After school we came home and watched hours and hours of the coverage on 9/11.  My brother Jack was 6 years old at the time, and the twins were 2.  We went to Bread Co. for dinner that night and when we got home from dinner I noticed the sunset that night was so beautiful.  I did take a photo of it for keepsake.  I need to try and find that photo one day.  I remember at marching band practice the next morning how eerily quiet it was with no planes in the sky, and it stayed that way for days to come. Still to this day, 9/11 is a vivid memory in my eyes and will always be.  

• September 11th also marks a sad day for us.  Today was suppose to be the day that we were going to find out the gender of the baby.  You can read more here about that.  I know, I haven't caught people up lately on what is going on with us and partially its because nothing has been going on.  Just trying to keep our patience while we wait until we can try again.  Someday's it's easy to wait, other's it's not, but we are getting through it all. 

• I don't know if you are all like me, but I have such a weird shape to my body.  Jeans never fit right on me.  Last year I thought I found 2 pairs of jeans that fit me perfectly and then of course, you wash and dry them and they shrink....UGH!!  So I think I am going to have to go up a size in jeans because they shrink.  How depressing.....I went to Old Navy to try on these jeans on my lunch.  They were kind of too big but they are 98% cotton, which means, shrinkage!  I still haven't pulled the trigger on them yet, but am going to have to eventually {especially if the weather is going to get cooler}.  I am waiting on a coupon bigger than 15% off.  They always throw 20 and 30% off coupons out towards the end of the month.   Another complaint I have on clothes, why are all the jeans skinny jeans!  Seriously!  I am a women with curves and hips and a butt, skinny jeans are suffocating on this body.  I even told the women at Old Navy that I couldn't wait until the skinny jeans are no longer popular.  I just want a pair of jeans that fit and that I don't feel like a huge whale in them! {End Rant}

• Sending my thoughts and prayers to my friend Jenn over at The Adventures of Our Army Life. 

Linking up with Megan over at In This Wonderful Life for a Wednesday treat of:

My house will never be fully clean

Every weekend, I always reserve time to clean up the house.  Wether it's a simple pick up things and vacuum, or it's a deep clean of the bathrooms, cleaning out this closet, or organizing/decorating the living room.  Sunday was one for the record books.  I started just picking up the main floor: taking shoes upstairs, doing the dishes, cleaning the counter tops  etc.  Next was the upstairs.  I had every desire to clean out the hall closet and ended up cleaning out under my sink and deep cleaning our bathroom.  Now normally bathrooms are Andy's responsibility, but since he's been busy with the finishing of the basement and was on-call this weekend, I decided to clean that bathroom out.  I spent a good 2 hours on the bathroom and could have really spent several more hours.  It's a big bathroom and you never realize how many corners are in a bathroom until you deep clean one.  

Friday - we spent the evening at Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner and watched some TV.  Nothing too out of the ordinary for us.  Pretty boring in fact.  The excitement of our night, finding out that my cat is a hoarder!  He likes to take my hair ties and play with them in the bathroom.  I knew he had been taking them a lot more recently but I never thought about where they went too.  I decided to pick up one of the bath mats and holy cow, there they are!  All 13 hair ties under the rug!  I died laughing.

Saturday - I had every intention on spending the day at my mom's pool.  The temperature was in the high 90's and I decided that I needed to get some more Vitamin A in this skin before winter comes.  I spent a fabulous afternoon with my family.  Me, my sister and my mom painted each other's toes.  Mine, I tried out a teal color (very not like me at all), Jena went with the same teal color and my mom went with a lilac purple color.  Andy had to work that evening (thankfully it was just at home) and 







I decided to go out to Bath and Body for some pumpkin smelling soap and candles.  I came home with 7 soaps and 2 candles for $27!  Thank you $10 coupon off a $30 purchase!  I stopped by Old Navy just to see what they had in their clearance section and found a swimsuit.  It wasn't the exact matching pieces, but it works for what I paid for it.  A black tankini top and a pink and white bikini bottoms.  Total for the 2 pieces, $10!

Sunday - I woke up this morning to rain and thunderstorms.  YES!  We needed some rain in St Louis bad!  It kind of made me in a more cleaning mode, for example, the deep clean of the bathroom.  I made some pumpkin apple muffins this morning.  YUM!!   Cleaning and laundry took up the rest of the day.  That evening we watched the movie, "Now You See Me".  It was pretty good and had a great twist in the end.  I would suggest it for someone looking for a new movie to watch.  

Puppy cuddles!

Ice cream is kryptonite in our household with the fur-babies!

High Five for Friday #15

It may have been a 4 day work week, but I will say, it has been a LONG 4 day work week!  Nothing bad has happened at work, it's just been boring and my motivation has been way down.  The last 3 early mornings {Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday}, Keeley and Smokey have decided it's play time at 4 AM.  I don't sleep much at all when they are running around.  Usually what happens is I get sick of it and put Smokey in the bathroom and shut the door until it's time for breakfast for him.  He's such a goof!

Now onto the High Five for Friday!  

One - 

Over the weekend, I was going through old photos and found this gem!  This was May 2009.  We were just at Kristina's graduation with her Master's and piled into her Dad's truck {he was driving}.  We took I think 10 photos just to get this one good photo.  I love it!  A great photo of Teri, myself, Donna and Kristina.  I posted this up on Facebook and many people also loved it.  I sure do miss these days with Teri.  I hope she is watching down from heaven keeping an eye on her children and grandchildren!

Two - 

I made a homemade lasagna for dinner Tuesday night and filled the pan up too much, sauce decided to slowly drip in the oven...which means the oven is in need of a cleaning.  I shall tackle this, this weekend.  

Three - 

I decided to start Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred...holy cow!!  She makes it look so easy, but man it is not and you will become so so sore!!  I never thought sitting down would hurt so bad.  LOL.  Tuesday night Smokey and Keeley decided to "help" me with 30 Day Shred.  In fact I was attempting push ups over Smokey.  I posted a funny video on instagram {bettertogetherandforever} of Smokey playing with the yoga mat.

Four -

I know I posted this up yesterday, but I think it is just so cute!  When I have kids, my poor kids are going to hate it when they see a camera....at least I hope they won't!  :) 

Five - 

Keeley loves it when I say to her at night "Want to go upstairs?"  That means bedtime and Keeley is my guard dog when I am in bed.  I put her new lion stuffed animal next to her on bed and she didn't move.  It was just too cute to not take a photo of it.  

I don't have a whole lot planned for my weekend, which I am more than OK with!  I hope you all enjoy whatever plans you may have for the weekend.  :) 

Linking up with Lauren for High Five for Friday!

AND

Linking up with April at A Liz Adventures Darci at The Good Life, Christina at Carolina Charm, and Natasha at Hello! Happiness