Halloween 2012

 Pumpkin Carving night with friends! Clearly I am not the artsy one...

 Stacey, Karen and I as 'Rock, Paper, Scissors'

Thanks to the hubs for all his help with my costume!

 Duck Dynasty!

Boon, Jeremy, Nic and Wayne as Phil Robertson, Willie Robertson, Jase Robertson 

and Si Robertson- they should have won the contest...

My love :)

Falling Leaves & Sausage Dip

I forgot how busy our falls are every year, I mean of course there is always the usual... football watching, Tailgating, Halloween and candy giving, colder nights, changing leaves, Scarowinds with my Dad and the brother, etc. But this year we also have J is playing softball on Monday's and Wednesday's, I'm working out at Omni after work some nights, we started our small group on Thursdays, it's busy, busy!

I'm really looking forward to Scarowinds with my Dad and brother, this year will be third year that the four (including J) have gone. I'm hoping we can mess our schedules enough in order to be able to go. It's the only tradition aside from family vacation that we have together, so it means a lot to me.

Tonight I started the 4th week of my interval training for my race in November, four sets of run five minutes and walk one. Rebekah, J's cousin, came with me and ran along side me it was nice to have someone to talk to while warming up and it spurred me on make sure I completed all the sets. We're meeting up at the gym again tomorrow so that she can show me some of the machines and how to use them, she's in college right now working on her personal training degree. Fingers crossed she moves here when she graduates in December.

Saturday I made some Sausage Rotel Cream Cheese Dip, I highly encourage you to try it as a tailgate food or something to munch on when you  have friends over!

Ingredients:
3 (8oz) blocks of Philadelphia Cream Cheese
1 can Rotel tomatoes
1 (16oz) Jimmy Dean Sausage
Directions:
Brown your sausage, drain.
Pour everything together in a crock pot or saucepan and heat through. Serve with tortilla chips, a baguette or whatever floats your boat. Keep warm while serving.

Weekly Doldrums

Stress: a state of bodily or mental tension resulting from factors that tend to alter an existent equilibrium

It’s been a busy week, especially at work. I swear by the end of the day on Tuesday until Thursday at lunch this week I really experienced the doldrums in my cube… you know the doldrums where you can’t figure out how you’re going to get through the rest of the week and accomplish all of the stuff you need to and your head… well it just MIGHT explode?  This week I literally can’t get the scroll bar in my email to go away, it’s terrifying at times. Especially when you come back from lunch and have 17 MORE emails awaiting your reply… It’s safe to say I’m more than ready for the weekend, can I get an AMEN?

The good news is that while I’ve been feeling super stressed, heading to the gym last night to run was the biggest stress reliever. Currently, I’m training for the Color Run 5K in November and I’m working on some interval training over the next few weeks so that I can (**Fingers crossed**) run 3.1 miles without walking. That’s my goal and I’m hoping I can do it. I’m only on week 3 right now, next week is going to be brutal…

Another stress reliever I’m looking forward to? Fellowship with our eGroup tonight at Starbucks and Grey’s Anatomy! This is only our third wee at eGroup but I know it’s exactly where God wants us to be. I definitely think we’ve found an amazing married couple mentor in Daniel and Emily and I can’t wait to get to know them better.

Hope you’re all having a good week. Sadly no recipes to post about this week, haven’t had time to cook but I will say my mom made some amazing post roast and mashed potatoes for us on Tuesday, yummmmm! I may have to experiments with a post roast soon, just saying.

Foodie

Food Survey

Breakfast
Favorite cereal as a child? Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Confession: when mom would buy it on rare occasions I would literally eat it for breakfast and lunch.

Coffee or Tea? With milk or without? I like both, I guess I prefer coffee though. I take it with creamer, no sugar or sugar substitutes though. I can drink it black but I choose not to be that hardcore.

The one food you eat most often at breakfast: J makes me an egg with cheese on my whole grain English Muffins, yummm!

Lunch

Sandwiches are usually considered lunch food. If you had to choose from a grilled cheese sandwich or a peanut butter and jelly, which would you pick? I love me some PB&J’s especially with my Nanny’s homemade blackberry jam, yum!

You can only put four ingredients in your salad (not including greens); what do you throw in the mix? Additionally, which greens and dressing do you pick?
Base: Ice burg Lettuce
Ingredients: Croutons, Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Red Onion
Dressing: Ranch (such a fatty)

One food you cannot live without at lunch: Umm there isn’t really anything I can’t live without at lunch. 

Dinner

It's the end of the day. You're tired, hungry, and your fridge is empty. If fast food (from a chain) is your only option, where do you go and what do you order? Chick Fil A, I’m super partial since I worked there in High School though. So healthy choice? Chargrilled Chicken Wrap with Spicy dressing. Unhealthy choice? Number 1 with no pickle

TV/Computer on or off while you are eating? It’s on, that’s how J prefers it. We will usually watch something off of the DVR. That’s something that I would really like to change once we have children in a few year but we’ll see.  

The one food you eat most often at dinner. Chicken in some form. Since my Dad doesn’t eat Red Meat that’s the thing that I grew up knowing how to cook the best.
Dessert

Choose between two American desserts: cheesecake or apple pie. I prefer Apple Pie fresh out of the oven with some crunchy topping on it!

Choose between two foreign desserts: tiramisu (Italy) or flan (Spain). Well, I would have to say Tiramisu since the taste and texture of Flan is literally repulsive…

Ice cream: cone or cup. I love cones! In the words of Sarah C. my friend from work, ‘Gotta have the crunch.’

Andddd I'm back

My oh my how long it's been since I've posted! I've been gone for a bit but I'm hoping to keep up the blog this time. So, updates on life since last year but first things first...

Happy birthday to the sweetest husband I know, the one and only Jeremy Reynolds! You make our (Buddy & I) lives so wonderful and you bless me each as my husband, I'm so proud to be your wife :)

1.) Jeremy and I celebrated our 1 year anniversary back in May by going to Las Vegas with Jake and Stacey! Great time no $$ big wins but I did not adjust well to the lack of humidity or the time change, sigh... guess I'm just a southern lady to the core with no hopes of ever living elsewhere. It's hard to believe that we already been married a year and half, time slows down for no one as you get older.

2.) I was asked to be Cecilia Brooke Hamilton's godmother/mentor! She's so cute and little, I can't wait to see how she grows over the next few months. (PS I'm currently growing my hair out as well, we'll see how long I let it get)

3.)  I got the iPhone 4, no judgements on the lateness of me getting one or the fact that the iPhone 5 just came out... I'm not rich :)

4.) Buddy turned 2 in September, can't believe we've almost had him for two years at Thanksgiving

 

5.) We joined an eGroup (small group) at our church and we love it! We're currently going thru the series Greater and God is really using it to reveal a lot in our relationship with each other and with Him.

 Sometimes life just gets in the way the busier it gets and I think that's why I haven't really posted much in the past year. Another major thing that stopped my writing was my grandmother passing away on October 28 last year. I literally can't describe why it made me stop writing/blogging but I definitely know it was a huge factor in it. I never thought that I could miss some one so much until she went to meet Jesus. Miranda Lambert said it best: '...I miss you.  They say I'll be okay,  But I'm not going to ever get over you..." The good news is that I'm back and it feels good to blog again, I think I just finally got my blogging mojo back though! 

Until next time... Go tigers :)

Slacker

I'm sorry for my absence, there is no excuse honestly... sighhhh.... here's yet another quick update on The Reynolds and fingers crossed this will be the last one as I will get back to regular postage!

1.)  It's October already? This year is flying by!
2.) My husband turned 26, love my old man :) he wanted to keep it low key this year so we had dinner at the house and watched a movie.
3.) Buddy Dog became mischievous one night while we were gone...and J left him out again one after this devastation and he ripped it up even more. We love him of course but not trust him right now to stay out of his kennel when we aren't home... poor guy.

4.) While Buddy Dog did destroy the couch, we still had couch time a few days later when J went to bed a little early. He looks very great danesque doesn't he?

5.) My sweet Grandmother is continuing to progress towards meeting Jesus which I'm sad and glad for all at once. Please pray that when she does go it's painless and hopefully in her sleep.
6.) Clemson is still undefeated! Holla... :)
7.) J bought me mums for the house and I finished my fall wreath! I need to take a picture...
8.) J installed our glass door and it looks amazing and lets so much more light into the house when we're home!

For now that is all. I'll post more pictures later!

Busy!

I'm back! I can't believe it's been over a week since I've posted. We've been busy is an understatement... so updates of note:

1. My Grandmother is getting worse by the day and I'm hoping it won't be long now til she gets to meet Jesus, I've been to see her twice this week. She's sleeping a lot. Please pray for her!
2. Work has gotten super busy and when I've come home I haven't wanted to be on the computer at all. Praise the Lord tomorrow is Friday!
3. My doctor's appointment today seemed to go well. The therapy treatment should help, fingers crossed no surgery!
4. Buddy almost ate J's birthday present that came in the mail today. It seems he's still not old enough for us to leave him out in the house while we're gone.
5. Speaking of birthday presents... I ended up telling J I bought him tickets to the ACC championship in December.. I'm so bad with surprises, it's weakness. It's usually why I wait til the last minute to buy something so I won't end up getting so excited and telling him.
6. We tailgated last weekend in Clemson and watched as they beat Florida State. We had a blast with Boone and Nic! J found a new tailgating game online called Hammerscholgen which was a huge hit with anyone who saw us playing it :)
7. We're going to Scarowinds tomorrow night with my family minus my Mom. She scares easily. Super pumped to hang out/spend time with the siblings and Dad!
8. I'm taking my MIL and Grandmother in law to see my Grandma on Saturday morning. Grandma Reynolds is going to play some hymns for Grandma :) and then we're going to Trader Jo's, I've never been so it's going to be fun. Glad to spend some time with them, with the new job it seems I don't get to do it enough with any of our family members. J is heading to Columbia for the USC game with some his friends.
9. Sunday we went to the Panther's game courtesy of a contractor J works with. I was so excited since I've never been and have always wanted to go! It poured but we stayed dry and watch the whole game.