Put a ring on it!

This morning I tried another one of my beloved Pinterest recipes, the Sticky Bun Breakfast Ring!

Every weekend that the whole family is home (hubs is usually known to be golfing or hunting on his weekends) I like to make a big breakfast and least one of the days. The usual suspects are found on our plates - eggs, bacon, biscuits, etc. But if everyone is lucky (and Mama remembered to buy them at the store) you will find a yummy, gooey, delicious cinnamon roll. Of course this was not one of the weekends I remembered to buy them. BUT...the stars did align for me to have all of the ingredients to make the yummy treat. And they were so easy!


Don't those look amazing? The only thing that could have added to the sticky goodness would have been a little icing drizzled over the top of them. But they were certainly winners in our book! So a big thank you to The Jones Way blog for posting the recipe. It has made a permanent home in our recipe box! :)

Dear Pinterest, I love you.

I am in love. No, seriously. I have had a closeted love affair for a couple of months but I am clearly ready to shout it from the rooftops. Pinterest, you have my heart.

If you've never been on Pinterest (boy are you missing out), it is basically an online bulletin board and the world wide web is like your magazine. But instead of ripping out pages of cute shoes, great recipes, and chic decor to stick on the front of your refrigerator, you pin it to your Pinterest board. And let me tell you, it is addicting.

Where else can you plan a wedding (when you're already married), redecorate your two story mansion (when you live in a ranch), and plan gourmet meals (for your family that prefers chicken nuggets and corn dogs). :)

I did try a new recipe from my beloved new addiction this weekend and it was pretty good. I will be altering it slightly next time but all in all, my family tolerated my desires to try some new things. The recipe was Lemon Garlic Chicken.


I won't bore you with the prep as you can read the recipe linked above. I will tell you that in the future, I will omit the sliced lemon in the bottom of the pan. It made the green beans and red potatoes super tart. But other than that, it was delish! I forgot to take a picture of the chicken after it came out of the oven so here is the photo that I found originally. You can find the pin here.

I am excited to try more and more recipes as my family allows, and I will definitely be filling my house with some new decor thanks to my new love, Pinterest!

Disney World, 2012

We were super excited to get outta dodge and go to Disney World with our family. This was the first time we were there with my parents, and my brother, my sister in law, and their kids. And I might I add the first time we were going to meet our almost 2 year old niece, Ellie!

I've always been taught that a bad day on vacation is better than a good day at home. Well, I expect that rings true in most cases. However, does that still apply when your entire family comes down with the stomach flu at Disney World? It was a rough go the entire week as it seemed that each mini family was sick in shifts. Good news, we did get to go do some things. Bad news, only once was everyone together and there isn't a single photo to prove that we were all in the same place, at the same time. And even though we weren't able to spend the entire week frolicking through the parks together (yes, I said frolicking), we still had a wonderful time being together.

{the highlights}

Driving onto Disney property unaware of what we were in for.

The only photo of the boys with Grandma. :(

Zachary teaching Grandpa about Pokemon on his 3DS.

Damion schooled me on the Buzz Lightyear ride.

The boys make friends everywhere!

Andrew & Zachary bonding with their super cool and gorgeous cousin, Alix.

Going through these pictures I have now realized that I have zero pictures of our sweet niece, Ellie. And there are no pictures of Damion and I. I am definitely calling for a Mulligan. Here's hoping that our next trip will be virus free and lots of fun.

Happy Birthday, Andrew

If I could save time in a bottle, the first thing that I'd like to do...Is to save every day till eternity passes away, just to spend them with you.

This is what I think with every birthday that comes and goes for my boys. I just don't know how they keep getting so big so quick!

Happy 11th Birthday to my sweet Andrew. I couldn't imagine how dull my life would be without you. Thank you for choosing me to be your Mama. I love you!

Cirque du Christmas Cards

There are two words that plague me every December...Christmas Cards. Strange? Maybe...But I always feel so much stress about them. Every January I swear that next Christmas will be different, and then December rolls around and I end up with the stupid cards that feature what looks like the Easter Bunny in a Santa hat greeting us with a Hoppy Holidays. Okay, it isn't really that bad, but - it's close.

This was going to be our year. We were going to own the Christmas Spirit with our cards. I wanted something different that captured our personalities and I wanted it to have that certain WOW factor that I so desire every year. I thought it would be really fun to hire someone to take our family pictures, hoping they would share my vision, or at least humor me. There are a few of problems with this... #1. It's already the middle of December. #2. We are blessed with a child that has Asperger's Syndrome, that loathes having his picture taken. #3. We are traveling for Christmas and that leaves about 30 seconds to find someone to take the photos, edit them, give us a disk, order cards, address them, AND actually mail them. #4. Refer to #'s 1-3.

Thankfully, I was creeping on my neighbor's Facebook page and saw that she recently had her family's pictures taken by a local photog. I called her immediately and she was surprisingly up to the challenge. We made arrangements for her to come photograph my motley crew 2 days later.

All that are close to us, know that we live our lives with lots of love, laughter, and understanding. I truly think all of these things were captured in our session. Here are just some of my favorites!

Doesn't Zachary look excited?!?

I have to interrupt and tell you that it couldn't have been more perfect for our kitty to be taking his leisurely stroll during our mini photo session. It's like he knew. LOL

I love how Belle and Zachary are still watching the cat. This continued for several minutes.

I couldn't be happier with the results of our session with Melissa Jenkins Photography. We definitely got lucky. I have vowed to book our next Christmas Card session in October to give us plenty of time to get it just right. It is written in stone to remind me - well, as in stone as the Google Calendar can be on my iPhone. :)

Take a look at what made the cut for our card.

I apologize for the horrible cell phone photo, but you get the idea. I am pleased to tell you that we had our cards in the mail with only days to spare. Talk about sneaking in at the 11th hour. Well, there's always next year. ;)

The Perfect Tree

We took a family outing in search of the most perfect Christmas tree today. Although we will be making the pilgrimage to my parents house in Raleigh for Christmas, the boys still wanted to put up a tree. And of course, one of the three artificial trees we have just wouldn't have been good enough. ;)

Much like the Griswolds, we were kicking off our fun old fashion family Christmas by heading out into the country in the old front-wheel drive sleigh to embrace the frosty majesty of the winter landscape and select that most important of Christmas symbols. Mind you, it was in the 70's with a light breeze - gotta love South Georgia in the winter.

We ended up at a tree farm called, Busy Elves...And were they ever. We were pointed in the right direction of finding our family tree. The boys picked it out and even assisted Damion is cutting is down and carrying it to the car.

And even though it will end up in our living room with only lights on it but I will tell you that we made memories that won't soon be forgotten. <3

Happy Homeowner-iversary!

Today marks 1 year since we closed on our first home! I can't believe how quickly the time has flown by. Being a military family, we are so used to picking up and moving our entire lives every 3 years to a different Marine Corps Base. Before now, we never had to worry about mortgage payments, yard maintenance, and power bills. Living on a base, all of that is taken care of for you. It's truly one of the perks. But after living in this beautiful brick house for the last year, I can't imagine raising our family anyplace else.

~Home is where your story begins~