It's a cowBOY!

It's been entirely too long since I shared something interesting with ya'll...but I was inspired today by

to share something creative with you! Just so you know, my OCD is going crazy right now because I am about to go completely out of chronological order and share with you something that I did during my 8 weeks off this summer, but it was NOT the first thing I did during my eight weeks off.

Anywho! Deep breath....

My bestest of friends, Melissa Ann, is having a BABY BOY! So I threw her a super adorable CowBOY baby shower over the Summer while she was home on leave (she's a Marine), to celebrate in her joy with her hometown friends! I was so excited that I was off from school because it gave me the time I wanted to be creative and add special little caring details. I even actually made things from Pinterest! My mom and I love this kind of stuff, and she was a huge help! First things first, my amazing cousin Ashley, Sister to my cousin Paige, who you might know from Live, Laugh, Love ,designed the most adorable invitations for me, thanks again Ash, they were perfect!!!

(This is actually the first draft she made for me... not the final product, but ya'll don't need all my bizzzzz, no stalkers allowed! Anyway, you get the picture, super cute!!!)

My theme of course was Denim, Bandannas, and Farm Animals. One of my very first ideas for this shower was to make a diaper cake with those cute little denim diapers that Huggies has out, and everything just built from there. At first Melissa wasn't sure if she wanted to announce the gender to everyone, and when I started the planning she didn't even know yet! I wanted something that could be gender neutral, but could also be tweaked to favor a boy or girl if I wanted. If it had turned out to be a girl I was originally thinking I would add some pink, but then just decided to stick to Red Bandannas regardless...

The main attraction - a denim diaper cake (made by me, with some help from Mom) with Cowboy Booties, and that super cute horse on the left over there was crocheted by my Mom! Isn't it AWESOME?!?!?! There is also a matching little one on the cake but it's on the left side, not clearly pictured. Melissa went nuts over that thing, as I suspected she would, because she always appreciates homemade/crafty things, AND she is also learning to crochet.

 

As seen on Pinterest.... Cowboy Cookies as game prizes! (I was so excited to find bags of colored M&M's at Party City that I overlooked the dark blue ones - I was so mad when I saw them later!!) The denim on top came from an old pair of my stepdad's jeans that mom said were beyond mending. Thanks Steve! :-) And don't worry Lissa, they were washed first!

"Take one and clip it on, but don't say BABY, or you'll have to pass it on!" using the cutest farm animal ribbon I have ever seen (found at JoAnn Fabrics)... and another one via Pinterest... Wishes for Baby - made into a little book for Mommy to keep, made with scrapbook paper and tied with suede strings.

Mom and I picked out some outfits we couldn't resist in various sizes and snatched an idea from a shower my SIL threw to hang them on "clotheslines". The tables were decorated with little farm animal rattles/toys and daisies in ball jars (got a huge case at WalMart on the cheap), tied with bandanna ribbon and accompanied by trail mix. The little red baskets were a 3 pack from the dollar bin at Target, and the red bowls were a 3 pack from the dollar store. Bahhhgain! 

Oh the food, so yummy! Fried chicken in bandanna lined baskets from the Dollar Tree. Utensils in soup cans, Mom lined the edges with another (washed) old pair of jeans and we wrapped bandanna ribbon around them too. The plates are in a bucket from the dollar bin at Target.

Dessert! The adorable little farm animal plates are from WalMart. My cousin Ashley, who made the invites actually found them at her Dollar General in KY, sent me a picture and said I should really have them for the party. I agreed and was so excited that WalMart had some! They are made by Hefty I think... The little lunch box is from Party City, along with the napkins, and the cupcakes were handmade by me! Another idea from Pinterest. The chocolate cows have spots made of Tootsie Rolls, the chocolate sheep are marshmallows, the chicks are yellow cake with yellow colored coconut and starburst noses, the pink piggies are just dyed yellow cake, they have starburst noses, the eyes are all made with mini m&m's and the frosting is just colored with frosting food coloring. As tedious as it looks, I promise it wasn't. I think it probably took me about a half hour to decorate them after they were made, honest. We served sweet tea and lemonade, and I took another idea from Pinterest that I strongly recommend... I froze sliced lemons in a muffin tin in lemonade so they served as ice that wouldn't water down the drink, and a pretty decoration all in one!

 

Mommy's spot :-) I rushed to take this picture before I would let her in the door, but I was still waiting on the cow print balloons that I got on Amazon and had filled at Party City, that were put behind her chair and all over the house using bundles of leftover denim diapers as weights. I found that "Cowboy's Welcome" sign at Ross, and I couldn't resist. My mom and the Boy thought I was crazy when I asked them to help me take a picture off the wall to hang it. Whatever, my beach scene clashed with the decor.

She actually spent most of her time on the floor opening her gifts and playing with her fur baby, Gracie. (good thing I swept before she came!)

Almost everything I bought, got sent home with Mommy. She had hinted to me weeks prior which bedding sets she had been admiring, so my gift to her was to help her decorate the nursery with the decorations from the shower. The baskets, the sign, the bandannas, table decor, etc.... it all went to Mommy. And my other little gift to her? That pony on the ground in the above photo with the bandanna around it's neck. Everyone needs a Rocky Horse in their childhood, and this one sings while you rock on it!!! (p.s. he's from WalMart too if you are in need of one)

Ta-da!!! Me and the Mommy to Be!!! 

(now you can see the balloons too!) 

I was so pleased with how everything turned out, and I think Lissa was too. I can't wait to meet her perfect little Christmas Present, and I'll be sure to keep ya'll updated too!

25 Again.

I thought I should probably finish this post and hit publish so ya'll don't think I'm crazy when I turn 24 again in just a few months... Ya know, especially since its been sitting in my queue since February, and it was late even back then. On January 12, 2011 I turned 25 again. Yup, that's right, again. Because, really, who wants to turn 26? It's so lame, and un-eventful. The way I figure it, if I start counting back now, by the time I'm turning 30 I can re-celebrate my 21st Birthday! Wouldn't that be awesome? I think so....

So anyway. My 25th birthday this year... It was awesome!!!! My mom and step-dad took the boy and I out to dinner at J.Alexanders. That place is awesome, probably my favorite "fancy" restaurant. It's not fancy really, but it's not Chili's either. Then we went back to their house and I got super spoiled with some amazing presents. Way more than I ever expected or could have imagined I was getting!!!! Included in all that was this way cool coupon organizer that my mom hand-made for me!!! And... a super cute Coach purse!!! My mom rocks.

Yup, I'm totally wearing a princess crown - I'm the birthday princess, duh!

That boy of mine is pretty awesome too... he finally got tired of hearing me whine about not being able to listen to CD's in my car anymore after my factory stereo decided to eat 5 of them and not give them back, so he got me a new radio!!!! And it even came with free installation provided by that handsome man himself! Which is good, because it came with all these pretty colored wires that I had no frickin' clue what to do with. All is good now though, it's hooked up, and pretty, and it even connects to my ipod!!! My poor little 2002 Accord is so high tech now!

Love him!

And... Because my friends and I are all January babies, we celebrated our birthday together with a joint party at my house. Jenn and Jess were turning 25 for the first time this year, so it was a 1/4 century blast!

Completely equipped with party hats. 

You know how I know my Mom's cool?

She "Gave Cancer the Boot" with early detection...

and takes photos of herself in the bathroom mirror, on her iPhone, to show off her new hot pink hair extensions on Facebook!

Stylish? Who me?

I feel so cute and stylish today in my comfy fall-ish outfit I wore to meet up with my study group. Looks kind of like something you might see on Pinterest, no? So what if it's 86 degrees outside.... My brain says its fall, and I'm wearing $10 Converse. :-)

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Keepin' it clean...

I'm not gonna lie... I'm really not very good at this "housewife" stuff. I'm hoping one day I will be, and I think I'm getting better all the time, but I am a work in progress. My house is not always clean. My bed usually isn't made, I don't recommend the 5 second rule around here, and my dog does a lot of artwork on my sliding glass doors...

Source: carrotsncake.com via Amy on Pinterest

BUT - there are a few things I have to keep clean. I like a clean kitchen, and clean bathrooms. The rest I can tolerate. We empty the sink every night after dinner so dirty dishes don't pile up, I wipe down the kitchen counters all the time and I get really frustrated when the boy empties out his pockets on the bar and spreads everything out, so I try and pile it all up

and put it in "his basket". Seriously, when you open my front door this is what you see.

(note overflowing green "basket" that needs to be cleaned out...sigh...at least it's in a basket!)

It's the main focal point of our little house. If the kitchen was grody anyone that comes to the door would see it, and I certainly don't want my UPS man thinking we are the dirty people in the neighborhood. That's not cool. I also insist on keeping my guest bathroom tidy. Mostly because I don't like gross bathroom germs, but also because honestly, you just never know when someone is gonna ask you if they can "take a leak" and I don't want them seein' our pee dribbles, that's kind of embarrassing. Since I'm really not good at this cleaning stuff one of my little "tricks" is to keep some of these in both bathrooms.

They work great for a quick cleanup whenever it needs it, or when you know someone is on their way. You can use them on almost every surface in there to spruce it up at the last minute. (and I may have actually used them to clean the entire bathroom today) Keeping one in each bathroom has definitely made a difference. I used to just say "oh, the counter is getting grungy, next time I walk to the other bathroom I'll grab the cleaner and wipe it", but now I just pull out a wipe and do it. The other thing I keep in both bathrooms is toilet bowl cleaner and a brush. To some it might seem silly to have two of all this stuff, but to me, it helps me keep up on the little things that make a big difference. Countertops and toilets are where are the nasty stuff lives, and nobody wants to get someone elses nasties on them when they visit. That's just gross.

Do you have any daily cleanup tips that can help out this un-wife housewife with a busy life from putting off the little things? I would surely appreciate them. And please, if you are gonna stop by, gimme a 5 min warning so I can wipe everything down and we can pretend that I keep a clean house :)

**I wasn't asked by Clorox to write this post... I was just giving ya'll my advice on semi housekeeping and asking for yours! :) **

Does anyone else ever have this problem?

What you can't see in this photo is that she is actually pushing her head down on my arm so that I can't move it... My silly Zoey Monster. Forever the attention whore...

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Sulfonamona-wha?!?!?!

So I started getting grey hair a little prematurely in life - it's not bad, but it bothers me. It bothered me enough that a few years ago I started dying my hair with that drug store box wash out crap that doesn't actually ever wash out. Eventually I had to start going darker and darker to get rid of the red/orange/brassy color and I began to realize that I no longer knew what my natural color was, but it wasn't this dark brown/orange color that I had acquired.

(brassy/reddish/orangy color - so not natural!)

So this week, for the first time in my life, I had my hair professionally colored. I got highlights. It's so much lighter than my hair has been for the past 5 years that It's taking some adjusting to, but I think I like it. What do you think? Be honest...

(indoor lighting...)

(hello sunshine!)

In an effort to maintain these chemically processed locks properly, I've started looking into sulfate and paraben free shampoos, but I am so confused. There are so many, and so many have ingredients with similar names to sulfates, but are supposedly okay. I don't get it. I also don't want to spend a whole bunch of $ on something that doesn't work well, or smells nasty. I'm a nursing student - I'm broke! The boy loves me, but not enough to spend $50 on shampoo. Have any of you picked up on this SLS free craze? What kind of 'poo do you use for your 'do?

Oh how I have missed thee...

Did you miss me too!?!?!?

I took an un-announced and un-planned blogging hiatus. I have come to the realization though that I don't know why! My brain is obviously still in blogger mode because I do things, or I think of things, and in my head I say - I need to blog about that. I think I felt like I didn't have the time, and then I had 8 weeks off from school and I still didn't make the time so that probably wasn't true. In any case... I think this is about to change, but don't hold it against me if I don't live up to my own expectations.

I have learned that not every post needs to be thoroughly thought out, and not every post needs to be long... I'm hoping that these new realizations will help keep me motivated. I usually study for about an hour, and then I take a 15-20 minute break before getting back at it. My new goal is that when I break, I do something productive, like write a blog post!

Thanks to all of you that have stuck around! Be back soon!

While you were freezing...

While most of you were probably freezing your behind's off this past weekend... the high was about 75 degrees around these parts, and we spent a gorgeous afternoon out on the water! The day started out pretty chilly and boring...

but things picked up a bit in the afternoon and we brought in a 150-200 pound MARLIN!

Most amazing fish I have even witnessed being caught...

We put our underwater camera to use and got this spectacular (and HILARIOUS!) shot of our friend PJ who was REALLY excited about reeling this monster in!!!!

There was even an article published in the local paper about it all!!!!! Apparently it's very rare to catch one of these babies... especially where we were, with the bait we were using, and more importantly, by not even trying!?!?!? We were definitely not set up for such a big catch, but it was SO AWESOME!!!!

Stay warm ya'll!!!!!

The bang disaster of 2011...

So today I went and got my hair cut by the same lady that has been cutting my hair since I was five. Now, I have to tell you, I've been debating cutting ties with her for a while. For one, sometimes she has her off days... and two, the snotty salon she is at these days keeps jacking their prices like we AREN'T in a recession or something! Well today was the icing on the top of the "off day" because she completely and totally messed up my bangs beyond repair, AND charged me $11 more than normal! What the heck dude!?!?!?!

I tried to have her fix them, and it just came out worse, so I gave up. I came home and washed my hair only to discovered that she angled them the opposite direction of how they lay when parted!

(can you tell I'm un-happy!!!??!!?!?!?!) Who does that!!!!

So desperate to get a fix to this mess, I stopped at the only Hair Cuttery I know of around here that has employees that speak English. Insert: emo hair 2011.

What's a girl to do at this point except wear clips and headbands, use lots of hairspray and gel, and wait for it to grow out...

::sigh::

I hate wholesale warehouse shopping.

But I sure do love the deals!!!! We have a membership at BJ's Wholesale, but I despise going there. We usually go (together!) about once or twice a year and stock up on paper goods and stuff, but it really is one of my least favorite things to do, no matter how good the deals are. Seriously, it's gross, and inconvenient. It smells, smelly people go there, it's kindda dirty, everything is HUGE (and I'm so little, hence why we go together), it just all pretty much sucks. But - I've finally found a solution! Amazon.com Subscribe and Save. Have you heard of it? It's amazing. Wholesale prices from the comfort of my home, and they deliver to my doorstep in just a few days, for free! Seriously, how can you go wrong?!?!?!?! No crowds, no smelly warehouse, no smelly people... it's fantastic! They have all kinds of stuff too, not just paper goods. They even have food products! So far I've only ordered paper goods and stuff, but check out these prices!

Charmin Ultra Strong - 18 MEGA rolls - $20.96

All Small and Mighty Laundry Detergent - Case of 4, 96 oz. bottles - $53.44

Bounty Huge Roll Select-A-Size - 12 count - $32.24

Yeah... I'm sold... with it just being the 2 of us, this stuff lasts us FOREVER.

The way it works is - you sign up here, and search for the items you are looking for. If they qualify, it will say so... then you pick the quantity and select how often you would like this item delivered. You get an email before the item ships, and you can change the frequency at any time. So basically, there is no "contract." Just because you set it to ship every 6 months doesn't mean it actually has to. In 6 months, you'll get an email, and if you aren't ready for it yet, you go in and change it not to ship for another 1,2,3, or 6 months. Sound like an awesome deal yet??!?!?!? Just wait, it gets better... When you subscribe, you save 15% off the price, and they ship for free with Amazon Prime membership. Whats that? You don't have Amazon Prime? That's okay... anyone with a .edu email can get Amazon Prime membership free, for a year! Which means fast shipping, for free, on TONS of stuff! Not just Subscribe and Save items. Seriously, it's amazing. I take advantage of it all the time. Then you just sit back and wait for the awesome UPS guy to come, and if he's cool like mine, he'll even bring the heavy stuff inside for ya ;-)

Now, I know these prices aren't really any better than wholesale stores... but the convenience was the selling point for me! Especially since our BJ's is shutting down anyway. Amazon didn't offer me anything at all for writing this... it's just one blogger sharing a good deal with another blogger. But hey, Amazon, if you're out there, feel free... because I love me some Amazon!!!!

Five Favorite Friday

In following with the theme of my blog, and my life... I'm going to give you a post that is over a month late. Yup, that's right, I'm about to write about Christmas. Don't judge. I'm a nursing student. I have no life. Plus, I just can't seem to document things out of chronological order, which means I can't tell you about my birthday, or school, or anything else until I get Christmas out of my bloggy mind. I'm just crazy like that.

Soooo, in an effort to get this out of the way so I can continue.... I've narrowed my Christmas post down to my Five Favorite things about Christmas this year. In no particular order....

1. Friend time! and cookies! Yum!!!!

My friends and I got together for a girls night were we ate entirely too many cookies, drank some wine, played some fun board games, and exchanged recipes! Good times :)

2. Evenly dispersed family time. Instead of having to cram time with all of the family into one day, we were able to kind of break it up a little bit this year. The boy got lucky and was off on Christmas Eve, and day! So we did dinner at my parents house on Christmas Eve, and dinner at his parents house Christmas day! Now don't get me wrong, we were still running around all over the place and crazy stressed for 2 days, but at least it was 2 days, and not one!!!

(my little family..)

3. Cheesiness. In the form of matching jammies and goofy family shots :)

4. Presents!!!! (My parents got us an AWESOME waterproof camera!!!! We will be putting this to LOTS of use!!!) and I'm still lovin' my early present from the boy... my Evo :)

5. Decorations. And my mom.

My mom didn't have just one tree this year, she had at least 7... and they were GORGEOUS! She had so much going on at the end of the year, including 2 surgeries, and a holiday party.... but she just couldn't resist putting up all of her decorations.

Love you Mommy!