High Five for Friday!

Not too much to discuss today, but here are 5 things:

1. It finally felt like fall today.  There was chilly weather, drizzling rain, hot soup & grilled panini sandwiches (Zupa's!), jackets and turning on the fireplace.  As much as I don't like the weather going from hot to cold (reminds me of that one Katy Perry song), I do enjoy the fall-like weather.

2. For our fat unit, I had my 8th grade FACS Exploration students make these Oreo Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookies. 

They loved them!  It was my first time trying it out and I'm glad that it went over well.  I've had quite a few make them at home for extra credit.  Don't worry, we made something healthier the next day.




3. I only have a 3-day school day next week!  I have two days off for fall recess.  It will be nice to be able to get some things done, especially for my party.

4. Speaking of my party, I am slowly making progress. Invitations are being sent out tomorrow, so I can't back out now!  I'm sorry if I'm going to mention this party a lot, but it's my first major one I've thrown (like ever), so I'm really excited/nervous for it.  Anyways, here's a peek at the invitations:

Front

Back

 5. My amazing husband made this week great.

What a good looking guy.

Spoiled

I'm going to brag a little bit about my husband.  He is the best.  Scott works graveyard shifts (7pm-7am), so he is extremely tired when he gets done.  Today, I was at school watching my kids cook some healthy muffins when I see him walk in with flowers!  I was totally shocked to see him!  We talked for a minute when a student yelled out "Is that your man?!"  Haha. It was pretty funny.  He left pretty quickly since it was 8:30am and he needed some sleep! (I mean seriously, he stayed up all night and despite how tired he was, drove all the way to my school just to give me flowers. Wow.)

The flower stems were long and we have no vases in our kitchens at school, so I was looking through cupboards trying to figure something out when a student suggested to use a blender.  So, I did! 

When I thanked Scott for them later, he said that he had read my blog post from yesterday and decided that I needed some cheering up.  Gosh, I love my man!  He sure knows how to treat me well.

It's Only Wednesday?!

The week is only half over and I've definitely felt this way everyday:

I haven't been sleeping too well, which makes it to where all I want to do is sit on the couch and watch t.v. or facebook.  Because of that, the poor house has been neglected with cleaning.  Blah.

I also am trying to do too much at school and surprisingly, everything has gone well, but I am just drained when I'm done since I have to be the energizer bunny and keep going and going and going...

Shoebox project!

I am also throwing my first ever Halloween party and so I'm working on getting invitations out this weekend, still need to figure out a costume for Scott & I (I saw one online that was Carly Rae Jepson & a phone "Call me maybe" anyone?) and gotta get some decorations made.  I feel like Halloween is still far away, but will be here in the blink of an eye.

Scott has also been bombarded with school work and I always help him out in getting things done, so that's been busy.  In happier news, he'll be done with school in December!

Sigh.  Can it be Friday yet?

A Work in Progress

This weekend, Scott and I were productive with things inside the house and outside.  Like I mentioned in Friday's post, Scott bought 6 trees and we worked on planting them.  We put 5 in the backyard and 1 in the front yard.  I felt bad because Scott did pretty much all of the heavy work while I sat and took pictures. :)

Maddie being a great help while planting trees.

Maddie's going to love it when the trees mature.

We still need to buy some mulch to put on top, finish planting the tulips and put some weed killer on the lawn.  We're a little late on lawn stuff, but better late than never, right?

I went shopping on Saturday for fall decorations, stuff for my Halloween party I'm throwing and stuff for our bathroom upstairs.  Yes, I know it's late for fall decorations, but I figure my house will be decorated for Halloween when I throw my party and then I can re-use what I bought for November.

Maddie was sure helping out here.

It will be nice when we get a T.V. to have that piece of wood finally covered up.  I'm still unsure about the space in the middle, but I already spent more than I should have on decorations, so I'll leave the space empty for now. 

I've decided that while Hobby Lobby is a store with awesome stuff, it is a little more expensive than other places that have the same things, but cheaper.  I did find that cute 'Thankful' plate at Wal-Mart for about $3, so that was fun.  I also got the fake leaves at the dollar store.  We waited too late to be able to drive up the mountain and get real leaves.  I've really realized now that our house is quite large and it's hard to figure out where to decorate so that it's not overboard, but still obvious we have stuff up.

Our bathroom upstairs is still a work in progress, so no pictures yet.  Scott has already replaced the toilet seat and put up a new towel rod.  I bought a new shower curtain and decorations for the wall.  We're going for a beach theme and although it would be nice to paint, we just don't have time right now.  It's been fun working on little house projects we have.

Anyways, we ended Saturday night with Scott making home-made apple cider!!  It was quite delicious.  Go hubby!

It's Friday!

Here we go again...5 things that happened this week.

1. Just today, Scott went shopping at Lowe's (never a good idea with that boy) for some things for the yard and our upstairs bathroom.  I get a text from his with this picture:

He bought 6 trees (5 of them shade trees and 1 a crab apple tree) and 2 rose bushes for $42!!  All the trees were on sale for either $5 or $10.  We got two of them planted today and some tulip bulbs.  We'll finish planting the rest soon.  I sure hope we get some pretty flowers come spring!

2. This week I had parent/teacher conferences.  Normal teachers would be sighing at the fact that these are here, but they aren't that bad for me for two reasons.  One, I am only part-time, so I only have to attend one night.  Two, since I teach FACS, there is never really anything bad I need to talk to the parents about.  Sometimes I wonder why some even come talk to me. Um, your kid has an A and the highest number you can get in citizenship.  Not sure what else you want me to say about your kid besides they're great.  One teacher today said that she asks the parents if they want her to start making stuff up about their kid.  I thought that was hilarious and I might try that next conference.

3. Tuesday night was awful for my poor husband.  He had a part of this big project due that night and we worked on it until he had to leave for his history class.  He worked on it during class and was ready to do some final touches at home.  Well, he got home and went to open it up and it was nowhere to be found!  Poor guy had to pretty much start all over.  Yeah, it was not a good night.

4. In happier news, I made this delicious potatoes and sausage dinner tonight.  I didn't get a picture of it because we gobbled it up, but here is the link to the recipe!  And yes, I did put bacon in mine.  Because bacon makes everything taste better.

5. Lastly, I am excited Castle is back on!  I love having a show to look forward to and I think this season has been great so far.  I love that Castle and Beckett are together now.

Doing the Work

Rebecca and Andrew organized a family gathering at the temple on Saturday.  Rebecca is really good at doing our family history work and I'm thankful for it.  I'm just not the biggest fan of sitting in front of a computer looking up family history.  I definitely enjoy doing the work in the temple though. :) 

We were doing baptisms for the dead since I guess we had no more names for endowments or sealings, although I have 4 I still need to do personally from when Rebecca and I did initiatories.  It has been so long since I've done baptisms, I had to think of how the routine went down.

It was just another great spiritual Saturday with family.  It took a few tries to get a decent picture of all of us though.  I should probably teach my family members how to use my camera.

Scott & I are not looking at the camera.

Scott's not looking, but it's not a bad picture. I think Brianna's eyes might be closed.

Kyle is the only one looking at the camera.

I have a funky smile in this one.

5th times a charm!

Afterwards, everybody came over for brunch.  I figured that doing any sort of casserole would not work since they take about 40 minutes to bake.  Well, I should have done it anyway because it took about 40 minutes to make what I wanted to anyway.  I decided on these mini cinnamon rolls and this bacon, egg and cheese wreath.

The mini cinnamon rolls actually were pretty good, although I always forget that cheap crescent rolls are a bad idea.  Sometimes you have to splurge on certain items.  They were very sweet, but still yummy.

The wreath was okay.  I think I filled it with way too much eggs, but I was worried if it would be filling enough.  Because of that, the crescent rolls weren't able to fold over the top very well and a lot of stuff spilled out.  I didn't take a picture of this because I was a little frustrated with how it turned out and I didn't think it was worth documenting.  Everything was good, but I should have just prepared something beforehand.  I get way too stressed when I'm cooking food for other people.  I don't know how I'm going to act come Thanksgiving! (yes, I'm cooking Thanksgiving dinner! more on that later.)

Next work at the temple, sealings!

High Five for Friday!

I've decided that I really like the idea of the high five for Friday posts.  It makes you think about what is going on in your life and to focus on the positive that is happening.  So, here are my top 5:

1. I am getting paid today!  At first, it was annoying that I only got paid once a month, at the end of the month, but it actually works out really well in the fact that all our bills are due at the beginning of the month.  So, it's nice to know that we will have money for those bills every time they come around.  I also got $100 extra for a meeting I went to before school started.  Woo!

2. I got the day off of school today because of parent/teacher conferences next week!  It felt so nice to sleep in today and don't judge, but I slept in until 10:30. (I didn't go to sleep until 12:30 last night, but whatever).  There is a lot to do today, but 3-day weekends really are amazing, even though they mess with my schedule a bit . Today is Saturday, I swear!

3. On Sunday, the 23rd, my family got together for Sunday dinner.  It was fun to eat yummy food, talk, jump on the trampoline and play Apples to Apples.  That seems to be our go-to game to play when we get together. It's a bummer I didn't get any pictures.

4. Scott is playing indoor soccer again and he loves it!  I go and watch when the games aren't too late at night and it's great to see him have fun.

Bad picture, but he's the one in the red jersey.

5. We are going to the temple tomorrow with my family to do some baptisms for family names.  The last time we did baptisms was a couple of years ago.  Afterwards, everybody's coming to our place for brunch!  I hope everything that I have planned to make turns out well.  I'll make sure to take some pictures of this event.

I didn't think there would be enough for me to write about, but there's always good happening if I just open my eyes and notice it.