Mediterranean Quinoa Salad

  Let me just begin this post by saying that this may in fact be one of THE BEST new recipes I have ever
tried!!  I do love food, and I am semi-experimental with new food combinations, but in all seriousness.... this recipe far exceeded my expectations and was the highlight of my short 15 minute teacher lunch break this past week!!  The magnificent burst of flavor in every single bite and aesthetic appeal of this colorful dish happily drowned out (if only for a moment....) the all too familiar sound of, "Ewww...so and so is putting his green beans in his chocolate milk" and "Can you open my ketchup packet?"  :)

   So, probably like many of you, I have been seeing "quinoa," pronounced KEEN-WAH, (which I so called KIN-OH-UH for like...ever!!) in stores for quite some time. I've heard about it on Dr. Oz, and I even tried some at my sister's church in Atlanta one Sunday when a friend of hers brought it to a church potluck lunch, but for some reason I have been skeptical to try actually making it myself.  I guess maybe because it just looks complicated....almost fancy.  But let me just tell you now...this may have been one of the easiest dishes I have ever whipped up! No, seriously....  I mean, can you boil a pot of water? CHECK!  Can you put the quinoa in the pot?  CHECK! Can you chop up some veggies with a knife? CHECK! Then you can make this amazing Mediterranean inspired dish.

   So, before sharing this recipe, let me just tell you why you may want to run to the store right now and buy all the ingredients to try this mouth-watering dish.  First, quinoa is a several thousand year old food and is often called a grain, though it really is a member of the spinach, beet, and tumbleweed family. It originates in the Andean region of South America and is high in protein, yet gluten free, therefore it is a perfect food for those who have celiac disease or are gluten sensitive. It contains all 9 essential amino acids, and it is also a great source of dietary fiber, magnesium, iron, and calcium! It is truly a super food!

    Okay, you foodies, on to the recipe:

 Ingredients:
        - 1 cup dry organic quinoa
        - 2 1/2 cups water
        - 2 cups grape or cherry tomatoes
        - 3/4 cup pitted kalamata olives
        - 3/4 cup block feta cheese (always seems to turn out better for me than the already crumbled kind)
        - 1 1/2 T extra virgin olive oil
        - 1/2 lemon, juiced
        - 1 tsp oregano
        - 1 tsp salt
        - 1/2 tsp black pepper

Directions:
    Put the water and quinoa into a pot and bring to a boil.  Reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer for about 15 minutes until the quinoa has absorbed all of the water. Stir the quinoa and set it aside to cool.

                             

    While the quinoa is cooking, slice the grape/cherry tomatoes into quarters.  Slice the olives as well.  Crumble the feta cheese. 

Add the tomatoes, olives, and feta into a medium sized bowl.  Add the quinoa, spices, olive oil,  and lemon juice, and toss until completely blended.  Store in an air tight container in the fridge. 

    And....voila!!! There you have it....Mediterranean quinoa salad.  I took this to school for lunch Monday - Friday of this past week, and I still had enough to sneak a forkful or two when I came home as a little snack before working out.  I tried to get my husband to try it (I even told him I'd pick out the tomatoes), but he was NOT having it! He's a little turned off by a fear of the unknown when it comes to food. But he promised that if I make it again (which I totally will!!), he'd try it.  So I will update later with whether or not this dish is picky husband approved! Haha.  Happy Saturday friends!!!

  - Beth

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

   So, way back in the day when I was in high school, after I would get home from school I would always
watch Oprah.  I know that probably wasn't very highschoolish, but I just liked Oprah for some reason. She always had interesting stuff and interesting people on her show. And one of my favorite shows they would do every year around the holidays was "Oprah's Favorite Things."  It was such a great show, because Oprah would keep this ongoing list of neat products and random stuff that she loved throughout the year, and then on the Favorite Things show, she would give away one of everything to her audience members.  It was just fun!  I thought about it the other day for some reason, and it made me think about what my own favorite things are, so I decided it would be a fun topic to write a blog post on!  Now, you could interpret the word "favorite things" in all manner of ways - things that are beautiful, things that make your life easier, things that have sentimental value, etc.  And I don't feel like separating the different categories, so these are going to be a smorgasbord of all of the above!  Some of these are individual items, some are sets of items, and just FYI, they are not in order of most favorite to least favorite. Here goes....

 1) My Camera - Canon PowerShot Elph 330

       I could have seriously made a 2nd career as the paparazzi.  I take pictures of everything!  But I'm old school...I don't do smartphone pictures.  I mean, I do..... but not as a replacement of a camera. They're just not as good.  I have a good smartphone - Samsung Galaxy 3, which I love (I'm anti everything Apple), but there is just something so much better about a real camera.  They have better zoom, a better lens, tons of different photo taking settings, less blurring, etc.  I keep my camera in my purse at all times. It never leaves my side. And I have been able to take some awesome photos with this little guy. Here are some I've taken this past year...

2) Children's Books
      I know we live in an age of everything digital and e-readers are the norm, but there is just something alluring about a real live book. I love taking a book off the shelf, turning the pages, and even the smell of books.  I'm actually not a huge reader when it comes to adult novels (and by adult novels, I mean any novels written for adult readers, not trashy romance novels...just to clarify. Haha), but I have a true love for children's literature.  While there are some wonderful new children's books that have been written in the last 10-15 years, there is a lot of trash for kids out there too now with sarcastic one-liners with no true lesson to be learned and no real literary value.  I still love the old classics -  Goodnight Moon, The Giving Tree, Where the Wild Things Are, Dr. Seuss, and all books by Jan Brett, Patricia Polacco, Cynthia Rylant, etc.  I have such sweet memories of my mom reading to me when I was little, even up to 8, 9, and 10 years old.  Parents don't read to their children nearly enough these days.  I love reading books to my kids at school, and I can't wait to be able to read stories to my own babies one day.

3)  Mary Kay and other awesome health and beauty products!
        I enjoy discovering new products that work well when it comes to health and beauty. I've pretty much tried it all, and I've found that the most expensive products aren't always the best.  While I love the moderately pricey Timewise Mary Kay line as well as Mary Kay's fabulous foundation primer (helps your foundation to go on flawlessly and keeps it matte) and eyeshadow/mascara, I can't stand their foundation.  I have been faithful to Revlon Color Stay foundation since high school, and I still haven't found anything I love more.  It's only $10 per bottle, and there's always coupons!  Same with Cover Girl powder... 

      Call me crazy, but THE BEST makeup remover I've ever found is Dawn Dish detergent....and it's like practically free.  You can get it for 99 cents a bottle or less on sale.  I know any skin care professional would probably shoot me for doing that, but it works great!!  I also have become a lover of natural moisturizers like coconut oil and sweet almond oil. They are amazing!  Sweet almond oil soaks right into your skin and doesn't leave an oily film.  Coconut oil is good for tons of stuff! It's a great moisturizer, a great alternative to cooking oil like vegetable and canola, and it's purely natural. Reading about all the synthetic chemicals that are additives in lotions like parabens, phathalates, etc. in articles like this one and how they are related to cancer, infertility, and birth defects, you'll only want to use natural stuff.  Your skin is your largest organ and you have to take care of it!! :)
      Comparatively speaking, I'm pretty low maintenance with hair care.  I don't have any upkeep with color or highlights. It's just way too expensive, and I'm too busy to have hair appointments every 4-6 weeks. I don't even get my hair cut but like every 5 or 6 months....it's just too much to keep up with.  But I do love my Helen of Troy hot rollers. I may look like an old lady when I'm pinned up in curlers, but soft billowing curls and added volume is priceless.  I hot roll my hair almost every day.

4) Pandora Internet Radio

      My husband and I are borderline obsessed with Pandora.  We listen to it every night when we go to bed.  Our alarm clock has a connector where you can plug in your smartphone and the Pandora app will play through the speakers of the alarm clock while charging your phone at the same time.  I have it on pretty much all day in my classroom too (calms my kiddos), and it often plays through our home sound system through the Blue-ray.  There is something so calming and joyful about music playing in the background - it's so much better than having the TV on.
      I feel like most people are familiar with Pandora, but I still meet people who have never heard of it.  So for you newbies, it's pretty much like all your favorite songs being played at the click of a button....for FREE!  Pandora has some pretty fascinating technology, courtesy of the Music Genome Project that allows it to code different songs using an extremely detailed list of attributes.  When you log into Pandora and set up a free account, it asks you which music artists you like.  Once you've typed in an artist, Pandora creates a radio station just for you, playing only music by that artist and other similar artists. If a song comes up that you like, you can give it a "thumbs up," which tells Pandora that you like that song and you want more songs played that are similar to it.  If you give a song a "thumbs down," it will never play that song again and gives Pandora more information about what songs not to play in the future.  So after a while, you have a radio station perfectly tailored to your own personal musical preferences.  I have about 20 different Pandora stations that I have created so far, and each are vastly different.  I love the mellow sound of the Coldplay station, the calming serenity of the more new-age Enya station, the jazzy vintage feel of the Frank Sinatra station, and every now and again when I'm in the mood for some old school gangsta rap, Notorious BIG is good too!  Other favorites: Mumford and Sons, Jim Brickman, Nat King Cole-The Christmas Song, and the list goes on......

5) Frozen Yogurt

     When I was in high school and college, ice cream was the craze.  Between Marble Slab, Cold Stone, and Bruster's, the freshman 15 was not too hard to gain.  But in the last 5 years, frozen yogurt establishments have been popping up EVERYWHERE!  Six or seven years ago the only frozen yogurt place around was TCBY, and now I'm wondering if they are even going to make it with all the other competing business.  But, I pretty much love this new trend, because yogurt is healthy for you!!  I mean, yes, it has sugar...but it has tons of pro-biotics, live and active cultures, and is either fat free or very low in fat....so that equals way less guilt!  I have become a connoisseur of all things frozen yogurt, and I like to try out all the new yogurt hot spots.  Thankfully my in-laws are always up for fro-yo after our family dinner dates....yay. :)  So far, here is my list of visited yogurt establishments:   TCBY, Yogen Fruz, Tutti Frutti, Yummilicious, YogHut, YoTopia, Yophoria, Sweet Frog, Blueberry Frog, Menchie's, and there is probably more, I just can't remember them all.  I have to say, I think my two favorites are Menchie's (Lexington, SC) and YoTopia (Augusta, GA).  Menchie's has the best red velvet, cake batter, and vanilla, and I just love YoTopia's dutch chocolate.  Those two brands seem to me to be the most creamy and ice-cream like.  Fro-yo, you're awesome....

6) IKEA Shelves

    Anyone who knows me knows that I pretty much love IKEA.  It is ridiculously awesome in every way....super chic and inexpensive furniture, all the organizational supplies you could ever want (can we say Type A heaven??!), and....... Swedish meatballs.  What more could you ask for? A trip to IKEA is an all day affair..in a good way.  It seriously takes you like at least 2-3 hours to navigate through the entire place, which is probably at least 10 million square feet.  Actually, I don't really know how big it is, but I'm pretty sure my whole neighborhood could fit inside the building with room to spare.  It's been a life saver for classroom needs!!  I made the huge mistake of buying super cheap bookshelves for my classroom from Wal-mart and Target my first couple of years teaching, and those lasted a grand total of 9 months before they warped and/or broke.  I should have known then that IKEA was the only way to go.  But since then, I have learned my lesson.  To date, I have purchased 5 sets of IKEA shelving units for my classroom. They are sturdy, inexpensive, and 1st grader proof....nuff said. 

Here is a view of one side of my classroom with some of my IKEA shelves.  I just love them!!

    So there is my 1st list of "favorite things."  I have many more, but they will have to wait for Favorite Things Blog Post Volume 2  The vacuum cleaner and washing machine are calling my name....ugh.  :)  Happy Saturday! 

  What are some of your favorite things??  I'd love to hear about them!

          - Beth

New Beginnings in 2014

Me and hubby on New Year's Eve

Angela, Kelly, and me hanging out while the dudes shot fireworks on New Years.

  There is just something magical about the start of a new year that renews my faith in the goodness of people and gives me hope for the future.  I love how the New Year begins.... with a midnight toast alongside good friends and family and a kiss from your sweetheart (which I got this year for the first time in a while since my hubby is always working New Year's Eve).  It's just hopeful.....and I feel like the New Year brings about that deep down desire that everyone has to be a better person.  People may not know what "better" may be or what they may need to be "better," but I just think that everyone wants that in some way for themselves.  Many people follow the age old tradition of making New Year's resolutions or goals for themselves to better in some area of their life.  A common resolution is to lose weight or get out of debt, etc. I think I just love New Year's, because it's the one time of year everyone tries really hard to be better....not worse, not just okay, not mediocre...they try to be better.  Now, of course, I'd say a good 3/4 of people probably don't keep their resolutions, but I don't think it's really about that anyway.  Life isn't about checking off a to-do list  or tracking weight loss data from week to week. Those things aren't bad, of course....if list making was an Olympic sport, I would be Michael Phelps. (I'm Type A...what can I say?)  And I've been known to keep track of lbs lost too because it can give you a sense of accomplishment. But you can't measure your worth based on whether or not you kept your New Year's resolution.  I truly believe even people who don't keep their resolutions (including myself) learn something along the journey, and that's what counts.  I most definitely haven't kept all the resolutions I've ever made, but I can safely say that every year I learn new things about myself, about my friends and family, and about life..... and then I get wrapped up in the business of life and I forget some of those lessons, and then I end up rediscovering the same truths and life lessons all over again in new ways. 
  I have noticed that some people are very cynical about making New Year's resolutions.  "I'm just going to break them anyway...what's the point in even trying?" I've heard some people say...or "I like myself just the way I am...I don't need to change anything."  Well, while I think it's okay to like who you currently are as a person, I truly hope that when I look back over my life in 10, 20, or 30 years that I will honestly be able to say that I am wiser and more mature in my faith.  I once heard a sermon where the pastor said, "It's true what they say....that God loves you just the way you are.  However, he loves you entirely too much to let you stay that way."  I thought that was very profound.  I  know that God loves me for who I am, and I am so blessed to be able to call Him my Savior and Lord, but if I know anything about Christianity it's that our purpose in life is to strive to be more like Christ and to live out His perfect will for our lives....and that doesn't mean to just keep doing what we're doing. Life would be pretty boring if we didn't grow, change, and acquired wisdom as we got older with each passing year.  Now, I'm trying my very hardest to freeze my face at age 27 (thanks Mary Kay), but I do hope that my mind, my heart, and my soul change a lot over this next year and every year. 
    For the last several years I have just had a fire light under me starting a few days before New Year's, and I get this instinct to just cleanse my entire home of everything unnecessary.  I go through closets, cabinets, clear off shelves, go through every item of clothing I own, re-organize drawers, file stuff, vacuum the collection of crumbs that have accumulated between the couch cushions, throw away the expired ranch dressing from March 2012, etc.  You get the picture.  It's quite the process and usually doesn't come without some disagreements with the hubby over what is and is not "necessary and useful." Haha.  But it has always been worth our time and effort and helps us to start out the new year fresh.  Hubby sometimes gets perturbed with my instinctual New Year's cleansing routine, but he does appreciate the end result.... a clean and happy home. We usually end up donating bags and bags of stuff to Goodwill that we never end up missing, as well.  My general rule of thumb is that if it hasn't been used in the last year or two, toss it.  Things can be perfectly good and even brand new, but if they are not being used, they don't serve a purpose and clutter up your life.  For instance, I have like 10 overnight type bags on the top shelf of our closet. They are all cute, they are all in good shape, and some are even brand new (free gifts with purchases,etc) but who needs 10 bags that all serve the same purpose??  Who has room to store 10 bags?  Not I....  So last year I got rid of 3 or 4.  I didn't miss them.  This year I got rid of a few more, and I'm pretty sure I won't miss those either.  
    Aside from deep cleaning and purging, I do have some resolutions or goals I want to work on this year:

1) Live simply, be content, and stop living in comparison 
     - It is so easy in the world we live in to convince ourselves that we need a lot of "stuff" to be happy, but we really don't.  From every outlet (tv commercials, internet ads, Facebook, that "Jones" family we always want to keep up with) we are being bombarded with the message that we need more. Some things, of course, are actual needs, and others are not.....and learning to decide which is which is the hard part.  But I want to be more purposeful in being thankful for what I have and being content.  It's so easy to compare your life to others now, but if it wasn't for the Facebook, blogs, and other social media these days, we wouldn't even know what "others" have in the first place. 

2) Be Positive
     - I think that I generally am a positive person, and I try to always see good in people, but just like anyone sometimes my circumstances get the best of me.  I tend to be a very logical and methodical thinker, though, and sometimes that doesn't always elicit itself to positivity.  Positive thinking is not always easy, because we are human and sometimes we start getting all Debbie Downer on the situation at hand.  But being negative never did nobody no good.  Haha.  (That just literally physically pained me to use incorrect grammar...just FYI).  Positive people are way easier to be around.

3) Pray every day
     - I think I probably do this more than I think I do because prayer doesn't always have to be head bowed and eyes closed in a quiet room....prayer can be just talking to God in your mind or literally talking out loud to Him in the car as if He's sitting beside you.  Prayer isn't always formal, and that's okay.  But I want to be more purposeful about it.  I need to be better about praying more specifically too....naming individuals and asking God for what they need....  healing or comfort or guidance, etc.  

4) Cook at least 3 meals per week
    - During the school year I totally stink at this.  I'm so hit or miss...  I'll do well for a week or two and then things will get busy and we'll end up doing Mexican, or cereal, or meeting friends/family for dinner for a week straight so we don't have to cook.  I love meeting people for dinner, but it gets expensive and I feel like it should be more of a treat, not an every week thing. But in order to cook well, you have to plan well, and that means getting my meals planned and grocery shopping done.  Before I was married, meal planning and grocery shopping seemed like no big deal, but it is a lot of work. I thought Pinterest would help me keep my recipes organized, but all it does is distract me and pull me into an endless abyss of craft and home decor ideas from people with perfectly airbrushed and edited blog photos which brings me back to Resolution #1...it's a vicious cycle.  Darn you, Pinterest.

   I think I'll stop while I'm ahead.  I actually have a few more, but I don't want to overwhelm myself.  As usual, this blog post is getting super long.  Brevity is not my strength if you haven't noticed already.  I can't help it....I'm detail oriented.  Maybe I should make that my New Year's resolution for next year...shorter blog posts. 
    Well, Happy New Year folks!!  May you keep.... or at least learn...from all your resolutions!!!!

Cute Melted Snowman Cookies!!

    Sometimes I feel like the holidays are one big Bake-a-thon.  Between parties, dinners, cookie swaps, and gifts for friends and families, I sometimes feel like I never leave the kitchen.  But as time consuming and expensive as cooking and baking can be, it is truly a labor of love....and if you spend enough time on Pinterest, you can find lots of fun and creative new ideas to try....which brings me to this blog post!
   Last year during one of my lengthy pinning sessions, I stumbled across these adorable sugar cookies that looked like melted snowmen!  Now, being the connoisseur of sugar cookies that I am, I thought the idea was fantastic!!  I mean, in what other cookie design are you allowed to sloppily squirt on icing in a free form and messy manner and it still looks cute?!  I decided I had to try them one day.  So, in my usual pinning fashion, my poor little snowman cookie pin sat untouched for a whole year until a few weeks ago when our school decided to have a cookie swap. 
   Now, there are several different melted snowman cookie designs floating around out there.  Some of them use a white gumball or malt ball for the head, and some use a marshmallow.  Some use red hots for buttons, some use M&M's, and some use sprinkles.  I used whatever I could find the fastest while running down the aisles of Publix on my way home to bake, because I stayed too late at school and knew I'd never get done with the cookies if I didn't hurry up and get started!  I have to say, though, this cookie design had quite the freeing effect on my mild and undiagnosed baking OCD. Usually I'm freaking out if a pearl sprinkle isn't lined up right or if I can't get the cake frosting to spread smooth, so it was kind of awesome to get to make cookies not perfect....on purpose!
    So, here is the step by step for super duper cutie patootie melted snowman cookies!!

INGREDIENTS:
   - Sugar cookies (baked and cooled)
   - 1 bag large marshmallows
   -  1 bag mini M&M's
   - powdered sugar
   - black food coloring
   - orange food coloring

Step 1  - Make your favorite sugar cookie recipe.   Use a round cookie cutter to cut out shapes.

Step 2 - Make a batch of royal icing  and pipe free form edges on each cookie using a piping bag and large round piping tip.  The larger the hole in the tip, the bigger the border of icing, and the less likely your fill icing will run over the edges of your cookie.

  Don't have a good sugar cookie recipe or don't know how to make royal icing?  

See my previous blog post on this HERE.

Step 3 - After all the cookies have border icing, take the remaining icing (minus 1/2 cup which will be used for piping later) and add water to it.  Whisk the water into the icing with a fork, spoon, or whisk.  It will start out really chunky, but keep whisking until it is a thick liquid, much like that of melted chocolate.  This will be your fill icing.

Step 4 - Pour the fill icing into a squeeze bottle.  I used a big squeeze bottle because I was making two batches of cookies, but a normal small squeeze bottle will suffice for a single batch.  Squirt each cookie with fill icing starting next to the border, and working your way to the middle of the cookie.  The fill icing should naturally "fill" in the gaps, so don't put too much.  Let it spread out on its own before you add more.  Too much fill icing = overflowing cookies and really big mess!

Step 5 - Set a large marshmallow in the wet fill icing at one end of each cookie.  This will be your little snowman's head.

 

Step 6 - While the icing is still wet, place 3 mini M&M's in random places on each cookie to mimic buttons spilling down a melted  snowman.

Step 7 -  Take the 1/2 cup border icing that was set aside earlier and use food coloring to dye MOST of it black (save a little bit to dye orange for the carrot noses).  Using another piping bag and tip, pipe eyes and faces onto the marshmallows.  I like happy snowmen, but expressions can vary, of course.  Excited snowmen?  Frustrated snowmen?  Melancholy snowmen? Oh, the possibilities..... :)

 Step 8 - Now here's where the little personalities of each snowmen show up! You'd think it be the facial features.... but what made the snowmen seem real for me was their cute little stick arms.  Pipe stick arms in different shapes and in various places on each snowmen. 

 

Step 9 - Now, use the little bit of icing left over to dye orange for the carrot noses.  

Ta-da!!!  Cutie patootie snowmen cookies!! Love Love Love!!

 

    Contrary to what I had expected, these cookies bagged beautifully!  I was worried about the marshmallow sticking out and not being able to tie the bag closed or it looking awkward, but it proved not to be an issue at all.  These little cuties were the perfect cookie swap treat!

Happy Baking!!!!!
       - Beth

FROZEN Hot Cocoa - Recipe #2

  There is just something about a cup of hot cocoa that brings about an almost unrivaled sense of
happiness, warmth, and feelgoodness (yes, I made that word up.)  And the most important part about it, of course, is that it's chocolate.  It's a warm, delicious, drink made out of chocolate....how can you go wrong??!  Well, all these years I've anxiously awaited cold weather for the sole reason that it brings the joy of the holidays and deliciousness of hot beverages like apple cider and hot cocoa (because I certainly don't like being cold)....that is, until I was introduced to FROZEN hot cocoa!  Yes...you heard correctly.  Frozen hot cocoa!!  Now there's no need for cold weather to enjoy your favorite feel-good beverage!  You can enjoy it anytime, even in the summer.  Or, if you live in the insanely odd weather state of South Carolina, like I do, you can enjoy it on those few hot days in December when it decides to go from 40 degrees to 80 degrees in a 24 hour period.  Ridiculous, I know.  SC weather is a little cray-cray, but I diverge.
    Now....the first thing I thought about when I first saw a recipe for frozen hot cocoa was, "OMG...it's like a hot chocolate milkshake!"  And I love me a good chocolate milkshake....especially one from Rush's (for all you out of towners, that's a local burger and shake joint in SC).  So the thought of combining the cool, creamy, smoothness of a milkshake and the rich, warmfuzziness of hot cocoa.....what more could you ask for?  Over the last week or so, I've experimented with a couple of different recipes for frozen hot cocoa, and they were either too thick where you can't pour it out out of the blender, or too thin and runny (not cool), so I came up with my own recipe.  This sweet concoction is pretty much my guilty pleasure at least a couple times a week now.....it's so delicious!!!  My hubby likes it, and I just tried my recipe out on my sister-in-law, brother-in-law, and my 5 year old nephew tonight, and they all approved!

  FABULOUS FROZEN HOT COCOA

 Ingredients:

        2 cups milk
        3 or 4 packets of hot cocoa (I love the Swiss Miss Dark Chocolate Sensation)
        4 cups of ice
        5 Tbsp sugar

Directions:
        Put all the ingredients into a blender and blend until ice is crushed and consistency is smooth.  Pour
        into glasses and serve cold with whipped cream and sprinkles, if desired.    Serves 4-6.

  NOTE:  Make sure your blender is adept at crushing ice.  If not, you will have ice chunks...not cool.... and it totally takes away from the creaminess factor.  I used my Ninja Blender that my mamma in law got me for Christmas two years ago, and it works great for crushing ice!  Thanks Mrs. Patsy! :)
        

        So, here's a recap....

 If I don't blog again before the holidays, which is totally probable, Merry Christmas friends!
        - Beth

Apple Picking Adventures

My husband and I at the SC State Fair

   Does anyone else out there gauge the change of the seasons by what seasonal coffee concoctions  Starbucks starts to advertise?  Well, when I saw the signs for the annual debut of the "Pumpkin Spice Latte" I knew my favorite season was finally here....fall!  I absolutely love fall for many wonderful reasons... one being the weather, which here in SC is perfect...still warm but with a crispness in the air.  But there are so many other reasons...some of which others might share (corn mazes, fall festivals, pumpkin carving, etc) and some of which are completely tied to my own idiosyncrasies and are absolutely ridiculous.  One example being my complete and utter love for the State Fair.  I have countless memories of the South Carolina State Fair as a child, because we went as a family every year.  Not only is the food amazing (can we say funnel cakes, corn dogs, vinegar fries, dipped cones, and cotton candy? And just for the record, I ate one of each of those items this year...and....it....was..amazing!), but the people watching is priceless!! Plus....where else can you get deep fried Oreos and Donut Burgers???  And it's so much fun to go in all the buildings and see all the prize winning cakes, crafts, flowers, artwork, and more!  I always loved going to see the sand castle sculpture that someone makes every year...and when I was little, my brother and I also used to walk up to every single booth of all the candidates running for office and get a pencil and a sticker and we'd have a contest to see who'd collect the most, so it brings back fond memories. 

Here is our family at Sky Top Orchard in October 2011.

    Anyway, pretty much anything "fall-ish" makes me smile...but there is one new fall activity that I was just introduced to in the last couple of years that is going to become a new yearly tradition, I'm sure...and that is apple picking!!  I went for the first time with my husband and his family in October 2011.  We went to the Sky Top Orchard in Flat Rock, NC.
It was a blast!!  I came home with bags full of apples and spent the next few days baking like crazy making cobblers, applesauce, and the like.  I didn't get to go last year, sadly.  So when fall came around this year I decided an apple picking trip was a non-negotiable!  This time, since my hubby was busy, I convinced my BFF (I feel like I'm a teeny bopper when I say that...) and former college roommate, Katie, to come with me!
    We picked a great day to go...it was a beautiful and sunny fall Saturday!  We started out the day with a stop at Starbucks for a Pumpkin Spice Latte, of course, to jump start our fall festivities and then headed up I-26 toward NC. Watching the leaves slowly get more and more colorful the further we drove north was neat. When we finally got there, it was packed!!  There were LOTS off families, kids, couples, and church groups.  We finally found a parking space, grabbed our buckets, had not-so-pleasant experiences with the port-a-potties, and then set off to pick! 

      Katie really wanted to get some Granny Smith apples, so that's where we headed first!  All the apples towards the bottoms of the trees had already been picked, so we were forced to go with Plan B.....climbing trees and contorting ourselves (quite unsafely, I might add) to get to the best apples.  It was quite a lot of work, and we got pretty dirty.  Note for next time:  Flip flops are not the best for climbing trees.

We totally tag teamed this one. Katie climbed and I caught!

 

Where's Waldo???

Something about this picture makes me think of the evil queen in Snow White....eek!

I decided I need to start working out.... I was huffing it up those big hills carrying my bucket of apples and this mom had a diaper bag, a purse, and her bucket of apples and was doing better than me.  And daddy over there had a baby!  Sad...I know.

Everybody we passed kept talking about "Pink Lady" apples, so we decided there must be something special about them....  So we climbed one of those trees and added a few to our collection.  Aren't they beautiful?? I love the light pink sides and speckles!

   After we were done picking, we had to indulge in the one food item that may or may have not been my main reason for wanting to go apple picking....apple cider doughnuts!!!  I was first introduced to these little melt-in-your-mouth pieces of heaven when I went to Sky Top for the first time in 2011.  I honestly think Sky Top could run its entire enterprise on doughnut sales alone.  They are freaking amazing!!  I knew the line would be long, so I was expecting the worst...but it ended up being only about a 45 minute wait...and worth every second!  I was also happily surprised to find out that they had a new flavor in addition to the apple cider....pumpkin spice!  What more could a girl ask for?  So Katie and I decided to get a dozen doughnuts - 6 of each flavor.  I mean we had to get a full dozen...so we could share with our friends and family, of course.  And it was cheaper to buy in bulk.  Totally justified.  :)

DOUGHNUT HEAVEN.........

         After we finished our doughnuts, we decided to go get some lunch in Flat Rock.  We had dessert first...so what? Don't judge.  We did take some pretty pictures on the LONG walk back to our car.

   Apple picking was a blast, and it was so much fun to hang out with my "woommate," as we used to say back in the day in college.... :)  I would highly recommend Sky Top Orchard, and I will definitely be back again next year.  Now I just have to come up with some yummy recipes for all these apples....

Wedding Weekend in the ATL

       Presbyterian Church of the Redeemer, ATL

   I'm quickly beginning to run out of room in our spare bedroom closet for all the bridesmaid dresses that I'm accruing....and this week I got to add another dress to the collection!  It was a beautiful plum colored one shoulder gown (which became quite the fiasco as you will read about later) that I wore to my sweet sister's wedding on Saturday! I'm so excited to finally get a moment to post about everything!!  Because I was out of town this weekend, and not doing school work all weekend like usual (I'm super exciting, huh?), work kicked my butt...so I haven't had a moment free to post!  I bet my sister and her new hubby are having much more fun at Lake Tahoe right now on their honeymoon than I am sittting here on my sofa watching more about the government shutdown.  I'd honestly rather watch paint dry than hear anything else about that...which is why this is going to be my last sentence referring to it! Done. :)

My sister and her hubby to be with their pastor.

     Back to the wedding.......it was fabulous!  Sweet, small, worshipful, intimate.....everything that my sister wanted it to be.  About a week ago I thought she may just give up and go elope, but I'm so glad she didn't!  I totally related to the stress that goes along with wedding planning.  I remember the week before our wedding I just wanted to cry.  I was so tired of making decisions and coordinating things and communicating with people, I could have screamed.  But as I'm sure my sister experienced on Saturday, all the hard work and effort paid off.  Everything went as planned, and it was a beautiful day!

Me and my husband at the rehearsal.  He was such a huge help!

     We started the weekend festivities with the rehearsal at Presbyterian Church of the Redeemer in Dunwoody.  I am in love with their sweet little church! It's so quaint...the stonework is beautiful, and the pastor has a Scottish accent, which doesn't hurt anything.  I have decided that people with accents just sound more intelligent in general...unless, of course, it's a redneck accent. Not so much...  
  My sister's wonderful friend Christine directed the rehearsal and made sure everybody was where they were supposed to be, and my awesome husband watched from the side and so graciously ran around doing last minute errands and attending whatever little extra tasks that needed attending to .  I was so happy he was there!  After that, we had a lovely dinner at my sister and new brother in law's home in Atlanta.  It was a small, informal, Italian dinner with family and close friends.  It was great to see many of my family members who live far away and also get to know some of my brother in law's family members that I had never met before.

Here's all the ladies on my dad's side of the family.....plus my brother! haha.  All my aunts, cousins, and of course the lovely bride (the one in the veil, of course...). :)

       The next morning I was an early bird up and ready at 6:30 so I could get my hair did! haha.  One of my guilty pleasures is having my hair done.  I'm in love with up-do's.  I think they are so elegant.  So I was super excited to see what gorgeous concoction my sister's hair and makeup artists would come up with.  I think both of our outcomes were beautiful!

My sister getting her "Old Hollywood" look.  I loved her birdcage veil...so vintage!

     After we got our hair did and got all gussied up, as my mamma says, we headed to the church.  After about 10 minutes at the church, I discovered that my zipper (which had worked perfectly fine the night before) was warped and would NOT go up!  I then proceeded to allow like eight women to try and persuade my zipper to go up with anything from vaseline to tweezers, including, but not limited to....my mom, my sister's mom, the wedding director, the photographer, the florist, and the florist's daughter.  Random, I know.  After multiple failed attempts and less than 5 minutes before formal pictures, my mother saved the day with her tiny sewing kit from like the 1970's that had she had stuffed in the side pocket of my day's toiletry bag, which she just so happened to have in the car.  We spent the next moments together in the ladies bathroom of the church while she proceeded to sew me into my bridesmaid's dress.  Yes, you heard that correctly...she had to SEW the dress on me. For a split second in the bathroom I had a blonde moment and thought to myself, "Oh no...I'm sewed in...how am I going to pee?" And then my brain reminded me that I was being sewn in a dress..not pants.  I worry about myself sometimes..
     I felt bad that I wasn't providing as much moral support to the bride as I should have been, but what do you do when you're stuck in a bathroom while your mom sews you in your dress?  I was kind of helpless.  But thankfully the church was dimly lit, and no one noticed that my dress had small stitches in the back.....
    We took some family pics while my sister and her hubby to be were doing shots with the photographer outside.

Me and my sweet hubby.

The fam....me with my lil bro, my mom, and my dad.

Me and my bro...it was so weird seeing him in a suit!   He never dresses up...  ;)

 

     The ceremony was very worshipful and special. Laura and Bruce read their own heartfelt vows to one another and the pastor gave a beautiful sermon.  I even got to do a reading of one of Laura's favorite quotes during the ceremony, which was a very neat experience.  After reading the quote she wanted read, I connected with it immediately.  It is actually crazy how alike we are in our thinking.  The whole quote and her sentiments about it almost mirrored exactly the very first blog post I ever wrote and the actual reason why I named my blog "Finding Fairy Tales."  We are so cut from the same cloth when it comes to all things intellectual & spiritual.  My reading is below:

      If we are all honest with ourselves, (as cliché as it may sound) we all have an innate desire to live “happily ever after.”  We’ve been taught that “happily ever after” is only for story books and that hoping for such a thing is not only dangerous, but gives us unrealistic expectations about life and love and sets us up for failure.  Even so, our culture remains enamored by fairy tales.  From Cinderella to Braveheart, we are enchanted by tales of the transformed, because that is the deepest yearning of the human heart.  Just as the fairy tale princess needs the prince to risk his life, slay the dragon, and save her from captivity, or awaken her from her deep slumber with true love’s kiss, we live in a broken, sinful world and are in need of our own Prince Charming - our Savior, who can bring us from death into life by the transformative power of His unconditional love and sacrifice and give us our own happily ever after in Heaven with Him….. for eternity. 

The following passage may not be a typical one for a wedding, but I hope you’ll appreciate its powerful meaning for Laura and Bruce on this very special day. You’ll find it printed on the back of your program as well.

 

   “It is a world of magic and mystery, of deep darkness and flickering starlight. It is a world where terrible things happen and wonderful things too. It is a world where goodness is pitted against evil, love against hate, order against chaos, in a great struggle where often it is hard to be sure who belongs to which side because appearances are endlessly deceptive. Yet for all its confusion and wildness, it is a world where the battle goes ultimately to the good, who live happily ever after, and where in the long run everybody, good and evil alike, becomes known by his true name....That is the fairy tale of the Gospel with, of course, one crucial difference from all other fairy tales, which is that the claim made for it is that it is true, that it not only happened once upon a time but has kept on happening ever since and is happening still.”          - Frederick Buechner

   After the ceremony, we headed over to the reception.  My sister's decor theme was very shabby chic and rustic.  She had lots of tree stumps, tree trunk cross cuts, bronze lanterns, and colorful flowers.    Everything came together beautifully....

Daddy daughter dance...

I made the cupcakes for the wedding, but not the cake.  I think the arrangement turned out pretty cute!  Very free form and rustic....  The big tree slices that the cupcakes are on came from oak trees on our family's land in upstate SC.

  

Bruce's brother and I giving our toasts to the couple!

The cake cutting....my favorite part!! Carrot cake.....yum!!

Farewell....

The Happy Couple!

  
    I am SO very happy for my sweet sister and her wonderful new husband!  It was an honor to be a part of their wedding ceremony, and I can't wait to hear about all their fun honeymoon adventures on Lake Tahoe!  Best wishes to them!!