Maternity pictures!

On Sunday, Josh and I met with a lady that my mom works with that also does some pretty fabulous photography. She had done my sister's newborn pictures in 2011 and my mom gifted us with a Maternity Session with her for our baby shower. I was so excited! We met at 6:30 in Grand Rapids and spent 2 1/2 hours driving around taking pictures. We had a ton of laughs and it ended up being more fun than I'd expected it to be. Sherry Hengeveld (our fantastic photographer) was so tired when we were done and, even though I didn't expect her to, she went home and started editing our pictures. We got a preview on Facebook and I just fell in love. I absolutely can't wait to see the rest. Here are some of my favorites from our preview! Check Sherry out here!

Meatballs with homemade "barbecue sauce"

My mom made meatballs for my nephew's 3rd birthday party earlier this month. They were so good and, the big crockpot she made, was gone by the end of the party. So, I decided that I wanted to make them at home. It is so simple to make them and the outcome is so delicious.


2 lb of frozen meatballs
16 oz jar of grape jelly
1 bottle of chili sauce

Put the meatballs in the crockpot. Add the chili sauce and grape jelly and mix it together. Turn on high and let sit for 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.  Turn on low and let them sit for another 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally. Serve and enjoy!

See how simple it is? Let me know if you try it and what you thought!

Cleaning a pack n play!

Several months ago, we received a used pack n play from my sister's friend. I was extremely grateful for this because pack n plays can be kind of pricey. I never thought about cleaning it until I opened it up. It was covered in stains and the thought of putting my baby on that made me cringe. I love Google when it comes to these things. I searched "cleaning a pack n play" and found a bunch of directions involving cleaning products that I didn't have and were far too expensive. Finally, I came across a small post that used only three ingredients; Laundry soap, baking soda, and vinegar. While doing a little happy dance about finding one with things I already had in my cupboard, I grabbed the pack n play and started filling the tub. Here are the directions for cleaning a pack n play:

***
1 cap of laundry detergent
1/4 cup of baking soda
A splash of vinegar
Extremely hot water
A bath tub

Fill up the bath tub with as hot of water as you can get it. Add the detergent, baking soda, and vinegar to the water and mix it together. Place the pack n play into the water. After some time flip the pack n play over and let it soak some more. After about an 1-2 hours, remove the pack n play from the water and set it up outside. Spray it down with a hose and let it air dry.
***

I frequently checked on it because I was worried that it wasn't going to work. There were so many stains on the pad, and I just didn't know if the recipe would work. Every time I checked it, the water was a little browner. At one point, I lifted the pad to see if it was working, and the amount of brown water that came out of it was so gross.

After about 1 1/2 hours, we took it outside and rinsed it off. The pack n play is now stain free, however, the pad is so grimy that I'm going to have to soak it again. A lot of stuff came out of it but there are still some stains on there that I'm sure will come off with another soak or two. I will definitely do this every couple of months just to keep it clean.

Babies!

In January, we found out that we are expecting our first child! While scared, we were so excited. We soon found out that our baby would be a boy! We are due at the end of September and we get more excited every day!

In light of our exciting news, I have decided to give the blog a little makeover. It will be more family oriented and will be about our growing family. I will continue to share recipes and such. I'm so excited to bring new life to my blog and I hope to bring new people into my little world.

Wedding dresses, cowboy boots, and tiaras

Today was my first time trying on wedding dresses. It was exciting and scary all at the same time. I went by myself and I'm actually really glad I did. It was a very stress free experience. That is until I found my dress and realized I didn't have the money to buy it right now. I'm hoping that work starts giving me more hours or I won't be having a wedding at all. After getting injured at work, I had to take some time off to heal and now I'm not getting many hours.

Anywho, I tried on 3 dresses. The first dress was beautiful but not really my style.
The second one, I liked and I thought that it might be a contender. I loved the front but I didn't really like how the back looked. The girl assured me that it wouldn't look so bad once it came in my size and was altered, but I wasn't so sure.

The third and final dress I tried on was beautiful. It was simple and short. It looked perfect with my boots. I wasn't quite sure about it still, so my consultant put a veil and a tiara on me. I stepped in front of the mirror and almost cried. It was so perfect for me.

I felt so pretty. But then she put a belt on me and I knew that this was the dress. I was so happy.

So, now I just have to get the money to buy it all. I can't wait to marry the man of my dreams and wear this beautiful dress.

The newest member of our little family

Meet Ginger!

Eliza No More

Hey everyone. This is a short story I wrote a few months ago for a writing contest. I didn't win but I wanted to share it on here. Hope you like it.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Eliza Ripper didn’t have much in the way of friends. She was one of those girls that nobody really cared about. She didn’t even get picked on in school because no one really knew she existed. She wasn’t really a talker. She kept quiet whenever possible to avoid the inevitable look that she liked to call “the crazy look.” She always ended up saying something that warranted that look so she chose to keep her mouth shut. She lived alone in a one bedroom apartment and hardly left her apartment except to go to work, stocking shelves at the local bookstore. It was the perfect job for her. The only time she ever had to talk was if someone asked her where a book was. Although Eliza wasn’t good at making friends or talking, she was good at one thing. It was really the only thing she thought she could do. That was writing. She would write till her fingers hurt and she couldn’t think anymore. Then she would put her writing on her blog. She used a fake name. She was Penelope Benson to the online community. Eliza wasn’t loved by many, but Penelope was adored by 100’s, maybe even 1000’s of people. She had sent her book out to publishers and had gotten letter’s back from half of them saying how much they loved the book and how they would love to sign her on. Her stories were on their way to the best seller’s list. Eliza didn’t think anything could ruin the life she was leading.

One day when Eliza came home from work there was a note taped to her door. She ripped it off the door and unfolded it. It said, “I know who you are pretending to be. I will make sure that you never go anywhere with your writing again.” She scrunched up her nose thinking this was some stupid joke one of the kids in her building was pulling. She opened her door and stepped inside to find her apartment trashed. Her jaw dropped. Who would do this? She walked to her room and found her computer laying on her bed. Another note was on top of the computer. It read, “You probably didn’t believe me before. So I took the liberty of deleting your writing for you. Hope you don’t mind.” Eliza started to cry. She wrenched her laptop open and went to her blog. It didn’t even exist anymore. She went to her documents to find all of her writing gone. Her life was over in her eyes. She was never going to get that back. All that writing, gone just like that. She grabbed her house phone and dialed the police. She silently vowed to never let anyone walk all over her again. She would grow from this and no one would dare mess with Eliza Ripper again. She swore that no one would even know her as quiet little Eliza ever again. She would become Penelope.

Sunday dinner: Chicken Pot Pie Crumble

Tonight we went to my future mother-in-law's house to watch The Big Game. So, I made dinner at her house. It didn't go so well first try. I was not used to her oven and burned the crumble and had to start over again. But I got it right the second time and it turned out so good. This is definitely something you should try. You can find the original recipe here.

Ingredients

• 20 oz. boneless skinless chicken breast halves 
• 1 (14.5 oz) can low-sodium chicken broth
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1 cup peeled and diced carrots (I use canned carrots. Me and my canned veges....)
• 3/4 cup diced celery (about 2 large stalks)(I didn't use this because we forgot it at home. haha)
• 3/4 cup finely diced yellow onion (about 1/2 medium onion)
• 2/3 cup frozen peas
• 3 Tbsp butter
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• 1 1/2 tsp dried parsley
• 1/4 tsp dried thyme (I didn't use this because we thought we had it and didn't. It turned out just fine without it.)

 For the crumble:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 tsp garlic powder 
• 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper (optional)
• 1/4 cup butter, cold and diced into small cubes
• 2 oz. finely shredded Parmesan cheese (about 1/2 cup packed)
• 3/4 cup + 2 Tbsp heavy cream

Place chicken in a slow cooker, pour chicken broth over chicken. Cover with lid and cook on low heat about 5 - 6 hours until chicken is cooked through. Remove chicken from slow cooker, dice and set aside. Strain broth from slow cooker through a fine mesh strainer into a bowl and reserve broth (if you don't have a fine mesh strainer just try to remove the pieces of fat). 

To prepare crumble
Preheat oven to 450 degree. In a mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, pepper, garlic powder and optional cayenne pepper. Using your finger tips, cut butter into mixture until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. (I actually used a pastry blender the second time and it worked a lot better than my fingers.) Stir in Parmesan cheese. Pour in heavy cream and mix just until combined. Break and drop mixture into pieces onto a wax paper lined baking pan. Bake in preheated oven for 10 minutes until golden. Remove from oven and set aside. (This is the part where I burned it. If it's not golden on the top but it is on the bottom, it's okay. It'll cook more later.)

To prepare filling
Heat olive oil over medium high heat. Once hot, add diced carrots, onion and celery. Saute vegetables, stirring occasionally until lightly golden and tender, about 5 - 6 minutes. Pour vegetables into a bowl and set aside. Reduce heat to medium, melt butter in saucepan (I like to brown it a bit for and extra layer of flavor), then add in flour and cook, stirring constantly for about 20 seconds (it will be very thick). While stirring, slowly add in milk followed by reserved chicken broth, lemon juice, parsley, thyme and season with salt and pepper to taste. Bring mixture just to a boil, then slightly reduce heat and allow to cook about 1 minute longer until thickened, stirring constantly. Remove sauce from heat and add sauteed vegetables, frozen peas and diced chicken to sauce, then toss to evenly coat. Pour mixture into a 9-inch pie dish and sprinkle with baked crumble topping (mine fit perfectly in my pie dish but if yours is coming close to the top edge you may want to sit it on top of a cookie sheet to prevent spills in your oven). Bake in 400 degree oven until nicely golden about 12 - 14 minutes. Serve warm. Enjoy!!

Let me know if you tried this and what you thought!

Ice cream sandwich cake

This cake is absolutely amazing. It's also extremely easy to make. You can find the original recipe here.


Ice cream sandwiches
cool whip
caramel topping
your favorite candy

Lay the ice cream sandwiches down in your baking pan. The amount of sandwiches used will depend on the size of the dish. Cover the sandwiches in cool whip, then cover with the caramel topping. Break up your candy and sprinkle it on top of that. Then add another lay of ice cream sandwiches, cool whip, caramel, and candy. Put it in the freezer for several hours or overnight. You may have to let it thaw on the counter for a little bit afterward, depending on how cold your freezer is. Cut it up and enjoy!

BTW, I made this awhile back and don't have a picture from it. The picture above is from the original link.

A day off and good food

Today was Martin Luther King Jr. day. Many people had either work or school off. I however was expected at school at 8:30 this morning. I planned on getting up at 6:30 and then making the hour drive to school. However, I woke up at 7:30 to a text from my mom. I jumped out of bed and yelled at Josh that we needed to get up right now! I ran around the apartment trying to get ready. Josh, not being used to getting up so early, was moving very slowly, so I checked my email. The first email in my inbox was from my instructor saying that she was sick and class was cancelled. Josh was happy that we wouldn't have to make the drive because the roads were getting bad. I was happy to get an extra day off this week.

Now on to the good food. I made Tator tot casserole for dinner tonight. This is one of my personal favorites. It is very easy to make and it tastes so good. You can make it two different ways. Both ways are delicious.

burger or chicken
1 can of corn
1 can of cream of mushroom soup
tator tots
cheese

If you use burger spread it flat in the bottom of a casserole dish. If you use chicken, cut it into small pieces and lay it out on the bottom of the dish. Both ways the meat should be raw. Spread the cream of mushroom soup over the meat. Drain the water from the corn and spread it over top. Cover the corn in a single layer of tator tots. Set the oven on 350 degrees. Stick it in the oven and leave it for about 45 minutes. When the meat is cooked pull it out and cover it in cheese. Stick it back in the oven until the cheese is melted. Pull it out and Enjoy!

Sunday dinner: Crock pot chicken chili

Since we moved into our own apartment, I decided that, on Sundays, I'll try a new recipe that I found on Pinterest. It will give me a reason to make something new and to try all those yummy looking recipes I see. This Sunday is the first day I'm trying this. I did chicken chili in the crock pot. This is the original recipe. I made some changes as I went along. It turned out a lot spicier than I had expected and I had to add things to make it less spicy. Next time I will just cut things out of the recipe. It was very delicious though and I will definitely be making it again. This is what I did.


1 onion, chopped
1 16 oz can of black beans
1 8 oz can of tomato sauce
1 16 oz can of corn, drained
1 can of rotel (I used the original kind with chile peppers in it. Unless you like things extremely spicy, only use 1 can instead of 2.)
1 packet of taco seasoning
1 tbsp cumin
1 tbsp chili powder
3 chicken breasts (the original recipe says to leave them frozen but I let them thaw just to be safe.)
(I also added a can of diced tomatoes but that was to make it less spicy. If you want more tomatoes I'd suggest adding it.)

Combine onion, beans, sauce, corn, rotel, and seasonings in crock pot.
Place the chicken on top.
Cook on high until chicken is cooked. Pull the chicken apart with a fork and then mix the pulled chicken into the crock pot. Cook on low until done.

I only cooked it for 4 hours and it was done. The recipe said 6 hours on high but I didn't think it needed that long. I think it might have been because my crock pot is small. I'm feeding myself and Josh off of this recipe and we will most likely have left overs. If you try the recipe let me know what you think or if you did anything differently. Enjoy!

P.S. The picture doesn't look very good but it tasted and smelled very good.

2013!!

So 2013 is in 2 hours in my timezone and I figured I'd wish anyone that reads my blog a Happy New Year! Also I thought I'd share some of my "resolutions." I put quotes around this because when people hear resolutions they think "Oh you'll never stick to it." These things are more like goals. For me, goals are things that I will actually work towards.

1. Lose 100 pounds. I'd like to get down to 130 pounds. Even if I don't get to that by the end of 2013, I'd like to have lost a good amount of that 100 pounds.

2. Finish the first draft of my novel and start revising.

3. Get a job and keep it.

4. Save money for our wedding.

5. Be happier.

6. Do something crazy just for the fun of it.

7. Write a little bit everyday. You can only get better with practice.

Best birthday ever

Friday was my 20th birthday. I woke up the morning of my birthday especially early. I'd fallen asleep earlier than normal the night before and woke up unable to fall back asleep around 4 in the morning. I was turning 20. It was all I could think of. I was no longer a teenager. I was growing up. Josh snored next to me and I smiled as he mumbled something in his sleep. Around 7 he got up and got ready for work. We had a cup of coffee together and kissed goodbye. The morning past rather uneventfully. Josh's mom, Ann, took me to Coopersville and I filled out applications for apartments and we got lunch at Taco Bell. We did a little shopping for my birthday dinner, picked up my cake, and came back to the house. Ann wouldn't let me see the cake. It was a surprise. She was mad because the bakery had apparently messed up the colors on the cake. She started dinner and Josh got home. I chose Stir Fry and onion rings for my birthday dinner. (Don't judge. It sounded good.) Then they unveiled the cake. At first I didn't know what it was. They finally told me that it was supposed to be the main character from the book I'm writing. I was so surprised. I didn't care that the bakery had messed up on her hair or her gun. It was awesome. I blew out the candles and finished eating. Finally, it was present time. I ripped the wrapping off of the big box. Inside was a bunched up plastic grocery bag and a bunched up paper grocery bag. I pulled them out. Inside the paper bag was a smaller box. I opened it and inside was a smaller box. I pulled it out and opened it. Inside was a little angel pin. Josh said it reminded him of a character off of Doctor Who (my favorite show). I was looking at it, wondering when I would ever wear it when I looked up. Right next to me was the sliding door to go outside. It was dark outside so I could see our reflection. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Josh's reflection and he was getting on one knee. I slowly turned and started crying.
"Will you marry me?" he said.
I cried harder and said "of course I will!" I pulled him into a hug before he could even stand up. I was crying and shaking as he put the ring on my finger.
Ann was crying. She was recording the whole thing. I laughed when I realized the angel pin was just a decoy gift to the even bigger gift I was about to receive. 

If you would like to watch him propose, you can watch it here.

21 Things to do in your 20's

So, since I'll be 20 in less than a week, I thought I'd read an article about things to do in the 20's. I like most of the things on the list. If you want you can check it out here.
These are the ones I really liked.

1. Don’t feel the need to respond to every text message, phone call, and email the second it reaches you. Once upon a time, it took longer than a minute to reach someone. People used stamps and envelopes; they had answering machines they didn’t check for hours, sometimes days. No one will die if you don’t immediately respond to every message you receive.

2. Ask for what’s owed to you. Half the time, you’re not getting your needs met because you’re not making them known. Your employers, romantic interests, and friends are not going to read your mind and give you what you need unless you speak up.

4. If you’re unhappy and someone offers you a way out, take it. You don’t owe your first job years of loyalty and your first-born; you don’t have to stay in your city just because you’re on a first-name basis with the bodega guy. Do what feels right; the initial fear will give way to excitement.

8. Learn how to cook. Here’s an idea — instead of spending all your money on ridiculously marked-up restaurant food, save your money by buying non-processed WHOLE FOODS and LEARNING HOW TO MAKE A MEAL OF REAL FOOD. A meal of real food is not a box of Annie’s Organic Mac and Cheese — that’s PROCESSED FOOD. A meal is something like sauteed brussel sprouts with onions and pinto beans garnished with salt and pepper. You’ll thank yourself for learning how to cook when your metabolism catches up to you.

9. Keep making friends. Everyone complains that it’s hard to make friends after college, but we still manage to find new people to flirt with and date, right? It’s not that hard. You know yourself better than you ever have before, and your friends can finally reflect that. Don’t cling to old friends because it’s too frightening or ‘risky’ to make new ones.

11. Stay up late. In your 20s, you’re all, “Let’s go to another bar!” “Who wants to eat at a diner?” “Have you guys seen the sun rise from the High Line?” “In this moment I swear we were infinite!” When you get older, this becomes, “What are you doing? Go home. Watch Parks and Rec and go to sleep. What is wrong with you, staying up all night? Who has time for that?” If you’re in your 20s, you do. You have all the time. Do it now and take advantage of how not tired you are. You think you’re crabby now when you stay up too late? You’ll never believe how terrible you feel when you do it in your 30s.

13. Indulge in diner/ fast food at 4 a.m. This is considered depressing behavior once you become a real adult.

14. STOP PROCRASTINATING YOUR TRIP ABROAD. YOUR CHANCES OF TAKING A LONG VACATION ABROAD DIMINISH AS YOU BECOME MORE SET IN YOUR WAYS AND AS YOU GAIN MORE RESPONSIBILITY.

18. Walk into Forever 21 and grab every single crappily-made floral dress available. Is every other girl on the street wearing it? Is it literally falling apart at the seams? Is it also actually five dollars? BUY IT IMMEDIATELY. When you get older, your clothing becomes all expensive blazers and tailored khakis and other pieces that won’t break while on your body. That will be a great day — the day when your closet starts to look respectable. Though those outfits are more expensive, they also last longer and look better on you. You will be a classy human ready to take on the future. But as long as you’re still in your 20s? You know — the demographic of Forever 21? Game on, stretchy black dress with pockets that lasts about a week. Game on.

19. Take road trips. Sitting in a car for days on end isn’t something your body was designed to do forever.

21. Go to/host theme parties. Once people age out of their 20s, no one’s trying to wear pajamas or Saran Wrap out of the house. The only theme parties that exist after your 20s are ‘Wedding,’ ‘Baby Shower,’ and ‘Funeral.’

As for the others, I liked them but I didn't love them. I'm determined to make the next 10 years of my life fun. No more sitting around feeling like I'm in my 40's. There's a lot that you can do in 10 years, and I'm going to do as much as I can.

New year, New me

My birthday is in 2 weeks. I'll be 20 years old and 235 lbs. That's scary. I'm coming out of my teenage years weighing more than I ever thought I'd weigh. I know some pretty amazing people that are over 300 and I watch them struggle all the time. It's hard and I don't ever want to have to go through what they go through. I'm already seeing my body start to do not nice things. I have a hard time walking up the stairs at school. I have been sick a lot lately. I'm always tired. I'm done feeling bad every time I say "I'm going to workout today" and then don't. So to bring in the start of my "grown up" years, I'm going to start working out for at least 30 minutes every day. Whether that means taking a walk, going for a bike ride, or just walking around the house. I'm also going to start taking my vitamins every day and eating more fruits and vegetables. My goal is to lose 100 lbs total. I know it will take a while, but I know that I can do it. I'm going to make small goals and have big victories when I hit those goals!

These are my starting pictures. Kind of embarrassing to be honest but I feel like if I post it, it'll keep me from back sliding.

angry does not describe how I feel right now

*WARNING* There will be very angry and possibly very inappropriate language in this post. If you don't like it, then don't read it.


So today was the first day back to school. As if that couldn't ruin my day enough, I came home to something that made me want to throw a refrigerator (Timmy reference for all my NaNo readers). I said goodbye to Josh and watched him leave. *sad* I went to the fridge thinking I'd get a piece of chicken and pop it in the microwave for a bit and have some chicken and rice for lunch. I opened the freezer and grabbed the french fries to move out of the way and realized that they were not frozen. Not even a teeny tiny bit frozen. I began to panic as I grabbed my FULL bag of chicken and my untouched hamburger. All squishy and unfrozen. I was livid. I thought at first that maybe somebody had unplugged the fridge over our WEEK LONG break. I called my mom and cried over all of my food being destroyed for a minute and then I called Campus Safety. The lady said that it shouldn't have been unplugged. I hung up and went to see if my roommate knew anything about it. *This is where the bad language comes in* Some dumbass decided it would be a good idea to turn the fucking temperature of the freezer down to COOL!!! They messed with my fucking freezer and now my food is ruined! Now my mom has to come and spend money that she doesn't fucking have to buy me food so that I don't go hungry. I am super pissed and somebody is going to pay. I don't know who did this yet but I will find out. And you don't want to be around me when people ruin my stuff.

*End rant*

Busy busy busy!!

I think the last time I wrote was when I was having a job interview. I unfortunately did not get the job but I am still looking. I've been crazy busy with school so I haven't written anything on my book in like 2 weeks and I haven't worked on school work at all over my Thanksgiving break. The last couple days I've been sick and feeling really bad so I've just been laying around. I started making bracelets again yesterday and remembered how much I liked doing it. I'm gonna teach myself how to knit sometime soon and maybe start selling my stuff on Etsy.

Anyways, it's bed time. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!! Eat lots!

What the heck happened?

I've been slacking on my novel. I haven't even hit 11,000 words yet and I should be at 20,000 words. Kind of depressing but I keep telling myself that, even if I don't win, at least I'll have a great book to start getting my name out there. I try to write a little every day. Even if I can't get my 2,000 words a day in. Plus, Thanksgiving break starts on Friday, so I will have that whole week to try to get caught up.

Big news!! I had an interview with a temp agency of Friday! They offered me a second interview on Tuesday (tomorrow) at 5/3rd bank's call center and I accepted (obviously! What unemployed college student wouldn't?). So I'm going in at 11:00 tomorrow because Josh has his interview with them first and then I have mine at 11:45. Josh has this job in the bag because he has previous experience in a call center and his best friend works there, but I'm going to have to work really hard to get this job. We both really need jobs so I'm praying that I get this.

Well, I will update tomorrow after the interview. Love you guys.

Election day and NaNoWriMo

Yesterday was election day. I finally got to vote in my first election. It was pretty exciting. My mom took a picture.

So onto NaNoWriMo. I am a whole day behind on my writing and I'm not going to be able to get caught up today. I have class all day today so I'm not going to have a whole lot of time to write. I will get caught up though. Whether I finish in time to win or not.... This book WILL be completed. Today is going to be a crazy busy day. Wednesdays for me are worse than Mondays because I have 3 classes. Anyways, I will write more later. I love you guys.

It's not a job when you love what you do!

Hello everyone. I've been writing all day and just been feeling really good about my book. I finally reached 7,000 words. I'm above that now. I'm not quite to 8,000 words though. I'm so excited about my novel. It'll be my first novel so it is definitely something to be excited about.

I'm super happy about the fact that my book is basically writing itself. It has gone so many places that I didn't expect it to go. My story has done a really good job of surprising me on a few parts. I just hope it continues to be this easy to write. I really didn't think I'd make it passed day 2 of NaNoWriMo but it's now day 4 and I woke up this morning just as excited as on day 1. I hope it continues throughout the month. Well, I think it's time to do a little bit more writing. Love you!