Recap

I don't know about you, but this has felt like the longest/shortest month ever. I am definitely ready and looking forward to a new month full of new opportunities. BRING IT ON MARCH!

If I had to recap and pick out one of my most memorable moments in February, it would have to be shooting my first 3D course for bow with my husband. Trying new things and starting a new hobby that my husband and I now have in common is very thrilling to me. Not only do I enjoy the sport of archery, but I love that it gives my husband and I the opportunity to leave all of our stresses and worries behind and spend some quality time together.

Pretty much a pro now, no big deal

For the month of March I am looking forward to warm weather! Even after living in Tucson for a year-and-a-half, I am still not used to winters that only last 2 months, and rarely goes below 20 degrees. Also, at the end of the month my husband gets to go on his first TDY to Alaska. Call him crazy, but he would move to Alaska in a heartbeat if he could, hunting and fishing galore! So I am very excited that he gets to visit there for a few weeks, and hopefully get it out of his system :)

In honor of Throwback Thursday I am going to leave you with a very old, and very embarrassing stop-motion video that my friend and I made. I warn you, we weren't very experienced in the art of creating stop-motion films, so bare with me. It's the thought that counts right?

Love and miss that girl so much! Have a great night everyone.


- Jenny

Hot Chocolate

I apologize in advance, this is going to be a sad excuse for a post! I honestly don't know what I want to write about today. This week is draaaaaaaging for me. I'm feeling stressed. 

Since Michigan got dumped on with snow last night, and many schools had a snow day today, I thought I would do a little hot chocolate roundup for you all. 

Confession: I hoard hot chocolate mixes. I have 6 boxes right now. I just love it. I buy it compulsively, even when I don't need any. 

When I was younger and had a snow day, nothing was better than coming in after playing outside to a steaming cup of cocoa full of marshmallows. Even though I no longer enjoy being out in the snow, the simple pleasure of a hot cup of cocoa has not diminished with time.

So without further ado, here are some hot chocolate recipes from around the blogosphere:

Nutella Hot Chocolate from The Sweetest Occasion

Boozy Peppermint Slow Cooker Hot Chocolate 

from Culinary Concoctions by Peabody

Mexican Spiced Hot Chocolate from Gimme Some Oven

Grown Up Hot Chocolate from How Sweet Eats

Very Best Hot Chocolate Mix from Something Swanky

Skinny Hot Chocolate Mix from Dashing Dish

All photos belong to their respective blog owners.

Design heals the soul

It is Tuesday folks, and that means it is time to please your eyes with some of my favorite design finds of the week.

In honor of the Oscars this past weekend, yes I did watch those, I am going to share with you some of my favorite movie poster designs, in no particular order.

The Birds

The Dark Knight

West Side Story

Walk the Line

Inside Man

The Nightmare Before Christmas

Lord of War

Lincoln

Little Miss Sunshine

3:10 to Yuma

I hope you all had a great Tuesday!

But seriously, is it Friday yet?

- Jenny 

Murder by Death

On Saturday night, we went to go see one of my favorite bands, Murder by Death.

(source)

MBD is pretty much the only band for which I make it a point to buy all of their new albums. I've followed them since their first major release and have pre-ordered every album since. I proudly supported their Kickstarter this past summer and became a member of the Whiskey Crew. 

I finally got that bad boy sewn on my vest. Just have a few additional patches to get on there.

Another vest shot

The show was amazing. It was the first show I've gone to like that in a long time. They are awesome, though. The show was at the Magic Stick downtown -- small venues are the best.

So was the pizza we got after their set. Thank you, Sgt. Pepperoni. We got a fresh one out of the oven, too... piping hot.

Sometimes you just need greasy pizza.

Anyway, if you haven't heard Murder by Death, I strongly suggest you check them out. I created a little sampler playlist with a couple songs from each album. If you like what you hear, definitely visit their website and purchase some albums!

Check it out and let me know what you think.

Who are you listening to these days?

Friend like you

In my limited experience of being a military wife, I feel as though I am constantly learning new things and adjusting to this new lifestyle. One of the main conflicts that I have been dealing with lately is how quickly you make and lose friends in the military. So far we have only been stationed at one base, but in the year-and-a-half that I have lived here I have learned how difficult it is to maintain good friendships. It seems as though whenever I become close to someone, they either get orders to move, their enlistment is up, or they just turn out to not be the person I thought they were. I am starting to feel very lonely out here, I feel like I am back to square one again. The way it was when I first moved here, out of my element.

Luckily I have a great support system back home, but I never realized how difficult it would be to keep in touch with people, and I'm sure that most people who have moved away from home can relate. Weeks go by and I realize that I haven't even talked to my own parents, which is my own fault. The phone calls become less frequent, and I feel like I am missing out on so much. Then when I finally feel content and have created a strong group of friends in Tucson, something always happens to ruin it.

Now I love my husband more than anything, and he is my best friend, but a girl needs her girlfriends to talk to and laugh with. Especially being a military spouse, it is important to have a strong support group of other military spouses that can relate to certain aspects of you life. I am starting to feel like Paul Rudd in "I Love You Man," I need to go on a friend hunt A.S.A.P., with hopefully fewer awkward encounters. It is really getting to the point where I am becoming jealous of my own husband when he leaves to go hangout with his friends, pathetic right? He can only invite me to hangout with them so many times, and I can't expect him to not have a social life because I haven't had much luck in the friend department as of late.

Then I came across this great article from baseguide.com, Desperately Seeking Friends, and it really made me realize that I am not alone, and the only person holding myself back from making new friends is, well myself. Yes meeting new people and forcing myself out of my comfort zone is scary, and something that I have never been the greatest at, but sometimes taking risks and facing new challenges is the best way to learn and improve your life. My friend hunt still continues, but now I realize that ultimately my success is up to me. In the military moving around is inevitable, and constantly adapting to new environments is challenging. But each challenge we face just makes us all stronger, whether you realize it or not, and this journey is something that I am willing to take on one day at a time.

- Jenny

Twerk it out

I have a very regimented personality. I like things to be scheduled. I follow my daily routines, and I like to know what is going to happen when. It gives me a sense of order and control. When I feel like I don't have control, that's when I feel stressed. 

I was always an afternoon exerciser, always. I like to take my time in the mornings and not have to think until after I've had my coffee. A little while back, though, I switched to early mornings. I definitely like not having to do anything once I get off work (except put on my pajamas), but, it is rough getting my body going that early in the day. The first week or so I felt energized and ready to take on the day after my morning workout, but honestly, that sentiment did not last. 

The other downside is that I was getting to work much later, and therefore having to stay much later. The after-work part felt so good, though, that I kept it up for months. Now, however, I'm debating switching back to afternoon workouts. I feel like I'm more likely to push myself later in the day when I'm actually awake. But I also feel kind of overwhelmed when I get home, like I have to hurry to do all of these things.

I don't know. I'm kind of crazy sometimes. This is not a big deal but it's what's on my mind and is causing me some slight stress. That's pretty silly, I know, but -- am I alone? Does anyone else like to plan out their day? Do you work out in the mornings or afternoons/evenings? Pros, cons? Help me out here.

To thank you for reading this far, here's a short playlist of some of my favorite workout songs right now. My music library is somewhat so random. The music I like to workout to is nothing like what I actually listen to (for the most part). Yes, Taylor Swift is on there. Please forgive me! That song is freaking catchy.

 

PS: Thanks to my friend Sara for getting me hooked on Imagine Dragons!

PPS: Do you guys know about Grooveshark? Somehow this fell under my radar. A friend told me about it recently. Free web-based streaming! Like Spotify, but you don>'t have to download anything. Spotify really messed up my computer, so I feel much better about GS. Check it out!

Throwback Thursday

Today I am going to copy the trend of doing Throwback Thursday's and share with you some pictures of my sister and I when we were just little tots :)

My sister doesn't know that I am doing this so hopefully she won't mind...

Loving the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle slippers, growing up as a 90's child was the greatest.

I absolutely love looking at old photographs and reminiscing on past memories. Looking at all of these old pictures not only makes me nostalgic, but it also reminds me of a really great website called Dear Photograph, and an inspiring project created by Irina Werning where she recreates old photographs. What do you say Kristin, let's take on the challenge and attempt to recreate some old photographs of us?

What was your favorite or most memorable moment of your childhood?

- Jenny

Wednesday

I'm sorry for the late post! I did not have a chance to get on the computer yesterday. 

Since my sister introduced you to her fur babies, I thought I would introduce my cat, Wednesday (after Wednesday Addams).

We've had Wednesday for a little over one year. She was born October 2011 and we took her home January 2012. She was born to a stray cat living at Mat's work. It was her second litter, so Mat said that if she had a black cat, we were taking it. The first litter had no black cats -- this one, of course, had two.

Awwwwww

Her favorite spot

Halloween

Her Halloween outfit is pretty appropriate... she can be a little devil ;)

Just a baby!

My favorite picture

She's pretty cute, huh? 

Tell us all about your pets in the comments!

Inspiration Tuesday

Hello!

I apologize in advance, I am feeling out of sorts today so this post may be brief. I think I am coming down with a head cold, and I have probably sneezed at least 80,000 times today so my brain isn't really functioning properly at this point. I did want to share some fabulous food art pieces with you today, I mean who doesn't like looking at food? I am also pretty hungry so that may be a factor in why I wanted to look at food. Well, when don't I enjoy looking at food.

Anyways, enjoy!

Golpeavisa Studio

Stoyn: Iconic Ice Cream

Exploding Food: Alan Sailer

Pop Chart Lab - The Various Varieties of Vegetables

Leanda Zavian - One Little Bird Studio

Life is Short Eat Dessert First

That last one would be really cute hanging up in a kitchen!

Have a great night!

- Jenny

Secret Ingredient Chili

Happy Presidents' Day! For some reason, I get the day off work today. We are actually going to go meet with the caterers for our wedding today! :) Very exciting.

Even though it's going to be a whopping 40 degrees today in Michigan, we still have a ways to go with winter. One of my favorite winter meals is chili. I throw a bunch of things in the crockpot, go about my day, and come home to a warm hearty meal. (Sound familiar?)

Mat LOVES chili, but he has high standards. He loves a good old-fashioned beef chili, especially his Dad's. I've tried chicken chilis, chilis with pumpkin, and vegetarian chilis, and while he will respectfully eat them, I don't get any requests to make them again. 

I like a simple chili, too, but I also like to try different things. This chili, however, I've made at least four times in the past few months, and I'm pretty sure Mat would eat it every week if he could. You can sub the beef for turkey or chicken and add or change whatever else you want. It's pretty foolproof.

Sorry for the terrible picture, ha.
I swear it tastes better than it looks!

The ingredients:

• 1 lb. ground beef (I try to use a 90/10 lean beef)
• 1 can black beans
• 1 can white beans
• 1 can chili beans (we like it spicy, so I use the hot beans)
• 3 carrots, sliced into rounds
• 1 can diced tomatoes (I used garlic flavor)
• 1 packet chili seasoning (again, we like it hot!)
• Garlic powder (or minced garlic)

And the secret ingredient?? .... Cinnamon. When I was in school, there was a restaurant at MSU called Pizza House that had the best chili. It tasted of cinnamon. I finally started adding cinnamon to my chili and never looked back. It just brings out all of the other flavors. It's not overpowering at all, and I use a lot of it.

Brown the meat on the stove, then throw everything into your crockpot and cook for 6-8 hours on low. 

If you try it, let me know what you think! I know a  lot of people add cocoa powder to their chili, also. I'd love to try it, but Mat hates chocolate, so I will stick with the cinnamon.

If you haven't seen Jenny's song lyric DIY yet, check it out!

Hope you all have a great week,

Kristin

Sunday Funday!

Happy Sunday! I hope your weekend has been going well. Did you anybody watch Beyonce's documentary last night on HBO? Ohh my gosh it was great, it makes me love her more! In case you didn't know, she is one of my idols. Not only is she an amazing performer, but I think that she is such a strong, classy, and independent person that other women can look up to. I swear I could go on about her forever, anyways...

Spring is in the air in Tucson, and this weekend has been absolutely beautiful! It has really been putting me in the mood to get a jump start on some spring cleaning/organizing. I am always looking for news ways to decorate and spruce up our house. Now we live in base housing, so there are some limitations towards what we can do or change, so I like looking for fun and easy DIY projects that add small little touches that make the house feel more like our own. My absolute favorite stores to go to when I am in need of supplies or cute decorations that won't break the bank are Target, Michael's Art and Crafts, HomeGoods, Bed Bath & Beyond, and Hobby Lobby (and I am so excited that Tucson is finally opening one in a month!) I love IKEA as well but sadly the closest one is 2 hours away, so I have yet to go there since I moved here. I also love using Pinterest to find fun DIY projects and creative ways to organize your home on a budget. Some of my favorite sites to turn to for ideas are:

Thrifty and Chic
Craft Gawker
Our Vintage Home Love
Dollar Store Crafts
Sew Many Ways
Delightful Order
Design Sponge
I Heart Organizing

This weekend I decided to work on a canvas art project that I have been meaning to do for the past few months, but my inclination to procrastinate everything in life always gets the best of me.

I found a very useful tutorial for this project at This Humble Home, it is a project to create wall canvases that display the lyrics to your first dance song from your wedding. Of course you could use any sort of song, quote, or even a photograph to complete this project, with a little bit of creativity the possibilities are endless!

To start off this project I bought 4 5x5 inch canvases and a small bottle of Modge Podge from Michael's. If you don't already have it, I reccommend downloading the free Michael's app to your smartphone, it provides you with weekly coupons and deals that they can scan directly from your phone.

Once I had all of my supplies I created a 10x10 document in Adobe Illustrator and typed out the song lyrics, Microsoft Word would work as well. I made sure that my text touched edge to edge, and then I divided the document into 4 equal squares and saved them each as a PDF. I then printed each document out and I cut them down to size. Next I spread a layer of modge podge on the first canvas with a paint brush, then I carefully placed one of the papers on top of the canvas and spread another layer of modge podge over the paper. I repeated these steps for each canvas, waited about 15 minutes, and spread another layer of modge podge over them again. I found that I got small bubbles and creases in the paper as I was layering on the top coat of modge podge, but it turned out that I liked the rustic and worn look it added to the image so I decided to keep it. Once all of that was completed I sprayed each canvas with a thin layer of clear Krylon gloss just to give it a nice finished look.

And voila I have my own meaningful and inexpensive art work to display in our bedroom!

My baby Sam!

As I stated before, I am always looking for unique and inexpensive DIY projects to work on in my home, so as I come across more I will be sure to post my decorating adventures with you!

Have a great night everyone!

- Jenny

Love Castle

Hello! Just a short post today. I hope everyone had a great Valentine's Day. I loved reading Jenny's post about her and Alex!

I spent my Vday at the Love Castle!

They really go all out at White Castle. Candles, chocolates, fancy placemats, the works. I had 
a few sliders and some sweet potato fries (sweet potato fries > regular fries, every time!). I never eat WC under normal circumstances so this was a treat. I must say though -- they had this pecan marshmallow dipping sauce for the fries that was a-mazing. I was also really psyched about the cupcakes! Last year they had chocolate-dipped cheesecake on a stick (forreals) cupcakes win in my book.

We also saw the new Die Hard, which was pretty much awesome. If you are a fan of the originals, you will enjoy it.

I will leave you with this video that my sister thankfully alerted me to. It is a follow up to one of my favorite Key & Peele skits, Liam Neesons.

Happy Friday!

Will you be my valentine?

In honor of Valentine's Day I would like to dedicate this post to my wonderful husband Alex. Now I won't lie, we typically don't celebrate Valentine's Day. We will probably find ourselves just eating tacos tonight and watching the I.D. channel. We both believe that it is a consumer driven holiday, and you don't need a designated day to show your loved ones how much you love and appreciate them. However, at the same time I love any excuse to buy cute mini cupcakes and chocolates (for myself of course) and eat them guilt free. My sister's post yesterday had me drooling, red velvet is the other benefit to giving in and celebrating. So I guess that just makes me a walking contradiction then, my sweet tooth typically wins.

Either way, I feel truly blessed to be married to an amazing man that has always loved me for who I am, and never goes a day without telling me so. We officially started dating our senior year of high school, and I am still in denial that we graduated high school almost 7 years ago, where does the time go? We had known each other long before we started dating though. We both went to the same middle school, in fact he only lived about a mile down the road from me, and I still remember how goofy I thought he was at the time. Even then he always knew how to make me laugh. If I would have told my 17 year old self that the boy I just started dating would end up being the love of my life, I would have never believed it. Luckily fate didn't make me wait too long to find him, and I am thankful for everyday that I spend with him. Would you like to see an embarassing picture of us on our first official date? Okay well just this once...



Our senior year Homecoming dance... we were only 16 here!

Then flash-forward 5.5 years later...

One of my favorite pictures from our wedding day, courtesy of Jeff Borisen Photography

Now I would like to leave you with a list of my top 10 favorite romantic songs (in no particular order) that you should play for your loved one tonight:

1.) The Girl - City and Colour

 2.) 1+1 - Beyonce 

3.) I'm Yours - The Script

4.) The First Day of My Life - Bright Eyes

5.) No One's Gonna Love You - Band of Horses

6.) Smash Into You - Beyonce (I walked down the aisle to this song!)

 

 

7.) The Blower's Daughter - Damien Rice

 

8.) I Won't Give Up - Jason Mraz

9.) I Will Wait - Mumford & Sons

10.) Wonderwall (cover) - Ryan Adams

Okay I have to admit, choosing just 10 was tough. There are so many more songs that I wanted to list, I am a sucker for a beautiful love song! What are some of your favorite love songs?

Enjoy your night everyone!

- Jenny

Red Velvet Roundup

While I love red velvet any time of year, it seems especially perfect for Valentine’s Day. I’ve always loved Valentine’s Day, even when I’ve been single. It seems like a good excuse to get dressed up and eat chocolate (when in a relationship) or ice cream (when on my own). Valentine’s Day, to me, equals pink, hearts, and sugar. I always try to bake something for my coworkers. I think it’s because I miss buying paper valentines to hand out to all of my classmates… they seem to sell cuter ones every year!

This year I will be making some red velvet cookies with the help of the Pilsbury Doughboy (they actually sell premade dough now!), but if you feel like being slightly less lazy ;), here are some delicious-looking red velvet treats!*

Red Velvet Cupcakes with White Russian Frosting, by Culinary Concoctions by Peabody

Baked Red Velvet Donuts by Taste and Tell Blog

Perfect V-day breakfast: Red Velvet Pancakes by Something Swanky

Red Velvet Cheesecake Cake by Taste and Tell Blog

Red Velvet Dipped Oreos by Peabody (I actually made these
one year, they were a HUGE hit)

Red Velvet Brownie Pie by Crazy for Crust (this reminds
me of my favorite pie EVER, red velvet custard!)

Red Velvet Gooey Butter Cookies by Buns in My Oven

Two of my favorite things: Red Velvet S'mores Bars by How Sweet Eats

So tell us: What are your Valentine's Day plans? Whatever you do, hopefully it involves a little sugar :)

xo,
Kristin

*All photos belong to their respective blog owners!