Merry Christmas!

This Christmas has been a whirlwind of travel that has only just slowed down before the next go round! I wanted to pause and upload some picts from this year's festivities. This is a pic that my wonderful Sis took of Dill in front of our tree! Lindsey and Evan were our wonderful housesitters while we went to South Carolina to visit Mr's Fam. It was my first Christmas away from my own fam and with Mr's. It was kinda sad to not wake up surrounded by my family Christmas morning but it was a whole new set of family traditions and dynamics! This weekend is my family Christmas and I am super excited!!! Two Christmases is better than one.

 Lindsey and I made some "creative" Christmas cookies!

 This is a cute little Christmas decoration that Lindsey got me at after Christmas sales. Thanks, best sis ever!

Trunk 'er Treat: Haunted Pumpkin Patch

Last night was the Trunk 'er Treat at Good Shepard Methodist Church. It was a blast as usual! This was our second year as part of the festivities and I can never find good inspiration for these so I thought I would contribute some pictures of the blogosphere.

 We used 6 pumpkins, 4 inside the trunk and 2 by our chairs, webbing, little plastic spider rings (that the kids could pick out of the webbing) and a glass jar and tons of candy! The kids really like to grab handfuls of candy!

Dillenger as one of our pumpkins! This is her second change of costume... Long story!

The plan was to have Dill sit in the car and be one of the pumpkins. It worked for a good portion of the night.

This was Dill's first costume... Also pumpkin, but she was really not liking the hat. She literally just moped around with the stem on her head.

Simple living

Sometimes in the hustle and bustle of life you look up and say what am I doing... I've recently become interested in simple living. I am at the beginning of my thinking/experimenting with this lifestyle but really I am just interested in distilling my life down to what makes me and Mr. happy and fulfilled.
One of the ideas from the simple living manifesto (posted above) is to come up with simple pleasures and sprinkle them throughout your day. Here is a sample list. and here is the beginnings of my own list.

•  Coffee
•  Painted nails
•  a hot bath
• a glass of wine
• baking/creating
• a good book
• watching Mr and the dogs play
• blogging 
• catching up with a dear friend
• a massage
• getting my eyebrows waxed
• going for yogurt
• Christmas music/decorations
• laying on the beach
• walking barefoot
• a quiet saturday morning
• kolaches 
• fresh baked bread
• staying up talking 
• sitting on the porch 
• a baseball game
• a nice walk
• the way you feel after a good workout
• dinner out 
• pizza carryout
• new sheets 
• planning a weekend away
• dinner with friends
• a new piece of clothing or shoes
• curling my hair
• JIF peanut butter on bread
• a clean house
• clean dogs

I just came up with 33 things in like 5 minutes and just making the list brought a smile to my face. That is what I want my new lifestyle to be about: making myself happy (I hope you don't see this as selfish, I see it as filling my tank so I have more to give to Mr.'s and others), using my time more wisely and not stressing the small stuff. I look forward to adding to the list.

Family Pictures

I have been in Temple, Texas at Scott and White doing my internal med rotation. It is alot of long hours and I have no internet at my hotel. I wanted to post some pictures from our Family photo shoot Thanksgiving. Abby with Sweet Fix is an amazing photographer.

Trunk er Treat!

Halloween was always my favorite holiday as a kid. My mom would ask us months in advance and she would handmake our costumes. We were awesome things like Disney princesses with custom made gowns. It makes me sad when people say that Halloween is a pagan thing that Christian children shouldn't celebrate because to me Halloween was about dressing up and getting candy by the handfuls.

Our church this year asked us to do a Trunk for their Trunk 'r Treat festival. I wanted to post ideas on the blog because their weren't alot of ideas when I went looking.


Our Theme was Dr. Frankenstein's Lab! I was Dr. Frankenstein, and Mr. was my Monster.


We had lots of hidden little funny things like we put a miniature pumpkin in a cage and said we shrunk it in our lab. We also took leftover wine bottles and labeled with "Fresh Squeezed Beetlejuice" and "Poison Ivy."

We had a can of squash relish that looked kinda weird and we labeled that "Lunch 1912"

Here is a picture of Mr. and Dillinger. We should have decked her out in a costume ... next year! We took her along because we thought she would enjoy the activity, Jo Jo was jealous but he was too big!


Halloween Fun!

Our Babies

We have two dogs. Dillinger aka. Booger a Shi Tzu and JoJo aka, the nibbler, a Pitbull (who got his nickname as a result of countless pairs of heels lost :(. They are the old couple for sure. Both were rescue dogs and they are the loves of our life. I have heard before you have children your dogs are your children and that is the case with us. They are so spoiled.

-Jojo and Dillinger both sleep in our bedroom with us because we couldn't bear the thought of making them sleep outside or heaven forbid in the garage in their crates. Dillinger sleeps in our bed sometimes and I thought Jojo should have that option too because it would be unfair otherwise. But Mr. put his foot down. As a result Jojo is content to sleep at the foot of the bed.
-Jojo is our alarm and wake us up at all hours of the night to go see what is in the backyard (couldn't miss the action out there)
-Both get jealous when they are not the complete focus of our attention. ie. when we are studying, sitting on the couch talking.

But we love em!






We almost lost Dillinger last friday night. She got out during the first Rangers vs. Yankees game (we living literally in front of the ballpark) We searched and searched for her. I was so scared she would get run over with all the cars trying to leave in the dark after the game. Finally after hours of searching we found her and brought her home safe and sound.

Adventures of a housewife!

This morning I was taking a shower and all of the sudden I got this feeling that I was not alone in the house. Freaky feeling but I shook it off and continued my lather rinse and repeat. All of a sudden there is movement in the bathroom and I see through the glazed glass of the bathroom shower door a black figure. I hold my breath thinking all I have in here to 'protect myself' is my Venus Razor.'

Then a smile spreads across my face as I scan the door and realize the figure though dark is only about 5 inches tall. My sister and Bro-n-Law's dog is staying with us. Unlike our dogs who are afraid they are going to get a bath if they come on the tiled floor of the bathroom, I recall, this dog loves the bathroom. Haha. Kinsley got my blood pumping for nothing! The dog featured below is my Bath Time Intruder!

In other news

A new song that my sister introduced me to is Just the way you are by Bruno Mars. I love the positive message!

Also Movie Recommendation: We went to see Dinner For Shmucks last night. I thought it was hilarious if you like Steve Carrell and can stand those times on The Office that are so awkward they make you squirm it is a great Date Night Laugh.