Me

Finding My New Norm

Hi guys. I show up here every day, open a new post, and stare at a blank page. They say that successful people adapt to change easily. I sometimes wonder if I’m successful or not. I adapt, but I also resist a little. Sometimes I prefer the safe, comfortable feeling of normalcy.

What am I babbling about? My sidekick started school. Every morning 4 days a week we’re up at 7 am. We brush our teeth, get dressed (sometimes argue about this), and hit the door running.

I might have cried a little on that first day. I’ll leave that for you to decide. As I was trying to take some photos, hubby was trying to shew me out the door. I might have been annoyed with him… a little a lot. My friend Tiffiny gave me advice to not be by myself in those first few days and to keep myself busy. I went to the gym and took out my sadness on the treadmill. That day I also conquered the elliptical and started on this stair climber that hurt way to bad so I moved to a stationary bike. I came home in a better mood. But I was also ready the minute it was time to fly to the school to get her. (more…)

Mudslide Cake (It’s a Birthday Thang!)

Today is my Mother-in-Law’s birthday. Happy Birthday, Memaw. Yes, we all call her Memaw which confuses some people. There’s actually a little confusion that goes along with that.

  1. My mother-in-law (MIL) was 35 when she had my husband. She was an “older” mom just like my mom was. (My mom was 28 for her first and only). When we all call her Memaw, people sometimes confuse her for being my husband’s grandma. I’m not totally sure why because I don’t think that’s possible!
  2. We all call her Memaw so when people call her by her real name, they don’t know who we’re talking about.

This year, we’ve been attempting to get together with my husband’s family at least once a month. It hasn’t totally happened, but we’ve tried. We just get together, have dinner, and play games. I think we’ve missed a couple months, but at least we’re trying. Family is important.

Last month (August) we got together the last weekend of the month to celebrate Memaw’s birthday. I guess I (hubby and I really) forgot we had Tbug Labor Day weekend (note to self… every even year we have her :)), so we wanted to get together to celebrate Memaw’s birthday when she (Tbug) was around. We won’t be in town the next weekend we have Tbug, so it seemed like we’d celebrate early instead of late.

Now if there’s another thing I can tell you about my MIL, she loves a good Mudslide. So with my Cake excursions this year, I went in search of a good Mudslide recipe. When I didn’t find what I wanted, I set out to make my own. And that’s just what I did. I made a Mudslide Cake in honor of my MIL. (more…)

Summer: Currently…

Listening to…

The air conditioning running. It’s so peaceful and keeps the house cool… Well… usually. This summer the AC hasn’t totally worked right, but it got better. Thinking that before long we will turn the AC off and maybe open windows until it gets to cool out and we have to either start burning wood or turn the heater on or both. The only thing I think winter is good for is Christmas. I like snow on Christmas. Otherwise, I’m a summer girl through and through.

I’ve been posting on Facebook a lot about x number of days until Christmas. Christmas is my absolute favorite season and I absolutely LOATH January. Poor January. But truth be told… my birthday is in the summer so it’s like Christmas in July (literally since my birthday is in July). I’m cool with that sans snow.

I’ve also seen a couple “Farmer’s Almanac” predictions. Either way, we’re predicted to be extremely cold and snowy. But both Farmer’s Almanac predictions I’ve seen are different. That leaves me scratching my head just a little. (more…)

Kansas City: Where We Stayed, Where We Ate, What We Did

Wow, it’s been quite a while since we actually went to Kansas City, but still, it’s worth mentioning.

Last month we made a weekend trip, actually just an overnight trip to Kansas City. The goal was to go to the Farmer’s Market and get Jalapeños. I know that sounds funny, but hubby makes these things called candied jalapeños and the best place to get bulk jalapeños at a decent price is the City Market in Kansas City. Gosh, I love that place. The first time we went, I wound up buying 20 pounds of jalapeños. This time we only bought 15 pounds. haha. You still get just as many weird looks buying 5 pounds fewer jalapeños.

But, because we went, we decided to make it a weekend trip. This summer’s goal has been to Have Fun!

Where We Stayed

4600 Summit St. Kansas City, MO

We stayed at the Hampton Inn & Suites Kansas City Country Club Plaza. (more…)

Book Review: Royal Design

Royal Design by Sariah Wilson Book Cover

Guys, I did it. I’ve gone above and beyond my Good Reads book challenge for sure. It’s either Book 13 or Book 14. Remember, yesterday’s blog post I discussed how it could be 13, but that one of the original 12 was a novella and I wasn’t sure I wanted to count that as a true book.

But… I also finished another book. WHAT?!?! My husband picks on me because he thought I just kept starting books but never finished them. See, he used to read my blog, but he doesn’t anymore. If he’d have read my blog, he’d know I was actually finishing books. Yes, I have a few started, but they are all different genre’s so when I get tired of one type, I have a fallback.

I truly didn’t intend on finishing this book yesterday, I just got to the point I didn’t put it down apparently. Because, well, I finished it. I have now read 4 books boy Sariah Wilson. Royal Date, Royal Chase, Royal Games, and now Royal Design. It doesn’t appear that she has any more in this sequence, yet anyway. (more…)

Book Review: Scrappy Little Nobody

Wow, look at me… I’m on a roll! This would be Book number 12 or if you ask Good Reads Book 13. I’m not sure I count the novella that tied up the Just One series as an actual book because it was like maybe 60ish pages or something like that. I can’t remember. Either way, for sure, I have now met the 12 book challenge for 2018 I set on Good Reads. Look at me go! It’s only just August too which means, I could easily surpass that, right?

I’m kind of giggling at myself because I’ve read a lot of memoirs. I guess I like learning about people. Celebrities are people too. I’m not sure why I guess I just do. I actually took a memoir class in college. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before. But the funny thing is, I wish we would have read this book during that class. This book had me thinking, ooooo I could have written about this or I could have written about that. I’m pretty sure my memoirs in that class sucked! I mean, yes, I got an A in that class, but the funny part of that is the professor was about to retire and I’m sure as long as you did the work you’d get an A.

The professor had written his memoir and self-published it. A lot of the class seemed put off by his memoir, but why? I’m not sure. There were parts that were weird/interesting and he always wanted the juicy details of our lives. Most of us weren’t really comfortable giving those. {raises hand} I was one of them! I have a habit of worrying about people judging me. (more…)

Where to Stay: Double Tree by Hilton Downtown San Antonio

When we decided to go to San Antonio on Vacation, Hubby went to looking for a place to stay. In San Antonio, there are multiple options. Eventually, he settled on a Double Tree by Hilton Downtown San Antonio.

Double Tree by Hilton Downtown San Antonio

502 W Cesar E Chavez

San Antonio, TX 78207

Listening to Siri directions pronounce that street is hilarious! Now, remember, we were coming from the North. Oh. My. Gosh. We came off one Highway into another highway and immediately had to take an exit which caused us to have to cross 4 lanes of traffic almost at a diagonal. CRAZY! I’m glad hubby had to do it the first time, although I got my chance when we came back from Corpus Christi. More on that later.

4 Lanes of traffic at a diagonal during rush hour = stressful! Oy! (more…)

Book Review: Melissa Explains It All

This is a book that took me a bit to read. In fact, I think I got it about the time it hit shelves… oh… around 2013 maybe 2014. So why did it take me so long to read… Well, if you remember, there was this thing called Grad School. If, and that is a strong if, I had free time, I had a lot of books to read for comps… so reading for pleasure was only a distant memory. Then… I moved. When I moved, I tried to put it in a place I could keep track of it, but it got misplaced a lot. I finally found it this spring, I was maybe 40 pages in if that. I found it just after I finished My Life in France about Julia Child.

Earlier this year hubby got me a Kindle and I love my Kindle. It makes it easier to read at night, that’s for sure. So when I finished Julia Child’s book, I planned on just taking my kindle to the ride we were going to. That way I didn’t have to drag any books with me, I had multiple books on my kindle… but as you know, that didn’t happen. Nope. I took this book with me. Hubby laughed at me.

While we were at the ride, one morning Jared took it from me and started reading it. That was fine, I had my Kindle and was planning on reading Royal Date by Sariah Wilson. If there’s one thing I can tell you about myself, I’m usually reading more than one book at a time. They are usually different genre’s so if I get tired of say, a memoir, I have a love story to read, or whatever. It’s the 7 Ps. Proper Prior Planning Prevents Pretty Poor Performance.

Oh and that was April and I’m just now blogging about it… That’s because I set it down at about 80% through and misplaced it again. Oy! I misplaced my Kindle this summer to. Who knows. I found it in my daughter’s ballet bag about 2 weeks after I couldn’t find it. I even looked in there once. (more…)

Magnolia Market at the Silos & In-N-Out Burger – Waco, TX

Hello, Monday morning. How was my weekend? Well… I just about broke my right middle finger last night. We had wicked weird weather that blew through. I was trying to open a door in a downpour while carrying the little one and my hand wouldn’t let go of the door handle. My silly hand is sort of swollen and still hurts this morning. Hello Monday.

But let’s focus on the fact that it has been a week since I was on vacation and I totally miss it. I love going on Vacation! This year we chose to go to San Antonio, Texas. We debated and hemmed and hawed quite a bit trying to decide where to go. Hubby really wanted to go to Sea World so our choices had to kind of involve cities that had a Sea World.

Last summer when we spent time down at my aunt and uncle’s house, they got my family hooked on watching Fixer Upper. Of course, the show that decided to go off the air this year in April. Sure… So we got a year of them + reruns. At that time, my aunt wanted us to go to Waco, but we just ran out of time. Truthfully, I had no idea who Chip and Joanna Gaines were so I was like, what’s in Waco? Well, now I know. 🙂

Since Waco is on the way to San Antonio, I asked hubby if we could stop by their market and hopefully eat at their restaurant. We figured being a Monday morning, pulling into the restaurant around 10:30 would work. Um… Hello. NO! The wait was 1 hour 45 minutes and there were NO parking spots. We decided to forgo the restaurant, but that didn’t stop us from going to Magnolia Market at the Silos.

Magnolia Market at the Silo’s

(more…)

Where to Stay/Coffee – Denison, Texas

It’s been a week since we got back from vacation. A WEEK. How on earth did time fly so fast? Seriously. So much has happened in this past week. We finally, thank the good Lord, got Rain! We needed it. Our AC went on the fritz and came back again. Don’t know, don’t ask :). Hubby got home with us only to turn around Monday and head back to Boston, more on that later. Tbug started School. My parents left on vacation. It’s just been a whirlwind of things.

p.s. I might have been dragging my feet about packing myself after packing 3 other people for our trip…

The leading up story

Hubby’s work took him out of town to Boston the week before we were to leave on vacation. Our scheduled departure date was Sunday, August 5, 2018. Hubby’s work trip was supposed to bring him home on August 3, 2018. Supposed to…

Hubby was supposed to board a Delta flight in Boston in the evening on Friday, get into Kansas City late, and potentially drive home to be home around Midnight. A storm threatened the Eastern Seaboard and all Delta flights were canceled in a 150-mile radius around Boston, although hubby said no storm ever hit where they were. All of his co-workers who flew on Southwest Airlines, their flight was delayed, but they got out.

His travel partner and he jumped on trying to scurry and find flights home. The earliest they could get home was Sunday. His travel partner wound up getting home around 4 pm into Kansas City on Sunday. He got rerouted finally through Northwest Arkansas and got home around noon on Sunday. No flights were to be found for Saturday. Oy! (more…)