fun friday!

So today has been a fun day full of getting things done.

This morning most of our family {dad, mom, andrea, NC, and I} got in the car early to go to an Estate Sale in Ft. Thomas. We are crazy over these sales. We find them in the local recorder but you can also get on their mailing list.

The Website is:
http://www.hsestatesales.com/

You always find things that you would love to buy and other good items to go home with. This sale was no different. I do have to say though that Andrea got the "find" of the day! She found a red "Le Creuset" pot. Retail value: $189.99...gently used estate sale price $15.00!! Shut up!

I have also been planning Norah's second birthday party...{I have to say it again, "SHUT UP"} I cannot believe she is turning 2. We are having a little cookout like last year, it is going to be a cupcake theme. The Pom Pom's from the Valentines Day dinner will definitely make an appearance and I am also doing some fun decorations that I get ideas from other bloggers. I am not a good creator of crafts but I am fantastic at recreating so I love DIY sections of people's blogs.
I also made Norah's Birthday invitations, no inspiration needed. They were plain but cute. We do however need to find her something to wear for her birthday. Typically she has a closet full of amazing dresses with the tags still on them {thanks to awesome Grandma's} but right now there is no outfit that is perfect for her party. I guess I will have to go shopping!

OHHH...

I knew there was something else I wanted to Blog about. I seriously have been wanting to tell all of blogland about this amazing online estate sale sight that I look at ALL the time. It is the website where I bought my sink that is going in the upstairs bathroom {still a work in progress.} I would post a picture of the awesome sink but the faucets {which are the coolest part} are being worked on at the moment. The sink is amazing, just take my word for it.

The website is:
http://www.ebth.org/

It is kind of set up like ebay...you bid on items and the top bid wins!!! It is awesome...really one of my top 5 websites to visit. Let me know what you think!

Have a great weekend...and hopefully the snow stays away!

I am finished with this:

...and ready for this!

Busy Busy

Things have been busy around here lately.

Norah is growing and growing before our eyes...we are taking a parenting class at church that is really helping us try to figure out how to discipline her, train her, and love her well. It is such a relief to know that yes we can have resources helping us know what the heck we are doing but it is God's power alone that will change her little heart...oh how I desire for Him to change her heart. I think I will be like the persistent widow in praying for her...I guess every parent is like that for their children.

Well...the time is almost here, I got the final coat on the bookshelves in the office and hopefully shortly the room will be completed...finally! phew!

I made homemade meat sauce tonight for dinner with my homemade bread. It was pretty good and everyone seemed to think it was a hit!

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Spaghetti-Sauce-III/Detail.aspx


Here is the link to the recipe if you would like to try it out for yourself...it seriously was as easy as pouring prego over ground beef. Try it out and tell me what you think!

reviving furniture

First of all how cute is NC getting her second hair cut but first hair "style"? She was soo good for the girl as she shaped her hair into a cute healthy looking "bob" instead of the mess it was before! NC has curls in her hair...I love that about her. My hair is super straight so I love that she has some curl that we can play with!

Now onto the furniture. As I have said in past posts my basement and my sisters basement is quickly filling with furniture that needs TLC. This weekend I was finally able to tackle a few pieces.

So...Andrea bought this super awesome chair from a yard sale and I "stored" it in my living room until she got a house to put it in. It is such a cute chair and I truly hated to part with it and it left a huge hole in my living room that I needed to fill.
So...that hole was quickly filled by this lovely wicker chair that my mom bought me for like $5.00. It is nice but not the same.

So...Joe's mom was cleaning out her parents house and found this chair. She thought it would be a good replacement for Andrea's chair that I miss so much. When I first saw it...I hated it! I thought it was short...ugly and it sat in my basement for months. But last week I decided I wanted to bring it back to life. A little primer and blue paint to match the ceiling and it is a beautiful cheerful chair that I love! It cannot fully replace the wonderful chair that now lives at Andrea's house but I do like it A LOT!!

So...that chair was a fun project but Andrea and I also tackled a huge, long awaited project at her house. A few weeks ago we decided to refinish her dining room table. We first wanted to stain it black...but quickly realized it was super ugly. So we sanded it again and started fresh. We went to the hardware store and picked up {what we thought was} dark brown paint. We got the entire thing painted and realized it was army green!!! IT.WAS.AWFUL. At this point I was thinking I would have to buy her a new dining room set because it was my brilliant idea to paint it. So Saturday we decided to give it one more shot. We bought new dark brown paint and it turned out perfect!!! We have two coats of paint...now all we have to do is distress it a bit, put on some polyurethane, and put the new material on the cushions. I cannot wait to post pictures!

This week I finally hope to paint the bookshelves for the office. Oh there is so much I want to work on...have a good week!

so productive

today seemed like a super productive day!! I am afraid to type this because I don't want to speak too quickly but for the last 6 months I have been struggling with horrible almost constant nausea due to an ulcer. After many different medications I think I am finally on one that is healing!!! For about 2 weeks I have been practically nauseous free!! It has been freeing but scary at the same time because I keep expecting it to come back with a vengeance.

I have been thinking about how thankful I am to be feeling better today because today was a day that I truly feel like I pushed myself to my old limits and it is 9:30 at night and I still feel good! I seriously feel like today was such an accomplished day. I feel like I have kicked into high gear since March hit because I have so many little things that I want to get done before I start school.

I hope that school is not as bad as I am making it out to be in my head...I seriously think that my life is officially over for 2 years. I of course am going to make it into a high priority but I am trying to do as much preparation as I can before April so that my family and I can be prepared for the change. I feel like I am "nesting" to have a baby. Trying to be prepared and getting everything all ready. I never thought I would say this but I truly wish I was having a baby. I was never a baby type {but that has changed!} If God was to bless us with a second little one I would be so excited!! We do however realize that it would be super difficult to get through nursing school while being pregnant and with a newborn so we would like to wait a couple years but oh how sweet that time will be when it comes!!

Now to go watch someone else have a baby instead...Jim and Pam!...oh I love the little things!

Oh how I missed you

February did not seem as long this year as it has in the past...but I am always excited to see March arrive!! I always used to anticipate March so much because nothing was better than a week in the sun for Spring Break...oh where did those years go!! This March is a little bittersweet however because I feel like it is my last chance to enjoy down time before the craziness of April arrives and I head back to school for two intense years learning how to be a nurse. {I don't think Spring Break is included in those years}

In March I plan to enjoy quiet nights at home with the family free from exam deadlines and study sessions.

I also plan on taking this "new" to me handy tool that my dad had and begin and hopefully finish some of the furniture pieces I have collected recently that are in some serious need of TLC. The handy tool is a mouse sander...it is perfect for cutting down on time and labor to sand furniture before it is painted.The nice weather man on the news this morning said the weekend is supposed to be in the 50's...perfect weather to drag all of this furniture out onto the driveway and sand until my hearts content! I am really excited to get these projects underway and even more excited to keep the mess to a minimum! I hope my weekend stays free enough to do this!

Also a little side note...March is National Craft Month, so get inspired and create something cool this month!

the sweet things

I wanted to chat a little about about my husband, Joe. Lately, I have been thinking a lot about how much he points me to Christ and I am so unbelievably thankful for him. I don't know if I ever realized how much he is a servant to Norah and me. He is always willing to step up and help with Norah. He does not let me parent and he be in the distance, he is right in and bold and is a great husband and father.

He is so much more than that though. I love that he knows truth and sticks to what is true, noble, right, lovely, and admirable. He is always striving to do right in God's eyes and does not waiver much in that truth. He does not live his life off of emotions but of truths. This quality is something I could learn from everyday.

I just love him and I wanted all of blogland to know how great of a guy he really is!

i do what she does

I have been a terrible blogger lately. I have been down with poisoning myself with food I did not even have the energy to read blogs for days nevertheless write one...anyway I am back and super excited to blog about something Andrea M taught me how to do.

I like to copy things that she does because she is my sister and I think she is cool. One day she made bread for a fantastic "snowed in" party that we had at our house. There was only one thing better that night than the party--AMW's BREAD!

So I decided to make the bread myself...post HER recipe on my blog and let all of you in blogland try this stuff! I made it again this morning for the second time and it was better than the first. I am thinking about only baking bread now and never buying it...ever! It's easy, healthy, and my family loves it! Anyway...see the recipe below, bake and enjoy!

{if she got the recipe from somewhere online and it is your recipe please accept my apologizes!...but it is good:) }

I love excuses the use the kitchen aid mixer

The ingredients

pre rising

post rising...i was so surprised it rose!

finished product

The Master Recipe: Boule

(Artisan Free-Form Loaf)

Makes 4 1-pound loaves

3 cups lukewarm water
1 1⁄2 tbsp granulated yeast (1 1⁄2 packets)
1 1⁄2 tbsp coarse kosher or sea salt
6 1⁄2 cups unsifted, unbleached, all-purpose white flour (3 1/4c Bread flour & 3 1/4c Whole wheat flour)

Mixing and Storing the Dough

1. Heat the water to just a little warmer than body temperature (about 100 degrees Fahrenheit).

2. Add yeast and salt to the water in a 5-quart bowl or, preferably, in a resealable, lidded container (not airtight — use container with gasket or lift a corner). Don’t worry about getting it all to dissolve.

3. Mix in the flour by gently scooping it up, then leveling the top of the measuring cup with a knife; don’t pat down. Mix with a wooden spoon, a high-capacity food processor with dough attachment, or a heavy-duty stand mixer with dough hook, until uniformly moist. If hand-mixing becomes too difficult, use very wet hands to press it together. Don’t knead! This step is done in a matter of minutes, and yields a wet dough loose enough to conform to the container.

4. Cover loosely. Do not use screw-topped jars, which could explode from trapped gases. Allow the mixture to rise at room temperature until it begins to collapse (or at least flatten on top), approximately two hours, depending on temperature. Longer rising times, up to about five hours, will not harm the result. You can use a portion of the dough any time after this period. Refrigerated wet dough is less sticky and easier to work with than room-temperature dough. We recommend refrigerating the dough at least three hours before shaping a loaf. And relax! You don’t need to monitor doubling or tripling of volume as in traditional recipes.

Sprinkle the surface of the dough with flour, then cut off a 1-pound (grapefruit-sized) piece with a serrated knife. Hold the mass of dough in your hands and add a little more flour as needed so it won’t stick to your hands. Gently stretch the surface of the dough around to the bottom on four “sides,” rotating the ball a quarter-turn as you go, until the bottom is a collection of four bunched ends. Most of the dusting flour will fall off; it doesn’t need to be incorporated. The bottom of the loaf will flatten out during resting and baking.

6. Place the ball on the pizza peel. Let it rest uncovered for about 40 minutes. Depending on the dough’s age, you may see little rise during this period; more rising will occur during baking.

7. Twenty minutes before baking, preheat oven to 450 degrees with a baking stone on the middle rack. Place an empty broiler tray for holding water on another shelf.

8. Dust the top of the loaf liberally with flour, which will allow the slashing, serrated knife to pass without sticking. Slash a 1⁄4-inch-deep cross, scallop or tick-tack-toe pattern into the top. (This helps the bread expand during baking.)

9. With a forward jerking motion of the wrist, slide the loaf off the pizza peel and onto the baking stone. Quickly but carefully pour about a cup of hot water into the broiler tray and close the oven door to trap the steam. Bake for about 30 minutes, or until the crust is browned and firm to the touch. With wet dough, there’s little risk of drying out the interior, despite the dark crust. When you remove the loaf from the oven, it will audibly crackle, or “sing,” when initially exposed to room temperature air. Allow to cool completely, preferably on a wire rack, for best flavor, texture and slicing. The perfect crust may initially soften, but will firm up again when cooled.

10. Refrigerate the remaining dough in your lidded (not airtight) container and use it over the next two weeks: You’ll find that even one day’s storage improves the flavor and texture of your bread. This maturation continues over the two-week period. Cut off and shape loaves as you need them. The dough can also be frozen in 1-pound portions in an airtight container and defrosted overnight in the refrigerator prior to baking day.