a tailgate thanksgiving.

 Ah.

Hello blog. How ya been? 

Let's get right into it, shall we?

This past Thanksgiving, we opted OUT of the traditional sit-down at home dinner in lieu of tailgating in Aggieland before the last tu game for Dodds God knows how long. Whatever. Don't get me started.

Of course we won't discuss the OUTCOME of the game...

{and by WE, I totally mean commenters, cha?}

So. We bought a fancy plastic table cloth and set up in the parking lot, in OUR spot, under the tent and enjoyed a Thanksgiving meal my mom miraculously cooked the day before/of and managed to get all the way to CS warm and tasty. 

 We all even looked cute and festive, so Dad decided to try and get a decent picture...

But of course, Liam had other ideas. 

Some of our absolute FAVORITE people in the whole world, the Williamsons, dropped by and that made us super happy. They live in our neighborhood, no more than 1 minute away by car. It's awesome. Christine and I have known each other since our brothers were kids in elementary school together, so probably since 1995 or so? That's a long damn time, yo.

They're too damn cute.

My dad, hubs and I headed into the stadium around 6:00 (to ensure we got to see the corps, and the senior day stuff) as the sun was headed down. I love being in Aggieland. OH SO MUCH.

Kinda awesome to know that XII will never be there again. 

In my mind, the picture below totally has a soundtrack. 

NOBLE MEN OF KYLE.

It rocks my face off.

Corps March-in.

Student section.

I can TOTALLY sit over there next year. As we welcome some of the BEST TEAMS in the country to Kyle. Oh yeah. 

The students again. 

Now. WE MAY NOT have had the larger number on the scoreboard when regulation time was over. 

BUT. BUT. BUT.

We ALWAYS win HALFTIME.

You may want to check out the band's performance, looking in particular for the Four-Way, which they do once a year, and is the signature big !!! move for them. It occurs at around 3:00 in -- they're setting it up at 3 minutes, it's amazing. I wish I could video so much better, wish I'd had an actual video camera instead of my little point and shoot. Apologies for the commentary by myself, my spouse, my dad and our neighbors.

brain dump for a busy few days

• Yesterday was looooooong. I got up at 6 and didn't crawl into bed until around 2:45. I'm still grumpy/tired. No, not the best idea. 
• I was up late because I was working on a painting. I don't know where I'm going to hang it, or how I'm going to frame it, but I'm fairly pleased with the way it came out. I'd have preferred the colors to be a little more muted, a little more dank, but I also didn't want to wash the whole thing with a lot of Payne's Grey and end up with a hot mess. Cause I could have. I am hoping it's giving off a kind of "once upon a midnight dreary.." vibe. I wish y'all could see the iridescent medium I applied over the moon. Love it.
• Liam is being picked up by my mom tomorrow and they're going to take her puppy to Zach the Vet. Since we don't *ahem* GO to the Vet, it'll be interesting to see how Liam likes going to see his daddy at work. 
• Mom's taking Liam because I want to clean. I cannot, can NOT clean my house thoroughly enough for my taste while Liam is home. I have to have him out of the house so I can focus completely on what I'm doing and not have to have one ear and eye on Liam at all times. 
• When i clean, I turn off the TV, open all the windows and listen to music very, very, very loudly. It keeps me moving quickly and keeps my spirits up. I put my CDs in the Blu-Ray player and let them play on the surround sound. I also get out the iPod & dock from Liam's room. Tomorrow, I think it's going to be Audioslave, Queen of the Damned and The Essential Michael Jackson-- skipping the Jackson 5 stuff, though. Believe me, when nobody's around, I can belt out Smooth Criminal and P.Y.T. like nobody's business. 

• I'm also thinking about letting Mom take Liam to work with her on Tuesday morning. Zach and I need to get outside and do yard work. Like now. We've got massive weeds and they need to not be in my yard anymore. Getting Liam out of the house will allow us to get outside and get work done without worrying about where he is or what he's doing.
• We're in "make the house presentable" mode because our friend Ryan is coming over for dinner on Tuesday. I'm excited. We got to be friends our senior year of high school. We were lab partners in physics and did a lot of traveling with the band. When he came to A&M for grad school, it was lots of fun to have him around. (Ryan's modeling the CD below)... BONUS points to anyone who knows where the photo was taken, too. 

• Zach's cooking Tuesday night. I love showing off my husband's cooking skills. He's trying to decide if he wants to grill steaks or shrimp or if he wants to do his homemade chicken piccata. I'm leaving the menu up to him. I should throw dinner parties and just let him do the cooking/planning. I'll just clean and make pretty. Yes.
• I'm still trying to settle on dessert. I can't decide. I won't make Oreo Ice Cream Dessert for anyone but the Cory. You just gotta hope you can grab a slice when he's in town some time.
• WITH THAT. Zach has retreated into the bathroom for his old fashioned razor date and I'm going to hoof it into the baby's playroom for a workout. I skipped ONE day and I'm feeling like a fat, lazy slob. Lord have mercy, can you believe that came out of my mouth!?

unreLENTing.

I've never "given up" anything for Lent. 

It's not something we really do.

But I really, really love the sentiment. 

Chatting online with a few other girls, there were discussions about Lent and how people approach it. I really connected with somebody who said that their pastor didn't focus on GIVING UP something, but instead suggested challenging yourself and making yourself a better person during Lent. 

So, that's what I've decided to do. 

I am CHALLENGING myself to make myself better.

I'm working out daily.

Yes. 

Scrape yourself up off the floor. CORY.

(We love you and miss you. Come see us. I'll make you Oreo Ice Cream Desert so we can totally blow what I'm about to write. For serious. I need BFF time!)

I eat a healthy breakfast (read, whole wheat cereal), and a big lunch. I'm not drinking any soda at home. I allow myself one small snack a day. I eat a small/moderate dinner (not because I don't want to eat dinner, I don't feel like it. Working out at around 3:30 leaves me with zero appetite for the rest of the day. Love it!) I make sure at least one of my meals has veggies. IF I drink a soda during the day, I am not allowed any iced tea lemonade at home. I drink water all day long. I alternate between two workout DVDs. 

Now, don't judge.

Or do, I don't care.

I alternate between these two: 

My Tae Bo has an extra workout on it called the Ultimate Fat Burner or something and that's the one I'm doing now, because I'm not advanced enough to do the 90 minute workout (yesh!). I will say, in the beginning, I had to stop a couple of times and catch my breath. 

I love the Carmen Electra DVD. In fact, I swear by it. I have all 4 of the Aerobic Striptease DVDs, but I don't even pay attention to the other 3. This one is won-der-ful. I love it. I look forward to doing it, and it's not because of Carmen, but because of the guy she has actually DOING the work, Michael Carson. He is fan-freaking-tastic. I am just doing the 30 minute workout until I feel like it's getting easy, then I'll add on the quick <10 minute sections targeting legs, bum and abs.

Before we got married, I did the Carmen DVD every night for about... oh, two months before the wedding? Maybe not even that much and my results were pretty fantastic: 

I'm thrilled to say that after 13 days of really making an effort, I am truly seeing results. Seeing the results has me so enthusiastic about maintaining my current pattern. I am not even tempted to use Liam not napping as an excuse to lay off my workout. 

I'm pretty proud of myself. 

NEXT?

My next project is to start doing something during nap time. I do my workout as soon as I put Liam down. This takes between 35 and 45 minutes. When I'm done, I've been plopping on the couch in front of my computer until he wakes up. NOT a very productive use of my time. I think I'm going to start doing a different thing each day of the week during nap time. Things like, reading my Kindle, painting (watercolors), working with my pastels, writing, cleaning... ANYTHING besides sit on my bum and do nothing. And something that doesn't cost money. That'd be nice. 

What are YOU doing for Lent?

Are you challenging yourself?

{images: Carmen, Billy}

pizzapie!

We decided to be very adult and make our meal plan Monday night before we went to the store Tuesday.

We were having trouble coming up with what to eat for dinner Tuesday night, so I suggested pizza.

Usually, we buy pre-made crusts, canned sauce (don't judge, it's the BEST) and the mozzarella with Philadelphia cream cheese in it (it melts so well!).

HOWEVER, this time around, Zach suggested we make our own crust. 

This is my arena, folks. The mixer? MINE. The kneading? All ME. Yes. So I told him to hie he to the computer and find me a recipe. 

Oh man. DID. HE. EVER.

The dough has to rise, then you split it in two, then let it rest for 10 minutes under a towel. The smell is insane. It makes that the longest 10 minutes eh-ver!

We plop them on a couple of cookie sheets, I work my fingers and make them into perfectly lovely crusts, brush them with olive oil and go. 

They take between 12 and 15 minutes to bake and the smell is DIVINE.

I made this for dinner Tuesday, and then yesterday for lunch, Liam and I wanted pizza. We didn't have enough time to make crust and make Zach a pizza too, so we had an extra crust. We baked it for half the time, then pulled it out, piled on the butter (4 tablespoons worth!) and cinnamon sugar, and then baked it for the remaining time.

Little boy heaven. 

I told Zach yesterday, when two crusts pre-made are about $4 a pop, it's WAY cheaper to buy the bread flour and the yeast. And to be honest, it's so easy and so much yummier, I am forever cured of wanting to buy crusts at the store.