Almost November?

Partly due to the ever-warm weather here, I have a hard time believing tomorrow is November! I'm looking forward to things that include hubby's birthday and Thanksgiving though!

We're not sure if we'll get any trick-or-treaters here at our apartment, but we'll put out our pumpkin and have some candy ready just in case. Last night we went to a Halloween party put on by another couple in hubs' training class. Costumes were mandatory, but luckily hubby came up with a good idea a couple weeks before - we went dressed as each other! Yes, my husband had on a dress, a wig, heels, and makeup. I won't be posting any photos here, but if you know me in real life or on Facebook, you'll be able to see some. Everyone complimented him on his costume and it was good for a lot of laughs! Oddly for us, the "switch" really did give us a taste of life in the others shoes. He realized it can be a pain to have hair in your face (and wear heels!) and I got to spend the night nice and comfy in his boots. We also made fun of each other and pretended to be the other person before we left - strangely insightful in addition to being funny! I was mostly appreciative of hubby's willingness not to take himself too seriously and go out on a limb for Halloween fun!

Today is ending up to be a very lazy day, but also food-centered! I'll be making a couple batches of cookies for an event taking place on Tuesday, and I've just been working on meal planning.

Here's what I'm thinking:

Monday: Steak with Burgundy Mushroom Sauce (PW)
Tuesday: Hubby fends for himself while I'm away
Wednesday: Veggie Quesadillas
Thursday: Pasta with Roasted Red Pepper Sauce (PW)
Friday: Buffalo Chicken Pot Pie (RR)

Hope everyone had a great weekend. :-)

Television

I'm definitely a little too into television, but luckily my schedule of late has made it so I don't watch it so mindlessly most of the time. I do have my shows a few nights a week that I always stay up to date with though - whether online after they air, or the night they're on if I can watch.

The return of Glee has been very exciting for me... though I do miss watching with my roomies like I did during my senior year of college! It's so cheesy but so fun. :-) There's also a season of America's Next Top Model on right now. I know, it is definitely on the trashier side, but I can't resist it! And tonight I'm pumped for the season finale of Project Runway! I just find it fun to keep up with a few of my favorite shows, and especially on my nights alone, to settle into the couch for 60-90 minutes of viewing pleasure!

(Other TV pleasures guilty and otherwise include Teen Mom, which just ended a season, and Top Chef, which ended one and will be back with the All-Star season in December! You're probably not too surprised about Top Chef, considering the heavily food-oriented nature of my blog!)

Pumpkin Cupcakes (L + S Cupcake Club!)

I *should* be going to bed so I won't be tired tomorrow... which of course means it's a perfect time to post about the pumpkin cupcakes I made this past weekend, following Lola's announcement on her blog about the L + S Cupcake Club - two choices this month! The pumpkin kind sounded fantastic the moment I read about it, so it wasn't a very hard decision! I blatantly copied her and made brown sugar cream cheese frosting as well. Unlike the slightly special marble cupcakes I made last month, I am happy to say the pumpkin cupcakes were a solid winner for me!

Soooo let's get to the good stuff, the pictures!

The ingredient round-up. Oh how I love channeling Pioneer Woman!

[Incidentally, Lola posted about clarifying the butter and heating it on the stove... my online version of the recipe said no such thing as I recall, so I just microwaved the butter. As far as I can tell it all turned out ok!]

 Dry ingredients. Love those colorful spices! (Nutmeg, cinnamon, ground ginger, allspice.)

 I think this is (melted) butter and sugar... 

 Mixing dry ingredients with wet. And yes I was watching TV. My husband went to bed at 7:30 (work tires him out) so I had a little Friday night baking session!

 Yes.... the pumpkin enters the picture. 

 Irresistable. 

 Pre-baking. The instructions said to fill each cup halfway, and also it said it made 18. I could have made more than 18, but my tins hold 18, and 18 it was. Some were just big...

 The frosting was so easy! Brown sugar, butter, cream cheese. Mix, the end: 

 YUM!

Fresh out of the oven! 

Frosted. And yes, I may have eaten one at that point. Next time I will do better at hiding the evidence. ;-)

Sorry if my captions/writing seems a bit odd tonight - I think it's definitely my bedtime!

Monday means meal planning!

Actually, Sunday means meal planning and Monday means food shopping, but it's all good. Here's what I came up with yesterday (hubby won't be eating dinner here Tues, Wed, and Thurs).

Monday: Steak and Onion Sandwiches (MS) + Salad (Recipe is out of the Everyday Food cookbook)
Tuesday: Pasta with Roasted Garlic, White Cheddar and Wine Sauce + Salad
Wednesday: Portobello, Broccoli, and Red Pepper Melts
Thursday: More of Wed's dinner
Friday: Italian Supreme Calzones

I'm not planning weekend meals because we've got some parties (at least one anyhow) to get to and if nothing else we can throw something together. Or maybe we'll just eat candy all weekend. ;-)

Three of the recipes (tonight's dinner excepted) are from a blog that's new to me called Annie's Eats. A friend of mine had me over last week and made shrimp enchiladas from a recipe she found there, so I had to check it out! Shockingly I am not making anything by Pioneer Woman this week, despite my recent obsession with her. Today though, she posted a recipe for Beef with Snow Peas and I think that's going to have to make an appearance in our kitchen very soon!

I'm off to fitness class and then errands in a little while, but the fact that it's thundering and pouring rain outside is making me want to curl up and stay in. Also, my post about the Pumpkin Cupcakes I made for the L + S Cupcake Club will be up soon, I just don't quite have enough time yet. The results were really good this time, that much I can say!

Keeping Busy, plus thinking about Christmas???

This has been an overall good week - lots of social time, plus volunteering, plus more baby-sitting, means very little time at home, which at times I regret but since hubby isn't home this week, it's nice to be busy!

Yesterday with M and J was good once again, and I'm headed over there this afternoon too. Their mom is still really happy with how they've warmed up to me, and I feel the same way. Plus it gets me back in touch with being a kid - nothing like letting the toddlers bury my feet in sand at the sandbox to remind me of life's simple pleasures.

I've also realized that for the first time this year, I might be one of those people thinking about Christmas in October, eep. Really it does appeal to my planning nature though. I'm concocting gift ideas that won't break the bank, making lists of things that we would like or need, and pondering our trip back to our home state and the logistics of everything. More than anything I am grateful that we get to spend our first married Christmas (and Thanksgiving!) together, since I know that will not always be the case. Hoping to book our flight soon, once hubby has a better idea of the work side of things!

A Yankee in the South

Just today I was thinking about the things I embrace about this region of the country, and the things I'm not as into. I think the "culture shock" of being down here is definitely not as extreme as I thought, partly because the "culture" I'm in is also the military, which is pretty different than "the South" in some ways - so I get a bit of both. Woah, lots of quotes. Moving on!

In case I haven't already made it clear, I'm from the northeast originally - as in New England. I went to college in DC, and consider that my "by way of" home in a sense, particularly because my parents moved about 45 minutes away from the house I grew up in while I was in school. (No hard feelings, I just wasn't going home to the same house anymore.) So there's a lot of things that are a bit different for me. I don't say "y'all." I'm mostly prone to "you guys" even when everyone concerned is female, but sometimes I will do a "you all." No "y'alls" have happened yet. I listened to country music some growing up, but I'm not as entrenched in it as many are, and where I'm from a lot of people straight up don't like it. College football (at least the SEC type version) is not a thing where I'm from. My high school didn't have a football team... my college's football team wasn't really worth talking about. It's just not something I grew up with.

All that said, there are a few things I'm definitely getting on board with down here:
1) October weather - sunny and 70s is pretty nice, I'll enjoy it while it lasts!
2) The occasional sip of sweet tea - can't take too much of it, but I enjoy it in small doses.
3) Not feeling weird for greeting people and asking how they are, because that's more normal here, at least I think...
4) Relatively small doses of country music - indulging and just getting into the spirit. Not too much though... (I don't even know how I feel about that "Chicken Fried" song - hubby and I have a couple philosophical issues with it, but it's catchy and I can appreciate the idea of life's simple pleasures. I definitely find myself leaving the radio station there when I hear it, regardless.)
5) College football. By no means do I feel authentic when I watch it, but we've started to turn it on on Saturday afternoons. Last week I went ahead and started cheering for my grad school and they had a great win! Hubby and I are definitely going to have to go to at least one game when we move out there!

A few things I can take or leave:
1) October weather. Yes I know, it's up there too. Here's my thing - much as I love sunny and 70s, I also love a crisp chill in the air. Sweaters. Vibrantly colored leaves! Some are falling here, but they kind of just go brown and fall off the trees... The weather here feels nice lately, but it's not the October I know, and that kind of weirds me out. Maybe I have to wait til November???
2) The food. I've tried a little bit of it - I appreciate the tradition. It's just not my style. Or at least what I perceive of as southern food isn't as much my style, or how I regularly like to eat.
3) Being called "little lady." Not in a demeaning way, but just offhand. I was in the grocery store in July or August (meant to write about it then but didn't) and the man shelving the produce just simply said to me "How are you doing today, little lady?" It threw me off to say the least, but mostly I just chuckled to myself.

I'm not too worried about missing snow - we'll be back in our home state during the holidays and I've got a visit to Chicago scheduled for February... so I think I won't be totally deprived! I love the snow for playing, but not so much for driving anyhow.

I'm really not trying to insult anything about the South, I promise! I just find the idea of culture so interesting, and I like to keep track of the things I'm enjoying and the things I miss, all of which tend to keep reminding me that I'm not from around here. At the end of the day though, it's not so different, especially because studying in Italy was a whole different adventure in culture shock! I really do value the chance to get to know different parts of this country though, and it's an opportunity I am trying to embrace.

Express Lane Grocery Shopping!

Yesterday was my weekly trip to the store, but I didn't buy much at all - mostly because hubby is gone this week, and also partially because we'd been shopping this past weekend for our little gathering. I felt very frugal going through the express lane, though in a sense that wasn't the case since we got things like milk just a couple of days ago. That said, here's my personal meal plan for the week:

Monday (last night): MS Lighter Eggplant Parmesan
Tuesday: Eggplant leftovers
Wednesday: Quesadillas using party leftovers (with guacamole)
Thursday: Quesadillas again
Friday: Chicken and Dumplings (we didn't end up making these last week)
Saturday: Out to dinner maybe

I've been making quesadillas for myself as a regular snack/meal since I was a teenager. Once I started making my own guacamole it turned into an extra tasty treat!

My meal plans by myself are getting simpler - I'm trying to streamline, keep things easy, but still delicious, partly since I'm so busy these days, or at least I feel like I am. :-)

Adventures in Baby-Sitting

A week or two ago I posted about my excitement about a new baby-sitting job, then about my disappointment when that ended before it even started. I waited to post about my next opportunity for fear of the same thing happening. While I don't know if it will definitely turn into a long term thing, I did watch the kids for this second family this afternoon, and so far things are going fine!

One thing that helps is that this family is also military - the fact that I'm leaving next year doesn't really phase them at all. The boys are 3 years old (M) and one year old (J) and they are both very cute. M has brown hair and brown eyes and J is blue-eyed with blonde hair! This afternoon while I was watching them was definitely a change of pace - from volunteering, errands, and all that, to having two toddlers pile blankets and pillows on you and then climb all over you, and so on and so forth, is a change, but a welcome one for me!

I also cracked up while the boys were eating yogurt - M is pretty coordinated and managed to get most of it in his mouth, but J's motor skills are obviously not as advanced. He insists on feeding himself, and this situation leads to him dribbling yogurt all over his mouth, face, and clothing, not to mention the floor and table. Every time some yogurt got on the floor, he'd go "uh oh" and wait for me to clean it up.

I was really happy with how the boys warmed up to me today, and their mom seems happy with the situation so far as well. I'm hoping it continues to work out! I have to say though, leaving I was reminded just how much I am not ready for that part of my life, at least ideally. I have some pregnant friends here, and it's so exciting and everything, but sometimes being so close to the reality just tells me *how* not ready I am... hoping things go more or less according to plan and that I've got a few selfish years ahead of me, because a few afternoons a week with M and J is plenty of kid time for me right now!

Great Success! (Entertaining/Our Weekend)

Good weekend this weekend - husband and I tried out a local pizza place for the first time last night, which was chill and delicious, and today we had over a bunch of his college buddies who live around here. A couple of them are leaving for long term training in a couple of weeks, so this was the last time most of them would be around before the first ones start moving next year. We had some NFL on, and we made food that reminded hubby of college, and was good for football - wings with veggies and potato wedges, and congo bars for dessert. We got lots of compliments on the food and it was nice to have everybody over, since we're only in this same spot with them for the year. I definitely love having people over to our apartment as well!
Another success this weekend was getting my new desk/workstation set up. We ordered it online, but had to assemble it ourselves. While the physical pieces are a bit shoddy (reflecting our budget), I really like the set up and functionality. I'm also really proud that we managed to put it together with no major meltdowns or stress on our relationship. :-)

Here it is hanging out in what will now be the office!

 

I've got more stuff than this set up on the desk, but I'll post another picture when I've set it up more fully. 

Now I've just got to finish meal planning for the week (really just for myself) and then it will be off to bed to get ready for another busy week!

Busy is Better than Bored

I do love some good alliteration...

I keep telling myself it's better to be busy than bored at least - and it's true, but this week I've been tired to the point of even getting grumpy a couple of times! (Not one of my more attractive characteristics, but just trying to keep it honest here...) It's surprising considering I don't even have a paying job, but I guess I've just done that well at filling up my schedule. Between volunteering as much as I have, social time, other commitments, planning and making dinner, and other miscellaneous things, I've been craving some down time and sleep! Sometimes I feel like a baby, especially since I don't have kids and my husband has a much more demanding schedule, but I suppose it's all relative.

Today is no exception - I'm volunteering and I've got a couple of other things in my plate today. Once it's all over I'll head back home to try to get the apartment back in order and see hubby. Then we will probably go to sleep at an astonishingly early hour, at least compared to my college days (which ended all of 5 months ago). We've got a couple things on tap for the weekend - hopefully having some of hubby's college buddies over, and hopefully putting together my new desk.

No complaints though - I would feel much worse if I were bored. I would sit around all day and watch too much TV and spend too much time on the computer, and feel much worse about myself than I do now. This way, I get out, I see people at volunteering, spend time with friends here, get my fitness classes in, and all that good stuff. I think this will also only help in winter when hubby goes away for some more training and I am even more on my own.

Ok, enough rambling for this morning. Happy Friday everyone!

Our Weekend (and this week's meals)

This weekend, we took advantage of the extra time off to go camping! It was a great blend of low-key and fun. The campground/park was only about 40 minutes away, we took our time getting ready but still got there early enough to set up and make dinner, made delicious food (kielbasa, bagels for breakfast, pasta and salad), went on a nice 6.7-mile hike, and enjoyed quality recreational time together! Of course yesterday when we got back was all about laundry, dishes, and cleaning, but that's just how it goes.

A quick summary in photo form -

Our campsite

At a waterfall on our hike

 A nice view

 Pasta and salad for dinner

I think I might be just a tad obsessed with campfires... love them!

Today I volunteered again (I usually do 2-3 days a week), and it was really busy. I'm getting to be a pro particularly at witnessing wills, and it's good to feel helpful. After I left, I went to the grocery store, and hubby joined me since he was getting out of work, so that was fun and unusual. :-)

This week's meals - already ate the Tuesday meal, it was a success!

Tuesday: Nachos and PW Beef and Bean Burritos
Wednesday: Ditching hubby to do potluck at a friend's house, don't know what he will create for himself :-)
Thursday: Balsamic Roasted Red Potatoes and PW Chicken Piccata
Friday: PW Fettucine Alfredo and Roasted Broccoli
Saturday: RR Chicken with Dumplings

Life is Good, or a sharing of many thoughts

At lunch with some great ladies today, we talked about those Life is Good Jeep tire cover thingies... but I digress, I used it for inspiration but it rings true to what I feel like sharing.

Despite my little baby-sitting job snafu and my lack of paid employment, I feel like I am getting into my groove, or at least a groove, here in this place where we live right now. I feel like I have a variety of good friends who I know through different avenues, some of whom I feel like I've known much longer than a couple weeks or months. I am always meeting new people too - and I am continuing to reflect on how blessed I am socially in this world of the military, soldiers and spouses alike. Despite the fact that we move a lot and are forced to part ways, I feel like social groups are not as hardened as in other situations. We're always shifting and moving and so I think the average military spouse is more open to new friendships than many people, even when they feel like they have "enough" friends. All of us have been the new girl on post/base at one point or another, and probably will be again very soon. At least in my mind, I never want to shut down to meeting new people, because I want to make it easier for whoever happens to be new or looking for more friends at any given moment, and I don't want to miss out on meeting another great person. Wow, this turned into a rambly paragraph, but I hope it makes some sense.

I did yoga today, for the first time in two weeks, and I could feel that it had been that long. It was amazing how much tighter my muscles felt than average, but that made me much more grateful to be betting back into it - it felt so good! Now that I volunteer most Tuesdays and thus can't do my favorite spin class, I'm hoping to find some other classes at times when I'm free so I can keep on feeling as good as I did when I was doing them two days a week, before I was volunteering.

We've also got some good little projects planned for home decor/improvement coming up - we received some 8x10 wedding prints today, and I was able to put two of them up already! I still need a frame for that third one. We also bought a desk/"workstation" for me, so hopefully we'll put that together relatively soon, and it will inspire me to turn our extra room more into an office than a junk room... which it kind of is right now... 

And last but not least, hubby and I have a fun little, low-key getaway planned for the weekend - camping! We still have to figure out what we are bringing and eating, but it shouldn't take too long and I hope it won't be too difficult. We're also having some friends over tomorrow night, and I'm excited because I love playing host!

.... or not

Ugh, letdowns. The same day (yesterday) that I posted about my new exciting baby-sitting job that I was so excited for, the mother called me in the evening and basically told me she'd changed her mind - she was going to put her baby son in daycare instead of having me take him, because it suddenly occurred to her that with me leaving next spring or summer, the kids would get attached to me and she'd have to find someone all over again - or at least this was her rationale. Thing was, I told her my probable timeline up front, the first time we met, just to be clear and make sure it wasn't a problem, and I thought it wasn't. I was all set to start at 7:15 tomorrow morning, and so when she called last night I thought she might change the time or the day or something - the last thing I expected was to basically be fired before I even started...

She said she felt horrible and I did everything right, but emotionally it was hard to believe that, because I felt kind of shocked and rejected. Thank goodness, hubby was home last night and was there right when I got off the phone to comfort me. I'm getting over the initial shock now, and I'm a little better about it, but of course I had to update here as well since I'd JUST posted about how excited I was.

So alas, I'm back on the job hunt, but at the very least I still have volunteering, which is good as well, in many other ways. It's just tough to feel like I am back at Square 1, but I have good friends who have been comforting, and I know everything will be (and is) fine, even if this was a little disappointing.

This Week's Meals

Another day with two posts - I guess that's just how Mondays are for me lately, since I usually don't post on the weekends when hubby is home.

Monday: Grilled Vegetable Paninis* with Sweet Potato Fries
Tuesday: Spaghetti Squash w/ Turkey Meatballs and veggies
Wednesday: Balsamic Chicken w/ Eggplant, Tomato, Mozzarella Salad
Thursday: Panang Curry w/ Chicken
Friday: Quiche Lorraine + Smashed potatoes w/ lemon 

*Writing "paninis" makes me part chuckle, part cringe, because of how wrong it is as it relates to real Italian. The singular of sandwich is "panino" and the plural is "panini" - so really panini is already plural, but in its Americanized form, we say paninis. Just wanted to mention it, so there's your Italian lesson for the day!


This reminds me that I do have one food photo I can share from a recent dinner, though it actually wasn't that recent. I made Seared Flat-Iron Steaks with Wine Sauce (though I believe I used a different cut), and added in some mashed potatoes and broccoli, both of which hubby made because he's a connoisseur of both foods, and because I told him he wanted to volunteer. In all seriousness though, assuming he's not just getting home from work, he's a great help in the kitchen. He also nicknamed the red wine sauce "booze butter" because it literally consisted of... you guessed it, wine and butter! It was fun to make such a "meat and potatoes" meal for a change, with the special touch of the yummy booze butter. :-)

A little extra $, and some mommy practice!

At this point, I think I've reached "equilibrium" when it comes to keeping myself busy during the week and doing productive work outside my home. As I have shared recently, I started volunteering in the legal/military field, and last week I managed to line up a once-a-week job that will earn me (us) some extra cash - baby-sitting!

I was connected to the mother of the family by a website, and she asked if I'd be interested in helping them out one day per week. I was looking for something to earn money while continuing to volunteer, so this is ideal in many ways. I have done some baby-sitting in the past, including a pretty regular summer job for a family of three kids back in my home state, while I was in college.

At this point, I've been to the home twice, and I've met the mother, father, 4-month-old baby boy, and 3-year-old girl. There's also an 11-year-old girl who I've yet to meet. Because their grandmother lives close by, I won't always have the two girls, and I'll primarily be caring for the baby. I've never been a primary caregiver for a baby, so he's going to break me in with the feeding, burping, napping, diaper-changing routine. During my two visits so far I got familiar with what they normally do with him, and I've had some time holding him and even changing a diaper yesterday, so I'm hoping to get the hang of it relatively easily. I'm sure he'll test me at times, but hey, I plan to be a mother someday and I don't mind the practice.

Anyway, my situation now is very different from the 9-5 clerical type position I'd hoped to get while here, but it works for me in a lot of ways. I like my volunteer position, but earning some money is helpful too, and now I am combining those. Depending on how things go, I should also have 1-2 days per week to get errands done and I'm grateful for that too. I'm resisting totally giving up my daytime fitness classes also, haha.

My first baby-sitting day is Wednesday, so I'll have to share how it goes with me and the baby that day. Just wanted to share the new situation, and now I'm off to the gym and then some errands!