CHOCOLATE Cake!!!

There's just something about chocolate that I love. It's perfect for a bad day...or even a good one of course. It's right up there for ice cream for me...definitely one of my favorite food groups :-)

During my snow day last week I decided to make a chocolate cake. I used to bake cakes a lot. I'm not really sure what happened but I haven't baked one in forever. I love baking, there's something peaceful about it...and cake batter is simply amazing! Josh doesn't really care for sweets much but he does love a good chocolate cake or brownies.

I got this recipe from this Better Homes & Gardens cookbook. This was one of the first cookbooks I bought & actually used.

The cake itself turned out kind of ugly this time. I'll blame it on the consistency of the icing. I ran out of powder sugar & there's not much I could do about it! It's still delicious.


Ingredients
3/4 c butter (room temp)
2 eggs (room temp)
2/3 c unsweetened cocoa powder
2/3 c boiling water
2/3 c buttermilk
2 t vanilla
2 1/4 all purpose flour
1 1/2 t baking soda
1/8 t salt
3/4 granulated sugar
3/4 c packed brown sugar

Frosting of choice (I made Chocolate Sour Cream frosting...Delicious!)

Directions
1. Grease & flour 2 9-inch cake pans & preheat oven to 350.

2. Whisk together cocoa powder & boiling water until smooth. Let cool for 10 minutes. Whisk in buttermilk & vanilla.

3. Stir together dry ingredients & set aside.

4. Beat butter, add sugars until combined. Add eggs, one at a time, beat until combined. Beat in 1/3 of flour mixture until just combined. Beat in 1/2 chocolate mixture. Beat in 1/2 remaining flour mixture, remaining chocolate mixture then remaining flour mixture until combined.

5. Divide batter between pans, bake 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool on wire rack 10 minutes, remove from pan then cool completely on wire rack.

6. Trim cake down to even out (I love to snack on the cake top while I'm decorating & waiting on the cake to cool). I brushed the top of each layer of Mocha flavored Kahlua. It adds just a little bit of a mocha flavor (Great for Josh, & not too much of a coffee flavor for me).

7. To avoid cake crumbs in the frosting, brush off any crumbs then ice with a very thin layer of icing. Now ice over this.

I meant to take step by step pictures but I got ahead of myself. I'll try to remember next time.

Puppy Love

One of the many reasons I can't wait for us to get our house is because I can't wait to get a puppy! I always had a dog growing up. I have a dog that I had to leave with my dad when I left for college but I couldn't take her now. She's used to having a large yard to run in with her brother & sisters. My little niece is so attached to her. I miss her a lot but I know she is happiest where she is now. This is her with my niece the day after Christmas. She didn't want to sit still for this picture so she doesn't look very happy here. Haha. Anyway, she's a 7 year old Pit & she's an amazing dog. I know Pits have a bad reputation but this one wouldn't hurt a fly, unless you mess with one of us...you might regret that :-)

Josh loves her just as much as I do. We have considered getting a Pit but they have so much energy, I would just feel bad getting one without a huge yard for it to run in. I LOVE American Bulldogs. They're a bit bigger & more wrinkly. I love all types of dogs, but there's just something about a wrinkly dog with big feet :-) You might remember me talking about a dog from when I worked at the vet when we first moved up here. His name was Mack & he was an American Bulldog. He was gorgeous! He was pretty big, close to 100 lbs. & still growing, but he was just a huge baby! Here is an American Bull puppy...so adorable!!! They're just as cute when the grow up too!


I also love Bullmastiffs. I think I love them equally but Josh likes American Bulls better.


We've considered TONS of other breeds but these are our favorites & most likely choices. We've eliminated a lot for different reasons. Long or thick hair, temperament, energy level, too common, etc. We hope to have one by Christmas time. I'll definitely post when we decide for sure & get one!

Delicious Lasagna!

Lasagna is one of my favorite meals & it's something I probably make about once a month. I make a spinach lasagna that I love but the most recent one is definitely my favorite! I got my inspiration here but of course I changed the recipe a bit :-) I think the next time I make this sauce, I'll make a double batch so I can freeze some & have it on hand. I had a little bit left over after this, maybe enough for a small lunch size portion of pasta. I would like to try this sauce again with fresh herbs, other than that, I don't think I would make any changes.

Ingredients

1 pound sweet Italian sausage
3/4 pound lean ground beef
1/2 cup shallots, diced
2 cloves garlic, crushed
2 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes
2 (6 ounce) cans tomato paste
1 can diced tomatoes, undrained
2 tablespoons white sugar
2 teaspoons dried basil leaves
1 tablespoon thyme
1 tablespoon oregano
1/2 tablespoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 tablespoons dried parsley
lasagna noodles
15 ounces ricotta cheese
1 egg
Shredded mozzarella
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Directions

1. Cook sausage, ground beef, shallots , and garlic over medium heat until browned. Puree crushed tomatoes in food processor. Add tomato puree, tomato paste, and diced tomatoes. Add seasoning. Simmer, covered, for about 1 1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.

( I made some changes here because I didn’t have tomato sauce on hand. I had tons of stewed tomatoes, diced tomatoes & crushed tomatoes so I just pureed some of them, it turned out perfect! I couldn’t find any fennell seeds at the grocery store or I would have added them :-/ Even without them, this was the best sauce I’ve ever made! I only used half the amount of salt from the original recipe because I don’t care for very salty sauces. )

2. In a mixing bowl, combine ricotta cheese with egg, a little dried parsley, nutmeg & about ½ cup shredded mozzarella.

3. Prepare lasagna noodles. (I never cook my noodles. You can either get the no-bake kind or you can soak the regular kind in warm water for about 20 minutes, while you prepare your other ingredients.)

4. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

5. To assemble, spread 1 1/2 cups of meat sauce in the bottom of a 9x13 inch baking dish. Arrange noodles over meat sauce. Spread 1/3 of the ricotta mixture. Top with mozzarella. Add meat sauce. Repeat layers (I had 4 layers for my lasagna). Cover with foil & bake in preheated oven for 45 minutes. Remove foil, and bake an additional 15 minutes.

Snow Day!!!

Tuesday night/Wednesday morning we got the first of our latest snow storm. We were supposed to get about 1-3". I didn't really expect to get even that...we definitely got our 3"! The road crews apparently didn't expect to get much either. The roads were horrible going to work Wednesday morning. It kept snowing/raining/sleeting throughout the day so my office closed down early. I left work around 2:30 & I'm glad I did. The rush hour commute in some areas were horrible! It was taking people over 5 hours to get home & some were even stuck over night. People were leaving their cars on the sides of roads & staying in hotels. A lot of people lost power & some areas still don't have any. We definitely got lucky. We went to Costco & Lowe's to pick up a few things after work. Can you believe Lowe's didn't have any snow scrapers? They have 3 aisles of gardening supplies but no snow scrapers! We do have one but it's tiny & completely useless for anything other than frost. We picked up a shovel & left to go grocery shopping. It was sleeting SO hard outside. It was huge sleet & it was falling so fast, I've never seen sleet like that. We picked up our groceries & headed home.

I already knew the chances of me going to work the next day were not very high. I didn't think my boss would be there & without her there for a second day in a row there wouldn't be much for me to do. I planned on making a super yummy dinner for Thursday so I made the homemade sauce for my lasagna (it takes about 2 hours from start to finish), assembled the lasagna & made dinner for that night. We just relaxed & watched TV for the rest of the night. We were expecting 5-10" of snow in our area. It did most of the snowing before we even went to bed. It's so weird when it snows at our apartment. It's so bright! We ended up getting around 9" or so. My boss lives north of Baltimore & she got around 13". College park only got 4" & the areas closer to the coast only got a little over an inch. All of those areas are within about 40 minutes or so from us. We saw on the news that it was actually thundering & lightning in some areas. My boss said it was at her house. It's crazy! Obviously it was really pretty yesterday. I kept all the blinds open so I could enjoy the snow from the warmth of my apartment :-).

Josh went to work late & worked late. I was a little bummed he didn't get to stay home with me but it turned out to be a good thing. I was super productive! I got a lot of things done around the apartment that I've been putting off for a while. We moved some of the furniture around to accommodate the Christmas tree. Since we took it down, there's been an awkward open space where it used to be. I re-arranged our living room & it's a lot more open now! It's not exactly how I would like it, but with the shape of our living room makes it impossible to arrange it the way I would prefer. That's ok though, the shape gives us space for a bigger balcony.


I put the words above the couch several months ago but I don't think I ever took a picture. They used to be centered above the couch but I had to move it to make room for the love seat to go in front of the window. Now I'm trying to figure out what to do with them. Do I leave them where they are? Do I center them above where the couch is now? Do I spread them out & center them on the wall? What would you do with them? It seems that there's something wrong with each option. Symmetry really bothers me sometimes. Stupid OCD! Anyway, I like the living room this way SO much better!

Russett

Josh and I had a great time looking at houses with our real estate agent this weekend. We had lunch at Chik-Fil-A in a shopping center near a neighborhood called Russett that we really like. They had a hostess who cleaned tables & got you refills. I've never been to one with a hostess! Anyway, we really like that area & we even saw some houses we liked a lot. Of course, these won't be available when we're ready to make offers. It's still a ton of fun though! Here are some of our favorites...

This was the favorite kitchen. I LOVED this townhome. The bedrooms were huge & the master suite took up the entire top floor. Of course it couldn't be perfect...the living room & dining room were tiny & the only outdoor area was a very small patio off the dining room.

This was one of my favorite bathrooms. I couldn't pick just one :-)

This is the other favorite bathroom. It's in the master bathroom of the townhome with the favorite kitchen.

We got a little lost because the GPS couldn't find one of the roads. We saw someone getting arrested! I've never seen anyone get arrested so I took a picture.

Our favorite overall house was the last one we looked at but the area wasn't our favorite. My camera died right after we walked in the door (I forgot to charge it like always).

Weekly Recap

This week has really been a great one! Work has been going very well. I finished my first project! The client & my boss were both very happy with it. YAY! Once it is officially approved we will be producing the product in the plant. I'm technically not completely finished with it, I'll have to be out on the floor for the first run to make sure everything goes smoothly. I'm finished directly working with it in the lab. I'm really excited about it :-)

I realized I'll be watching American Idol this season. I usually don't watch it very much after the embarrassing auditions. This year there's someone on there from my home town! I definitely have to watch it now! She grew up in St. Pauls, I used to check out her mom's groceries when I worked at the Piggly Wiggly in high school :-) Small world. I'm so very excited for her & I hope she goes all the way! Here is her audition video. The guy in the back of the car (at 1:17) with her was my teacher in high school. He sang at my wedding! He should definitely be on there too!

We met with a lender yesterday. We've been on the right track. We won't have any problem getting approved for the range we want to stay in. The lender cleared up a lot of questions for us so I feel much better about the whole process now. :-) We have a more concrete time line figured out now :-) I'm SO excited

Today we'll be going to look at houses with a real estate agent for the first time. We're aware that it's not likely that the houses we look at today will be on the market when we're ready to put in an offer. It will be nice to get a better look at different areas & neighborhoods to get an idea of where we're most interested in looking :-)

Staying Put!

Not too long ago I mentioned a decision Josh and I made recently. We've decided that we're staying put for a while! We plan on staying here for about 7-10 years so we're planning on buying a house! We've decided to stay & buy a house for several reasons.

* Josh has a great job with great benefits
* He makes much more money here than he would in other places
* There are many other opportunities for both of us up here & he can advance quickly
* I found I job I love
* We like it here...no reason to rush out
* Throwing away rent for 7-10 years is absolutely ridiculous
* Market is down = great time to buy & it's a great area to invest in real estate
* FL is pretty much opposite of the above right now...you can get a house dirt cheap...but the jobs/opportunities just aren't there

So...we're both very excited. We actually went this weekend to look at a few models. We found one we both LOVE but the location is just not good. The commute to work could almost double depending on traffic & we have some concerns about industrial zoning nearby. Although I LOVED the house & the community...I know it's not the best decision for us. After all of the upgrades we want it would be at the VERY top of our budget...actually a little over. Anyway...at the time we were really excited about it & we were seriously considering it. Then we had to drive home from it. Josh's job is on the way so we saw how long it would take without traffic. Definitely not cool with it. So here are a few pictures...
Sitting area in the master. I would personally prefer to donate a little space from here to each of the other 2 bedrooms...but it's cute. :-)

The master looking into the master bath. We didn't take a picture of the master bath but it was pretty much amazing!

Kitchen...the sun room is to the left, living room to the right & the dining area is where Josh was standing when he took the pic. We would have chosen darker cabinets & granite. The only thing I would change is the amount of counter space...I wish there was just a little bit more.

In the coming weeks we'll be meeting with a lender to get pre-approved for a loan & meeting with our real estate agent to view some resales. I'll definitely keep you posted on our progress :-)

Sunday after church we were riding around checking out different areas. We saw a sign for an open house so we followed it. As soon as we saw the house we knew it was well beyond our price range but we went in just for fun. OMG...it was AMAZING. Basically the kitchen & bathroom did it for me. Here it is. The pictures really don't do it justice. There's not even a picture of the pantry, which is about the size of my kitchen & dining room combined. One of the common areas is a finished basement that we never found. Clearly it's like double our budget & we definitely don't need a house this big. You could literally fit over 8 of our apartments in this house! It's insane. The master was actually too big.But it's actually a good price for a house this size & I loved the location. It's kind of in the country part of MD. We saw so many horses...it kind of felt like home :-) I wouldn't even know what to do with all this space. Anyway, back to reality.

Bye Bye 2010

I realize January is already half way over (CRAZY!) but I haven't really done a New Years post. 2010 was a great year for me...the best one yet! Just to recap a little...

The beginning of 2010 is kind of a blur. I was starting my last semester at State, planning the wedding & looking for an apartment in MD.

This is from the Super Bowl party at Anna & John's apartment. We made pizza from scratch...so yummy! As you can see, the Martins didn't have a rolling pin & we had to improvise :-)

I spent SO much time on Senior Design. I don't know how I would have made it through the semester without this lovely lady. Miss you Liz!

We somehow still made time to make the most of our last few months in NC. This picture is from a party our wonderful bridal party threw for us. I miss them all SO much!

Josh and I both graduated. Unfortunately, we don't have good pictures. We had intentions of going back to campus to take better pictures. With the wedding only 3 weeks away that just didn't happen.

I had to say goodbye to my college job. Everyone in MAD Lab threw a surprise going away/bridal shower for me! Of course all the food was amazing :-) I miss having co-workers my age! haha

I married my best friend in the world!

We experienced our first week of marriage in paradise.

We moved to MD...I do have pictures of this somewhere...I just can't find them now.

We experienced our first NFL game. It was a pre-season game but it was still amazing! I have a feeling we'll be going to more :-)

We got to go back to Raleigh for a few football games. I'm so glad we were fortunate enough to be able to do this! It was really great to be back at Carter Finley & to spend time with old friends.

We got to go to a few away games...

Some ended badly...

But the most important one didn't!

We got to celebrate the New Year with some amazing old friends!

I can only hope 2011 is as great at 2010 for us. There's a lot to look forward to & I can't wait to see what this year brings. I didn't make any resolutions...I always break them. However, I do have goals. This year our goals are...

* Find a church we both love
* Find our new home
* Save money!

Yummy Pasta

My latest thing now is cream cheese in pasta recipes. It makes something delicious even more delicious! I think it also excites me that Josh actually likes it. Used to, I couldn't even get him to taste something if it had cream cheese in it. Now he asks me to make pasta with cream cheese.

I've made several variations of this dish & I think this may be my favorite. Like most things I come up with myself, I don't have a real recipe. I just don't measure things out or write them down. This kind of sucks because when I finally get something right, I can never replicate it.

Anyway. For this dish I used some frozen mussel meat in a delicious garlic/butter sauce. I try to keep a box or so of that in the freezer. I found it at Harris Teeter a few months ago & now I'm addicted to it! It's so fast & easy...perfect for quick dinners.

I sauteed the mussel meat, added about a tablespoon extra of butter, half a package of cream cheese, a can of diced tomatoes, about half a package of chopped, frozen spinach & I just added traditional spaghetti sauce until it tasted the way I wanted. I poured the sauce over thin spaghetti & it was amazing!


This dish is so versatile. I've also made it without the cream cheese & added sauteed squash & zucchini...also delicious!

I'm usually not a fan of thin spaghetti but they had it ridiculously cheap at Costco. I actually do like it with seafood now.

Back & Catching Up!

This past week has been so busy! I have so many recipes to post it's not even funny. I've been really bad at keeping up so this will be my catch up post. I've had a horrible cold so I'll blame it on that. Hopefully over the weekend I can get caught up on the recipes :-)

So...in the past week...

Work has been getting busier. That's a good thing. Before Christmas was a little slow because I was waiting on so many ingredients to come in. I'm working on several projects now...BBQ Sauce, Pizza Sauce, Wing Sauce, several Caribbean sauces & some yummy Asian sauces. I'm really enjoying my job & that's a big deal for me because I get bored so easy. I'm learning a lot & I get to do something different almost every day. I've had jobs that I didn't mind but I haven't had a job that I really enjoyed the work AND the people since high school. haha. Anyway, I'm very thankful for my job & the experience I'm gaining.

We have been finalizing our plans for our vacation at the end of February. We booked our flights a few months ago, the hotel early this week & we plan on buying our Disney tickets tonight. I'm getting really excited! We leave from BWI the morning of the 24th. We'll be at Disney with my daddy, sister & niece from the 24th to the 27th. On the 27th we'll meet up with Anna & John in Melbourne & ride down to Miami with them. We'll be staying there until March 5th.

We got our 2nd snow (technically the 3rd but we weren't here for the 2nd). It was the type of snow I like. Enough to cover the ground completely & make everything absolutely beautiful but not enough to make the commute horrible. Unfortunately it's mostly gone now & I didn't get to take many pictures. Maybe we'll get some snow during the weekend next time so we can actually go out & play a bit/take some pictures. I did get this one crazy picture. It doesn't look like anything special but it was taken at 8:30 pm! It's crazy how bright it is! It was actually brighter then than it was when we got home around 5:30. It didn't look quite as bright as the picture but it was pretty close! The top one is one I took with a random setting when I was playing with the camera. I thought it looked cool :-)

My red Wii came in! I've been wanting a Wii since they came out but there has always been something else to save for. When I saw the red one I definitely wanted it! At first I tried to talk myself out of it since it's more than the white one. I tried to tell myself that it wasn't worth $20 extra just because it was red. Then I thought about it & it comes with Mario, I would definitely buy Mario anyway & that would be around $40-$50 more so it's definitely worth it! I was going to wait to see if they got any cheaper but they're limited edition & we haven't been able to find them in the stores anymore. Some of the online stores are even out of them. I found it a little cheaper at BJ's before Christmas but I didn't get it, now they only have the HUGE bundle with lots of crap I don't care for. Anyway, it's here & I'm super excited about it!

We made a huge decision! I'll post more about that later...when we know more :-)

Bringing in the New Year!

The last part of our trip was going to Raleigh to visit friends for New Years. We met up with my sister and her boyfriend at Cracker Barrel for lunch. I LOVE Cracker Barrel & I had been craving it for a while so I was super excited. We have them up here in MD but the closest one is about 40 miles away. Not really worth it, especially when there are tons of local restaurants we still haven't tried. My sister was on her way back from picking her boyfriend up from the airport. He went home to Louisiana for Christmas. This was our first time meeting him. Josh and I both like him :-)

We stayed with our friend Chris while we were in Raleigh. Josh went to play frisbee golf with some of our friends while I went after Christmas shopping! I always go after Christmas to buy things like wrapping paper, cards etc. when they're on sale. I got some really good deals but I didn't find a few of the things I was looking for. I found Black Ops on sale & picked it up for Josh. I knew he would end up getting it anyway & I like to get him things "just because" every once in a while...although they're usually a little cheaper; he's worth it though :-) We were invited to go see Tron & to go out to watch the UNC game but we decided to stay in to watch the game since our "going out" budget was blown in FL. We saved a good bit of money & we got to spend time with another one of our friends Spenser. Josh met him during a co-op at IBM. He moved to Raleigh from PA after he graduated. Shortly after he moved closer to us, we moved to MD. Anyway, we missed him the last time we were down & he had other plans for New Years so we wanted to spend time with him while we had a chance. It was a pretty low key night but that's kind of what we were in the mood for. It was an absolutely horrible game but we still had a good time.

The next night was New Years Eve!!! I can't believe how fast 2010 went by! Chris threw a party, a bunch of friends came over & our friend Kallie came up from SC. We haven't partied that hard in a long while & I needed it. I thought I missed being a college kid...& I know I still will sometimes (AKA Football Season)...but I'm definitely over staying up until 4 am just to feel like crap the next day. I'm too old for that now. haha. We had a great time but it ended too soon. We'll get to see Anna & John at the end of February but I have no idea when we'll see everyone else again. We took a lot of trips back home these past 7 months & we've been spending way too much money traveling back & forth.

Some lovely ladies :-) Miss you already!

I realized a lot of things while I was in town. I don't miss Raleigh as much as I thought I did. Sure, I miss my friends...but Raleigh really isn't any better than where I am now...except they have Cookout. When football season rolls around again I'm sure I'll miss it a lot, because that's something I can never bring up here. When we first moved, kept wishing I could bring everything from Raleigh up here because there was so much I didn't do while I was there. I realized I experienced Raleigh for 5 years, if I didn't do everything I wanted in that time, I probably never would. Also, if I dwell on Raleigh, I'll never get to appreciate where we are now. We live in a great area with so much to do...I really couldn't ask for more! I also know that if we were still in Raleigh, things wouldn't be like they were when we lived there. We would still have "real" jobs, although mine wouldn't be in my field & we would still have responsibilities like we do here.So...basically I realized that my husband makes perfect sense. He's not very big on looking back at the past...he's all about moving forward. I think this is something I really needed. I've always been one to look back & miss things...just wishing I could go back and re-do this or that. In reality, that's not possible. Why spend time wishing you could do something you can't when you can spend it reaching your goals?

Enough of the deep stuff...we left to come home on New Years day. It was sad to leave our friends but we were both more than ready to just be home. To sleep in our own bed & get our clothes out of the closet instead of a suitcase. We got home around 6:30 & did pretty much nothing for the rest of the night. We had dinner on the couch in our tiny little apartment & watched TV. It was great :-)

Going Bowling!!!

Part 2 of our trip was going to Orlando for the Champ's Sports Bowl! We left Josh's mom's house early Monday morning to go pick up our best friends Anna & John. We had a pretty smooth trip down aside from a little bit of traffic in SC. We got to Orlando Monday evening, cleaned up & met some more friends in downtown Orlando. We had originally planned on going to the pep rally then going out. Unfortunately, the snow storm kept the band & cheerleaders from getting to town on time & it was canceled. We decided to just go out for dinner & drinks. I was surprised to see that about half of the restaurants/bars were closed. The ones that were open were not really prepared for a large out of town crowd. We finally found a restaurant that could accommodate all 8 of us & it took forever for us to get service. It was SO crowded & I really think there was only 1 waitress in the whole place. Other than that & a random UNC jersey on the wall I liked the place. The pizza was great & they had decent specials. We went out to one other place then went back to the hotel since we wanted to get up early to tailgate.

We got up & got everything together the next morning. We got to our lot around 12. We paid $30 for parking we were told we had to pay for in advance. I found out later that we had other friends in the same lot that paid $20 that day! Anyway...at least we knew where we were tailgating & didn't have to try to find a place. It was pretty empty when we got there since the game didn't start until 6:30. We parked beside all NC State fans & they were all really nice. One of the guys that was parked near us ended up being someone I studied abroad with...small world. We played tailgating games & had a ton of fun. Some of our other friends came by too. I haven't seen some of them in a long time so it was nice to see everyone. Our seats were on the upper level & was pretty cold. It actually wasn't much warmer than it has been up here. Crazy. The upper levels were not nearly as full as I expected them to be. The crowd in general was much smaller than I thought. We played well & ended up winning 23-7. Better than I expected :-) By the end of the game we were on the bottom level & we just moved up to the front row after the game. Later on we found out that about 15,000 people weren't able to make it down for the game because of the snow. I guess that's why it was so empty! It was a great game...I couldn't have asked for a better way to end football season.

Study abroad reunion!


Celebrating!

Unfortunately, I don't have many good pictures. Anna has some great ones though!
We had a pretty smooth ride home. We were all tired & the ride home is never as exciting as the ride there. We stopped my Josh's mom's house to pick up the rest of our things before we dropped Anna & John off. We had way more stuff than I realized & everybody but Josh had something in their lap. Luckily it was a short ride. We went to visit my parents 1 more time before we left for Raleigh. Once we left we decided to stay with Josh's mom in Lumberton for the night. We were both really tired & we just wanted to sleep in a comfortable bed. We were definitely not up for crashing on an air mattress that night. We got up the next morning & got ready for Raleigh!

Christmas!!!

This past week has been pretty eventful. We took a few trips in one! I've decided to break the posts up into sections. If I write one ginormous post it will just be WAY too long. So...here goes part 1!

Josh and I left on Christmas eve to go spend Christmas with our families. On the way to my mother in law's house we stopped to visit Josh's grandparents. Josh's cousin came over & we stayed for a few hours. It was really good to see them all. It's nice to live so close to his grandparents. We're only about 2.5 hours away from them now. Since they're getting older, it's a lot harder for them to travel. They still come down to spend Thanksgiving with Josh's mom every year but other than that, their trips are pretty limited. It's on the way home anyway, so we try to stop by each time we go home to visit. Josh's grandma hasn't been doing very well & I think she's been kind of depressed because of some of her health issues. When they were in town for Thanksgiving she made several comments about it being her last trip. It was really hard to hear her talk like that. She was recently diagnosed with Alzheimer's & it's been really hard on everybody. She seems to perk up a lot when we visit :-)

We got in late that night but we stayed up with Josh's mom to catch up a little bit. Christmas morning started bright & early for us. We got up for breakfast & to open gifts with Josh's mom's side of the family. His step brother & his wife were there with our little nephew, EJ. Christmas is so much more fun with little kids around. They get so excited, it's adorable. Next, we went to my mom's house to celebrate with my side of the family. My mom always does lunch & it's pretty much like Thanksgiving again :-) We have turkey, ham, all the sides & desserts. I love it! My niece was there so it was entertaining as always. She got a little four wheeler this year. We took turns riding with her after lunch & gifts. I think it can go up to 30 or 40 but it has a switch that you can turn on to control the speed. I think it goes down to 3-5 mph or something like that. After my mom's we went over to Josh's Aunt Gayle's to visit with his dad's side of the family. I love going to visit with them for the holidays. She is a great cook & she makes the BEST dressing EVER!!! Luckily, we got there before everyone left. We haven't seen a lot of them since our wedding & some of them even before that. It was really great to catch up with everyone. Every other year they go on a cruise as a group. They invited us to come in 2012. We're going to think about it but we're saving for something really big so I don't know if we'll be able to make it this time :-) We visited some more with my mom, my dad & Josh's dad before we went back to my MIL's house...that's 5 separate stops not including Josh's mom's! That's why I'm always exhausted during the holidays!

This is me with Natalia on her four wheeler

It was supposed to snow Christmas night but I didn't really expect it to. We're from Southeastern NC & when it does snow, it's usually mixed with a ton of sleet & we get like 2 inches max. It rarely snows in December. Apparently we had another white Christmas back in 1988 or something like that. Of course I don't remember it. We were planning on going to Josh's childhood church but when we got up we had like 4 inches of snow! Of course EVERYTHING, including church was shut down. We made an awesome wolf snow man! After it warmed up a little & the roads looked a little clearer we went over to my dad's to spend some more time with him & build a snowman with Natalia. This was her first big snow so I wanted to make sure she got a chance to make a big snow man! She wanted a snow woman so Josh gave her boobs...you can't really tell in the picture.

I'm supposed to be kissing the wolf & Josh is supposed to be beating him up.

With our nepher EJ. His parents are UNC fans...this is for them :-)

Uncle Josh showing Natalia how to make a snow ball.

Natalia's first snow woman. She wanted to make funny faces.

Unfortunately, this was about all the time we got to spend with our families during our trip. We left early the next day to go to Florida. I'm usually ready to leave home to go to Raleigh or somewhere else. This time was different. I'm not sure if it's because I don't get to spend as much time with my family or what. We'll be taking a trip with my Dad, niece & sister at the end of Feb. but I'm not sure when we'll get to visit with the rest of the family again. Maybe that's what it was :-/

This was our first married Christmas & it was absolutely amazing. As crazy & busy as it was, I wouldn't have it any other way. I love spending the holidays with our families. It's worth the stress, but I'm glad we only have to do it 2 times a year!

As always, we didn't take enough pictures...We didn't take any with our whole families :-/ I'll have to remember next time. This is one with some of my favorites :-)