2011 Recap and Resolutions!!

2011 was an exciting year full of scary but good changes! First, the biggest change was that we moved to NJ from NYC. We moved into a small lakehouse and had work done, well ALOT of work done on the house to get it ready for winter. It wasn't winterized and didn't have underground water that wouldn't freeze for winter, so that was one of our goals...and we did it! We had the house raised, went without water for 6 weeks, (and survived) and happily, oh so happily got water back!!!  Here is our house before and after some of the work we did on it.

Another change that happened, was I left my 10 year job working for the Mayor's Office of Film in NYC to teach yoga and attend Acupuncture school full time, my true passion. Its been amazing and words can't express how grateful I am to God, the universe and my hubby Martin for supporting me to be able to teach yoga, take care of the puppies and Martin and attend school for my Professional graduate degree in Chinese Medicine.

Next change, we got our new beautiful cutie puppy Corbin! He is a handful at times, and has so much energy but he is the sweetest (and softest) big puppy (he's almost 70 pounds at 6 months!) we could ever have asked for and we love him so much!)  and we're so glad that him and Lealu get along!! (that could've been a disaster)

We had the wonderful chance to go on vacation to Hawaii with my sister and her husband. We had so much fun, and hopefully there will be lots more vacations together!

Over the summer, my wonderful good friend Danielle married her soulmate, Kevin and my sister and I got the chance to be there for it!

Next my Gram and her companion Harry made their way up to heaven to continue on with their journeys:)

Its been a year full of change and love, more than I could've asked for. I hope 2012 will be a year of good changes. I would like to show so much gratitude and love to my husband, to finish work on our home and make this my last year in school (which means, taking my comps in January, my CNT course in March, signing up to take my license exam soon after and then finishing up my classes!) I have hope and faith that everything happens for a reason and I know that God and the universe wouldn't put me in this place without the goal of becoming an acupuncturist...so I keep that faith and hope that everything will work out with classes and that I will pass my tests on time. :)

Wishing you a wonderful New Years Eve, day and 2012 year!!!

Christmas Corner 2011

I slid the couch over to the side and made ourselves a little Christmas corner! Most of our ornaments from Brooklyn are still there, hidden somewhere under our bed I think, where Martin couldn't find them, so we were stuck with what we had here. No star on top, but I did make a little bow with ribbon! :)

I haven't been on here for a bit! Things have been busy but really good, my husband has put in the spiral staircase (I know he's awesome!!) and its almost done with all the steps. (I will post pics when its all done!)  Things are taking a bit longer because we are doing everything ourselves, but we are doing it! We are working on giving handmade gifts this year. For my aunts, we bought homemade quilts from my Mom, along with giving everyone handmade soaps. And the wine we're giving as gifts are from the local winery.  My aunts on my Mom's side, we're giving homemade welsh cookies (my Gram's recipe). I'll be putting them in a little festive baggy with a tag label that says "Gram's Welsh cookies".  I think they'll love that! Those cookies were a trademark of my Gram's every year over the holidays and I'm grateful that she gave me the recipe so that it can be continued:)  It was a little difficult for the guys, but we found a cigar store that sells cigars made in the USA, so we got some of those for my Dad. Its difficult to get everyone's gifts handmade, local and made in the USA, but its a start! Are you giving any handmade gifts this year? What are they?

House Update - err well it was Wednesday just a second ago:)

The house is coming along!! My awesome Dad came over yesterday to help me put in insulation. We used the good kind with plastic surrounding the insulation so there wasn't alot getting all over everything and that we would have had to breathe in, called John Mansville. It was alittle expensive but so worth it when I didn't have itchies all over me after! You might notice all the duct tape used to hold up the insulation. Usually people have wood studs up that they can just staple or nail the insulation into. We used metal studs, so there wasn't anything we could nail/staple into, so we used duct tape! My dad double checked with a builder first to make sure that was a good idea and they said yup, so we did it! Looks kind of funny, but whatever works! Now we move onto putting sheetrock up. With the sheetrock, we are going to nail the boards into the metal studs.  More on that in a few weeks after we actually do it! The stone is also finished!! We're so happy with how it came out, and the guys did a great job. They were from Pennsylvania, figures! Every person we've met so far from Pa knows how to do a great job on building house stuff without overpricing. Here are a few pictures!

Frugal Friday - oatmeal cookies from scratch!

I was craving the homemade smell of oatmeal cookies the other day. I thought, I can either go to the store and buy some fake smelly thing or really make some oatmeal cookies. I got to town and started baking. How hard can it be?? I have to be honest, I'm not very good all the time with following directions when it comes to baking. I usually end of putting alittle too much of this or alittle too much of that. I got the ingredients together and it didn't seem too challenging, but with baking, it never does and it always is! Here are the ingredients -

3 cups instant oatmeal (I used regular old fashioned instead of instant because thats what I had, I thought I'd just try it and see what happened, this was where I went wrong I think! when you use instant, the oats absorb less water than with regular oats, with regular, the cookie seemed alittle too dry, like sconie instead of cookiey)
1 cup warmed butter
1tsp vanilla extract
1tsp cinnamon (I love cinnamon and may have put more like 2 tsp in there! I know, I'm bad with sticking to the recipe with this baking stuff!)
1tsp baking soda
2 eggs
1 cup sugar (I used about a 1/2 cup of sugar and 2 tablespoons of agave sweetener syrup)
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp salt

Mix all dry ingredients together in one bowl. Then mix all wet ingredients in another bowl.  Pour wet into the dry bowl. Mix together. I had some fun and mixed with my hands:)

 Take mixture and roll into cookie balls and then flatten. Put into the oven at 350 for 20 minutes.

 Let cool and taste! they were yum but like I said above, alittle more like a scone than a cookie:) Just need to have them with jam I guess.

Happy Friday to you!!!

free shipping @ steve madden!

Free shipping for a limited time for all steve madden orders!! use promo code

HOLIDAY





Happy Holidays!!!!

Fright Fest - Halloween 2011

This was a fun Halloween weekend! (aside from the foot of snow we got turning our work in progress aka the house into a winter wonderland!) I have to say, even though dangerous at times driving through snowy scary hills etc, the lake and trees looked so beautiful! Before the snow happened, we went to a local Halloween festival called Fright Fest. Its a really cool little festival located near the Renaissance Festival by us that we've been to a few times before. But this year, it was eerily spooky (don't know if I used that or spelled it right!) I guess with all the scary stuff in the world, the people who organized the fest decided they had to spook it up about ten notches, cause I was even alittle scared! and I didn't even go into the haunted house! From a girl skipping around in a dress, with a bloody knife hiding behind her back, to a green faced goblin man jumping at a fenced cage making rattling noises! I took some great pictures, so you could see, and when I clicked enhance, so you could see the picture better in the dark, all these little orbs showed up. Scary! check it out!

House Update Wednesday!

This week is proving to be a beautiful one! Its been chilly in the mornings but sunny in the afternoon, which is really nice! I'm a bibliography away from finishing my 20 page paper for school in points and the way points are used in the three styles of acupuncture and we have stone!! (see below)

we are also having the pellet stove delivered tomorrow, and this weekend, thanks to the help of our awesome families, we're putting in the puffy stuff that goes in between the wall and the sheetrock, and the sheetrock!!! then next week, we're going to work on the tile and ordering the spiral stairs, that because of lack of funds, we've decided to take on ourselves! how does that go? creativity is the mother of necessity? something like that! hopefully we'll have the house done and ready by the holidays!!