It's That Time of the Year Again

What time, do you ask? College football and volleyball time and I'm so excited for the Husker teams to start up their seasons! The volleyball team starts Friday and the football team opens their season at Memorial Stadium on Saturday! I love fall college sports season, especially watching my beloved Huskers! You can't beat fall weather, tailgating, and spending your weekends watching some good games in person and on TV.

I even got our apartment all decorated and ready to go today!

Who else is excited?

Vino van Gogh

Last night, my girls from work and I did a drink and paint experience with Vino van Gogh! It was held a Roja Mexican Grill, where we enjoyed some delicious margaritas while learning how to paint a canvas picture!

The picture we painted was called "Bluebirds in Tree" and here is how mine turned out, step by step.

 

The final masterpiece (not, ha ha)...

All of us girls with our paintings.

Love my work ladies! We had a fun night together!

Has anyone else done something like this?

If you want more information, click to go to the Vino van Gogh website. They are currently in Omaha, Iowa City, Kansas City, Chicago, Quad Cities, and St. Louis.

And, my only advice I learned for the night...be careful and paint the canvas, not your clothes!

This shirt is a goner...sad face!

Weekend Shenanigans

Friday night...
We enjoyed the beautiful weather and went out golfing, and I actually didn't do too bad. Then we played some pitch with some friends.

Saturday and Sunday....
We went home, babysat all of our nieces and nephews at some point (not all of them together), and had a surprise 30th birthday party for our brother-in-law. It was good to spend some time with family and friends!

Our 3 youngest nieces...aren't they adorable!!

Sunday...
We got home on Sunday, took a nice nap, had some delicious grilled burgers for supper, and had a mini movie marathon, watching 42:The Jackie Robinson Story and The Watch. 42 was awesome, I highly recommend it! The Watch was also pretty funny. It was nice to have a relaxing evening at home with my husband!

 

Friday Favorites

Linking up with Lindsey for Friday Favorites!
Favorite Recipe Cheesy Ranch Potato Bake All you need are potatoes, a few spices, cheese, and ranch. Loved this recipe from All Recipes!

Favorite Post Beth from That Little Spark wrote a hilarious post with some funny video clips about her introvert experience at the gym, go check it out if you want a good laugh!

Favorite Song Really enjoying this new song by Plumb called "One Drop". Besides being a neat, catchy song, it has also become the theme song for the Blood:Water Mission.

Favorite Tweet

Favorite Video This video might be a little older, but I've watched it numerous times in the past couple weeks because it makes me laugh every time!

Enjoy your Friday and your weekend! Thanks for reading!

Frozen Drink Deliciousness

Last weekend, I tried a new frozen drink recipe my mom  had gotten from one of her teacher friends, and it was fantastic! If you like pina coladas, you will love this drink!

Here's what you need:

2 - 46 oz cans pineapple juice

1 - 10 oz can creme of coconut

4 cups softened vanilla ice cream

1 bottle coconut rum

Mix and freeze and then serve with 7-up, and ENJOY!

Paparazzi

Just wanted to share a little bit about the recent jewelry party I had, a Paparazzi party! This jewelry is super cute, and the best part is...

Everything is $5.00, that's right! (plus a little tax)

I went to a party hosted by a coworker, and then had my own party too! There is a great variety of jewelry including necklaces, earrings, bracelets, hair bows, headbands, and rings. Most of the necklaces even come with a matching pair of earrings! The jewelry comes in all sorts of colors to match anything in your wardrobe! And the best part is that it's only $5.00, if I didn't mention that yet, so you can get a different accessory in each color!

Here is some of the jewelry that I've gotten:

To go check out more of their products or to find a consultant near you, check out their website:

Paparazzi Accessories

Love This Time of Year

One of the best things about this time of the year...

fresh garden veggies!!

My parents have a huge garden at home, and we get to reap a lot of the benefits!

So far, we have gotten carrots, sweet corn, cucumbers, potatoes, onions, zucchini, and green beans! They also still have watermelons, cantaloupes, and pumpkins growing, so I'm excited for those to be done.

Do any of you have your own garden? What's your favorite fresh fruit or veggie?

Weekend Shenanigans

Time to link up with Sami to share my weekend! To read more weekend recaps or to share your own, go check out her blog!

Didn't do the best job of documenting my weekend by taking pics, but I did get a few!

Saturday morning, I went on a nice 8 mile run with my dad, as we are training to do the Omaha Half Marathon in September.

1. Saturday afternoon/evening, we went to Thunder by the River, a big tractor pull.

2. Hanging out with my hubby at the tractor pull.

3. Had some fun with my sister-in-law that night, as we took full advantage of the free food and drinks we got with our VIP tent passes!

Sunday, we had baptism for our nieces, the twins, and Ryan and I were godparents for one of them. It was fun to see all of the family, especially all of our nieces and nephews.

4. Sunday afternoon, I had a jewelry party at my mom's house. I was disappointed with the turnout, but still had a fun time, and I got some new jewelry, which is always good!

Now, back to work for the week! Have a good week everyone! 

Thanks for stopping by!

Bonding Time

Last night, I got to have a father-daughter night with my dad, and it was great! We went out to eat, went to mass for the Assumption of Mary, and got to go on a nice long walk together! It was great to catch up, and dads give great advice on life! I am so blessed to have this wonderful role model in my life and am so thankful for the time I got to spend with him, just the two of us.

Good Reads

Recently, I started reading a new book series, and I thought I would share because I'm really enjoying them! The series is not new by any means, so maybe some of you have read them too.

The series is the "Women's Murder Club" by James Patterson. There are currently 12 books in the series, as the 12th book just recently came out. The series is a murder mystery series, where four women form a club to help try and solve the crimes on the side of their normal jobs. The women consist of a homicide detective, medical examiner, district attorney, and crime scene reporter.

I just finished reading the 4th book, and am continuing on with the series. If you like murder mystery, this series is a great one to read!

Check out information about all the books on the James Patterson website.

Craft Time

On my day off from work yesterday, I got a little crafty! After seeing some ideas on Pinterest, I decided to make my own Menu Board! I used this post from The Creative Mama to make my board.

Here's what you need for supplies:

11x14 frame

scrapbook paper (at least 2 different patterns)

letter stickers

clothespins

small box (I used a jello box)

hot glue gun

glue stick

glue dots

First, I gathered my supplies and got to work!

1. Cut your scrapbook paper to fit into the 11x14 frame. Since you need more than one piece of paper to fill the frame, I used my second pattern to make a strip where the paper overlapped.

2. Then, I added my "Menu" stickers at the top and also added some cooking stickers for fun!

3. After putting it into the frame, I measured out my spaces for the days of the week. Since we are gone a lot on the weekends, I only made spots for Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.

4. I put my letter stickers on the clothespins and hot glued the clothespins to the frame.

5. Then, I covered my jello box with scrapbook paper and used glue dots to stick it to the outside of the frame. This will be used to store my meal cards.

And...here is the final project! I'm pretty happy with how it turned out! Now, I just need to print out my meal cards and start using it in my kitchen!

Recipe Steal

Last night for supper, I made BBQ Chicken pizza, yum!

But, it wouldn't have been possible without Lindsey's delicious recipe for the crust!

Go check out her post on Keys to the Perfect Homemade Pizza by clicking here.

For my toppings, I mixed BBQ sauce with some pizza sauce, then added diced chicken, chopped red onion and mozzarella cheese.

So thanks Lindsey for the tips and the recipe, gotta love a good recipe from a fellow blogger!

Shark Week

Anyone else loving this week so far? If you're not aware, it's Shark Week on Discovery Channel, which means shark shows 24/7 for the entire week! Luckily, I have a few days off this week from work since I work the upcoming weekend, so I've had plenty of time to expand my shark knowledge!

So far, here are a few things I've learned:

1. Don't try to kiss a shark, it will bite your lip off.
2. If you get bitten or attacked by a shark, fight back and aim for its eyes or gills.
3. Researchers have placed trackers and cameras on sharks to study their hunting and travel patterns, which is pretty cool!

If you want more info on Shark Week, check out the Discovery Channel website!

I'm sure I'll learn more throughout the rest of the week, it's only Tuesday! So Happy Shark Week to all of you, hope some of you are enjoying it as much as I am!

Okoboji Weekend Recap

Hey Readers...thanks for patiently waiting for me to get back from my mini-vacation I had over the weekend! I apologize for the lack of blogging, but now I'm here to tell you all about my lovely weekend!

We spent the weekend at Lake Okoboji with Ryan's family and had a great time

1. On our way there, we may have missed a sign and made a slight detour into Minnesota, but as Ryan says, the more states you go to, the better the vacation!

2. We made it, and the view was gorgeous!

3. Got to see this little cutie, aka our niece, all weekend which was great.

4 & 5. We spent some time in the water, and I got to tube and waterski. I stayed on the tube, but this waterskiing picture is before I completely biffed it, as I'm not the best at it.

6. One day while we were there, I was brave enough to let our 4 year old niece paint my toes...let's just say she needs some practice!

7. Throughout the weekend, we spent alot of time on the boat, cruising around with drinks in hand. Loved boating with my hubby!

8. The last night we were there we went out to the downtown bars and had a great time!

9. Ryan's sister and I enjoying our evening.

It was hard to leave and come back home, but hopefully we will be able to go back next year!

Happy Tuesday to all of you, thanks for reading about my weekend!