ABCs of 2013

I cannot believe that today is the last day of 2013! I know this will sound so cliche, but where in the world has the last year gone??

Even though Christmas is technically over based on the date, it's most certainly not over for me. Not yet. Mom always kept our decorations up for the 12 days of Christmas, so that's what I'm doing too. However, I don't need a "legitimate reason" to get me to keep these decorations up any longer! I've seen so many people saying that since Christmas is now over, the decorations must come down. Sorry, but I've really been enjoying laying on the sofa, watching TV, with the only light in the house coming from the TV and the Christmas tree. I'm going to be really sad when it all comes down. Maybe Matt will decide to keep up a

25 Days of Christmas: Day 25

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

I had to wait to post this until later today, because I was giving our parents #25 as part of their Christmas gifts.

There's nothing I like more on a freezing cold day than hot chocolate! {But I've also come to like Hot Apple Cider, too!}

I thought finding a recipe for hot chocolate mix would be a great idea to end out this year's 25 Days of Christmas, and it probably couldn't come on a better day, since today was FREEZING cold!! But, I'd much rather have a cold Christmas rather than the warmer weather we had this weekend!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 24

I know, I know, you're probably going to say this is cheating to post these cookies today, but, it's my 25 Days of Christmas, so I make the rules and I say it's okay!

It just doesn't seem like Christmas unless you have some of these pre-sliced cookies, where all you have to do is plop them onto a baking sheet, put them in the oven for a few minutes, and there you go! I love the different pictures you can get on the cookies {which is why I had to confess to Matt that I bought three boxes, since I couldn't decide on which design to get...}.

Even though Matt thought it was ridiculous that I bought three boxes, I know he's secretly happy, because he told me last night that these are

25 Days of Christmas: Day 23

When I first saw these Grinch Crinkle Cookies I knew I just HAD to make them!

I mean, come on, they're not only festive cookies with a fun name, but they're actually GREEN. haha, I love it!

They are similar to the Brownie Crackles that I shared on the very first post of this year's 25 Days of Christmas.

While making these, I actually changed the name to Matt Cookies, since Matt seems to be a Grinch to my love of all things Christmas! haha. When I told him the original name of the cookies, he even said they should be called Matt Cookies, as well!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 22

I can't even put into words how much I lovvvvve fudgies!! They're
just so perfect and good!

When I found out that we were having them at our faculty & staff holiday lunch last week, I was SO excited!! {Thanks, Jenny!!! :) }

I knew I was definitely going to include these in my countdown, pretty much because I needed a good excuse to make them! haha

Hope you'll try this and enjoy it as much as I do!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 21

Believe it or not, I "came up with" a recipe without searching all over the internet for it! haha

I was looking through what we still had in our pantry and I thought, "hmm...that could work and be festive!" 

So, here's my idea for you, and it's very simple, just like I like it!

Brownies with Christmas colored M&Ms!!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 20

I knew that I wanted to include just a plain sugar cookie for this year's countdown.

A couple of years ago, I bought a pack of 3 Christmas tree shaped cookie cutters and have never used them until now! I thought about making green sugar cookie dough, but wasn't 100% sold on it. Plain sugar cookies it is!

According to this recipe I found online, it's apparently the best sugar cookie recipe out there. Personally, I don't see what's so special about it, but it's still good. haha.

Enjoy!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 19

It was funny as I was making these....I've eaten these cookies probably every Christmas for as long as I can remember, but I don't think I've ever actually made them before. Until now.  {Of course, I have had some of the cookie dough before :) }

My mom makes the besssssst chocolate chip cookies, so I definitely had to include those on this 25 Days of Christmas baking. Plus, Matt's been asking when I'm just going to make a plain chocolate chip instead of something "fancy" or "Christmasy." haha. But, with all the treats we've had in the house, I can't say that I blame him.

My cookies didn't turn out like Mom's, though. They taste the same, yes, but I like how hers come out flatter. I told her I like those better

25 Days of Christmas: Day 18

It just isn't Christmas until Mom's Chex Mix is made!

I remember Abby and I could walk down the stairs and just smell the chex mix baking and then it really felt like it was Christmas time!

It's one of our favorite snacks, and the few, rare, times throughout the rest of the year when we'd get Mom's chex mix, we'd try to make it last as long as we could! {Like the time she sent us a care package to Longwood with some!!}

Anyway, I know you want to try it, so here's the recipe for you!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 17

On Tuesday, our former Key Club advisors {and now my coworkers!}, Ms. Dick and Ms. Null, invited Matt and I to make Christmas cookies with them after school.  Ms. Dick had a great family recipe for cookies, and she was kind enough to not only invite us to bake and decorate cookies with her, but also share the recipe with us, as well, just to include for this 25 Days of Christmas of baking! She is too kind!

It was a great afternoon of fun, and also catching up! Even though I see or talk to Ms. Dick and Ms. Null a few times throughout the week, it's all school related things we discuss, and they rarely get to see Matt anymore, so it was just like old times! 

Hope you enjoy this recipe called Grandma's Lemon Cut-Out Cookies,

25 Days of Christmas: Day 16

Have you seen all of those food recipes that are shared on Facebook all the time? Do you ever wonder if people actually try them?

Well, I do know that my mom tried one recipe she shared on Facebook like that, and here's my first attempt at trying a recipe that was shared on my timeline. These Kiss Pies looked way too simple for me to not try, and they were very easy to make! Although, I did have Matt's help rolling out the dough, because apparently, I'm horrible at it and crack and rip the dough every time!

Hope you'll like these if you give them a try!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 15

Rice Krispies Treats always make me think of when I was in the youth at church.  When Ambra was our teacher, she would always bring some kind of food for us to have for breakfast, whether it was her yummy hot rolls, cookies, brownies, or Rice Krispie Treats......all always homemade of course!

I found this recipe for Rice Krispie Treats with a Christmasy twist to them, and they looked fun so I wanted to try them. Luckily, I attempted this one while Matt was home because I definitely needed the two extra hands to help me out!

They didn't turn out as sticky and messy as you would think, but they have the same taste and gooey texture once you bite into them!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 14

When I first came across this cookie recipe online, I knew I had to try it--the cookies just look so fun and festive!

The recipe uses a box of cake mix, so while they do still have the shape and some texture of a cookie, they really do taste like cake batter cookies! mmm!!

At first, I wasn't sure what to expect, because they have a kind of short baking time {9 minutes}, so I wasn't sure that they were done, but I was surprised that they were and that they turned out as good as they did :)

25 Days of Christmas: Day 13

I almost wasn't going to post this one, because it was a complete flop for me, and we didn't even eat it {all of it went straight into the trashcan, actually}.  But I figured someone else would probably want to try it, and would most likely have more luck than I did, so I thought I should share it anyway!

I really wanted this caramel popcorn recipe to turn out because 1) I love caramel popcorn, and 2) I was going to love it even more having red and green caramel mixed in!

For me, everything went great right until the end, naturally, but I'll explain that more once I get there.

25 Days of Christmas: Day 12

I've always wanted to try a recipe for Buckeyes, and when I found this one, I saved it so I could try it for Christmas. 

Now that I've tried it, I can honestly say I will probably never ever make them again in my life, at least voluntarily.  To me, they were the most annoying thing to make! ha. It's not even that the recipe is hard.  It's just that the process is a little bit time consuming, and then the dipping part made me too impatient!

However, if you'd like to try this recipe yourself, here's what you're going to need!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 11

I love most kinds of Chex Mix, trail mixes, snack mixes, etc., so of course I'll include a few of those here, too!

I came across this White Chocolate Christmas Chex Mix recipe a few years ago, so I brought it back out this year to share!

Most of the ingredients you're probably familiar with from any other chex mix or snack mix, so you can really make it your own by changing the ingredients up however you like!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 10

I actually came across this website while I was at work.

LET ME NOW ADD that NO I do not spend my day searching for new cookie and treat recipes! I always have NBC12 news and the Today Show websites open so I can keep up-to-date when I can.

This recipe was shared on the Today Show website, and it looked extremely easy to make, not to mention it looked yummy!

I made it in no time one night, and it has turned out to be a hit when others have tried it! Hopefully you will try it, too, and enjoy it just as much! :)

25 Days of Christmas: Day 9

This cookie isn't specifically a "Christmas cookie" but it always makes me think of Christmas!!

When we were younger, a big group of us from my church always used to go Christmas caroling. It was a lot of fun! Once we had made all of our stops, we'd end up back at church for cookies and hot chocolate and to play fun games, like Catch Phrase! Someone in my family, like my mom or my Aunt Cathy, would make these great peanut butter cookies with Hershey Kisses in the middle!! mmm!!

And I eat them the same every time: eat the cookie apart AROUND the Heshey Kiss, then eat the rest in one bite! Yum! :)

25 Days of Christmas: Day 8

When I came across this recipe, it was called a Chow Mein Noodle Cookie, but I've also seen these treats called "Haystacks" before.

Just a sidenote: I wasn't able to go to the grocery store when Matt bought the things I needed for this week's baking, so you can imagine his reaction later that evening when he asked me, "I could understand the butterscotch and the peanuts, but what in the world do you need chow mein noodles for?!" haha!

These are super simple {you see, that's a common theme here, haha} and yummy!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 7

So, I have another cookie recipe for you! These Ginger Cookies are so good! I love Ginger Snaps, so I knew I should try these.

I actually found this recipe in a cookbook at my Memaw and Papa's house years ago, and it's a great recipe.

HOWEVER, I must warn you, do not, I repeat, DO NOT, follow these ingredient measurements unless you're actually planning to make a lot of cookies. Yeah, for some reason, this year, I forgot that this recipe yields 14 1/2 DOZEN cookies. You totally read that right. Oh well, more cookies to go around!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 6

I know I've been a little MIA since Thursday, but don't you worry, I still have plenty of yummy recipes to share with you!

Friday, I was making a Christmas treat to share with you all which didn't quite turn out as planned, and we didn't have many baking ingredients left, so I decided Saturday I'd make two things.

Come Saturday afternoon after I had gotten home from work, I decided to head over to Martin's, not even thinking about the TONS of people that were already there trying to stock up for this ice/snow/precipitation storm we're currently having.  I walked in Martin's, saw that the lines were backed up down the aisles, turned around and walked right back out the store! No WAY was I going to even try

25 Days of Christmas: Day 5

This DEFINITELY is not a Christmas cookie recipe to share, but my gosh this Trash is good! No, really, it's called Trash...or Puppy Chow...or whatever other crazy name you can think of!

It's the perfect combination of sugar, chocolate and peanut butter, and it's so so addicting!

My sister and I love this, and when we'd both be at home for Christmas, you'd always catch us sneaking a handful of this every time we were down in the kitchen ;)

It's quick to make, so go get the ingredients now so you can make yourself some!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 4

I know all three posts so far have been three different cookies, but if you remember on my Day 1 post, I didn't limit myself to sharing only cookies. Tonight is the first night I'm sharing a treat other than cookies, and trust me, you won't be disappointed!

Whenever we go to the fair, our family lovvvvesss the candied/sugared nuts. They're sooo delicious! I happened to come across a recipe for making candied cinnamon almonds in the crock pot, and my gosh, they were definitely super good! Not exactly like the ones at the fair, but still as tasty and addicting! haha

25 Days of Christmas: Day 3

Today's cookies are very festive! I found them online a couple of times, with two different names: Candy Cane Blossoms, and Whoville Cookies.  I, personally, prefer the second name, because I mean come on, who doesn't want to eat a cookie themed around Whoville?! haha

These cookies are so easy to make, fun to make, taste good, and look cute too!

Hope you give them a try and enjoy!

25 Days of Christmas: Day 2

Hope you all enjoyed yesterday's post and are looking forward to more tasty and tempting posts through December 25th!

I found this recipe, and just because of the name, I knew I had to do it for one reason and one reason only! The cookies are called are Valencia Delights, and when my sister studied abroad in Spain, she was in Valencia! Naturally, after making them and realizing what was IN the cookies, I realized Abby was probably the one person who wouldn't even eat the cookies! hahaha. Funny how that works out!  But they turned how super, and were very easy to make!

The best compliment I got about the cookies came from Matt--he said, "They look just like the picture online!"  haha, it's not much, but for me,

25 Days of Christmas: Day 1

Nope, I didn't forget what day it is--I've just been really busy & productive today so far, but I am DEFINITELY doing my 25 Days of Christmas again this year! It took me a while to figure out what this year's theme was going to be, but, I finally figured it out!  I STILL think I'm crazy for what I finally decided to do, but, today is Day 1, it has begun, so there is no turning back now!

This year, I decided that I'm going to 25 days of Christmas baking! That's right, I've been working on gathering and making 25 different recipes of cookies and treats to make for Christmas time--mostly as things that can be given as gifts to family and friends, or just for you to enjoy yourself!  Our families have already been enjoying some of the recipes I've started making so far ;)

Sunday Date Night

Yesterday, we finally went on our date night that we've been planning for months, and I really mean for months! Ever since we found out the actual release date of Catching Fire, Matt said we'd go see it at Cinébistro {yay!}.

Now, for tickets at Cinébistro, they usually don't post the movie times and allow you to buy tickets for anything other than what's playing for that week or so. However, On October 23rd, for some reason I happened to jump ahead to November, just to see if they happened to already have the times for Catching Fire up...and they did! I immediately called Matt and asked if I could go ahead and buy the tickets 1) before they sold out, and 2) because our favorite seats on the end of the third row were still open! So, we've had our printout confirmation of the tickets hanging on the side of the fridge for a month making us more and more anxious and excited about seeing it!

I'm definitely not going into a full movie review at this time, because the movie just came out and I know so many people still have not seen

Our House: The Man Cave

The Matt Man Cave is, what I consider to be, the first mostly finished room in the house. There are still plenty of things Matt would like to add to his room {and many that we are still hoping to add to the rest of the house!}, but his was the first room we painted, the second we bought furniture for {our first was our den furniture set}, and is really coming together the way Matt wants it.

Let me go off on a little tangent right now and say that I ended up HATING when we would describe our house to people, and when we'd mention the man cave, they'd interrupt and ask Matt, "you mean she's letting you have a man cave?"  Um, what's with all this "me letting him" have it? I'm fine with the fact that he has his own room to decorate how he wants and make it really him.  I also have my own room upstairs {which is much further from being finished}, so we both get our own space to decorate.  Okay, that's all of my ranting for now.

DIY Chalkboard

I have had this chalkboard tutorial from one of my favorite blogs in the back of my head for so. long.

Finally, about a month or so ago, I finally found the perfect framed picture to use for my chalkboard! I was so excited--I found it at Goodwill for about $8.00

You need a picture painted on a wooden surface, or at least with a wooden backing--not cardboard--so that it's sturdy enough to use as a chalkboard.  The picture that I found, the paint was pretty textured, so I painted the back of it {and I guess if I ever wanted to have this picture hanging in our house, I still have the option, haha}.

This Week I Love

Time for another post of things I love this week!  I have to admit, it was hard to not write several food related things, or several Christmas related things....Not there's anything wrong with those, I just didn't want all ten things to be food related {at least for now! haha}.

1. Hot Chocolate! I've always enjoyed a nice cup love having a Keurig?} of Hot Chocolate, but I had really been looking forward to having some once we were into Fall. However, with unusually warm weather we've had, I never felt like drinking it.  But, one day last week, I was doing some stuff around the house, and just decided it was time to have some! I put in one of the Swiss Miss K-Cups I got for my birthday, and had it within seconds! {Can I just say how much I

2. Dancing with the Stars! I am really enjoying this season! There are so many of the couples that I like on the show, that it's usually so sad to see who is voted off! One of my all-time favorite dances from this season

Baby Brayden

I have been looking forward to taking these pictures so much!! Last weekend, I got to go and meet little Brayden, when he was about two weeks old! I couldn't believe how tiny and precious he was!

Brayden's mom, Krystina, and I have been talking back and forth since last Spring! She first asked me to take her maternity pictures, so I met with her and Stephen over the summer down near Belle Isle! Now, it has occurred to me that I never shared those pictures, so I'll start with a couple of those before the rest of the sweet pictures from last weekend!

Halloween 2013

I don't know how, but I would swear time is just speeding up and speeding past us so quickly! Much like last week flew by before I could sit down for five seconds and get a blog post up, Halloween approached us way too quickly, and guess who was running around on October 31st, trying to be prepared for the evening that was an hour away? Oh yeah, that was me.  As soon as I left work, I went to Target to dodge the people who were still buying Halloween candy {we've been stocked up on candy for weeks!} because we still needed pumpkin carving kits....Yeah, we started carving our pumpkins at approximately 5:15 on Halloween.  And yes, we had 2 trick-or-treaters come WHILE we were still carving our pumpkins!

Anyway, despite the craziness of getting our pumpkins carved within one hour and our families arriving, Halloween was great! All of our parents and Matt's grandparents came over and we got to see all of the trick-or-treaters in our neighborhood.  We even met some of our

Food For Friday: Fall Chex Mix

When it comes to food, especially food I find on Pinterest, I'm usually better at what I find to bake, than the things I find to cook.  Yes, there's a big difference. haha. When I bake things,  there's a much higher percentage that it will actually turn out right!

As soon as I saw this recipe on Pinterest, I knew I was going to try it!  Now, the recipe really calls it Halloween Chex Mix, but I changed the recipe just a little bit, and it turned out looking more "Fall" than "Halloween." haha.  You'll see!

This Week I Love...

I wanted to start something new, kind of like a little "series," where I just share things I'm currently loving.  It can be anything from food, TV shows, the weather, etc.....after reading this, you'll see how random the lists can be! I think I'll title them, "This Week I Love...," which is pretty self explanatory, haha.  So, here's the first one!

1. The fall weather--While I do miss the warmer weather, I'm glad to be able to wear scarves again! I love scarves!

2. Target Cartwheel App--If you haven't tried this, you definitely need to! Especially if you're like me and make several trips to Target in a week! ;)  I had seen several deals on the app for 20% of cardigans, long sleeved shirts, etc., but Mom told me that Target already had all of their cardigans marked down AND you can use to extra 20% off! So, I went last night to grab a new cardigan! You can only use one of each deal during a single transaction, but you can use the deal up to six

Favorite Halloween Movies

If you read my blog last year, then you already know just about all of my favorite Christmas movies.  If you missed it, you can find them all starting here!

Since tomorrow is the beginning of ABCFamily's 13 Nights of Halloween, I thought I should definitely compile a list of my favorite Halloween movies. And, okay, a couple of them are TV shows, not movies, but I included them in my favorite Christmas movies, so it's okay to include them now, too. haha.  My list ranges from good series movies, such as the Halloweentown movies, to Hocus Pocus-a classic!, and The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown.

So, in no particular order, here they are!

It's Beginning to Look a lot Like Fall!

I've had so much fun decorating for Fall this year! I've just been so very excited for all of the holidays coming up!!

Our excitement and love for Fall is shown all throughout our house, as we've bought some pretty great decorations!

I could try to come up with a mumble-jumble of words to fill in this space, but I'd rather just show you pictures!

Our Wedding: Candy Bar

If you asked every guest to our wedding if they received their favor, my guess would be that at least 75% of our guests DID NOT. The only reason I'm making this assumption is because of the huge amount of candy we're STILL eating from the wedding!!

We had a candy bar set up, displayed with a variety of candies --yes, all within our color scheme, with the exception of the yellow Starbursts..haha-- for our guests to fill up a treat bag to take home.  However, I'm guessing not many people walked over to that area of the room, or didn't stop by to take a look, because like I said, we have so much candy leftover!!

Mom and I searched for various size jars and glasses to display the candy on the table.  We also bought plastic bags and silver twist ties for guests to fill and take with them at the end of the night.  And, because we like deals so much, we found tons of sheets of letter stickers at Dollar Tree, marked down to 25 cents a sheet, so we bought ALL of the Ns, because we figured we'd probably find a use for them for wedding

State Fair of Virginia

Last Sunday, we went to the State Fair and I was SO excited we were able to go, because we all hadn't been in several years! I love everything about the fair, and this year was no exception!

The only complaint I would have, would be the high-80 degree weather on the last day of the fair. Um..in my book, it's supposed to be "hoodie weather" when the fair is here! haha.  Okay, now that the complain is out of the way, time for the fun stuff!

We walked around looking at the animals, went inside the agriculture buildings looking at all the prize vegetables, pies, jams, etc., and all of the different crafts! I love looking at all the crafty things in there.  We went inside mine and Abby's favorite building with all of the booths set up..because we can usually find some cute stuff in there to buy! Unfortunately, no such luck this year, but she did get some of the candied almonds and shared with me :)  We watched a little roping,

Longwood University's Oktoberfest

I'm so glad that even though I've graduated, I've still been able to go to Oktoberfest each year!  It's always so fun watching the parade, the Spirit Leaders and Klowns performances, and walking through all the booths! What was really weird this year, was that I saw so few familiar faces working the booths--I guess that's what happens when you've been gone almost two years.

This year's Oktoberfest was 90s themed! How awesome! It was so fun to see all the fun ways the booths were decorated {you'll see pictures of them below!} and the song choices played throughout were awesome!

I snagged this picture to the right from the Longwood University Mortar Board page, because I definitely wanted to share the fun Spirit Day themes.....and can we talk about how awesome the logo is???

You may remember my post from last year about Oktoberfest, when Abby was a Spirit Leader!  Unfortunately, I neglected to post all my pictures from Oktoberfest during my senior year, when Matt was a Klown, and I was on Mortar Board contributing to the planning and working of Oktoberfest :(

Hope you enjoy my pictures of this extremely HOT Oktoberfest!! {What was with all the 90 degrees last week/weekend and then all the cloudiness/rain this past week?? Definitely some crazy Virginia weather we've been seeing...}

Friday Randomness

To say that I'm SO glad it's Friday and I'm ready for the weekend would be a huge understatement!  This week has gone by SO. SLOW. Tuesday through Thursday, I woke up thinking it was Friday, and Thursday night, I went to bed thinking I'd wake up and it would be Saturday! Talk about a disappointment! haha.

This week has also been crazy hectic.  Which is why you've only seen one blog post this week before today's.  I had plans for different posts each day, but I've just been drained each day that I haven't been able to or felt like it some nights.

I do have lots of new pictures to share, and I'm hoping you'll see a lot of those next week!

For now, here's just a bulleted list of things we've been up to lately and random thoughts:

• Last Saturday, we took a trip to Longwood for Oktoberfest!  We

Matt's Record Player

About a month ago, Matt bought a new "toy" for his Man Cave.  He's been talking about getting a record player for so long, and even I'll admit that I'm excited about it now.  We've both had fun going through the record sections at various Goodwills to see what we can find. 

So far, there's a WIDE range of records in the collection, but my favorites include Elvis, various Christmas albums, The Beach Boys, and even a story recording of Peter Pan! haha. 

Since we've both enjoyed the records we have so far, I can't wait to see what others we come across in the future.

Enjoy these few pictures of Matt checking out his record player for the first time!

This One's For the Girls

Today, like most days, I couldn't decide what I wanted to blog about.

I have many "go-to" posts on my blogging calendar, with things that I want to post about, but will just do it when I feel like it, haha.

I was almost going to skip posting today {which seems to happen often these days...}, but then this morning at work, I received an email from a co-worker that was sent out to more of our co-workers, as well.  It was too good not to share! After Ms. Brown and I read it {I work with her in the front office!}, I said to her that it was just one of those emails that makes you feel good!

So, I'm passing it along to all of you and hope it will make you feel good, too!

The Beach Boys

When I first found out The Beach Boys were going to be here in Richmond, I knew I had to go!

Matt recently bought a Beach Boys album that we've listened to several times, so I was already in the mood to go!

Last Wednesday, Mom and I each left work, changed real quick and were back out the door to head out to Innsbrook!  We got some dinner, and went to find a place to put our chairs!  Without saying what food we had in particular, the food we bought for dinner was just unbearable.  I will say that it was supposed to have some "kick" to it, but it just tasted all wrong, and we each threw away over half our plates! But, we did make up for it later by buying funnel cakes! :)

If you follow me on Instagram, that you've probably already seen these videos.  I knew I was probably annoying everyone by posting them, but I really wanted to have videos saved from the concert {and the regular video camera on my phone is always questionable..}.

Fall Favorites

For some reason, I have been looking forward to fall a lot this year!  I think it started around the time I made our wreath, and then Matt said we needed to start decorating for fall, and then his favorite, Halloween!

Ever since, I've been looking forward to all things Fall related!  Plus, I'm just really excited to have all of our own space to decorate! {I know he's dreading the day the Christmas decorations all come out, though. haha!}

To start of the week, and since we're officially a week into Fall, I thought I would share some of my favorite things about Fall!

Food For Friday: Cherry Coke Chicken

When I was home during the summer, I was always looking for new crock pot recipes to try.  They're easy to prepare and good to eat.

I found this barbeque chicken was a great discovery, from Pinterest of course.  At first, I was very hesitant about it, but then I remembered I've had something similar to it!

My absolute FAVORITE meal from Cinebistro is their ribs in a Cherry Coke BBQ sauce.  This chicken didn't taste the same {because how awesome would that have been??}, but it was definitely worth trying, and I'll for sure make it again sometime!

Here's the recipe that I found online, but I ended up halving it for the two of us.  However, I did add in more than half a can of Cherry Coke, because I really wanted it to be flavorful, haha.

Our Fall Wreath

It feels like I just shared my summer/wedding wreath with you all, but a couple weeks ago, we took that wreath down and replaced it with a new one!

Since yesterday was the official first day of fall, I figured it's now time to share with you the fall wreath I made!  I had this idea since the summer, so I couldn't wait to finally make it and hang it up! And we didn't wait two seconds to hang it up!

Once school starts, it feels like summer is really over {even though it isn't officially over yet}, so we started putting out some fall decorations, and this wreath was the first to go up! :)

The materials I bought were the wreath, a stem of fall leaves, twine, and a letter N.  All of these were at Michael's, and I was SO excited to find the N in the clearance section for just 49 cents! And, if you've been

Married Life: Meal Planning, Grocery Shopping & Fuel Perks

I know..this title sounds so exciting already. haha.

When it comes to shopping, I'm always looking for a good deal! Red tags and Clearance sections are my best friends in a store (especially Target!), outlet and factory stores are amazing, and I love coupons!  I RARELY by anything for full price.

When buying our food and drinks to have at the house, I wouldn't say that Matt and I are cheap.  I would just say we use our money in the most reasonable ways possible for us. {I realize it's not the same for everyone.}  Instead of spending roughly $100.00 a week eating out every night, we spend almost $100.00 a week to buy everything we need for breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and snacks for the week + whatever we might need, like paper towels, toilet paper, laundry detergent, etc.  But those last few things aren't every week purchases.

On Sunday afternoons, we'll figure out what we want to have for dinner each night of the week.  From there, we see what meats we need to buy, what side dishes we want to have, etc.  I use the same notebook every week to write our grocery list down.  The left side of the page is designated for what we need to buy, and the right side of the page is our dinner plan.  {After we get home from shopping, I cut out the dinner plan and keep it on the fridge for the week!}

We do ALL of our grocery shopping at Martin's.  After making our list, we'll make sure we have a Sunday paper with a Martin's ad and go through to see what deals there are

Matt's Grandparent's 50th Anniversary

This weekend, Matt and I were just talking about how ever since we've been together, we've been to almost all family events for each others' family....with the exception of our first Thanksgiving together, when we'd only been together a few months, and I later told him I didn't know I was "allowed" to bring him. haha.

What's neat about having been to so many of these events, is that we've been there for a lot of major milestones.  We've seen some of each others' cousins basically grow up from the time they were born.  I just think that's really cool!

At the end of August, Matt's grandparents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary!  It was such a fun event, and I LOVED all of the details that Matt's mom put together for the dinner at the Boathouse!  I initially planned to do this blog post last Thursday, on Matt's mom's birthday, but once we got home from her birthday dinner and were

Food For Friday: Reese Cup Pie

Back in July, Matt and I had two of our friends from Longwood, Ashley & Zack, over for dinner.  Matt was going to be grilling steaks & veggies so I wanted to make dessert!

Naturally, I've come across MANY desserts on Pinterest, but I wanted something that would be relatively easy, taste good, and most everyone would like it! And, everyone did.....well, as far as I know! haha.

For me, I also needed something with easy directions.  This is coming from someone who messed up boxed macaroni and cheese.  Twice.  Luckily, the directions were dummy proof, and I successfully made a good, edible dessert!  {Notice, that I seem to always say that I made something "edible." haha.  I can always make things, but they may not always be edible or good! haha}

Even though it's a frozen dessert and might seem more summery, I

Our Experience at the Redskins Preseason Game

I know, I know, I DIDN'T post a blog yesterday.  I had every intention to {according to my blog calendar}, but, due to several things, I just needed a break!

Several weeks ago, Matt and I had a once in a lifetime opportunity.  Seriously.  We were able to do something we'll most likely never get to do again. 

And we have to give a big thanks to Matt's brother--unfortunately, he wasn't able to use these tickets he got, so he shared them with us! I will forever be thankful because it was so cool!

Neither Matt or I had ever been to a big sporting event before.  I mean, we've been to baseball games here in Richmond, but honestly, those aren't BIG. You know what I mean?  So, number 1: this was our first time going to a big game like this!  Number 2: we got to watch the game from the Cintas Corporate Box. Super cool!