New Baby

No.  I am not pregnant.

But, my new pride and joy was delivered yesterday and I am so excited!

Goodbye old, dirty, energy-sucking fridge.

Hello gorgeous.

She was on sale so we had to buy her!  For the past few years, every time we go to Lowes or Home Depot I check out this fridge.  I couldn't hold out any longer.  As you can see though, the fridge is quite larger than the previous sooo we are going to be knocking down the wall that leads into the dining room.  There goes all my new paint in the dining room but it's a good price to pay!

The fridge was only in the house for about 15 minutes before Rory started knocking down walls. He loves his man-work.

Now, I am left with a kitchen that looks like this.

Very good progress in less than an hour!  After we take down the wall we plan on renovating the rest of the kitchen…the projects never stop.  I will fill you in on our kitchen adventure as it unfolds!

Flavored Greek Yogurt

Before I talk about yogurt, I just have to show off one of my favorite sights.  Those little thighs are so squeezably delicious!

Any who, onto yogurt….

I have been on the greek yogurt bandwagon for awhile now but my one of my New Years resolutions is to eliminate some processed sugars from my diet (flavored coffee creamer is going to be the hardest!).  I just had to quickly share my new-ish take on adding flavor to plain greek yogurt.  Back in college, I babysat for a geology professor and they ate extremely healthy.  One odd thing I took away from the family was that the wife used to strain plain yogurt with cheese cloth to make it thick. This was before greek yogurt hit the shelves.  She then added zest, nuts, and fruit to the yogurt and stored it in a tupperware container in the fridge.  It was always my favorite snack when I would babysit!

I also like that there are different variations I can play around with, rather than just sticking with the pre-flavored yogurts sold in the store.

My favorite flavored greek yogurt consists of:

Plain greek yogurt

Orange zest 

Drizzle of honey/agave nectar

Walnuts

Dried cranberries

I have also done lemon zest and fresh blueberries…and of course a drizzle of honey.  One day, maybe in the summer, I will do lime zest.  Maybe with some chocolate chips as a dessert?  If I "create" any other yummy flavors I will be sure to pass them along!

Ok.  Just one more Deaglan photo.  Or three.  I gave him a cracker with a little bit of cream cheese.  Coolest snack ever.

 Smell test.

Christmas & New Years

Christmas equals chaos.  Here's a little recap on our last few weeks...

So far this winter we've had a decent amount of snow compared to years past.  It is actually snowing right now! It was exciting to have about 8 inches fall a few weeks before Christmas.  Deaglan wasn't very entertained with the snow like I was hoping he would be.  I kept throwing him in it but he would just stare at me with the, "seriously, mom?" look. At least I am entertained by it!

With a lot of snow and ice, it was difficult to spend time outside.  So, D and I went a little stir crazy but he did discover that the iPad is pretty cool.

 I baked a lot of cookies this year.  I cringe at how many pounds of butter I bought…and ate.  Tis the season!  I kept Deaglan busy one afternoon with a peanut butter jar that was empty. Ok, yes, I treat him like a dog sometimes but it's not my fault he likes to fetch balls & lick peanut butter jars.

I gave Grandma & Grandpa Brannan the task of decorating a gingerbread house with Deaglan.  They did all the work, while D ate the frosting.  Maybe next year he will lend more of a helping hand!

I think it's cute. Others disagree.

Our neighborhood has a cute tradition that we were able to take part in this year.  Santa comes around the neighborhood on a fire truck in the afternoon (we missed him :-( ). Later at night the neighborhood roads are lit with luminary candles and everyone gathered a few doors down from us for a bonfire, hot chocolate, and Christmas carols.  We walked down for just a few minutes to check out the massive fire and visit with a few friends.  I was quite impressed!

Since it is Maryland, a few days after the snow, it was about 70 degrees outside.  Most of the snow melted and I put Rory and my father-in-law to work trimming the bushes in the front of the house.  The bushes haven't been trimmed in over 25 years and were seriously 8 feet tall.  They needed to go.

It took about 5 runs to the dump to get rid of all of the "trimmings."

Now the house looks naked but in the springtime it will be nice to get some new landscaping and see if any of the bushes survived the great trim of 2013.

Hot days in December call for this to occur…

Oh, and Rory grew a beard.

 Luckily, the warm weather didn't last long and I got back into the Christmas feeling.  We took Deaglan to a local nursery that has a large display of fake Christmas trees.  Each tree is decorated with a different theme.  He enjoyed all the lights and colors!

He also did a pretty good job staying away from our tree.  I was hesitant to put ornaments on, especially the ones that look like balls.  He only took a few off here and there but then would try to put it back on the tree.  The cutest thing was that whenever a small piece of a  branch fell off he would find it and throw it back on the tree. I failed miserably at trying to get a picture of him by the tree!  Oh and we didn't trim the bottom of the tree after we purchased it and the sap resealed it.  Our tree didn't drink an ounce of water over the past month!  It is so crispy and dry but it still looks good and barely dropped needles.

Once again, I was excited to have a mantle to decorate and we enjoyed our first fire of the season on Christmas night!

We spent Christmas Eve/day at my parents house and then we had Rory's parents and some of my family over for Christmas night.  We had a very non-traiditonal Christmas Chili night.  My mother-in-law brought up a white chili and I made a traditional red.  It was such a simple meal but hardy and Rory wants it to become a new Christmas tradition.  Everyone was very skeptical on our meal choice but hopefully they won't be opposed to it next year...

 I am excited to announce that Rory got me this awesome camera for Christmas!  My old Canon stopped working this summer and I've sadly gotten really used to taking pictures with my cellphone.  I am looking forward to learning how to work this bad boy!!

 The past week, I have been taking random photos whenever I can to practice lighting/flash/zoom, etc.

Deaglan is enjoying all of his Christmas gifts.  He is learning how to be a basketball star...


A golf pro…

and just a styling' boy.

The Saturday after Christmas, Rory came downstairs with a fu manchu.  I wanted to cry. We went to Ikea during the day, and a girl that worked there turned around to ask if we needed help and started laughing at him.  I seriously can't believe I went in public with him.  We stayed in the rest of the weekend.  I was happy when he shaved it all Monday morning.

We spent the day before New Years hanging out with my good friend Susan.  We hung out like college days.  I actually went to a happy hour with her.  I can't tell you the last time I went to a real happy hour!  We had laughs and enjoyed playing Mario the rest of the night.  Yes. Mario.  Mario is awesome.  It is our winter game!

 

We spent New Years Eve at a friend's house where they fixed a delicious dinner!  We just hung around, watched the ball drop, and spent the night. We are to a point in our life where simplicity is the best.   Rory and I were very pleased that D slept in for us!!  That's a great way to start the new year.

I hope that everyone has a happy & healthy 2014!!!