Friday's Letters

Dear Readers... (If any of you are still out there)  I truly apologize for the blog silence lately.  No good excuses (as I believe I said last time, haha) just life, sicknesses, holidays, laziness.  But thank you for sticking around!

Dear Other Blogs I Read... I don't know how you guys do it!  I assume some of you have little helper elves or something to keep you posting on the regular.  You inspire me.  (Particularly any of you working moms.  How??)

Dear House...  We are working on getting you re-financed.  Not QUITE as difficult as buying you was, but certainly not an easy process, either.  Hopefully by March 1st we will be done with this and have lower house payments!

Dear Influenster... I know, I know.  I need to blog about my Cosmo VoxBox.  It's not you, or the stuff in the box, I just haven't been blogging at all!  I will say my favorite thing in the box was the razor.  :-)  Maybe I'll get around to blogging about the rest sometime soon.

Dear Rain... Please go away by Sunday so I can go to Disneyland! 

Weekend Rewind!

Here we are. Monday again.  Luckily, it's kind of like Wednesday this week! ;-)

This is gonna have to be quick as I was feeling crappy last night, so didn't take time to prep my post!

Friday...

I bought a couple more frames at Goodwill!  

I am planning to attack the map wall project over the 4 day weekend.  haha  Wish me luck!

I also bought this wooden carved cake plate thing....?

 It's kind of funky & big...but I like it!  I'll figure out somewhere to put it eventually.  

(BF is not a big fan so...going to need to be creative. I called and texted a pic from the Goodwill but he didn't answer so...too bad!)

Saturday... 

 - My BF got up WAY TOO EARLY and went dirtbike riding.

- My MIL arrived for her Thanksgiving week off. 

(I know we did not get the whole week off when I was in school!)

- I did some tidying up of the house, a bit of laundry, all that fun stuff... to the background accompaniment of Mary Poppins.  :-)

- Saturday night we went to the horse show, Valitar! (Post coming!)  It was a good time.

Sunday...

Nothing too exciting.  We switched our dryer door!  It's been opening "the wrong way" for the past year, since we bought it.  So that was actually kind of exciting.  haha 

(Oh, home ownership.)

A bit more laundry, sweeping etc with Mamma Mia in the background.  :-)

Started feeling kind of crappy toward the afternoon.  So I kind of lazed around while my boyfriend made some salsa to stock up the fridge.  Heaven forbid he ever has less than 12 condiments to choose from. ;-)

All grilled and ready to blend up salsa ingredients!

I'll be working from home tomorrow and then one more day in the office... and THEN?  

FOUR DAYS OFF!  Woo hoo! 

Linking up my weekend with these lovely ladies!

Weekend Rewind

This weekend seemed kind of long even though it was just the regular two days... 

I wish I was in Canada celebrating Thanksgiving, or had some kind of job where I got Columbus Day off, so I had a 3 day weekend!

Alas, I work at a regular old office job (non- government) and have to work today.

Source: Uploaded by user via Cynthia on Pinterest

It probably felt long, though, because we spent it doing tons of chores.  

(Or what felt like tons of chores to me.)   

So...sorry if this post seems a little bit like...well, a long list of chores. haha

Friday...

I filled up on gas before driving home from work. (it was $4.49/gallon and rising... it was actually $4.69 by my house Friday morning so I figured $4.49 was a good "deal" WTF gas companies?? Stop being so greedy!)

Watched some baseball (and read some blogs and started some drafts) when I got home.

We ate Thai food take out for dinner. #yummmy

Saturday...

I did tons and tons of laundry.

I swept about 1000 sq ft of hardwood, about three times.   

Dog hair!!  And he is not even an inside dog.  Grrr...

I did some preliminary kitchen cleaning. We (ok, I) don't do much housework during the week so the counter always has Starbucks cups, dirty dishes, empty food containers, etc. on it. I did a counter "sweep", took recycling out, trashed the trash, put the dishes in the sink, wiped crumbs off the counters. (TMI..?)

We went grocery shopping for Sunday.  We were planning to make various salsas (boyfriend's department), Caprese bites, and a pear/ricotta crostini that I found on Pinterest.  It was fun picking different peppers out. We got 4 kinds.

And...then we went to the diner for dinner.  Yes I have been there twice in one week.  He was craving pancakes!  :-)  I had Benedict.

Source: someecards.com via Cynthia on Pinterest

Sunday....

I did MORE sweeping and then vacuumed all of the area rugs and small mats by the doors.

I finished the kitchen, actually cleaned the counters & finished the dishes.

Did MORE laundry.  Put away all that laundry!  I also helped the BF do an "autumn" cleaning out of his clothes. (I need to do this, seriously.)

We (mostly he) cleaned the bathroom and the laundry closet room.  

I watered all the house plants. 

And the I prepped/gathered food for salsa/dinner making.

 Then I took a little break (while he mowed the lawn) and watched about 3 innings of baseball before we got started in the kitchen. 

My BF loves to make different kinds of salsa.  He grilled all the tomatoes, peppers and onions to make some smoky salsas this time. While he was doing that we had a tri-tip marinating, and I was working on the Caprese bites!  (Pear/ricotta crostinis are getting a rain check until tonight.) Really all I did was cute the basil leaves off their stems, rinse the grape tomatoes, and cut the little mozzarella balls in half. Stab them with toothpicks, pour some balsamic dressing for dipping, and dig in!  :-)  My favorite kind of recipe.  Quick and easy. 

Then we ate our trip-tip, watched the finale of The Great Food Truck Race (on DVR, I know it ended a couple weeks ago!) and hung out with this handsome guy for a bit. (Gunney is allowed inside in the evenings, only on the rug in the living room!  Too much hair & his nails scratch the very expensive hard wood floors.) (And we only have one dog this week, Juliet went home with my MIL for a while.)

Not a very exciting weekend, but quite productive, if I do say so myself. 

Linking up with English and Sami! 

Pottery... Part 2

I realized while writing this post that there were waaaay too many pics for one sitting. 

So, here is part two! 
These are all pieces that we have on our house, 
courtesy of my father in law's talented hands.   



Office/Bookshelves...

Most of these are on my bookshelves in our office. They are some of the coolest looking pieces we have, but not always functional.  One day I hope to put up some wall shelves in our kitchen/dining/living area and have them more visible to guests.   

You can put scented oil inside of these diffusers and the porous bottom halves allow the scent to leak out into the air. 

This is one of my favorites.  I chose it as a graduation gift from high school.  
If we ever break up?  This piece is mine.  ;-)

I actually made this.  Obviously.  I couldn't make a straight sided box.

If we ever have flowers, this is where they go. 

All of his lids fit so perfectly.  He really is talented. 

Other Places....

This is one shelf in my mother-in-law's closet.  And she has another complete house full of pottery.  ha!

This is in my mother-in-law's room. 

And that completes today's tour of mi casa and the pottery that decorates our daily lives.  Thanks for stopping by.  :-)