Shop 'Till You Drop!

Has anyone been Christmas shopping? On "Black Friday" perhaps? 

Friday morning around 6:30 AM Me, my Mom and Jeff all headed down to Cabela's to check out their sales. We saved tons of $ moolah $ , got a few presents for my Dad and stood in a very long line to check out. To my surprise, they had us in a line that wrapped around the whole store and still got us out of there in about a 20 min wait time. AWESOME! Kudos Cabelas.

Later in the day (much later) we went to Target, Old Navy and Kohls to see what deals they might still have. I was SOO happy with Target's deals .. I probably saved over $100 right there. Then Old Navy had the jeans that Jeff and I both wear HALF PRICE (which to me says: BUY ONE GET ONE FREE!) and so we got some jeans that we both really needed. Kohls was a major disappointment. I was shopping for one item of clothing in partciular for my sister (which I can not name because she might be reading haha) and it was only 20% off ... apparently they didn't get the memo about Black Friday.

Overall, I was REALLY happy with the experiences I've had shopping ... I didn't run into any crazy mace spraying people or see anyone get trampled so all in all a good day!

Happy Thanksgiving!

There are so many things to be thankful for this year .. and every year that it's a shame we don't think about it more often. But non the less, it is Thanksgiving and we are oh so grateful for everyone and everything that we have in our lives. 

This Thanksgiving I am thankful for the strange and yet awesome gift of having my parents to myself for the day. With Emma & Jimmy living in California we decided to have a small Thanksgiving together, just the three of us. Mom and I have been cooking, cleaning, prepping and I can't wait to eat. It's a low key Thanksgiving this year and I'm enjoying every second of it.

Here's hoping you are all having a wonderful Thanksgiving with your families.

"Thank you, Father, for having created us and given us to each other in the human family. Thank you for being with us in all our joys and sorrows, for your comfort in our sadness, your companionship in our loneliness. Thank you for yesterday, today, tomorrow and for the whole of our lives. Thank you for friends, for health and for grace. May we live this and every day conscious of all that has been given to us"

 From The Catholic Prayer Book, compiled by Msgr. Michael Buckley.

Those Turkey's Didn't Stand A Chance!

Some of you may have seen this post where I made Crafty Thanksgiving Turkeys for Daycare (and Sean's birthday!)

So to follow up, I thought I would show you the kids scarfing gobbling (haha, I crack myself up) them down ;)
Happy Birthday Sean!

Crafty Thanksgiving Turkey Treats

Hi There Blogland!

As many of you may know, I am LOVING Pinterest ... this is a site where you can pin ideas to a virtual cork board and come back to them later .. idea collecting .. if you will.

Here is my Pinterest .. comment on this blog with your email if you need an invite to the site ;)

So .. with that being said - one of my pins / ideas was by The Idea Room - I found these Oreo Cookie Turkeys and knew I would have to make them for daycare before Thanksgiving break! If you click on The Idea Room link above there are step by step instructions.

So here's what I used:

• Double Stuffed Oreo's & Regular Oreo's
• Whoppers
• Candy Corn
• Miniature Reese's
• Frosting (for the glue to stick it together)

 

  

 

 

If you have any questions, just let me know! I may still add a face ... and maybe a beak of some sort, but honestly this project didn't go as well as I had hoped.

The Oreo's were breaking and the frosting wasnt sticking (it needed to sit) so with patience I could have done more ... but I'm saving my patience for the kids instead ;)

But I still think they are cute! What do you think?

Crafty Christmas Planner

Hey Guys!

Do you read the awesome stuff from the lovely ladies at eighteen25 ?
If not, you should.

That link is actually a link for a project they made recently with FREE printables which is super fun. I LOVE printables. They made an awesome Christmas Planner and the second I saw it, my mind said "MOM!"

For as long as I can remember, my mom keeps a list of the gifts she has gotten everyone so that #1 she doesn't forget anything and #2 to make sure that my sister and I have "a even present list". So I made this bad boy for her .. inspired by the one at eighteen25! (mine is slightly different in that I made her tabs "Calendar", "Tara & Jeff", "Emma & Jimmy", "Ron", and "Stockings & Other Gifts"

:) She has been using it, so I guess that means it's working pretty well for her!! Yay!)

Here's most of what I used:

• Composition notebook (size: 9 3/4 by 7 1/2)
• Some Christmas 12x12 pattern paper 
• Adhesive ( I think I'm going to redo the front cover with rubber cement)
• Paper cutter
• 2 -  6"x9" envelopes with clasps
• A stapler
• Pen

On the inside of the back binding, I have another envelope just like this one for receipts too.

Merry Early Christmas Shopping!

Introducing Sara Peterson Designs

Hi There!

If you are a repeat reader ... you might have noticed that cute little "Sara Peterson Design" button on my sidebar over there (see right)... 

If you haven't seen it: Check out the Sara Peterson Design website here! My Cousin, Sara has started a blog design company ... she designed this beautiful blog of mine, actually! ;)

Please check out her new site ... she is really great at making your blog shine and loves blogging & scrapbooks which inspire her great taste and artistic eye! 

Now, she's family so I could go on for days about how great she is ... but check out her site and see for yourself! You won't be sorry!

Weekly Meal Plan for The Week Of November 14th

Hi There!

Next week's meal plans are as follows:

Monday - Cobb Salad (we didn't get to have this the week before as planned because of busy schedules)

Tuesday - Chicken Fried Rice

Wednesday - Chicken & Cheese Tortellini

Thursday - Hot Dogs and Fries

Friday - Go out!

Saturday & Sunday: Enjoy leftovers and go out!

Let me know if you need any recipes :)

I'm Dreaming Of A White Christmas

Just like the one's I used to know....

Jeff and I went Downtown Detroit, Tuesday to Andiamo's on the river for dinner and then saw White Christmas at The Fox Theatre ... we had an amazing night :)

The dancing was awesome ... the music was incredible 

... and of course so is this stud for taking me.

(Darkest picture ever? Yes.)

(Blurriest picture ever? Yes. But it was really beautiful)

Hope your week is going as well as mine! :)

Weekly Meal Plan for The Week Of November 7th

Hey Meal Plan Followers!

Leave a comment, I would love to hear from you .. if you exist! :)


Here is the menu for this week:

Monday - Grilled Cheese with Soup

Tuesday - Philly Steak Wraps .. haven't made this one before :)

Wednesday - Cobb Salad

Thursday - Turkey, Cheese Cresent Roll Ring (by Pampered Chef .. and altered by us!)

Friday - GO OUT of course!


I might be moving a few of these around because of our plans Tuesday night ...
We are going to see White Christmas, The Musical! I'm SoOoOoOoO excited!

Happy Eating,
Tara

A Beautiful Fall Day

As promised ... here are some pictures of us playing in the yard and in the fall leaves.

I'll just let the pictures do the talking today.

Weekly Meal Plan for The Week Of October 17th

If you're reading this thinking .. what the heck, I've already seen this ... you probably have. I accidently deleted it :/ sorry.

Here's our meal plan for this week! Don't forget to message / comment for the recipes!
Here we go:
Monday - Chicken BLT Pizza
Tuesday - Vegetable Primavera (by Pampered Chef - and I'll be adding chicken)
Wednesday - Meatloaf
Thursday - Hot Oven Subs

 Friday - Go Out! 

A few things:
-Usually I choose what we will have for the next week on Thursday. This gives me time to get all the stuff in the house (grocery store trip ...)
-I only plan out our dinners. Lunches are usually left overs or sandwiches.
-I only plan Monday through Thursday so that Friday we can go out to eat and have left overs on the weekend.
-We always have a vegetable. I won't lie: I never think about that ahead. We keep the following in at all times: carrots, frozen green beans, frozen broccoli, frozen corn, frozen potato of some variety ... so I have plenty to choose from.
- I keep the list on our white board by the back door. Nice and simple, everyone can see it, I won't forget about it.

Happy Eating Bloggers! Love,Tara

Fall Leaves

We played in the leaves today .. It was a GORGEOUS day! Enjoy this little picture and there's more to come later!

Weekly Meal Plan for The Week Of October 31st

Hi there!

I know it's late .. But here's what we are having this week!

Monday - Spaghetti

Tuesday - Hot Chicken Salad Casserole

Wednesday - Chicken Stroganoff

Thursday - Nachos

Friday - Go out!


Let me know if anyone wants any recepies! :)