Vacation

Earlier this month we went on vacation with my family. We had such a great time, thanks mom and dad! Even when it rained, we would still have fun playing games inside. We played the longest game of uno ever! Plus, Ethan kept us entertained with his dancing and playing peek-a-boo. And even though he is usually stingy with his kisses, he gave Aunt Rachel lots of them! It was really fun watching him on the boat too, he loved it and Uncle Eric even let him drive one day. Josh and Kim even got to come down for a couple of days too (it was so great spending time with you guys). Here are a few pictures of our trip.

Josh and Kim waiting for fireworks

My crazy brother!

Isn't he so cute!
We're too cool!
In the outfit Mimi and Papa found. So cute!

Uncle Drew couldn't have all the fun!

Margarita cookies

For Christmas this year I decided to give my father-in-law a subscription to my very own cookie of the month club. In other words, I would bake him cookies once a month this year. It was a hit, in fact, I think he wants to continue this next year. Which is great since he is soooo hard to shop for! I've been trying to get creative with this and find new recipes and also try to develop a few of my own. Well last month, I developed the best batch yet! These turned out to be his favorite so far and everyone else just raved about them also. Needless to say, they didn't last long. I've still got a little tweeking to do before I share the recipe, so be patient. Below is a picture of them in these really great plastic mararita glasses I found at Target. Oh, by the way, the pink ones are strawberry margarita (strawberry glaze on top).

Snakes on a barge

As many of you know, Drew's family has a house on lake Allatoona and we spend almost every weekend in the summer out there. They have this really big boat dock with a maybe 10x10 barge attached that we like to put our lawn chairs on and lay out. I'll post pictures of it if I can find any. Anyway, last year as I was laying on the barge something caught my eye. Right in front of me, in the water was a snake heading to the dock. Since I am quite afraid of snakes, I hightailed it back to the house! Yes, I know it was just in the water and probably not going to get me, but if you're also afraid of snakes, you'd understand! Drew of course did not believe me, "we've never seen any snakes out there" he said. So, I mustered up the courage to back down to get some sun on the barge. Well, this time, as I'm about to lay down on my chair, I see something that resembled an orange rope start to move! As you might imagine, I screamed and jumped onto the dock with Drew. And wouldn't you know, by the time he went to take a look, it was gone. Needless to say, whether he saw it or not, I was not about to get back on that barge. So we sat on the dock and talked for a little while and before going back up to the house Drew decided to take one last look. Sure enough, there was the snake, staring up at him through the boards. "See, I'm not crazy!" I told him. The snake got away that day, but the next week Drew, Clint and Bill went on a little snake hunting trip, armed with their homemade weaponry: a wide paint scraper on a pole, and a divers knife attached by duct tape to a broom handle. Erin and I watched from the porch as they jabbed at the slippery guy. Again, he got away, but not before Clint got a little piece of him! Finally, on the third weekend of trying to kill this snake, Drew got him, cut him into three pieces!

Fast forward to this year, Memorial Day weekend. As we walked down to the lake, we joked about the snake incident from the previous year. "There better not be any snakes waiting for us" Erin joked. Right as Clint puts his chair down Drew says, "hey look, there are two of them laying side by side." Clint got the weapons and they went to work killing them, Drew pinned them with the paint scraper and Clint cut them in pieces with the knife. And then they came back later that afternoon and killed another one while yet a fourth slithered away. Well, guess what, the next weekend, three more! After disposing of those three (though I believe one got away), they decided to pull up the boards to expose the stryrofoam. Well, this weekend, no snakes, though I'm still not getting back on that barge! We think exposing the styrofoam (their hiding place) was what got rid of them, at least for now. I think we are going to just burn the thing and build a new one next year.

So, that is how our weekends at the lake have gone so far this summer. We think it would make for a great sequel to "Snakes on a Plane" as long as Samuel L. Jackson would be on board! Oh, and by the way, they were water moccasins, yikes!

Sausage dip

Okay, last night I brought sausage dip to care group and everyone loved it! I had quite a few requests that I post the recipe on the blog, so here it is:
1 block cream cheese
1 sausage log
1 can rotel
Cook, crumble and drain the sausage. Place sausage, cream cheese and rotel in microwave safe bowl and microwave on high until cheese is melted, stiring every couple of minutes, about five minutes.
It's that easy! For care group I doubled the recipe and used one log regular sausage and one hot, and also one can original rotel and one mild. I also added some lime juice and fresh chopped cilantro.

My new do

Now that my family has seen it, I figured I would post pictures of my new haircut. I've never had it this short before, but I decided that it was time for a change. My stylist did a great job, she said she was proud of me for not getting nervous or freaking out. It's just hair, plus it grows so fast in the summer I figured it wouldn't be a big deal if I didn't like it. I really do like it though, I think I'll stick with it for a while. The great thing is that I can fix it so many different ways, or not at all! What do you think?

Projects

Along with school, work and general home maintenance, Drew and I have also been working on a few other projects lately. It's so nice to have the basement to work on these things.

Here are a couple of pictures of our new gym. Not much, but hopefully enough to whip us into shape!

Drew's new gun smithing table. He made it out of an old drafting table and a door.
Our newest art project: photobox frames. My sister really wanted one of these for Christmas, but they cost around $260. Drew and I decided that we could make one for much less. That way, we could also customize them. I forgot to get a picture of my sister's, but it pretty much looks just like the ones you see in the stores. Since my sis-in-law doesn't really like the antique look of the original ones, we did this one for her.

Update

I realized that I hadn't posted anything in a while, so I figured it was time for an update. The big news around our household right now is that Drew is finally graduating!!! The school still tried to keep him there a little longer. His advisor first told him everything looked good, and then said that he actually needed two more credits because the checklist that he had been going by had a misprint. So he had to appeal so that some of his co-op semesters would count, and thankfully the higher-ups accepted that. I think they just wanted to get more money out of him since every appeal costs like $40 or something. But that is over, all he has to do is buy his cap and gown and walk across a stage on May 10th and he'll officially be done! He's been thinking about taking the Professional Engineering exam, so please pray that God will give him direction on that.

We are still eating well and getting healthier. I have finally convinced Drew that his pants are too big so he bought a smaller size last week and they look great. Now if only I can get him to buy a smaller belt instead of putting more holes in the one he has! I haven't lost that much more, but I'm starting to be able to tell a difference in my clothing. I'm wearing a pair of pants today that I thought were going to be too small! The best thing about this though is that I'm changing my attitude about food. If we go out to dinner, no matter how good I think something might be, I think about how bad it is for me. Plus, that gives me the challenge of trying to make a healthy version at home. I've come up with some pretty tasty recipes! I'm trying to write them down so that I can share them, but it's kind of difficult because I rarely measure any of my spices or other flavorings. But, I will share once I get them all figured out.