Book Review: Committed: A Love Story

Josh has wanted to go back to school to get his MBA since the moment he threw his cap in the air at Concordia.  He patiently waited his turn while I went back to school, while we bought a dog, while we bought a house...  Well guess what?  It's finally his turn!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Last month, he went to an information session.  When reporting back, he let me know that the families of MBA students are called MBA orphans.  After laughing at how silly (and kind of offensive) that is, he turned to me completely serious, "You are going to read so many books."

In fact, I had started one a friend gave me FOREVER ago that very night, Committed: A Love Story by Elizabeth Gilbert.  She is the author of Eat, Pray, Love.  This book is completely different.  It is the story of a personal journey to come to terms with marriage so she and her longtime love could stay together.  She does a lot of reporting on research.  Quite technical.

It is an interesting read, something I would recommend if you wanted to learn more about the history or marriage in a more accessible way than a text book.  It is absolutely not a light, beach read.  It was good, but it did take me over a month to read.

New Favorite: Mulled Wine

We had our second annual Christmas wine tasting party last night.  To supplement the tasting, we wanted to have some other drinks as well.  Josh picked out his beer and I went searching for something else.  I discovered mulled wine on Pinterest. This is the recipe I adapted, and it is super simple.

Crock Pot Mulled Wine
1 bottle of red wine
4 cups of apple cider
1 cinnamon stick
1/4 cup Archer Farms mulling spices
1 orange sliced

Put everything on the crock pot and heat on high until hot.  We heated ours for about 2 hours before the party started and it was nice and warm.

We left all the spices in and as the party went on, it got nice and spicy.  I would say the sweet spot for the spices was at the 4-5 hour mark, but I LOVE Christmas-y spices.  You can filter out the spices when you feel it is done (if it lasts that long).

This is basically warm, Christmas sangria.  Yum!

Family Room Console Table DIY

When we moved into our house, we had an ugly problem in the family room.  The city water meter was just hanging out, in the open.  Yuck.

At about the same time, behind the couch console tables (or shelves) were all the rage on Pinterest.  I showed Josh my idea to cover the meter and he agreed that he liked it.  Fast forward 8 months and we finally started working on it.

We didn't follow a plan at all, just built a top, two legs, and supports.  Except for some minor engineering help from me, Josh made this on his own.  It only took a few hours with staining time.  Super easy, looks nice, and covers the meter.  Win!

Wool Dryer Balls

When I purchased my microfiber cloths, I also purchased two other things.  Sticking with my saving money and being green trend, I purchased wool dryer balls and reusable produce bags.

Puppy cuddles

After getting used to the initial shock of the balls rumbling around in the dryer, I really like what they do.  They do seem to make everything dry faster and more efficiently.  I have heard of people adding essential oils to the dryer balls to give a nice scent.  I only have lemon essential oil, so I will have to invest in another scent to try that one.

If you are looking for a way to improve drying efficiency and time, I would recommend testing these out.  I believe you can get them from Target and some other stores as well as Amazon.  Verdict is still out on the produce bags.  Our meal plan this week only required us to buy cheese and lettuce.  Hooray for pantry shopping!

Hiatus and Budget Cleaning

I have taken a bit of a hiatus lately.  I wasn't having a great time at work and thought that any posts would be a bit of a downer, so decided to just skip it.  A lot has happened since my last post.  We have been doing some projects around the house, attended a few weddings, went on a trip to Hawaii, and my Dad has had coronary bypass surgery.  Whew!

We won the ticket lottery to see Book of Mormon

Things are going to be changing around here.  Josh has always wanted to go back to school to get his MBA, and he is taking the first step towards that this month.  He will start his GMAT prep course in a few weeks and is also attending an information session at Carlson School of Business.  With oodles more debt looming in our future, we are looking for some ways to cut the budget.

Happy ready to support her Uncle Chase

I have been tossing around the idea of making our own cleaning products for a while, but we have had a HUGE stockpile of cleaning products since moving out of our apartment in St. Paul.  While we are working on that, I am doing some research on things I would like to try.

Shave ice in Hawaii

One thing I do know is that we will go back to making our own laundry detergent.  We tried it a while back and loved it.  It is super easy, cost effective, and smells good.  This is the recipe we used last time and will use it again.  We already have all the ingredients and I liked the results.

Cutie pie

Something else I have been considering for a while is not using paper towels for cleaning.  I have been trying to cut back on our paper towel use.  First of all, they are expensive.  Second of all, throwing away all that waste is not good for the environment.  When we got married, we registered for cloth napkins.  We were really good about using them, but since we moved, have fallen off.  I am going to add some cloth napkins to my Christmas list to bulk up our supply and try to get back to using them.

Wedding

Also, after being invited to a Norwex party but not being willing to spend that much money on something, I ordered some microfiber cloths from Amazon.  So far, I have used them one time and like what I have seen.  I like that you don't need to use cleaning solutions and that once you make the initial investment, there isn't much more to spend.

Puppy love

I will keep update with how this is going.  Let me know if you have any secret tips for cleaning on a budget.

August Goals Update

1. Fix dining room table.

2. Paint dining room table.

3. Recover dining room chairs.

4. Get budget back on track.

5. Start additional retirement savings.

This month was a bit of a bust!  We did get our budget back on track, but everything else needs to wait until we can borrow some tools.  Hoping to get them this weekend, and then we will work on the table!  Hopefully we will have better luck in September.

House Update: Outside

Back yard with a view of the garden

Patio with our new lounge chairs

Grill and new hose box

New fence section

Side door

Flowers

Hydrangeas in the front yard

Front of the house with a puppy model

Eventually we would like to stain our fence a dark brown like the wood on the house.  We also may expand and change our garden next year.

Weekly Cleaning Update

A while back, I posted about my weekly cleaning schedule.  This was in our old house, which was much smaller.  I wasn't sure this was going to continue to work in the new house, but we gave it a try.

The old schedule:
Monday- Dusting/Pickup
Tuesday- Bathroom
Wednesday- Floors
Thursday- Kitchen
Laundry- 2 or 3 loads/week (throw them in before you do the other task)

Avery waiting for Josh to come home.  She is so excited to see him and have him vacuum up her hair! 

We had to do a bit of updating to make this work for the new house.  Here is our updated cleaning schedule:
Monday- Bedrooms
Tuesday- Bathrooms
Wednesday- Floors
Thursday-Common Space
Laundry- 3 or 4 loads/week

On Mondays, we put clean clothes away, change sheets, and generally tidy the bedrooms.  On Tuesday, we clean the bathrooms.  This usually means cleaning the toilet, sink, and mirror.  We use daily shower cleaner, so we do a deep clean of the shower/tub once a month.  On Wednesdays, we vacuum all floors and steam mop the wood floors.  On Thursdays, we tidy up the common areas (kitchen, living room, family room, and dining room).  I have gotten in the habit of doing all my loads of laundry on one day.  We have a fancy new washing machine which completes a load in 35 minutes, so this is pretty easy for me.  When we had longer load time, I was trying to do one load per day.  Either way works well for whatever works better in your life schedule.

I am the first to admit that there are MANY days and sometimes whole weeks that this doesn't get done.  Fortunately, you can jump right back in and it is easy to catch up since it is essentially only tackling one task at a time.  So kick back and enjoy the nice, summer weather while we still have it!

House Update: Dining Room

Next up we have our dining room.  If you have been to our house, I'm sure we have told you that we do not have a dining room.  Instead, we have converted the bedroom just off the kitchen and living room into one.  Since we have 4 bedrooms, this works pretty well (for now). If we are still in this house WAAAAAY down the road, it may be another story. 

Overall view of the room.  The projects we have done so far include hanging curtains and replacing the light fixture.  We have a few things that will be changing soon.  We are going to fix up the table and paint it to match the hutch, recover the chairs, get a hook so we can hang the light fixture properly, hopefully find a rug that is actually big enough, and paint the "bar" to match the table and hutch.  Lots of "little" projects.

This is the hutch that we found at the occasional store near our old place.  It was a great find and we are so happy to have it.  It is wonderful to be able to display our nicer dishes and other glassware.

See, it is a bedroom.  Our dining room has a closet!  Right now it stores jackets, shoes, and some extra "china" type things.

Our "bar."  We are trying to collect crystal decanters so we can eventually switch over to having everything in them.  Fancy.

This is one room you will be getting an update on soon (I hope!).

House Update: Guest Bedroom

The second post in the series of our house, which is becoming our home.  In our last home, out guest bedroom consisted of Josh's old "oak" bed frame, night stand, and dresser. Before we moved, we sold the bed frame and night stand, but kept the dresser.  We had plans for it.  We found the mirror (and little mirror tray on the dresser) at the cute occasional store on the corner which inspired the look for this whole room.  This store is also where we found our hutch, but that is for another time :)

I found this bed frame at Ikea and spent months wanting it before finally taking the plunge.

Close up of the occasional mirrors

 See this dresser? This is our old oak dresser!  I am totally kicking myself for not taking a"before"picture of this.  We painted it with white chalk paint and added the knobs.   It looked a little bit like this before (but a little lighter and without the texture):

Super cool in the 80's and 90's, but the new look is much improved for today!

This room is on the main level of our house.  All of the floors on the main level are the original hardwoods that have been refinished with a beautiful dark stain.  I love, love, love them.  It was one of the main things that sold me on the house.  One thing I have noticed is that they seem to scratch pretty easily.  I'm not sure if this is because of the color or if there is some sort of protective finish we need to put on them.

Future plans for this room involve a quilt made by me.  I have the fabric (sticking with the blue theme) and the sewing machine, but I need some help setting up my sewing machine for the first time.  Anyone who would like to help with this is welcome to come on over and take advantage of this extremely comfortable bed!  Hoping that cooler weather will bring a little more motivation for this.

August Goals

1. Fix dining room table.  We need to add in a bit of wood to finish it off and do a little reinforcing.

2. Paint dining room table.  We discovered that the paint we used on the new TV console matches the hutch, so we are going to use that on the table (and maybe the "bar" as well).

3. Recover dining room chairs. Ideally using the same fabric we used on our last set of chairs.  Here's to hoping it works!

4. Get budget back on track.  Cash has been taken out which is a step ahead of the last few months.  Our trip to Montana might throw this off a bit, but hoping we can get this under control again.

5. Start additional retirement savings.  We are hoping to start an IRA with a few hundred dollars every month.  Hopefully getting our budget under control again will help with this!

July Goal Update

Sorry this is late.  I was fully intending to post last Friday from the road, but T-Mobile would not allow that (no service).  We are back in town and I am hoping to make up for lost time in the next few days.

1. Celebrate Josh's birthday in style- Patio mojitos and dinner, lazy weekend, check!
2. Repaint the dresser in the guest bedroom-Check
3. Finally get toilet paper holders in the bathroom- Check
4. Make and hang towel holders for the bathrooms- Check
5. Hang our chalk board- Check
6. Organize the garage- We meant to do this, and then a friend came into town, we went to our city's annual celebration, and first row to a Twins game... so, another time?
7. Recover our dining room chairs- Decided to wait until we fix and paint the table and chairs first

PB2 and Cookie Dough Greek Yougrt

Have you heard of PB2?  I feel like I have been hearing about it forever.  I finally took the plunge a while back and picked some up at Target, and I don't regret it.  We usually buy a large tub of plain, nonfat Greek yogurt.  It is a great substitute for anything that would need sour cream.  It also makes a killer cucumber salad... So obviously, I went to Pinterest to find inspiration for Greek yogurt and PB2.

A little beach time this weekend

1 cup of Greek yogurt
Splash of vanilla
1 tablespoon PB2
about 1 teaspoon chocolate chips
about 1 teaspoon sweetener (I have tried honey and brown sugar)

Just stir everything up.  I don't personally love the taste of honey, but with brown sugar (you can use less sweetener when you use this, in my opinion) this tastes like a delicious peanut butter, chocolate chip cookie! Yum :)

House Update: Main Level Bathroom

If there is one thing I have learned since moving into our house, it's that you never feel like a room (or the whole house) is done.  I feel like I was waiting until rooms were "done" to post updates on them, but have realized that it may never happen. So here goes nothing and the start of a "series."  First up, main level bathroom.  Forgive the phone pictures and terrible lighting, but I knew if I thought about it too much it may never happen.

Cute jars I found at Marshall's.  One is holding soap and the other is toiletries for guests.

Such a spa: Towels rolled in a basket

New towel hook we made

The other towel hook we made.  This one has three hooks.

Whole bathroom.  Cameo by our new toilet paper holder.

Fun fact, we didn't have any blinds when we first moved in.  Our first "project" was buying and installing them.  Of course, none of our windows were "standard" sizes, so custom blinds it was.  It's always the simple things that are outrageously expensive!  It took about 3 months and 2 MAJOR sales at JC Penney before we had all of them good to go!  We went with a 2" white, faux-wood.  We decided on faux-wood because we heard it lasts longer and we liked the wood-grain look that (surprisingly) the white real wood did not have.  Weird!

Future plans for this room involve a little more decoration and removing the shelving unit behind the toilet and replacing it with something a little classier.

So there you have it, room number one!  I think next up will be our guest bedroom.

Fab Friday
5. Super productive Sundays- I got SO MUCH done last Sunday
4. Recovering from illness just in time for the weekend
3. Getting some in progress projects finally finished
2. Towel hooks in the bathrooms
1. Half day Fridays when Josh and I are both home

July Goals

I'm a goal type of gal.  I have been recording them for myself for a while.  A few years ago, I posted them online for the whole year, but found that was too overwhelming.  I recently read a blog where the author posts goals for the month.  More reasonable?  Let's try it, even though for July it's kind of cheating since the month is almost done.

1. Celebrate Josh's birthday in style
2. Repaint the dresser in the guest bedroom
3. Finally get toilet paper holders in the bathroom
4. Make and hang towel holders for the bathrooms
5. Hang out chalk board
6. Organize the garage
7. Recover our dining room chairs

The good news is that you won't have to wait long to get an update :)

Mmmm, Mmmm, Mojitos

When Josh and I were planning our garden this spring, we decided that we wanted to try mint so we could make our own mojitos.  We didn't have a tried and true recipe, or even a rum to use, but we love mojitos.  Finally our mint was ready for harvest, just in time for Josh's birthday!  Commence research mode!  Ok, so I really just googled "Best rum for mojitos."  First result?  This article.  We also decided to stick with the recipe they listed so we would get great results.

-Mint leaves (approximately 8 depending on size and your taste)
-1/2 oz.simple syrup
-2 oz. white rum
-3/4 oz. lime juice (about one lime, and fresh lime is definitely better)
-Lots of ice
-Club soda

To make the simple syrup boil a one to one ratio of water and sugar until the sugar is dissolved.  Let it cool as much as you can stand before using it.  Put the mint in a regular glass.  Add the simple syrup and muddle the mint leaves (I used the handle side of our wisk, because I'm legit like that).  Add the lime juice.  Fill the glass with ice.  Pour the rum over the ice and top off the glass with club soda (we just made our own plain, fizzy water with the soda stream.  Stir and enjoy, preferably on a patio in a lounge chair.

As for rum, our liquor store did not have Brugal (voted "best in show") but they did have the second place Don Q Cristal ("Highly recommended/ great value").  It was about $12 for a liter.  Great value and delicious.  We went through the whole liter that weekend (with a little help from friends) and had to go buy a new one (which we sadly have not opened yet).  Please make these, you will not regret it!

Lazy Fab Friday

5. Only 3 weeks in, but sticking to the Couch to 5k program

4. Homemade mojitos (I will post the SUPER simple recipe soon)

3. A deeply-cleaned house.  Too bad it only lasts about 4 hours!

2. All-Star Fan Fest.  Kind of boring, but it was cool to be a (small) part of the All-Star festivities.

 1. Absolutely one of the best weekends we have had just hanging out at home for Josh's birthday

Sweater Weather

It has been quite chilly here the last few days, and I LOVE it.  Don't get me wrong, I love summer.  Well, I actually love sun and water, if I'm being honest, but the last two days have been awesome!  Highs almost 20 degrees below average?  With some sun, I'll take it.  I sure slept like a baby last night :)  The best of both worlds is getting to enjoy fall weather knowing that summer will be back shortly.

I will never complain about snuggling with a blanket and this pup.

Fab Friday and BIRTHDAY

Today is Josh's birthday!  When I asked him about a month ago what he wanted to do for his birthday, he said he just wanted to hang out at home.  At the time, I doubted it, but now nothing sounds better.  It is a kind of uneventful year (he got a yard trimmer for his birthday and bought it for himself last week, womp womp), but we are determined to make the best of it.

Garden is bumpin

5. Getting a glimpse into another job and remembering my passion.

Josh holding our first bean from the garden.  Delicious snack for Avery!

4. Google hangouts

Minnesota, Texas, Nebraska, united

3. Our backyard

Guacamole

2. Homemade mojitos

And new anniversary lounge chairs

1. Birthday weekend with Josh

4th of July at the lake

Avery and Grandma

Anniversary dinner at Rosa Mexicano, yum!

Wedding date!