A Great Start to 2013

I have been avoiding writing a New Year's Resolution update as I haven't done the best during the month of January.  My resolutions were to sleep, eat veggies/fruit and complete the Couch to 5k program.  Well...I did well with the sleeping, I slept 7+ hours every night except 1-2.  I did pretty well with the eating fruits and veggies, I don't have actual statistics but I would say I ate 2+ fruits and 4+ vegetables most days.  And the running, well I am on week 4 (rather than week 8 where I wanted to be).  The goal for January was to have more energy.  Obviously that isn't really a measurable goal so I haven't decided if I was successful or not....

On the other hand, January was a very enjoyable month!
On January 11th, Ben and I had our wonderful friends, Josh and Bri, over for dinner.  We made the most delicious chicken enchiladas (it is such an easy recipe, but for some reason we hardly ever make it), and drank a couple, maybe few, bottles of wine and beer and had great conversation!
On January 12th, I went for coffee with Bri and Natalie.  I know we are becoming real adults because we met for coffee at 8:30am!  If you would have told me not too long ago that I was going to meet friends for coffee at that awful time of the morning I would have told you that you were nuts.  We ended up sitting at the coffee shop chatting for 4 hours!  We talked about everything from family, having children, our significant others, to cooking and painting nails.  It was such great girl time!
The following weekend Chad, Katie, Ben and I drove to Freeport to see Kyle and his girlfriend, Ginny.  It was a great night of talking, laughing, drinking and eating Ginny's wonderful creations in the kitchen.  That night we stayed at Ben's parents' house in Freeport and were to spend a little time with them in the AM before we had to return to the city.
Once we arrived back at our apartment Alison arrived and we headed to Natalie's for a girls night/day.  We spent the afternoon/evening with a group of girls from college.  We caught up, we joked and laughed, we talked about the future and we ate wonderful food.  Natalie decided to have a pot luck, which was such a good idea!  We had appetizers, main dishes and desserts all that were delicious!
The next day, January 20th, Alison, Chelzee, and I went Bridesmaid dress shopping.  That task didn't take all that long so we then went to Michael's, DSW and Trader Joe's.  Possibly the only three stores that a person would ever need :)
On Tuesday, January 22nd I started my job as a Foster Care Social Worker at Anoka County.  This is a part time position so I will also be at Holland Center part time.  I think this will be a great mix, I will still get my fix of direct contact with kids but I will also get my social working fix.  I am excited to see how this goes!
Yesterday, Friday the 25th, we hosted game night at our place.  We made peanut butter cookies, delicious bars (cake mix, 1 stick of butter, sweet condensed milk, and heath chips), beer bread, crackers, veggies, hummus, and Bacon Bacon dip.  The bars and the beer bread were a huge hit!  We played "Jumbling Towers" and "Mine is" (or something to that affect).  We had a great time playing games and spending time together.
This morning we met Kyle and Anna for brunch and Copper Dome in St. Paul.  The food was really great and it is always fun to catch up with Kyle and Anna, unfortunately we don't see them as often as we would like.

As you can see, we spent a lot of time with people we love during January.  As far as I am concerned, being surrounded with supportive people that make us happy is far more important than completing a running program or eating 4 servings of vegetables every single day.  People will make me a lot more happy than broccoli every will!

I LOVE Christmas!

I love everything about Christmas: the music, the lights, the decorations, wrapping presents, COOKIES, and the good moods and kindness that comes in December!  I even like the snow, for the most part...although I would be okay if it left as soon as Christmas was over... :)

We don't have a lot of space to work with in our apartment but here are some pictures of our the decorating that took place this weekend!

Our little tree for our little apartment!

Top of the bookshelf

Table next to our couch.  The table runner on the table was made by my Godmother, you cannot see it very well in this picture but it is really pretty!

The kitchen table.  Ben's family did Christmas early and I received this from his parents.  

How can Christmas NOT make you happy?????!!!!!

Date Ideas - Nerd Date

Last Spring the MN Science Museum had a pirate exhibit.  Ben, with his ship fascination, really wanted to go check out the pirates.  We went to the museum and when exploring our options we decided to buy a year membership as it would pay for itself if we visited the museum only one more time (I attached a link to the membership info here).  That night we went through the pirate exhibit, since that took two hours we didn't have time to check out the regular/permanent exhibits.  

Yesterday, Ben and I have a free Saturday (these are extremely hard to come by) so we decided to go explore the permanent exhibits and the omnitheater show.  My favorite part was the omnitheater presentation: Tornado Alley.  We spent two hours at the museum and watched the movie and only went through about 50% of the permanent exhibits.  It was so much fun going through the museum and playing with all the exhibits, checking out the dinosaurs, and learning about the Mississippi river.  Needless to say we will need to go back to see the rest!  I would also like to go back in January since the BodyWorld will be the special exhibit.  

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

I love anything pumpkin: pumpkin pie, pumpkin spice lattes from Starbucks, pumpkin muffins etc. etc. I needed an appetizer or dessert to bring to a get together and since it is fall, the season of pumpkin goodness, I chose Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies.  I found the recipe on Pinterest (lets be honest, what do I not find on Pinterest???).  Thank you to the author of the blog http://www.shetknows.com for this recipe, I made a few changes and they came out great, if I do say so myself!

• 1 can (15 ounces) pumpkin pie filling
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1 egg
• 2 cups flour (I used one cup whole wheat and one cup white)
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon milk
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 package mini semi-sweet chocolate chips (12 ounces)
• Cooking spray

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spray your cookie sheet with cooking spray.
2. Mix pumpkin, sugar, vegetable oil and egg. In a separate bowl, mix flour, baking powder, pumpkin pie spice, salt, baking soda, milk and vanilla.
3. Mix the 2 bowls together. Add in chocolate chips.
4. Drop spoon size dough balls onto the cookie sheet, about an inch apart. Bake for about 12 minutes (insert toothpick and if it comes out clean, they are done!).

Nutritional Info: 

Per cookie (I made 30 cookies):

Calories - 152      Carbs - 21g      Fat - 7g      Protein - 2g

***When I make these again I will probably not use as many chocolate chips, I think 1/2 to 3/4 of a bag would be sufficient

The start of a hobby?

I seem to have a lot more time on my hands now than I have really ever had before so I thought I need a hobby and why not write a blog???  Also, I am beginning to realize that it seems as if everyone has a blog except me, and since I don't like to be left out here goes nothing :)

I am not at all sure what the focus of my blog is going to be but I do know that I enjoy reading blogs related to cooking, working out and traveling.  I also like the idea that a blog acts as a text and picture "scrapbook".   With that being said, my blog will probably end up being a conglomeration of all those things.

Happy reading, hope I don't bore you too much ;)