Because becoming a hermit isn't cool...

This weekend N and I went out after I got off work Friday and ordered pizza and hung out with some friends then went to another friends house so the men could play beer pong and the wives could gossip. Well it turned into a dance party needless to say and we are quite the raunchy bunch so everybody was doing their best "dirty" dances and my legs were killing me because I still had on my heels from work well I think that night we got home around 2 after a very long and trying not to fall asleep drive home.  Saturday we layed around and then went back over to said group of friends houses and cooked steaks and played more beer pong and sang karaoke. Except the karaoke wasn't quite working out so we just had the mikes plugged in and were singing along to the music channels on tv.

The only problem with that is that while the majority of us know a full reportoire of songs we are varied in ages from 24 to 44 so it was quite fun hearing some of the "older crowd going oh I remember this song in concert and us young-uns were like, we were 3. We got home around 33AM which just makes me tired thinking about it but definitely a fun filled weekend. Part of our resolutions this year (besides losing at least 50 lbs each) was to get out more because lets face, we are homebodys. We each have our own little hobbies that we do alone but we don't get out much together so we did want to change that. However I am one that when scheduling our iteniary on vacation, I schedule naps, which N thinks is hilarious but I know an entire day of sightseeing, eventually someone is going to get cranky (aka me!) so as long as I've planned out some down time to relax everybody has a better time. N knows this so he knows better than to try and refuse me a nap. Or food. I get downright hostile when I'm hungry and being tired on top of that is not a good combination. Plus our vacations are very laid back. On our honeymoon there was one day we didn't leave the room all day (granted it was raining) he brings his playstation and I read books and we just lay around. So whats the verdict? Are you and your SO busy bodies or home bodies?

"Mr. Clean, Mr. Clean"

Hope everyone survived Monday, and Tuesday is almost over so we are that much closer to the weekend. So hubby emailed me earlier, asking if a certain pile of clothes was dirty or just never made it onto a hanger. Which happens. (and don't act like it doesn't) So my thought is he is at home cleaning the house. Which makes him such a great husband but makes me feel like such a bad wife. Of course I had EVERY intention of cleaning this weekend, but Saturday I slept late and then immediately got up and went to Wal-mart and then straight to my parents house to help them set up their Christmas tree. Of course we stayed and had dinner so I didn't get back home until 8 and by then I was just exhausted.

Sunday was a different story. I wasn't busy. I had a case of the lazys all day long. I did manage to put dinner in the crockpot around lunchtime (I only gave it a 4 so I won't be trying that again) I did manage to pick up a few things and clean the kitchen somewhat and do a couple loads of laundry, but really it was a lazy day. Nathan however was off yesterday, and he raked and burned all the leaves in the front yard, and today he is off and most likely the house will be mostly clean, if nothing else the dishes will be washed. Its a joint effort really. Last night I washed a load of clothes but didn't feel good so I went to bed at like 9 (which also happens).

I feel really bad when Nathan cleans, because if we are being honest, he does it a lot more than I do, but he has more days off a week than I do too. For instance this week Monday thru Sunday, he will be off 5 days and work only 2 but next week it will be switched, off 2 work 5. Whereas I work 5 days a week every week. And nobody wants to do anything when we get off work, (and hey, we don't have kids, why bother?) So for me, anything and eveything I want done has to be done on Saturday & Sunday. I know, preaching to the choir for most people. And I guess one day I'll figure out that if I want to be lazy on the weekends I have to do a little more during the week. Which is a good rule, if you can follow it. Wash dishes after dinner, get up a little earlier in the morning and maybe sweep the kitchen floor. On the days Nathan works, I can vaccumm in the morning before work because he will be up by 4 for work. (and the only one I'll be disturbing is the cat). So my goal is going to be to get up earlier, so that I can accomplish things before work so after work when I'm really tired, I won't have as much to do.

Do you have a "cleaning schedule" that you follow every week?

Shopping Fever VS Joint Checking

"So it's Fri-day night and I jjjuuussssttt got paid!" Backstreet throwback! But its true, and so did hubby so our joint account is looking very nice considering that all of our bills are due at the end of the month so they have already been paid. And I want to go shopping. Like really really really bad. BUT since part of a joint checking means justifying every purchase pretty much, it makes it hard to go out and splurge on yourself when the other person isn't doing so and is going to ask you what you bought pretty much as soon as you get home from buying it. And you can't lie about it and say oh honey it was only $5 when really you paid $10 because he can now see every purchase.

Adjusting to a joint checking has been quite the experience. Gas buying alone has been frustrating. My car gets 30 miles to the gallon, and I communte for almost an hour and a half to work M-F, and if we go anywhere on the weekend we usually take my car so I fill up for less than $40 about once a week plus a little hold me over of around $15 depending on what we did that weekend.

Nathan on the other hand: his truck gets maybe 16 miles to the gallon drives a whopping 20 commute (to and from) and puts around $75 in his truck every week, of course now that hunting season is in he has filled up twice a week running around chasing dogs. And then stopping pretty much every day at the store and getting drinks for work, some chips and dip (like chewing tobacco, not for chips) which is seriously adding up. So we worked out a way to maybe spend a little more at the grocery store every week but it will save money overall by buying the snack size chips and getting cases of water for him to take to work. (I suggested taking like a Tervis so we wouldn't have to waste so much plastic but apparently thats not a option...oh well, I guess I'll learn to recycle.)

What concessions did you make when you and your husband started a joint checking, if any, or why you decided joint checking just wasn't going to work for y'all?

Cleaning vs. Hunting

So dinner last night turned out AH-MAZING! And the three glasses of wine I had put me in a pretty good mood too. I think that I should have put more cream cheese on the chicken but Nathan said it was perfect just like it was. I don't think I've ever gotten a perfect status before on a new recipe, so I considered that a definite win on my part. I got the recipe from artsyfartsymama.com and she just called it Bacon Wrapped Chicken. Its not healthy by any means, but it was D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S!!

So as I'm sure most of you are in the same dilemna I am in with decorating for christmas so the house looks like a christmas explosion currently with boxes everywhere. This weekend I was hoping to get everything put up because my hubby finally went by and picked up all his ornaments from his mothers house so we can finally finsih decorating the tree tonight or tomorrow night. And I have a few things I want to do with leftover Christmas balls so I was hoping to get that done plus the house needs a major cleaning since I have been busy the last 2 weekends.

However, Nathan wants me to go hunting with him on Saturday. Now this in itself is not a horrible way to spend a Saturday and I'm very proud of him for the deer he kills because it means less hamburger meat I have to buy, he even got a nice eight pointer last Friday, pictured above. But for me hunting is periods of high activity interspered with periods of napping. Something about being bundled up in 8 layers just sends me into the napping zone.

However, based on the fact that the last few weekends have been busy and I don't feel like doing a single thing during the week, I HAVE to clean this weekend and I have some organizing I want to do too, which is going to be more than just a Sunday job. Nathan hasn't said anything about the house because hey, he was off ALL last week and all he did was hunt when he could have been home cleaning some (this is not usually the case).( Usually I do big cleaning on the weekend and he picks up and does dishes during the week on his days off. It works for us nicely.)

So I'm still trying to decide between spending quality time with the hubby or spending quality time getting our house back to normal. Decisions, decisions....

3 Years Together

Today is the Mr and I's 3 year "dating" anniversary. Of course Nathan thinks that this no longer counts as an anniversary since we got married but my thought process was, okay when someone asks how long we have been together are you going to say 3 months or 3 years? Plus I'm just a sap anways so I'll celebrate it with or without him.

For breakfast this morning I actually got up and made breakfast, and by making breakfast I mean I opened a can of cinnamon rolls and put them in the oven. (Since breakfast is usually a root, pig, or die situation at our house, this act was quite the show of affection of my part)

Tonight I have a hopefully awesome dinner planned. Bacon Wrapped Chicken with Mac & Cheese and Crescent Rolls. Apparently you mix together cream cheese and minced garlic and spread it on the chicken and then wrap bacon around the chicken (per the name..)

I don't believe that meals need sides. If it was really up to me there would just be the chicken, no need for anything else. My logic is that I lived alone at college for three years and in that time I was trained that if you made a side, something was going to be leftover, and lets face it people: NOT ALL LEFTOVERS ARE CREATED EQUAL! So averting that equaled no sides with meals.

SN on leftovers: My mom always asks me if Nathan and I eat leftovers sometimes but honestly there isn't usually food leftover, maybe enough for a snack but not as a meal definitely. So not sure what that says about us: are we eating too much food or not making enough?

So hopefully dinner will be good since I got the recipe off Pinterest, (and who doesn't LLOOVVEEE Pinterest?) but I will update with results and if its good I will share the recipe. I really hate it when people share the recipe before they try it, which I know is the opposite of Pinterest, but I do like to give a little shoutout on my Facebook (since most of my fellow pinners come from there) on whether or not a recipe I pinned was good. I feel like we should help each other out from time to time.

Have you ever found any recipes that were so good you wanted to keep them for yourself so it becomes "your" speciality?

How We Met

Hello there, my name is Emily and I am a newlywed.

I met my husband Nathan while on Thanksgiving break from college (Go Hokies!) when my dad's truck, which I was driving, broke down on a back road. Lucky for me said back road was only about 10 minutes from my parents farm and that it was the middle of hunting season which meant plenty of good ole country boys riding around in my general vicinity.

When Nathan and I first started dating he liked to say that he came to my rescue that day and gave me a ride to my parents thus sparking my interest and our relationship. But this is how the story really happened...

As soon as the truck shuddered to a stop, I started calling my parents house and my dads cell phone to no avail. So then I called this guy who lived nearby to see if he was in the neighborhood. Unfortunately he wasn't, he was still away at school but his dad was hunting in the area so he called him and his dad stopped by to see if he could get the truck started. He couldn't. By this time a couple of other people from his hunt club had stopped to help as well and one of them gave me a ride to my parent's house where I found dad out in the shop. Crisis avertered, right? Wrong.

My parents land used to be all junkyard but now its part cows, part junk so we have a rollback for transporting junk cars and such. So here dad and I go on the rollback to pick up the pickup (pick up the pickup, haha) and the rollback gets stuck in the mud in the ditch. Good news is we got the green truck started so that we could drive to the house to go get a tractor to pull the rollback out. Then we had to take the tractor back from our house to where the rollback was now stuck. It was quite the process to say the least.

So there I am sitting behind the wheel of the rollback waiting for dad to get the tractor hooked up and I am just randomly going through my phone contacts, thinking to myself, who would think this is funny? I landed on Fitts. (Now in our high school most of the guys were called by their last name so that is how people were known, hence why Nathan was saved in my phone under Fitts.) So I texted him telling him the whole situation which started off a whole conversation and ended with us making plans to go hunting together the next day.

After about 10 minutes of awkwardness (what do you say to somebody you haven't seen since high school?) we just fell into comfortableness. Laughing and talking alternating between comfortable silences. 3 days later I had to go back to school the next day and we were sitting at my parents house watching a movie when Nathan decided that he didn't want me to go back to school single so he asked me to be his girlfriend. And I said yes. That was three years ago.

After a couple set backs with college I finally graduated in June 2011 and landed a job immediately. I was so happy to be home because the whole time Nathan and I had been dating, it had been long distance since Tech was a three hour drive from home. We had only had holidays, weekends and a summer break to be together. Nathan's conditions to get engaged had always been that I had to have finished school and have a job and I had known for a long time that this was the man I was going to marry.

On August 28th we left to go on vacation for a week and Nathan asked me when we got to Myrtle Beach if I wanted to go walk on the beach but I said not tonight because I was tired from the drive. The next morning, he asked again if I wanted to go but I was not willing to get out of bed. Monday afternoon he asked me again to go to the beach and I figured well he has asked me a couple times so I reckon we should go. We got in a little tiff about what time you had to stop paying the parking meters at because he insisted on paying to park when clearly the rules said after 7 was okay. In the end we payed so obviously I don't always get my way.

So we walked the beach for a while looking for shells and then sat down on the sand to watch the sunset. We started drawing silly pictures in the sand and Nathan drew a ring in the sand and asked me if I would marry him with that ring and I told him "I would marry you with any ring honey" to which he proceeded to pull a box out of his pocket, flipped it open and said "well what about with this one?" Needless to say I immediately started crying and when he asked me if I would marry him, I'm pretty sure I asked him if he was serious but I said yes and fireworks started going off. Like literally, fireworks. And no he didn't arrange them but they did work out perfectly. Oh and that parking pass reads 8/29 at 8:29PM which I now have perserved.

Nathan and I became Mr & Mrs on September 15, 2012 and I have loved every minute of it.