November has come and gone

Wow, I can't believe tomorrow is December 1st. Not only does that further reinforce that the holidays are coming, but it also means that the year is ending. On a slightly more positive note, November is over. You know what that means???

NaBloPoMo is officially over!!!!!!! I actually did it! I posted every single day for thirty days straight!!! For someone that just started blogging this past summer, I take that as a pretty impressive feat.

Whew. I'm tired of blogging. Most likely I'm going to take a few days off. I'll admit, some of my postings were complete crap. Yeah, I would sit at my computer and go, "well I have to post something!" I sincerely apologize, but now that I've accomplished such a feat there's no need to do it again.

Thanks everyone for not calling me out on my crappy posting days! It really meant a lot to me.

Thank you Mama T!

Last weekend the hubs and I went to visit his best friend. His best friend is slightly odd for a guy- he loves to cook! While I was copying some of his favorite recipes I asked him for a tremendous favor. For the past six years I have heard tales of the fantastic pumpkin role created by said friend's mother, Mama T, as we call her. Oddly enough, our friend didn't have his own mother's recipe in his recipe box. He called his mum and jotted down the recipe and was subsequently lectured about specific instructions (stressing to mix the eggs on high for five minutes, not low!). It was rather entertaining.

Monday night the hubs and I went to the grocery store armed with our recipe and purchased our ingredients. I'm not going to lie, I was really nervous about messing this pumpkin roll up. This thing is regarded with such fondness by my hubs that I was worried I was putting my cooking reputation on the line by attempting to compete with Mama T.

Thanksgiving has come and gone and I'm thrilled to report that the hubs loved the pumpkin roll. Loved may not be the quite way to put it. It's Saturday and the pumpkin roll is gone already. My brother-in-law got to eat two pieces and my hubs claimed the rest of it. FYI- it has a cream cheese icing and I can't stand cream cheese, so all I had was one small little bite, but that was my choice.

Today, while the hubs and I were preparing our grocery list we realized that we still have quite a bit of pumpkin left over. I mentioned that I might make a pumpkin spice cake, but the hubs quickly shot that down and said we should make another pumpkin roll for him to take into his office on Monday. That sounded reasonable enough. Then, after we went grocery shopping I realized we had enough cream cheese to make three pumpkin rolls.

The hubs response, "so, we can make another one tonight and then two more tomorrow. One of them should definitely make it into the office on Monday."

I kid you not, when he said that he really sounded like there was a slight chance he might eat all of them before Monday morning. I take this as positive sign that I didn't mess up his loved pumpkin roll. Thank goodness!!!

(I'm sorry, but I don't think I can share the recipe. I haven't asked yet and I don't want to anger Mama T. I'd like to get a few more recipes from her.)

Black Friday recap

Here's my Christmas list for this year:

Hubs
Mom
Dad
Sister
Nephew
Future Brother-in-law
Brother
Grandma
Oma & Grandpa
Secret Santa #1
Secret Santa #2
Brother-in-law
Mother-in-law
Nana & Pap Pap
Jax
Jewels

We already know what we're getting our grandparents, it is just a matter of waiting until closer to Christmas to pick up their gifts. We're really looking forward to avoiding the mall for the next few weekends!

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

T-minus 1 day

Thanksgiving is tomorrow!!! I can't wait. A whole day of parades, dog shows, football, turkey, pie, and possibly a little yard work. Okay, maybe that last part isn't on everyone's agenda, but our yard waste removal has a Friday morning pickup and we have a ton of leaves to rake up!

You know those scented candles that make your house smell fantastic? Yeah, we don't have any, but the pecan pie smell that is resonating from my oven smells much better than any candle. Hopefully, that doesn't clash with the pumpkin roll that is scheduled to be baked later.

(first Christmas present was pre-ordered earlier this afternoon via Amazon.com. One less store I have to trek to on Friday!!!)

I've created a monster

We're days away from Black Friday and I think I may have to commit my husband to some type of institution. I think I'm just bitter because "we" decided to postpone buying a DSLR camera in order to buy a tv.

Anyway, I just checked my e-mail and of course I have a new e-mail from the hubs and it's comparing tvs. Last night he kept interrupting me during How I Met Your Mother and Prison Break. Finally,I had to look at him and bark, "I'll look at tvs during the commercials!"

Here's how the tv research began in my mind. Our current tv is a whopping 26 inches, clearly not very big. I was under the impression that we would upgrade to a 32", 36", or maybe even a 40" flat screen. I swear the comparision shopping as gone as follows:

Hubs: A 36" Sharp Aquos is blah blah blah dollars.

Me: Okay, is that the tv you liked?

Hubs: Yeah, but then again for another $100 we could get the bigger 40".

Me: Okay, so which one do you want to get?

Tw0 days later:
Hubs: So, the 40" blah blah blah tv is blah blah blah dollars.

Me: Okay, is that the one we're getting?

Hubs: We could get that one or we could spend another $100 and get a bigger tv.


I'm at the point where I don't even know what is going on. I know we're getting an LCD tv. I'm 99% sure we're getting a 1080p tv. Now, I have no idea on the refresh rate, if it's 60hz or 120hz. My mind is cluttered between Samsung, Sharp and Sony. I better start hearing Nikon or Canon in here soon, otherwise I'm going to lose my mind.

Tonight, after dinner we're going back to Circuit City to look at tvs... again! I'm scared for when we decide to buy a new car in a few months. I can already see myself getting dragged around to various car dealership. If the hubs dares to interupt Grey's Anatomy, well, then we're going to have a serious problem.

The really "funny" part in all of this madness is that the hubs doesn't even watch that much tv!!! He'll catch an episode of SVU or House here and there, but he doesn't tune in to any series regularly. His PS2 is upstairs, so it won't even be benefiting from the new tv (although, the current living room tv will go upstairs and the former upstairs tv will go back to my brother-in-law). Yeah, the hubs and I watch our fair share of sporting events on tv, but we hardly ever have people over to catch the game.

I'm going to argue that if we spend this much money on a tv, then we should at least get new curtains and throw pillows. That way our living room will be that much more inviting and we can actually have friends over.

You're gonna need a bigger boat

Last year the hubs and I stayed home and prepared our own Thanksgiving dinner. This year my brother-in-law is joining us, so we've added another stomach to feed to our table. Unfortunately, we don't have a dining room table. Well, we do, but it's stored down in the basement.

Yeah, not having a dining room is really one of the things that bugs me the most about our duplex. Then, I have to remind myself that it's only a rental and hopefully we won't be renting for that much longer.

Oh well. The hubs and I decided to set up the table tonight and see how cramped we were going to be. Let's just say that our little pub table isn't going to cut it for Thanksgiving dinner. It could, but once you add the charger plates, small centerpiece, extra glasses, vegetable bowls, etc. the poor table is maxed out. Looks like I'm going to have to spend Wednesday evening pulling out our dining table and then reassembling it in our living room. Thank goodness it's an Ikea table and it'll take me mere minutes to put it back together. Dragging it out of the basement, well, that might take a bit more time.

I can't wait to use our china!!!

(I hope everyone knows where I snagged that title line.)