Congratulations!

Just wanted to give a shout out to our newly engaged friends!

Congrats to Kyle and Ashley!

And Congrats to Henry and Julia!

Can't wait for your weddings!!! We're SO happy for you all and wish you lots of love!

The Look For Less!

One of my daily blog reads is The Look For Less. Jen has great finds for designer looks for less and she also does great styling jobs! Check out her blog here. I've been loving the Parker Cami dresses since last summer and I was perusing her blog not too long ago and saw this option:

I immediately purchased the Nordstrom version and can't wait to wear it to a wedding in a couple of weeks!
Click here to purchase the one I got. It comes in several other colors as well.

Yesterday I was browsing LuLu's after Jen posted about these great sandals, when I saw another great alternative to the Parker dress. I sent it over to Jen and she used it on her blog today! I was so excited! Click here to see the post I sent over for her.

I'm really starting to love the blogging community and look forward to more interactions with other bloggers out there!

So, if you're a fellow blogger let me know so I can visit your blog and start commenting! :)

Easter!

I hope everyone had a great Easter! Hopefully someone will send me some pictures from Easter otherwise this is all you're going to get... The Easter bunny didn't bring me a new camera :( I may have to search the house again for that charger.. blech.

Here's a non-visual recap of what we did in Tulsa over Easter:

Rocked out to the new cd mix tape on the turnpike

Had dinner at Kilkenny's Irish Pub (love that place!)

Talked about how happy we are for our friends that have recently gotten engaged!

Drank some Smithwick's beers

Babysat above friends doggy (Ellie) while they celebrated in Houston

Tried to get Cooper and Ellie to make a puppy, unsuccessfully

Went to bed early Friday night

Got woken up by Dave Saturday morning at 830 "Will you get up already? I'm bored. What are we doing today?"

Got Cooper a haircut

Got a new shirt from J.Crew

Had a delicious birthday lunch at Los Cabos with the fam

Convinced Julia to come to town

Had beers with Julia

Had John Daley's with AnneMarie

Opened birthday present from AnneMarie - such fun stuff the Colorado airport had to offer me!

Had dinner at El Guapo's

Had beers at McNellie's

Ran into people I went to highschool with

Went to church on Sunday

Had an Easter cookout after church

Dyed easter eggs

Decorated recently engaged friend's apartment for them to find when they got home :)

Dropped Ellie off at above friends apartment

Drove back to the city, amazed at how much shorter the drive is when you don't have to go all the way to Norman.

Did laundry, then did nothing Sunday evening.

Had a great weekend!

100 Posts!

I can't believe I've had 100 posts! This is technically post 101 because I didn't realize it until now. So exciting, I never thought when I started this little blog that I'd actually keep it up! Go me! haha! I was trying to think of something witty to commemorate the occasion, but have failed to come up with anything at the moment.

I remember in kindergarten when we celebrated our 100th day of school, we had to come up with a collection of 100 things to show for show and tell.  I'm not sure how I remember this so well, but it must be because it was a great memory! I remember sitting out on the front porch with my mom and picking leaves off of our little cherry bud tree. (I'm not sure if that's what it actually was but it was a tree that had little leaves and red little berries on it?) So we picked off 100 leaves and glued them to a posterboard in the shape of a tree! It was so much fun! I don't even remember what the other kids brought I just remember thinking mine was the best.

This kind of relates since I'm talking about trees, and birds tend to live in trees... Last night we watched the Discovery Channel's Life Series episode about Birds. I wasn't really in the mood b/c they can tend to lose my attention pretty fast, so I had a magazine in front of me while we watched. Our conversation went something like this:

Dave: Can we stop watching 16 and pregnant and watch the Life series now?
Me: uhhhh I dunno? The girl's mom is about to kick the baby daddy out of the hospital...
Dave: You've already seen this episode?
Me: Yeah, I've seen them all, there was a marathon on and I have a problem.
Dave: Ok, we're watching Life now. It's about birds! You love birds!
Me: Yeah ok but only if they're cute little birdies not like ugly big birds with talons.
Dave: Alright, if there's ugly birds we can fast forward.
Me: Deal (reaches for People's Style Watch magazine)

I watched the part about Penguins because they're so funny to watch trying to walk around and climb up glaciers. Then some ugly birds came on and were fighting over who got to eat some bones, something was said about their stomach acids being stronger than battery corrosives, I lost interest. Back to the magazine. Then Dave goes, "Look! Cute birdies!". He was right! These little birdies were busy decorating their nests to entice potential mates! A cute bird decorating a nest with pretty stuff? Yes please. If you don't believe me here are some pictures of the little Bowerbirds decorating their nests:

 Looks like the little cherry buds from my old tree! :)

At first glance I thought these were pretty feathers, nope just a collection of blue bottle caps and straws!

But still prettier than your average nest.

Check out the entire house this little bowerbird built on the episode last night:

That's all I've got for my 100th post. Sorry if you were expecting something fantastical.

I'll try harder on the next 100. :)

Maybe by my 200th post I'll have enough followers/commenters to do a blog giveaway!

Otherwise, I should just flip a coin to see if Opal or Emily wins!

Birthday Week!

It's officially my birthday week, so prepare yourself for some awfully vain posts. Just kidding, I hope that won't happen. But to start things off, I checked the weather for this weekend's upcoming festivities.

Hooray! 70 degrees and Sunny! Lovely Day for a Birthday I'd say! :)

Fry Those Onions!

Last weekend I decided to break out the ole fryer after I read Pioneer Woman's super easy recipe for onion strings.  I say it's super easy, because it is! To prove this, I documented myself going through the recipe:

*Turn on your fryer filled with canola oil so it can start heating up.

Slice the onion super thin:

Then pick them up and move them over to the buttermilk soaking station:

Really get them in there:

Now pour some flour into a shallow dish, add salt, pepper and cayenne pepper:

Now get distracted by Cooper scratching at his bowl:

Now get the buttermilk soaked onion strings and swirl them around the flour batter mixture:

Really swirl them good, make sure the batter is sticking. You'll be glad later!

*Swirling is not a technical term, but it speaks for itself.

Now move them to the fryer basket:

Now wait, patiently of course... for my small fryer I found that 3 minutes is the perfect time for these:

Also the temp should be 375 degrees. 

Ahh 41 seconds left! The anticipation is getting to us! Happy dance when the timer goes off!

Dave's moves are a little suspect... Not sure mine are much better though.

Hooray! They're done! 

These were delicious! I was so excited that they were so easy, I fried some mushrooms and some pickles too! Sorry no pics of those. I ate them too fast. oops!

Haircut!

I finally got my haircut! I was starting to look like one of those women that never cuts their hair... yikes!

Before:

After:

 

It feels SOoooo good to have all my dead ends cut off! I also stopped by Ulta and picked up some dry shampoo - this stuff is amazing! I highly reccommend for those of us that can't wash our hair everyday.

Spring/Summer Cocktails

We've had the best weather lately. Yesterday it was in the 80's, it was super windy but the sun was shining and it was hot out so I took that as a great opportunity to make one of my favorite warm weather cocktails. (Besides margaritas of course... they'll always be #1 in my book)

Yesterday on my way home from work I stopped by the liquor store for some sweet tea vodka, then I headed to the grocery store for some lemonade.

I think these are called Arnold Palmer's but I think that's the non-alcoholic version... Anyways, I was super excited to try out my new mason jar glasses, which are the perfect summer cocktail glass. Just fill your mason jar up with ice, pour in some sweet tea vodka (Firefly brand is the best), add some lemonade and a few slices of fresh lemon and you're set!

Now put your ipod on the speakers and turn on some music while you enjoy the outdoors! Songs I'm currently obsessed with: "Right Moves" by Josh Ritter, "The World Aint Slowin Down" by Ellis Paul, "Bird in a Cage" by The Old 97s and "Save It For a Rainy Day" by The Jayhawks.