Lunch with Friends

On Saturday I had the real treat of eating lunch with three of my sweet friends from life (preschool, kindergarten, middle school, high school, college...you get the idea). We enjoyed an afternoon in the sun eating Amsterdam turkey wraps and catching up on jobs, married life, grad school, and who from high school was having babies. It's not often that I get to see these ladies so it was great to be able to get together for a while. I forgot to take a picture at lunch (I know, I'm trying) but I did manage to get a picture with Alison in front of Toomers while we were walking around downtown after lunch.

Yay for great friends, good food, and good weather!

"She packed up her potential and all she had learned, grabbed a cute pair of shoes and headed out to change a few things"

I went shopping with my mom on Friday and bought a full sequin black dress. Taylor swift style. And a FABULOUS pair of black patten leather pumps. This is going to be the start of a beautiful friendship...

 

Homeward Bound

I was lucky enough to get to go home this weekend and hang out with my wonderful Mom and some pretty amazing friends. On Thursday after class, Reg and I backed up the car and headed east. Reggie didn't have the most enjoyable ride. As can be seen my his dramatic pose here...

What a ham. 

When we finally rolled into the Burn we were greeted these fabulous banners linning College Street:

It was good to be back in the land of Auburn Fans. War Eagle.

January snow brings February flowers?

My sweet cousin made me a beautiful headband/pin for Christmas. She made these great fabric flowers and then pinned them onto an elastic headband so that you can unpin them from the headband and put them on shirts/hats/bags/whatever the heck you want. She is so talented and creative!

Well, today I was wearing a pretty boring purple tee that I've had for years and I decided to spice it up a bit by pinning the flowers on it. It was a great success! Just what the shirt needed and I got several complements on it.

Yay for creativity! Thanks Ellen! :)

"No soup for you!"

To all you Seinfeld fans out there, They now sell soup from the soup nazi in Publix! Of course I bought it.

In other news, Publix BOGO will be the death of me. I now have twice as much food as I planned on buying because it was all buy one, get one free! I have grocery store issues.

Sunday Sunshine

I was too busy enjoying the outdoors to take pictures on Sunday. Here is a pretty good representation of what I felt like...

Water Babies

I had a great weekend! And Saturday was especially great because I got to see some people who are very important to me. My second family, the Kings, were in town this weekend because Erin has a swim meet in T-town. I got up Saturday morning to go watch her swim and she was FANTASTIC! I've never been to a kids swim meet before and I was very impressed by the amount of work these kids put into it and what great athletes  they are. Here's a pic of the little munchkin in action!

After the meet I went to lunch with the Kings, then took Reggie on a walk with the boy, then brought Reggie and the Kings to my favorite park on the river and watched the sunset. It couldn't have been better! I love great weather and catching up with dear friends!

Tennis in the dark

My apartment complex is great and have many wonderful amenities, like tennis courts. The boy and I have been wanting to play for a while and even brought out racquets from Auburn and bought some balls. We were just waiting for it to get warmer so we didn't freeze out tooshies off! Well, it was about 60 degrees last night and we had nothing big to do so we decided to finally play. We were very disappointed when discovered that the lights weren't working :( but what did we do? We decided to play anyway! It was extremely comical to say the least. Picture Clay serving the ball and me running away with my hands over my head because I couldn't see where the ball was. I wish I had video, but on second thought I'm glad that I don't!

My pretty racquets! Hopefully we'll be able to see next time we play!

Gourmet Night

Thursday was the second meeting of gourmet night and it was another huge success! Gourmet night is a recipe club that some of my MBA friends started where once a month we all make a dish for dinner and then we swap the recipes. Thursday's theme was something you've always wanted to make but were scared to try. I made sangria and it turned out great! We also had spanakopita, meatloaf, a delicious herb dip, and then a cherry soaked pound cake. The cake was so pretty I just had to share it with you all (you can also see my sangria in the background.

 

There really isn't anything much better than spending time with sweet friends and eating amazing food.

In Memorium

Today was a very sad day for the Auburn Family. I'd like to pay tribute to the beautiful trees, who with such class, beauty and awe, represent a school and a spirit that is not afraid. 

War Eagle

If you don't know what I'm talking about, you can check out the story here

Funsies

Clay's parents gave me this fun little guy when they came up for the gym meet this weekend. Yay for no more lost keys (a very big problem for me)!!! Also, yay for having a magnetic door!

Sorry for Slacking!

I had a finance test today that kept me away from fun computer time, but it's over (thank goodness!) and I'm back! I wont say too much about this picture because I don't want to offend anyone but I'm sure some of you will find this picture funny.

The shredder

Reggie got a new toy yesterday. This is it before...

 

This is the Tennis Bone about an hour after purchase

I think Reggie may need more durable toys.

P.S. Remember that Catdog reference I made the other day? Well, Family Guy must read my blog because they totally stole my joke about what happens when they have to go to the bathroom. I'm funnier than Seth McFarland. Booyah.

Goodies

My sweet momma sent me these pretty flowers and this delicious chocolate cream cheese cake! :)

Gymnasty

 

The Auburn Alabama gym meet was last night. It was the first time I've been to a gym meet at bama and, as you can probably tell from the picture, it was nuts! For those of you who don't know, Alabama is really good at gymnastics and sells out their 15,000 seat arena almost every home meet. There were fireworks, disco balls, and hugs florescent lights that spelled out "BAMA". It was like a circus. Unfortunately, Auburn lost but they did a good job and were fun to watch. 

The fans were impressively loud and the student section stood up during every Alabama girl's routine. I was severely disappointed in the Alabama fans, though, when they booed an Auburn gymnast after her music in the floor routine messed up and the judges let her start over. The poor girl went into the locker room after her routine to collect herself after being booed for a really dumb reason by 15,000 fans. I try to stand up for you guys sometimes now that I go to school there, but you make it difficult when you pull crap like this.

Snow

Snow on trees= most beautiful thing ever

The snow was beautiful last night but I couldn't get a good picture of it. This is what I woke up to this morning though. So pretty!

Catdog

Remember this classic cartoon? Well, Reggie may not be a hybrid animal with two heads and no butt (I bet this causes problems) but he does have quite the affinity for sunbathing. My living room has huge windows in it that let in a lot of beautiful sunshine every afternoon and it is Reggie's goal every afternoon to follow the patches of sun and nap in them. The following pictures were taken over a span of about 45 minutes.

 Creepin in the corner...

 Working on eliminating that lovely puppy breath

This on is my favorite! He for realz stood like this for about 20 minutes before he ventured over to the Mentos wrapper.

February 7, 2011...

is the day I died a little inside. As you can probably tell from the frequency of which I talk about food in this blog, I really love food. This love affair does not always agree with my waistline so I'm trying to cook/eat healthier these days. A friend of mine told me about this fantastic website that has a ton of low calorie recipes that are pretty darn good. Many of these recipes call for ingredients like low sodium soup, splenda, whole wheat pasta, etc. Well, I went to the grocery store yesterday to gather up some staple ingredient to try out these new recipes and I had to buy this...

 Fat free sour cream, cheese, and cream cheese go against everything that is right and good in this world. It truly hurt my heart to cut my calories and buy fat free sour cream. If the day ever comes when I buy low fat cheese someone please slap me in the face rid my fridge of all "healthy" food items.

Super Bowl= Super Food

2.6

Yesterday was Super Bowl Sunday. I couldn't care less about professional football and the commercials aren't even that exciting but I do love all of the junk food! (I see a food trend in this blog...) Our spread yesterday included this party staple:

It's so simple and so delicious. I have a lifelong love affair with Rotels and I'm trilled that we were reunited last night. Absence makes the tummy grow hungrier. 

Lupe Love

2.5 

There are approximately 4.2177829 Billion Mexican restaurants in Tuscaloosa/Northport. I am one lucky lady in that the BEST one is right down the street from me! From the outside Lupe's looks like the kind of place that might send you to the bathroom for the night if you eat there. But Lupe's proves the old adage, "You can't judge a book by its cover". It's a total hole-in-the-wall, mom-and-pop establishment but it's authentic Mexican that is T to the A to the S-T-E-Y and they have the best mango margaritas ever! If you are ever in T-town you must go and please call me because I'd love to go with you!

H Dub

2.4

I am going to apologize in advance for how boring my weekend was and the pictures you are about to see. I pledge to be more interesting in the future, and be better at posting on time. I went to the gym on Friday and then did homework the rest of the day. I have 2 test this week and 2 next week. Boo. I worked really hard on making this influence chart with my group so I though I'd share it with the world. This is probably the nerdiest thing I've even done. I don't blame anyone for skipping over this post.

Snow? Hail? Diamonds!

I apologize for writing yet another post about weather, but I experience a form of precipitation today that I'd never experienced in my 22 years. Diamond rain. It's what happens when it rains all day and the temperature fluctuates between 32 and 33 degrees. If only these precious gems didn't melt away and turn into slippery ice.

Here's a bonus photo for all of the animal lurvers out there. I call it "Man with puppy in jacket"

This ridiculous show...

is do darn interesting but frustrating and insane! I decided to not do homework tonight (probably not the best idea), and instead crank out a few episodes of Scrubs and Twin Peaks with the boy. Twin Peaks was made in the early 90s (this is very evident in the silly clothes and "rad" dialogue they use) and is about a town where a girl's murder sparks a whole avalanche of events that make me happy I don't live in a small town. Everyone is sleeping with everyone else and everyone has a secret! It's a fascinating but sometimes frustrating show to watch but I CAN'T STOP WATCHING IT! I have two test next week. Hopefully I don't start writing about Laura Palmer and agent Dale Cooper instead of input parameters and provisions of the health care reform.

P.S. I'm bad at taking pictures and I have a really boring life. Also, one of my professors has an amazing mustache that I'm trying to sneak a picture of. I'll post it as soon as I can!

Flapjacks

2.1

I can't believe it's already February! To ring in the new month (and because I very little food at my apartment), I made savory pancakes and they were DELICIOUS! I saw Rachel Ray make a similar dish on 30 minute meals where she made savory cheese waffles so I decided to put my spin on things. I started out with basic pancake mix and added gouda, parmesan, black pepper, and paprika. I also got to try out my new griddle and the cakes turned out great! I also ate the leftovers for breakfast this morning. Yummy to my tummy! 

Manic Monday

1.31

I am convinced that Tuscaloosa is geographically located in some kind of stinky weather death trap valley. It seems to rain, thunderstorm, or is misty/cloudy at least 4 days of the week every week. Well, Monday was one of those gross days (I am thankful it only rains here and that we're not getting that terrible snow storm the midwest is getting). After sloshing through the grossness all day, I was pleasantly surprised by this beautiful sunset...