avocado mousse, birthday surprises and a dream that gave itself away

since my last post, i've tried a few new recipes from this amazing paleo cookbook- i am especially fond of the avocado/chocolate mousse, and the blueberry cobbler stuff! for real though...non-dairy mousse?! what?! amazing, i tell ya! my food processor has gotten more use in the past few weeks than it has in a LONG time!

seriously...too good to be good for me!

a birthday has occurred, so we're taking that in stride. i'm so glad that they work the way they do; the gradual release is a good thing. so glad that we don't just gain a year's-worth of growth over night. can you imagine waking up the morning of your birthday and having all of the aging signs show up at once in one day? that would be a dead give-away. people would look at you and say, "yep, must be her birthday!"

my co-workers treat me well...thanks jeri, andrea, dr. hughes, sean and carmen--bundt you really shouldn't have!

they know me well! my heart belongs to nothing bundt cakes!

always fun to walk into a bday greeting! thanks!

 it's always fun to get all of the messages on fb and whatsapp-feeling the love from afar, and i got the bday card from mom and dad-somehow they always pick out the perfect cards that make me feel super terrific! this year mom sent me an awesome calendar of rain forests-love it! (they also called, so they are in luck, they get props in the blog!) sending out props to gigi for remembering as well, because she is kind of a birthday master mistress..she is queen of all things birthday..in fact, she celebrates hers twice-crazy girl!

HONDURAS! appropriately placed on my bday month!

as i was at school, on my birthday, i got a phone call. my apt. people said they needed to get in because there was a leak in the apt below mine, so they needed to check the utility room. they had to call in because i have the boys, and they needed to know if the boys were locked up so that they could get in...

they got in.

 i was a little flustered that they left it this way, and i was going to take this picture to the office to have a chat, fortunately i stopped back at my place beforehand, or i might've made a fool of myself! they did come back to patch it up. thankfully.

also this month, i was able to go to a great workshop: identifying learning differences 1-6 yrs. it was truly enlightening! i really wish our entire staff could go to this workshop. for those of you with young children, think about teaching your kiddos to write in cursive, and read in print. why, you might ask? well, cursive is more fluid, they don't have to worry about all of the individual steps for printing letters, and spacing isn't an issue. not only that, they won't struggle with the b/d, p/q. so take that tip and do what you will with it!(it's free).

the other free tip for today is that, if you have lower back problems, placing a large pillow under your knees while you sleep will really help ease some of the pain.(two for one!) 

last week i was also able to video chat with my lil sis, sheryl in HONDURAS, and discuss possible plans for a little vacation time in the summer (? maybe?!?) and the biggest surprise was a fun phone call from a dear old friend, with whom i used to play basketball and softball in high school. it was really special and meant a lot-so good to catch up and hear the familiar voice of a friend from the past! catching up is like..the best thing ever! (better even than avocado mousse-just sayin...)

and to close it all out for tonight, i had a dream a few nights ago, and in the dream, i knew it was a dream. two of my colleagues-teacher friends, were in it. penny had decided to invest in a business venture: a library book store. i am not certain how you make any money from this type of a venture, as the two are in direct opposition, everyone would borrow and not purchase, right? but since she is a reading/language arts teacher, my 'dream mind' let it go. then carol decided that she was interested in investing with penny, and they were going to do this together. but at some point carol convinced penny that a roller skating rink would be a better business investment. i'm pretty sure at this point my 'dream mind' confirmed it was a dream because there was no way these two would ever open a skating rink! there's no fooling me! not even in a dream! 

and that reminded me of so many different roller skating memories! couples skate! limbo! conga chain! falling flat on face! woooo! when i lived in brodhead, there was not a rink there, so we would sometimes take a bus, with a group of people to a nearby town that had one (always with my brother and his friend tom walker...and sometimes the mcguinty's) good times! 

i'll save the roller blading memories for another day-they are pretty exciting, too! (the invincible college years)

'evening!

julie

i probably shouldn't love sauteed veggies as much as i do #notashamed

So thankful for long weekends!!

two days in and what have i done? NOTHING!! besides finishing up the merlin series on netflix...and trying out 3 new paleo recipes! every single one of them was amazing! i loved the pumpkin pancakes and the pumpkin custard. i enjoyed the zucchini/carrot crustless quiche...

so good! i saw this at bmayes' and had to go ahead and make the purchase-totally worth it!

even just looking at it makes my mouth water!

then tonight i did something i probably shouldn't have done. i sauteed vegetables. if eating a plateful of sauteed onions is wrong, then i don't want to be right! yes, a pan full of sauteed veggies is one of my weaknesses. several years ago, while working at kamp, a friend and i went to ruby tuesdays for dinner and i ordered the fajitas because the veggies in the picture looked SO good! then i was sorely disappointed when it came back with a sparse assortment of vegetables with little color. i may have complained to the manager about it due to the fact that my plate paled in comparison to the picture.

the weather has been phenomenal, so i took a walk with the boys yesterday-it's been much too long since we ventured on the back trail leash-less. when we got to the dog park we sat around for awhile because there was no one else there. as we were getting ready to leave, in walks a guy with a very large dog and the famous words: HE'S NOT MEAN. and my common response-NO, BUT CHACO IS.  i just worry that he doesn't realize how big he is and they don't realize how small they are. and just as i said that, the big dog came trouncing up and chaco, my littlest, snarled and snapped (i don't think the big fella even noticed). chaco calmed down as i picked him up and cradled him on his back-then we made our way home.

other than that, i saw some artwork at a friend's house and decided to see if i could do something similar...

it's been fun playing around with that...

tomorrow-last day of this fun little break...i'm sure we can find something fun to do!
julie

oklahoma- best part of my break, thanks to a long overdue reunion

here we go again!

happy new year! i'm certain it will be a great one with new adventures, fun meetings with friends, and growth. i had no plans or intentions to do anything over this break apart from relaxing and catching up with some reading and artwork. well...i got a text the day after we got off for break from shea, one of my amazing kamp friends, saying that she was going to be in oklahoma for the break!

so, we had Christmas here in dallas,

all dapper in their Christmas best!

and then on the 26th, we went up to oklahoma and stayed with bmayes, another amazing kamp friend-in case you don't follow this blog, or missed the episode from our last visit to norman, bmayes is the proud 'mother' of 2 yorkies (chaco's sister, reagan, and half brother, thatcher). it's always great for them to get together and socialize...and even greater for me to get together and socialize!! 

How do you know when you've reached oklahoma? well, it seems pretty obvious. follow the truck with the native american!

 we arrived to fall-like weather; it was gorgeous! so of course they went out to play first thing.

oh how they loved the yard with leaves!

then lo and behold, the next morning we had no idea, but we woke up to huge snowflakes! it was rather unexpected...none of us are into weather-watching and checking forecasts. hmm. 2 inches of snow out there!

so, of course, they had to play in the snow every chance they got! they even pretended that they had to go pee...and they didn't...you could almost hear them laughing each time.

so on the morning of the snow, it made for a lazy day, but everyone was meeting for breakfast..so eventually we were coaxed into joining for breakfast at cracker barrel, where stories and catching up began with a side of grits and biscuits. then we returned to bmayes' house to see puppies and just hang out for a bit. it's always a little worrisome having so many people around so many-especially friends who aren't used to having small dogs around; little critters have a tendency to get in the mix of things and then they are under threat of being crushed. more anxiety for me than the dogs.

 i don't have the actual photo, but here's a link to the charming pic taken by shea's camera!  http://instagram.com/p/xIMRxQF6yA/ what a fun bunch! yet more of the amazing kamp friends (anyone see a theme here? my kamp friends are pretty stinkin' amazing). i always feel so refreshed after i hang out with these guys!

after visiting at bmayes', everyone eventually headed out to shea's home, where her mom had prepared a delicious 'after-Christmas' spread-it was phenomenal!! then we played a little card game during which we found ourselves laughing harder than we had expected! good times, so if you wanna' know how to get a party started...just let me stand up and tell you...only i probably won't.

and i almost failed to mention that i was introduced to hurt's donuts...and for the love...they will literally hurt you. these donuts..i dream about them. my mouth is watering right now for the twixted...they gave me a new fondness for cake donuts-only they are gourmet-amazingness. twixted, lucky charms, Jesus donut, bacon-maple, choco-crispies, samoa-girl scout cookie....i will cry if they ever go out of business.

back at the bmayes homestead, the boys were making themselves right at home and marking like pros...grr. i wish there were a way to curb that. thanks for putting up with that b! they may have learned some 'bad' habits from the residents-climbing onto tables. chaco figured it out after a few tries. it's probably cuter because they aren't great danes...

thatcher looks on from the table as bruno thinks about doing something sneaky.

i was really excited when shea texted about going to the rock climbing silo...they had some awesome climbing walls in there! i definitely made a decision that i need to get in shape so that i can enjoy doing the things i love doing such as the rock climbing-i did a little research, and there is a gym not far from my place that has auto belay, so i will be partaking in that this year. it will be a good stress-reliever, as well (and likely much-needed).

shea making that reach of faith.

umm...so it's a little tiring.

before we left, several joined us back at bmayes place to play cards and, once again, it was mostly fun...apart from the judgmental gf stick-in-the-mud who came in tow. methinks she doesn't get us. and that's ok, next time, she has a true heads up and can stay home and knit or something.  we had plenty of food for chips and cheese dip, puppy chow, etc. but none of it was eaten because the hursts had gone out for mexican and we'd just gone out for hideaway-phenomenal pizza!! (zero snackiness-it's a word now, deal wit it)

before i left, i made an appointment to switch my cable to a basic-basic plan and get the internet because the service that i had was spotty-bad connectivity and speed. so i had that taken care of today and i am so happy i did! in fact, i cannot believe that i put up with the previous service for so long! it was rough! and then tonight as i was trying to cancel the former service, the lady kept going on and on trying to figure out how she could keep me as a customer, but i was strong. she even called back after the service was dropped. and i then let her know it was too late. no worries-i was polite. i worked in a call center at one time-in fact, most of my life i've been in some form of customer service, so politeness is usually not an issue.

this was the other problem, i was unable to use roku with the other service, so when i set this up today, i couldn't help but smile!

i am dedicating today to finishing some artwork, reading and perhaps a couple of letters. it's been a great break so far- 2 more days to make the most of!

happy new year!
julie