The dessert

 We kind of had a lot of dessert.

 pumpkin pie, german chocolate pie, apple crisp pie, pecan pie, pumpkin cheesecake, and fruit salad

It was good.

The characters

We had the Stevenson's, the Staples and Robert's brother, and Dan's mom Jan. 

We took one nice picture and then...

 chowed down

I really like these people

The set-up

Made this banner and borrowed a brown table cloth from Ashley. Then some candles in the center and my plain white plates kept it clean and simple!

Cooking schedule

Wednesday
7pm start getting things together and start the pumpkin pie
7:30pm put pumpkin pie (no crust! I don't like crust) in the oven
             start cutting up the potatoes

 8pm pull out the pumpkin pie
         start pecan pie
         start boiling the potatoes

8:30pm drain mashed potatoes/start mashing
             put pecan pie in the oven
             chat with my mama
9pm place mashed potatoes in fridge to reheat tomorrow
        put cooled pumpkin pie in the fridge
9:30pm take pecan pie out of the oven

Thursday--Thanksgiving!
8:40am go running
9:30am pull Turkey out, rinse off brine, pull out all the inside stuff since I forgot to before I brined it.
             give the turkey a nice butter massage
             wrestle it into the Reynolds bag since Dan-o's playing football
10:30am put turkey in the oven
               pull out the potatoes, set them on the counter
               make whipped cream
11:20am realize when you put the thermometer into the turkey and then closed the bag that it must    have hit a bone since it's been an hour and says your turkey is 207*. This is false
12:30pm pull turkey out the the oven, let it rest
1pm have husband take semi-decent picture with your bird! Cause you just cooked a freakin turkey!

1:15pm first stress hits while trying to find enough counter space for the husband to carve the turkey while you make the gravy

1:20pm husband watches a youtube video to try and carve the turkey just right

1:30pm time for eats!

I love me some Thanksgiving cooking!

Thanksgiving

I'm pretty sure it was a perfect success. I made my first turkey and hosted and I think it turned out just right. I am so grateful to have such great friends and family close by that we can spend holidays with. Yay for the holidays!

More fall

I think I might love fall even more than Spring except the whole turning into a long horribly cold winter thing...

I kind love this one, with the girl reading so intently

Yay for fall colors : )

Fall in Central Park

It'd been a while since I'd gotten to bust out the camera so on Saturday in the midst of running errands, I made sure to bring my camera with me to take a little stroll through Central Park.

More to come!

Spa Castle

The past week of work was pretty rough. So on our Friday when we had a day off, Dan and I traveled the 2 hours out to Flushing to enjoy the Spa Castle. I didn't take any pics before because I pretty much looked like I'd been beaten up and run over by a dump truck.

Then after I had this nice relaxed zen look on my face.

We struggled to take a pic together. The first one made us look like vampires. Don't you like his glowing baldie head?

I love me some Korean Spa time!

My big baldie

This is what happened when Dan was alone in the men's side of the Korean Spa this weekend. He walked out into the common area and I didn't know who he was! I want him to do the bead and baldie thing--I think it's pretty hot : )

NYC

A Year in New York from Andrew Clancy on Vimeo.

This makes me think I should take videos and not just pictures of the things we do here! Wouldn't that be a nice thing to have after living here? And this video maybe makes me tear up a little with it's reminders of everything that's awesome about living here.

My Dan

There's a quote floating around good ole pinterest these days: "Someday someone will walk into your life and make you realize why it never worked out with anyone else." And it's true. It's ridiculous how true this is. So much heart ache and frustration before you meet that person and then you meet them and... it's like this wonderful breeze just blew in. You feel like you can breath for the first time in your life. You wonder how you ever thought anyone else made you feel remotely close to this. All the puzzle pieces finally fit and it's easy. Easy!! (it does get hard sometimes, but can you imagine trying to do the hard bits without this person?! you'd never survive!) Do you ever look at your person and just think "I don't know how I got you to agree, but thank goodness you did!"

Ah! It just feels so good sometimes and I can't believe that he's mine. It makes my head spin!

Apple Spice Cake

This Sunday I made this yummy cake. It was very yummy, but I struggled to get it out of the pan...

Basically it didn't want to come out. But I scraped it and tried to level it...

And threw a bunch of frosting at it and...

at least this angle looks okay-ish

The other side had a rock slide thing going on.

But it still tasted good! Last time I made this recipe I did it with cupcakes and I remember it sticking in the liners also... so yeah, if you make this, watch out for that! But it's a good fall time yum!

Hairs

I finally figured out the trick to doing crown braids even if you don't have long hair. Pull your pigtail up high above your ear and then as you braid, angle it up and over your head (this will help it lay flat). Use those little clear bands (finally bought these, changed my life!) so you can't see those quite as much. Pin it in place and wa-la! Feel like a Swedish princess/milkmaid!