Happy Halloween!

Halloween is always a fun time of the year for me.  I don't know if it's all the fun memories I have of Halloween growing up or if it's my excitement to share and grow on those memories with my own kiddos. One of my favorite memories of Halloween is my Daddy.  He ALWAYS went as "Mr. Goodwrench" and would dress in his dirty work clothes, throw on a trucker hat and flip the lid with "Mr. Goodwrench" written in sharpie on a piece of duct tape....I soooo wish I had a picture of it to show everyone.  I always remember having big Halloween celebrations and my dad would pull the charcoal grill out into the front yard.  He'd give all the adults bringing their kids trick-or-treating hot dogs and a beer and send them on their way.  Halloween is one holiday that most of my favorite memories of my daddy come from!

Well, Halloween started early this year in the Orr house with a fun little costume party with our play group.  Luci of course had darling decorations and desserts and Bailey made some yummmy sandwiches (I ate 2 1/2 by myself).  But most importantly, the kids had a blast--like they always do!  Kenwood went as a "Rockstar" this year so we could utilize his legitimate mohawk/mullet that he has grown all by himself.  Here are some pictures of my little Rockstar.

Rockin' the guitar

I hairsprayed his mohawk up and drew on some tattoos and earrings, we already owned the clothes and we used Daddy's guitar from his Guitar Hero game.  

Cheap/EASY costume...IF your kid can grow a mohawk :)

On the way in to Finley's house--it was a little bright outside

 Luci's darling decorations...I swear you could see this in a magazine

Struttin' like a true rockstar

Side-view of the mohawk/mullet :)  

Rugs, rugs, rugs....

YAY!!!! We ordered our rugs yesterday.  Thankfully, Dillon and I usually agree on just about everything when it comes to decorating and our selections.  Rugs play a major piece in a house's decor.  Here are our options.

The plaid will be the 3rd one...it will go in our kitchenette under the kitchen table.  We fell in love with this in the store and brought home a sample...and coincidentally fell even more in love with it next to our furniture.  It is DARLING! Can't wait to see it in a big rug!  I'll also have a runner in my kitchen to match.

 One of the major focal points in the new house is our stairs!  They are carpeted in black and white zebra and it's the first thing you see when you walk in the door.  Since the dining room is also off the entry, we chose this pattern.  It will tie in the zebra print but will be FAR more subtle.  It will also formalize our furniture a bit more, since it's on the vintage/rustic side.  I'm anxious to see how this will look!  Even better, as a dining room rug--the black will HIDE a ton of spills and I'll be able to see exactly what needs to be vacuumed up :)

For the living room we chose a VERY plush carpet to be bound into a LARGE rug.  We chose this color because anything lighter would have looked horrible with our very dark brown furniture and we opted out of an area rug because of the pattern we will already have in the kitchen and because I like to change my mind on throw pillows about every other day, so I didn't want to be stuck with too much of a color scheme.  It will be a very cozy room....perfect for sitting on the floor and playing with the kids.  I'm so excited!

"The Famn Damily"

I am really completely and utterly looking forward to celebrating my 26th birthday with my family tonight! I am so blessed to have a family that I love so much and a family that actually has FUN together! We have a blast every single time and some of the time we don't even have meaningful conversation, we just have fun laughing at (and with) eachother.  I am lucky to have a brother and sister that are not only like me in certain aspects, but more importantly completely opposite of me (and each other).  That is what I love most about them!  We were lucky enough to have parents who loved us and cared for us and raised us with enough trust to make our own decisions.  They didn't try to shape the people we were going to be, but instead guided us and loved us while we were able to become the people WE wanted to be and loved us despite our many many (many, in my case) mistakes.  I can only strive to be the type of parent my parents were to us!

 

Decorating as the boxes dwindle SLOWLY

While we are in the process of getting our house unpacked, I have come across a number of things that don't have a place anymore.  In our old house we had SO MANY display shelves that were loaded with frames and miscellaneous home decor "knick knacks".  I literally have frames and vintage books coming out my ears with not many more places to put them.  So, I improvised.  I got into my "craft box" (that has yet to be unpacked) and dug out some fall colored scrapbook paper.  Then I cut the paper down into sizes that would fit my left over frames and thought of a "quote" or "saying" that I could spell out to print onto the paper.  I placed the back row on all the left over books I had (genius, I know)....Here is the final effect:

I am going to spray paint the 2 that aren't black.  But for now it works.

I think this is a fun little entry table idea!  I can change the saying with the different seasons and/or holidays.  It was so quick and easy...turned out pretty cute too!

This entry table is pretty simple and probably won't change much from season to season except that during Christmas the garland will be pine or poinsettias or something and there obviously won't be pumpkins.  The rest of the year will probably just have a plain ivy or spring flowers or something around those lines.  PS-my husband surprised me with this AWESOME table from my favorite furniture store, El Paso Imports (who knows us by name when we walk in...sadly).  I'm in love.  With the table.  And my husband of course :)  Thanks Daddy-O.

Cooking Adventures

Something about my new kitchen has made cooking a breeze.  Yes, cooking, which I've never really had a knack for and quite frankly never really liked at all.  It's amazing to me the blissfulness of having a GAS stove.  I've always heard how wonderful it was, but since I was obviously never a "cook" persay, I really didn't give a hoot. Though I still won't deem myself a "cook" for a quite awhile, I will say that having a gas stove is one of the luxuries in life that I will never go without from this point on.  Here is a sneak peek at my little helper:

Kenwood has also been a big helper in this "cooking" mama learning process.....he completely UN-organized my spice rack the other night, but hey, it kept him busy for a good 20 minutes.  Un-organize away my little angel :)

What's on the menu tonight?  Enchilada's! Yummy.  This is a recipe from Dillon's mom, it's one of his favorites.

Enchilada Sauce:

1 8oz can tomato sauce
1/4 can water
4 T vinegar
8T sugar

Heat on stove until desired temperature is reached.

Enchiladas:

12 Corn Tortillas
1 LB Ground Beef
1 cup shredded cheese

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Cook beef on stove until brown.  Spoon into corn tortilla and add cheese.  Roll tortilla and place into casserole dish.  Continue process until all are rolled and ready.

Place casserole dish in oven for 10-15 minutes until cheese is melted and tortillas are golden.

Top with Enchilada Sauce to your preference. -- I serve my sauce on the side because some people want ALOT and some people want not so much.

Custom Cards

Another thing I've been working on lately--other than the obvious which would be moving.  Is cards and stationary for our family.   We needed some new stationary for thank you cards as gifts for Miss Olivia start arriving and for us to send out for our thankfullness in general to those that are helping us get settled along the way.  Here is what the new stationary will look like:

Front of Card

Back of Card/Inside of Card

You can't really tell but they'll be 5x7 professionally printed on white 100# Cardstock with a Linen finish.  I can't decide if I'll do a postcard style or a folded card...but I'm excited!

This is our moving announcement that I'll be sending out as well.  Sorry, creepers.  I changed the address to keep our privacy.  These will also be 5x7 printed on 100# cardstock.  They will be postcard style with the back being solid green.  I'm probably going to print these with a Metallic finish for fun :)

I've been doing tons of shower and birthday invites and stationary gifts for other people, so it's fun to do something we will actually get to use!  I'm already getting antsy to do our Christmas card!

Easy Breezy Cheeze-It Chicken

One of the major changes we knew we would encounter when we moved was the convenience of all the fast food joints around us.  Thankfully, it is a change that will be for the better!  With that said, I'd mentioned earlier that I was going to have to start cooking.  So, tonight is the first night we will have our first home cooked meal in our new house! What's on the menu? Something easy of course!!!!


Cheeze-It Chicken

Chicken breast, any size, skinned (as much as desired)
butter, melted
1 box of Cheez It crackers

Salt the desired number of pieces of chicken and leave overnight, (makes chicken tender). Melt butter and finely crush the crackers. Dip pieces in melted butter and then roll the pieces in the crushed crackers. Bake on a lightly greased baking sheet at 325 degrees for 1 hour.

We will be serving the Chicken with:

Loaded Baked Potatoes

Steamed Asparagus 

All things shiny and NEW!

Well, well, well.  Hello there blog readers! I am back to life!!  We are officially moved in to our new house and slowly but surely getting nice and settled.  Last week was a FULL week of packing up the house...we literally had 7 days to pack a 3000 square foot house with an almost 2 year old and me, the giant pregnant one.

God has had some truly amazing timing in our lives these last few weeks. He is the only one I can praise for all of our new found blessings!  The first week of October we got an offer on our house.  That same week, Dillon accepted a new job.  Then, last week was packing week which was ended with double closings (on our house and the new house).  Thankfully, Dillon was off work all of last week to help me pack up the house and lift all the heavy boxes that Dillon forbid me to lift (I didn't complain).  I cannot tell you how perfect the timing was for him to be off last week!

So, with so much "new" around our house in the past week, we are looking forward to settling into all the changes!  We are beyond blessed and thankful.

Pumpkin Patch

We went to the pumpkin patch today! YAY!  It was so much fun to go with all the kiddos again this year--we missed a few of our group but we added 2 little boys to the mix (and technically 2 girls and another boy that will be here this winter!)!  Carter and Colton pretty much stayed in their strollers the whole time, but all the big kids got to run around and have fun!  Props to Luci and Amanda for having the super-mom powers to bring both kiddos!  I will be learning alot from you women in a few short months!  So lucky to have all of you girls (and your kiddos) in my life! Love you all!

This was from last year....they grow up so fast!!! I love these little munchkins!

The BEST month of the year

I love, love, love October for many reasons.  October is the month of my birthday, it's the month that you really start to notice the fall weather, it's the month full of candy and costumes and pumpkins, and it's a month that the kids really get to have some fun!

My little Skeleton:

Our little Sooner

Our little munchkin has learned how to say "BOOMER!" and "OOOOOOO-U!"  We are very proud Sooner parents :)

I have about a million things to do, and low and behol I'm avoiding it all and blogging. I have to organize my work papers so nothing gets lost in the move, I have to start packing up all my dishes and china--which I'm avoiding due to a wild and crazy toddler, I have to do loads of laundry--a job that will never ever end, and I have to play with and entertain my sweet munchkin while we can take advantage of this beautiful weather!! Sometimes I complain about all the things I need to do in my life, but really I'm just thankful I get tro stay at home with my sweet baby and that I have a work-at-home job and that I have THINGS that need packing. A daily reminder that even the mundane day-to-day chores are in fact blessings from above!!

Griddle Sticks

When I was at the grocery store yesterday I found these pancakes and turkey sausage on a stick. They look like corndogs, but they are breakfast food! It's great for Kenwood because he is obsessed with "hot dogs" due to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and the "Hot Diggity Dog" song and dance--which he sings and dances about 50 times a day. Plus, since it's near impossible to keep him in a high chair these days we opt for breakfast options that aren't insanely messy that will get all over my carpet!! These are just the trick!

Jimmy Deans Griddle Sticks with Turkey Sausage. I haven't tried them, but Kenwood ate the whole thing this morning!

Bargain Shopping

Since we are in the process of moving, I'm having some major jealousy towards everyone that is buying pumpkins and fall stuff to decorate their houses! I don't really want to do anything to my house since the second I buy anything, I'll have to move it.  So, for my retail therapy, clothes will have to do....and since I'm pregnant and hate buying maternity clothes, my boys get the good end of the deal on this one!

I am sincerely OBSESSED with TJMAXX.  I buy just about all of Kenwood's clothes there and just recently got my husband several nice Ralph Lauren Polo button-ups for work and some sweaters for the fall and a comfy pullover.  I bought Olivia a little one-piece footsie set, and I bought Kenwood a new pair of jeans today too...my little man is too tall for his 24month jeans even though they fit perfectly around his little belly.  I hate it that he grows so fast :(  but the high-waters just won't do.

Anyway, for those of you that have a break or need some good quality clothes hit up TJMAXX for almost half the price of what you pay at the mall.  I also buy all of Kenwood's books there.  They have a huge selection of kids books, again, for almost half the price of retail.

Nothing like some good 'ol bargain shopping to complete your day!!

A Bedding Decision!!

Ok, so I know everyone is probably super sick of discussing our bedding dilemmas! But, I think I have FINALLY made up my mind :)  I am going to duplicate my original favorite, with some changes:

I cannot find a pink stripe or gingham print in taffeta or silk ANYWHERE....you'd think it'd be easy right? WRONG.  So, I went to my handy-dandy Fabric.com and picked out some cotton fabric with the same print.

This stripe will be horizontal for skirt, ties and ruffle on bumper

The pink polka dot will be on the outside of the bumper

The white minky dot will be the inside of bumper as well as the crib sheet

Thoughts?!  I haven't set anything in stone, so I'd love to hear your opinions! :)  I like the idea of simple pink and white...I just don't think you can go wrong with polka dots or stripes---they will always be "IN". And I don't want to SPLURGE on crib bedding that she will likely only use for 6-9 months if she's anything like her big brother!

A new cook on the horizon!

For those of you thy know me, especially my husband, you know that I was not blessed with the "good cook" gene that my entire family has. My mother actually TAUGHT cooking for 15 years and I somehow avoided letting any of her cooking knowledge sink into my little brain! I'd like to think my cooking expertise came from my Dad, whose favorite foods consisted of sauerkraut and vinegar on chili. GROSS. Neverthelss, I am bound and determined to start cooking for my family.

There are a number of reasons for this sudden change of attitude toward the dreaded "cooking":

1. Health Benefits--even good 'ol down home cooking is healthier than greasy MSG-full take-out.

2. Convenience--as soon as we get moved and settled, it will no longer be "convenient" to go down the street for fast food.

3. Poket-Book-- it is a lot cheaper to cook than to order out every meal! Especially as soon as Dillon and I learn to eat left overs.

4. Vanity-- as vain and lame as it is, I want my kids to grow up loving their moms cooking and wanting my recipes. Just like I grew up loving my moms cooking!!