4th of July & Pancakes

Happy Independence Day!!

Yesterday was Independence Day and I woke up with one thing and one thing only on my mind. Not America, not my freedom... no.... that one thing was.....Pancakes. I had to have them. I never want pancakes, but yesterday morning I could not stop thinking about them. I got up and looked in the pantry and *GASP* there was no Bisquik. This is probably because I make pancakes about once a year. Luckily the internet is my BFF and I quickly found an easy recipe and my first time pancakes from scratch turned out wonderfully! The batter made way to much so I made the dogs some extras and made one "MEGA pancake" for Casey to use as a frisbee for the dogs.

Behold MEGA PANCAKE!!!!

BOW to MEGA PANCAKE!!

After "Pancake Mania" we rearranged the guest rooms to consolidate into one room so we will have room in the nursery.

Yesterday afternoon we headed to Chris & Jessica's for their 4th of July block party. Normally we have a 4th of July party at our house, but this year it was nice to have a break. Here is a pic of Casey, myself, and the bump. :)

My Blogger Persona

Has anyone else noticed that my blog has multiple personalities? Is it a cooking blog? A family blog? Diet blog? Well my blog, like myself, is quite eclectic... and by eclectic I mean very inconsistent. I like to tell people that I don't know a lot about anything, but I know a little about everything. I also have ADHD (attention deficit) which means that my mind bounces around like crazy from one thing to another and a lot of the time I become "obsessive" about something and do that one thing for a while and then quickly burn out. Then I'll bounce to something else and then burn out and sometimes I'll go back to one thing that I have previously burnt out on and the cycle continues. While this is great if you are a believer that "variety is the spice of life" it can sometimes be cumbersome if you are trying to be consistent at something. Unfortunately my life has never been consistent so that's something that I'm trying to work on. While thinking about my New Year's Resolutions, I really figured out that my real goal this year is to be more consistent. The things I want to be consistent in are all things I've tried, but never made a habit in my life. Here are things that I would like to be consistent in:

1. Photography and taking more pictures and better pictures.
How I will achieve this consistent goal: Making it a point to take pictures every week. Also I am planning on going to my cousin's studio this summer to shadow him.

2. Staying fit. Story of most womens' lives. I just want to quit fluctuating so much so that ALL of my clothes fit ALL of the time and I don't have to have 3 different sets of clothes (really skinny clothing, normal happy size clothing, and "fat" clothing). Currently I am straddling the normal happy size and fat clothing so I want to work on shedding a few pounds on top of staying in better shape. I don't think that I will ever be one of "those" girls that has 0% body fat and looks awesome in everything, but I can be happy with my weight and size and that's what I truly want.

3. Have consistent hobbies. Did you know that I used to be a competitive inline speed skater? On the golf team in high school? A theatre geek? In junior high choir? President of the Home Ec club? An archaeology major? Highly involved in Student Government? A huge movie buff? A budding photographer? A really good cook? A Fashion Merchandising major? An avid doodler and painter? The list goes on. Do I do any of these things on a regular basis these days? Nope. I just want to be more consistent in my hobbies and doing something twice a year does not a hobby make.




In other news, the new Kings of Leon album is phenomenal. I am also really obsessed with the Cee Lo song "Forget You" (but the unedited version). Check them out.

Goodbye 2010!

Hello 2011!

This past year was the best year of my life. I married my best friend, finished my first year of teaching, and rekindled several wonderful friendships.

For New Year's Eve, Casey and I went to Nacogdoches to spend the weekend with Leigh Anne, James, Christy, Nick, Jennifer, and Carl and I can truly say this was the best NYE to date. It was so relaxed and understated and it was wonderful to end the year with such great friends.

Here are some pictures from our weekend:

The girls and I with our sparklers!

The guys did a great job on the fireworks display!

Handsome Casey and me right before midnight. :)

Me and best friend Baker!

The New Year's hats were repurposed as dog bowls!

New Year's Day Shooting

Now for the resolution(s):

1. I will run my first half marathon. I am already working toward this - I signed up for the Austin Zooma half!

2. I will be more diligent.... in everything! I am a GREAT starter, but I have a hard time keeping up with things after I start them and I'm even worse at finishing things. This blog has been one of the only things I have continued to do after starting... well ever!

3. I will paint more, draw more, take more photos, dress up more, cook more, bake more, read more, and generally DO more with my life. As much as I love to sleep and lay on the couch watching crap television, I deserve better and so does Casey. I want to get out and do more with our lives. I want to take the dogs on more walks. I want to watch more movies than TV shows. I want to read more books than magazines (I LOVE magazines...) and I want to foster my relationships with family and friends more than ever.

4. This year, we WILL travel more. I absolutely love to travel... if I had one thing that was the most important thing that I wanted to do with my life (besides becoming a mother, and other family responsibilities) it would be to travel as much as possible. So far this year Casey and/or myself will be traveling to the following places:

• St. Lucia (maybe) for our honeymoon in March
• New York (again) to visit family
• California (for Casey's work)
• Colorado for a family vacation
• New Mexico to visit Christy and Nick
• On a cruise for Leigh Anne's bachelorette party
• Possibly Indiana or Missouri to check out campuses if Casey decides to go to Seminary.

5. I will get back into shape (did I mention that I have gained 10 lbs since the wedding?) and STAY in shape. I'm so tired of the fluctuating due to my whimsical view on food. Food is for nourishment and overeating constantly is just gluttonous.


So hello 2011 and Happy New Year to everyone!

Back to Basics

Now that the wedding is over and I have myself a new husband, I am trying to embrace my role as a wife and partner to Casey. I've always been a very headstrong independent person and even though Casey and I have been together for 6 years now, it's still sometimes difficult for me to let go and let someone be my life. Luckily I found Casey and I want nothing more for him to be my life so I've been in full on "nesting" mode since the wedding. We have completely unpacked all gifts and hung up all of the framed pictures we had/got, I have started making a menu each week so I can stay on track with cooking (thanks for the idea SB!), and I'm trying to find new and exciting things to do with my new hubby. :)

Last week I made Gnocchi from scratch as well as chocolate covered marshmallow s'more cookies that were so yummy! Casey helped with the gnocchi - I usually have no need for a food mill, but this was a time that I needed one, so we had to improvise by pushing the potatoes through a colander... not very easy. Here are some pics:





In the past two weeks I have cooked more than I have cooked in the last 6 months - crazy huh? Here are some of the things I've made so far:

Cuban Red Beans & Rice
Potato Gnocchi with marinara
Casey's favorite enchiladas
French Dip sandwiches
Corn tortilla chicken tenders with spanish rice
Cajun skirt steak with homemade creamed corn
Margherita pizza

As far as the new and exciting things to do, we registered for the MudQuest run in Waco for October 2nd and we are so excited to get to do something so fun with all of our friends. Pictures to come!

Americana

This weekend was our 3rd annual 4th of July party and I'm just going to go ahead and say it - it was by far our best for many reasons.

Reason 1: I actually bought cute tableware and set everything up beforehand so I wasn't super stressed out the day of the party:





Reason 2: I really liked the outfits I wore this weekend. Yes both of them included Chambray, but I really can't get enough of that stuff right now.



Reason 3: We had a slip and slide...




Reason 4: Our friends brought a TON of a fireworks...




Reason 5: My cupcakes turned out great..




and the final reason....

My neighbor busted out a huge blow up water slide about 2 hours into our party (he rents blow up bounce house things) and almost everyone at the party changed back into their bathing suits and played on that thing for hours...




And that my friends... was a 4th of July party to be remembered.

Happy Independence Day everyone!

Summer time and the living is easy...

Update time!

I have been a lazy, lazy blogger, and while I seriously doubt that anyone reads my blog enough to notice, I still feel like I should be updating more often. So here's what's been going on in the life of Sarah, Casey, Riley, & Zac (our new official spelling of his name):


1. Instead of going to New Braunfels for the weekend after the flooding that happened, we opted to make it a day trip and ride up to New Braunfels with Casey's parents to show them around that area (neither of them had ever been) and then to drive up to Austin for our wedding food tasting. On Saturday we took the Pages to New Braunfels and showed them around. We made our first stop at Naegelin's, the oldest bakery in Texas. This is always a must when we go to New Braunfels for 2 reasons. 1. We love supporting family owned small businesses. 2. Everything they make is incredibly delicious and very affordable. We ended up buying them out of kolaches so that we could take some back to the Chagla's who weren't able to take their family trip this year due to the flooding. After Naegelin's we went over to check on Heidelberg and were very sad to see that they were hit pretty hard with the flooding. All of their downstairs lodge rooms were flooded so all of the rooms were being gutted and repaired. Hopefully they will be back up and running by the time Casey's bachelor party rolls around in a few weeks.

2. I have been subbing at TWYLA and am loving it.

3. The weekend of June 18-20 I went to Nacogdoches and was lucky enough to be asked to help plan my best friend's proposal! James proposed to my beautiful best friend Leigh Anne on June 18th and it was perfect. I also got to hang out with my other best friend Sara Baker! Here are some pics from the weekend:






4. Upon getting home from Nacogdoches we celebrated Father's Day with Casey's family at Shannon's house. We got Casey's dad a bunch of miscellaneous gifts and among them was this book. I HIGHLY recommend it as it has made me laugh harder than I've laughed in a LONG time- WARNING: it obviously uses very explicit language- use discretion if you are offended by curse words. After getting home from Father's Day festivities we had Casey's (dog) Father's Day from the boys:




4. We went to Longview this past weekend to help my dad with some stuff and go to my cousin Lily's 5th birthday. Later that night my mom helped Casey and I give the pups a hair cut. Here are some pics from the party and also our hairless hounds:

Our God daughter Abby crawling all over me

My cousin Jen & I

Ms. Lily opening her gifts!

BEFORE

DURING

AFTER

5. I've been missing some things lately... I really miss cooking, fashion, and photography. I used to be so passionate about all three of these things and I've really let my passion for these things go by the way side. So in addition to planning a wedding, trying to stay fit, helping my best friend plan a wedding, keeping the house in order, and working part time, I am going to try to also put some effort into bringing more artistic and creative endeavors into my life again. What this means for you blog readers is that from time to time I might post an outfit, photograph, or meal that I have cooked and that I am proud of. Whether these things will truly hold any artistic value will remain to be seen, but they will be things I am proud of and this blog is about self expression and finding myself so yeah... lol. Here are some meals that I have made that I am proud of:

I may have blogged about this dish before, but it's my signature dish and something I make all the time so I thought I would share. I call it Italian Flag Pasta (because of the red green and white)

Italian Flag Pasta:
-Any pasta - I usually use angel hair or penne and I mix 1/2 whole wheat pasta and 1/2 regular for texture
-Cherry or Grape tomatoes - quartered
-Chopped fresh basil (does not work with dried basil)
-Kosher salt (my secret ingredient in everything)
-Fresh cracked black pepper
-Olive oil
-Lemon juice

I usually add shrimp that I have sauteed in olive oil and fresh minced garlic, but you can have this as a side dish (I'm planning to have it as a side for our 4th of July party) or you can add grilled chicken or shrimp and have it as a main course. It's SO easy and so yummy! It's a perfect summer dish.

This is a pasta recipe that I got from HEB Cooking Connection. It's pasta with this amazing imported tomato sauce with chicken sausage, fresh basil, and parmesan cheese. You can really do this with any pasta, tomato sauce, and chicken sausage. I have been adding basil to everything because my basil plant is thriving - yay!

Okay so I think I have successfully overloaded this post and it just might be the LOOOOOOONGEST post ever. More later!