Finding Crackhead Santa

Yesterday, Larry and I went to Forsyth to the Circle of Care thrift shop.  Ami, Brian and I had gone in September and had the best time.  I couldn't wait to take Larry!  We went looking for albums and we bought 14!  We lucked up and found some really cool ones!  Peter, Paul and Mary, The Moody Blues and John Denver's Back Home Again are just a few that we got.  And Larry found this awesome handmade watermelon potholder that I just had to have.  For 75 cents!  I absolutely love it.  It looks so cute in my kitchen!  We went looking for lamps for our bedside tables but didn't find any that we liked.  I want old, vintage, mismatchy and Larry wants a touch lamp.  The thrill of the hunt is what I keep telling him!

 We added a few Santas to our collection
 

I just had to have this one. Crackhead Santa is what we call him.  :)  He just looked like he needed a home.  And some rehab.
 

Y'all know I had to clean them folks out in their sheets and pillowcases!  We got two fitted sheets, two flat sheets and six pillowcases for $8!

We had lunch at Forsyth Country Cookin' and had the catfish and shrimp lunch with french fries and it was delicious!

We stopped by the furniture liquidation place to look at lamps there but it was so cold in there, we didn't stay long.  It was colder in there than it was outside so we left pretty quick.  We saw some really good deals, though, and said we'd go back.  When it's warmer!

Speaking of cold, there's a rumor going around that it's gonna snow Tuesday!  Oh, I so hope we get snowed in!!  I've been saying if it's gonna be this cold, it needs to snow and make it worth it.  Looks like maybe, just maybe...

We went over to some friends' house last night and grilled pork chops and played cards.  We had the best time!  We went to church this morning and had Sonic burgers for lunch.

Pinch me.  I'm that happy.  :)

Friday fun!

I hope today is my last Friday off.  I am supposed to go back to full-time status at work tomorrow.  I've been part time since New Year's Eve!  If I go back to 40 hours as of Monday, I'll have exactly three weeks before the furloughs start and then I'll be back to 32 hours like everybody else.  :)  But more hours and more money sounds goooood to me!  This girl got stuff to do.  Larry will be home in just a little over six months now!  Time is going by SO FAST!!!  He's still doing great. He's about to get his drivers license and start college and by the grace of God, the VA is going to pay for him to go to school and after he's been at the Refuge for four months, he can get a job and he's had an offer already!  We even talked about him buying a vehicle.  I'm leaning him toward a pickup.  :)  And just last week, Larry stopped traffic and helped save a mama duck and her babies that had gotten on the median and couldn't safely get away. That's a sweet boy I have, I tell ya!  Things are absolutely wonderful and everything seems to be falling into place.  God continues to bless us every single day.  We don't deserve a bit of it but we are so thankful for it!!

Here I am waiting for Belinda for lunch!

For my hopefully last Friday off, I met my friend, Belinda, at Casa Mexico out on Highway 96 for lunch and then we went to see The Internship, starring Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson.  What a hilarious movie!  The two of them play 40-something traveling salesmen whose jobs become obsolete by the internet.  They apply as interns at Google and have to compete with hundreds of 20-year-old computer whizzes just to land a handful of jobs.  Google is such an awesome company to work for!  Free food and drinks, nap pods, exercise and play time, laundry facilities, free haircuts, on-site medical care, the list goes on and on.  The nap pods are what sold me!  Can you imagine??  The movie was great and I really, really liked all the 80's throwbacks in it!  And the quidditch game left me sore from laughing so hard.  I even cried a little at the end.  I loved it!!

 

This was THE. BEST. guacamole I have ever had!!

It was so good, I had to get me some more!!  :)  And I got the grilled chicken fajita quesadilla and it was ridonk.  Amazing.  Out of this world.  Most yum.

AND I'd ordered a pair of jeans a whole size too small to motivate me and I tried 'em on today when they came in the mail and they already fit!!  

I hope today was my last Friday off but with Fridays like this one, I won't be mad if it wasn't.  :)

OLD friends are best!

An old friend of mine was passing through this weekend and we got together today for an eatin' meetin' and got all caught up!  I hadn't seen him in seven or eight years and he was in the area with his teenaged twin sons, Avery and Austin, for a baseball tournament.  They play FOUR games this weekend!

We went to Cheddar's and I got this amazing Roasted Pear Spring Mix salad with grilled chicken.  ZOMG.

Avery is second from left and Austin's at the end of the table.

Here are the cutie patootie ball players!  I took this pic of them when all four of them had their cell phones out.  I thought that was so funny!  I still don't have a smart phone and one reason is I'm afraid I will be so totally dependent on it that I won't ever put it down.  I know how I am.  Y'all think I'm on Facebook a lot NOW.  Ha!  

 

I've known Donnie since we were babies.  He moved away when we were in elementary school but we've tried to stay in touch over the years.  Here he is with his Chinese friend today.  I don't know who she is but she had my Cookie Monster shirt on.  :)

We had such a great time just sitting and talking and catching up.  But I just couldn't let the opportunity pass by to remind him of the time he pushed me off the porch into the rose bushes when we were five.  And how he got his tail tore up for it by his mama with his Hot Wheels race track.  And then he had to tease me about being so much older than he is.  I'll be 45 next Sunday, he'll be 45 a week later.  One week!!  He's done this as long as I can remember.  He should be so lucky to be this purty when he's as old as me.  Ha!

It was great seeing you, Donnie!!  Hope y'all win tonight!!

Presents!

My loot from the past two days!

My coworkers and friends, Lisa P and Lisa S gave me these cool gifts!

Lisa P gave me the pedicure set and spearmint foot soak.  Bless her heart, she's been suffering right along with me with my foot the past couple of months.

Lisa S gave me the super cool peace sign sunglasses, these adorable garden gnome salt and pepper shakers and awesome little Beatles compact mirror.

Do these girls pay attention to me or what??  

 Look how cute the gnomes are on my table with Brandy's mushroom!

We have had the most amazing December at the office with our Secret Santa gifts, the endless goodies brought to us by parents and reps, our wonderful Christmas luncheon we had yesterday at Olive Garden courtesy of Dr. Niebaum, who is awesome all by himself.  We just have the best time together!  I'm so blessed to work with such sweet, genuinely caring people. 

An afternoon in The Nature

I met some fabulous folks today. Folks I already loved before I even hugged them. I've been online friends with Mike and Brandy Nichols for four years now and we've been keeping up with each others' lives via our blogs and Facebook.  Finally, the stars all lined up for us and we got to physically meet and spend the afternoon together!

We agreed several weeks ago to meet today at High Falls State Park, in Jackson.  We had the best time together!  I felt like I'd been around them forever and that we were old friends getting together again after a while apart.  It was truly a wonderful afternoon.

The place was pretty much overrun with mushrooms!

They were all over the place, much to our delight.

We love us some 'shrooms.  :)

Mike spied this heron.  Can you see it?

And there were ducks!

Beautiful little Willow, telling me all about the "castle" we were in 

Precious little Roan was like this ALL afternoon!

Sweetest little thing EVAH.

Here we all are, just as happy as we looked!

The carpet of leaves was a nice backdrop, don't you think?

Looks a lot like my YARD.  Ha!

I'm so happy that we finally got to get together!

I just wish we lived closer.

What I'm loving Wednesday!

Today I'm loving these pumpkin spice latte cupcakes that my friend, Rachel made and gave to me! They are AMAZING!!!  She's taking orders for them, pumpkin pies and pumpkin cheesecakes for Thanksgiving so if you're in the Warner Robins area and are interested, let me know and I'll hook the two of y'all up!!

 Nom nom nom nommy nomm nomm

I am straight loving these homegrown green peppers and tomatoes that my friend, Sabrina, brought me today, too!!  I'm so jealous that she even still has maters growing in her garden.  Mine died and shriveled up months ago.

 I brought them home and promptly got them into a pan!  :)
 

Oh, and I am loving this thunderstorm we're having this afternoon!  It made for a very nice nap.  :)

 

It looks a little like snow!!!  NOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Happy Birthday, Lisa!

We had a birthday party for Lisa today at work and as always, we had a table full of food and lots of fun and laughter.  I needed that.

Here's what we had!

 Michelle made these delicious (and pretty!) 

lemon cheesecake squares!

 Cheryl's famous homemade onion dip 

that is out of this world!

 Lisa P's yummy little pickle 

roll-ups that we love so much!

I'm sure there's some kind of law against Dr. Patrenos' brownies with the butter and brown sugar crust on top. Good Lawd.

 

I made...guess??

Buffalo Chicken Dip!  :)

I hope she won't mind but I stole this picture of Lisa off her Facebook.  It was taken last month when she and her family vacationed in Hawaii.  I absolutely love it and I wanted to share it here. 

Happy Birthday, sweet girl!

Thanks for being such a wonderful friend to me.

New to me

Y'all know I've been wanting to get another TV for my guest room/office but I just didn't want to buy one new.  I wanted to get one secondhand (or even thirdhand!) for frugality reasons and to make a better choice environmentally.  I was talking about it at work to Michelle, our nurse who cooks and bakes the most fabulous things and knits and roasts her own coffee beans and has a hippie heart like mine that longs for San Francisco, and she said she had one just stored in a closet in her apartment and after she talked with her hubby, told me I could have it! 

So I went after work today to pick it up.

Y'all.  That thing is 80 pounds (I googled it!) of awkward, bulky tank.  It's a 25-inch Sansui and it's in excellent condition.  I was worried that it wouldn't be by the time I got it home!!  We had to carry it down the stairs of her apartment, rolling it end over end, robot-walking it side to side, anything we could think of to get it to my car.  It was so hot, our hands were sweaty and it kept slipping.  I thought I was going to DIE right there.

It wouldn't go in my trunk but it went into the back seat, along with Michelle underneath it.  She slipped out the other door, we said our goodbyes and I left, not knowing how in THE hell I was going to get it out of my car and into my house without busting it wide open.

I thought about it all the way home and when I got home, I pushed my office chair out to the car, pulled and tugged, prayed, tugged and pulled, pushed my hair out of my eyes, prayed, tugged some more, got half of it into the chair, huffed and puffed, pulled some more until it was all in the chair, the chair's hydraulics collapsed under its weight and the TV almost fell out onto the driveway screen first, ohmygod, I grabbed it just in time, threw my weight onto it to hold it in place and started slowly moving toward the front door.  I got it in the house, as far as just inside the front door.  But it was IN!!!  And it was COOOOOOOOOL in here.  Then I collapsed!!  For just a minute.  I pulled and dragged and rolled it until I got it into the room it was going in and had it hooked up to my Directv cables in less than five minutes.

And now I'm watching Caddyshack!  :)

Thanks, Michelle!!  I'm sure we'll never forget this afternoon!  Ha!!

What I'm loving Wednesday!

A Baby Shower!

We had a baby shower lunch at the office today for Niki, Dr. Patrenos' nurse, and her FIRST baby girl on the way, Morrigan.  Niki's leaving us to stay home with her four children and we are really going to miss her!  Already do, actually!  Here are a few pictures from our fun time with her and her little boy, Judah. 

 Yummy food as always!

Michelle brought a delicious quiche, Lisa S. made chicken wings, a veggie tray and salsa, Dr. Rollins brought a huge bowl of juicy summer fruit and a vegetable tray, Norma got us some Georgia Bob's chicken salad and crackers, I made buffalo chicken dip and brought flatbread crisps and Cheryl made the sherbet punch that was absolutely divine -- good, cold and sweet, just like we like it! 

 Lisa P. made these adorable and most scrumptous

red velvet cupcakes with pink cream cheese icing. 

I love the little diaper pins!

The gifts!

We all pitched in and got her a high chair and she got lots of sweet little baby girl clothes, socks, diapers and a baby book.

 Niki, all smiles opening her gifts and

Judah, lookin' all grown up with his baseball cap on. 

He won't be the baby much longer!

Happy early birthday to me!

This was my very South Beach-friendly lunch today! The girls from the office took me and Lisa P to O'Charley's to celebrate our June birthdays. I had the cedar-planked tilapia (PERFECTION on a plate!), broccoli, a house salad with blue cheese dressing and sugar-free raspberry iced tea.  Yum yum!!!

Happy Birthday, Lisa!

Today is Lisa P's birthday and we had a little party for her at the office.  We've got lots of birthdays in the spring and summer.  Two in May, two in June, two in July, one in August.  We are gonna be some eatin' fools!

Today we had this delicious white chocolate bread pudding that Michelle made!  It was amazing!!  She brought a homemade rum sauce to drizzle over the top, too. 

Cheryl made this yummy homemade Vidalia onion dip!  It is sooooo good!!  We ate it with crackers and it was half gone by the time I remembered to take a picture!

Norma brought ice cream, two gallons of delicious fruit juice punch and some of her famous caramel cake cupcakes.  

Have I ever mentioned how hard it is to lose weight and work with these women who are such incredible cooks??  Let me mention that again.

Lisa got some cute and funny cards, a gift card to Ross from all of us girls and since she loves birds (she has 24 at home!), I found a cute parrot salt and pepper shaker set at Pier 1 that I gave her.  

We had a great day!  We always do, though.  It's so much fun to work there and we just have a good time together.  Every day.  Not just on birthdays.

Happy Birthday, Lisa!!  You know I love you even if I didn't make you no buffalo chicken dip.  :)

Something Borrowed

I went to see this movie last night with Michelle and Lisa from work.  If you're looking for a funny, heartwarming chick flick, go see this movie.  You won't be sorry.  Just the scene where Rachel and Darcy dance to Salt-N-Pepa's "Push It" is worth the ticket price.  Hilarious!!  Oh, and Colin Egglesfield and John Krasinski ain't hard to look at neither.  This is the summary!

Rachel (Ginnifer Goodwin) is a talented attorney at a top New York law firm, a generous and loyal friend, and, unhappily, still single-as her engaged best friend Darcy (Kate Hudson) is constantly reminding her. But after celebrating her 30th birthday, perpetual good girl Rachel unexpectedly ends up in the arms of the guy she's had a crush on since law school, Dex (Colin Egglesfield)...who just happens to be Darcy's fiancé.  

As one thing leads to another in the frantic weeks leading up to Darcy's wedding, Rachel finds herself in an impossible situation, caught between her treasured friendship with Darcy and the love of her life.  Meanwhile, Ethan (John Krasinski), Rachel's constant confidante and sometimes conscience, is busy evading the affection of Darcy's hopelessly love-struck friend Claire (Ashley Williams) while harboring a secret crush of his own and the charming and irrepressible Marcus (Steve Howey) has designs on Rachel that don't necessarily exclude any other woman who catches his eye.

  

Apparently, there's a book this movie was based on that I missed somehow.  I was in Kroger last night getting my stuff for the buffalo chicken dip I made for today and I saw the second book in the series, Something Blue.  So I'm guessing there'll be a part two of this movie.

Good.  You're kinda left hanging at the end.  I hate when they do that.  :)

Partay at the office

Today is our nurse, Michelle's birthday and we had a little party for her at the office!  I love birthdays at the office!!  We eat ALL the dang time but on birthdays, well, just look.

Chocolate ganache cake that Lisa P. brought

Seriously, how ridiculous is this CAKE??

Them little things stickin' up on top??  Chocolate!

We started Weight Watchers last Wednesday and we figure points like crazy women.  We all wanted a sliver of this cake so I crunched the numbers and came up with 11 points for a 16th of the cake.  That's a lot of points for a SLIVER.  Good grief.  I ended up eating half a sliver and then walking with Lisa S. during our lunch hour to make up for it!  Ha!

Bananas and strawberries for smoothies...that they're making WITHOUT ME 'cause I'm off this afternoon.  I will get one tomorrow, though, by cracky!

Buffalo chicken dip that I made Weight Watchers style,

3 points for a 1/2 cup!

We also had a huge bowl of fresh seasonal fruit, melons, strawberries, red grapes and pineapple that Norma brought but by the time I got around to taking pictures, that fruit was gone!  Fruit = 0 points.  Ha!

I don't know how WW is going to work for me but it's something new and exciting and I'm gonna try.  I did South Beach last year and was pretty successful, I lost almost 60 pounds, but I've been stuck for a while and I think I just need new motivation.  A new program to jump start my weight loss again.  I really would love to lose 30-40 more pounds so we'll see how this goes this summer.  It's the easiest program I've ever been on and not nearly as restrictive as South Beach or Atkins.

And Good Lord, if you can have chocolate ganache cake, that sounds like THE plan to me!!

Happy Birthday, Michelle!!  We're happy to have you with us!!

Springtime napkins!

What a nice surprise I got in the mail today!!

My friend, Brandy, sent me these sweet cloth napkins that she made

along with a St. Patty's Day card signed by everybody in the family,

even the kitty, just 'cause she loves me!  :)

I'm absolutely crazy about Brandy's cloth napkins!

I have a little stack on my dining room table

that I use every single day, for every single meal.

I have not used paper napkins or paper towels

in over five years and I have not missed them!

I just love this fabric!!  It's so pretty and springy!! 

And GREEN in more ways than one!!

Thanks, Brandy girl!!!

Lord Of The Dance Comes To Macon!

Last night I went with Heidi and Lisa to The Grand Opera House to see The Lord Of The Dance and let me just tell you, the show was absolutely AMAZING.  It's this Irish dancing story of love and good verses evil.  I LOVED it.  I'd never been to the Grand before and we had box seats. As in seats that sit in a BOX AND HANG OFF THE WALL.  I was more than a little worried about crashing two stories to the floor and messing up my hair. As soon as the show started, though, I completely forgot about where I was and I was just caught up in the story, mesmerized would be a good word for it.  It's awesome. If you ever get a chance to see the show in person, GO!

We had to be there at 7:30 so we went to eat at the Downtown Grill before the show.  I'd heard lots about the DG and wanted to see what it was all about.  Yeah, that and it was the only place on Mulberry open for dinner!  So we park and get out to walk to the restaurant and the wind was so mean and hateful (seriously, what is the deal with all this WIND lately??!) and it was SO cold. We get in there and the first thing that hits us is CIGAR SMOKE.  Yeah, you can smoke in there since children aren't allowed. That was big strike number one. But we were so cold, we just wanted to get inside somewhere and as we were led to our table, there was a fire going in the fireplace and it was toasty warm in there.  That still wasn't enough to make up for the smoke but okay.  We sat down and glanced over the menu and everything was so expensive!!  I'd checked the menu out online beforehand ('cause I'm OCD like that a little bit) so I already knew a grilled chicken breast was $17.  And since I'm doing so good with the South Beach thing, I already knew I was getting a shrimp cocktail for $9. That's more like it!  I ended up getting a bowl of French onion soup, too, which was delicious but the shrimp.  

Oh my God, the shrimp.  'Twas six little bitty shrimp you couldn't even use for bait and they were NOT DEVEINED.  Now that's nasty.  I had to devein my own shrimp and then pay them $9 for the privilege.  I was so not amused.  I'm not one to send food back either.  I've seen Dateline. The service was so bad, too.  We got there at 6:10, I got my food at 6:40 which wasn't that bad but Lisa and Heidi got theirs at 7:10.  We had told the waitress when we got there we had to go at ten after 7:00.  As soon as she sat the plates down, they asked for a to-go box.  My first experience with The Downtown Grill was not a good one.  I'm sure the food's great and so is the service on a night when there's not much going on in town.  I'm also sure I won't go back and find out.

Hippie Dippy Crafty Day!

I went to a fall craft day this morning at the home of one of the nurses I work with. I had asked my Facebook friends earlier in the week for some ideas for an appetizer that I could take today and I went with Doghouse Dip! This recipe came from Dawn, my friend and local PartyLite candle lady. She's made this for candle parties that I've attended and it is SO good! It's called Doghouse Dip 'cause if you ever find yourself in the doghouse, this dip will sho' get you out!! It's chili mix, sour cream, cream cheese, corn and black bean salsa and shredded Mexican cheese. It'll knock your socks off and then put 'em back on for you. There were six of us ladies there, Lisa P, Lisa S, Heidi, Norma, Rosie and me. I work with five of them, everybody except Rosie. We had so much fun! And so much food!! We had my dip, a yummy Mexican dip, peach cobbler, chicken salad sammiches, a cold cuts, cracker and cheese platter and piggies in a blanket.

Here are two frames that Rosie and Heidi painted. They did such a great job! I was worried how my raggly little stuff was gonna look because I am not the least bit crafty. Ami got all the creative talent in our family!!

This is Rosie's frou frou pumpkin.

I LOVE it!!

Here's the pumpkin that I painted. I got a little foam one from Hobby Lobby so I could use it every year. It was Lisa P.'s idea to poke holes where I had painted berries and put a light inside. It's really pretty all lit up! Don't laugh at my leaves!

This is the picture frame that I painted. I have a picture of me and Ami that Brian took of us last year at the Fox in Atlanta when we went to see the play Wicked. I thought this frame would be perfect for that picture! And I can leave it out all year!

We had such a great time today! We're planning to do it again next month and make Christmas stuff.