Monday Funday

Alarm, not the kind you want to hear in the morning! 

Between yesterday and today we've had a few run ins with our fire alarm which is not a fun thing with a skittish kitty! Yesterday I came home to see our building evacuated, firefighters wandering around in and out of Zonies (which is directly below our apartment), and unable to reach Todd on his phone. Thankfully it was something minor at Zonies we assumed and we were allowed to return to the building with screeching fire alarms still sounding. Thankfully Todd was able to grab Noey and go to the car without Noey completely spazzing out. After being thankful we made it through a fire alarm without any mishaps we were faced with another one today. At least this time we were both here and I was able to grab Noey and everything else we needed and get out. After running out into the the cold windy snow in my pajamas and slippers with Noey howling we were told it was just a test. We sat in the car anyway until it was done since it's so deafening loud. A little heads up about a test would have been nice before 10 am! When we got home from errands today there was a notice saying that each apartment's fire system would be tested tomorrow to fix all deficiencies discovered yesterday... good to know. Just happy this will be over by tomorrow! 

Jalapeno Popper Bites, Yum! 

So these little wonders are from a new Southern Cooking cookbook my mom gave me for Christmas. So simple and so so delicious. While they're not the healthiest, they're not as bad as a typical popper since they're not fried. Here's how they're made:
1 8oz brick of cream cheese softened
1 C of Parmesan cheese (I used regular cheese in the plastic can instead of shredded parm)
1 large egg beaten
4 Tbsp chopped jalapeno (seed them first)

Mix it all together, form into a ball (about tbsp size) and roll in breadcrumbs. Place on a cookie sheet and bake 10-15 minutes. If you make them this size they take closer to 15 mins and you'll get about a dozen and a half of them.


That's all for now!

 

Welcome back to the blogosphere?

Oops....

So I'm self nominating for being a bad blogger! Once my anniversary arrived and the most exciting moments happened, I ditched you! I promise to try to get better now that I'm headed into my last semester of school and try to fill in the gap of life since Black Friday!

"Hey baby, I think I wanna marry you"

For those of you who don't know already, on our anniversary trip to Turning Stone Todd proposed! Needless to say I've been excitedly starting to plan our wedding since then. Currently we are 600 days from the wedding! If you want all the details on the proposal and wedding party, etc. check out our wedding website RobinsonandWilcox.ourwedding.com.As I come across things that I think would be relevant to share, I'll try to be better about posting! 

Happy Holidays!

I hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year. Christmas is always such a great time in my family as we have traditions that we always rely on. I am so blessed to have such a great family and for all  the gifts I received. It'll be exciting to get back to our apartment in about a week and get everything situated and be able to use some of the stuff we haven't been able to use or haven't needed to use while we were home. 

 #Collegelife

Next Wednesday I will start my final semester of college at SUNY Cortland. It's exciting yet bittersweet to think  that once I'm done this time, I'm really done and leaving that cozy little town and the people that have become a home away from home for the past three years. When I first started college I thought I'd be happy to graduate and be excited to get away. I kept that thought when I first arrived at Cortland until I was constantly told "you'll be dying to get out now but once you're out you'll be dying to get back in". Now I know why. My friends and I have realized that we have been living in a dream life through college and real life won't come close! What beats being able to sleep until at least 8:30 every day, go to class 3-5 hours a day and manage the rest of the time as you please, and spend countless hours with your best friends where no one judges the amount of beverages you drink or the conversations you have?

That's all I have for now!  Promise to make a better attempt at this this time!

#BlackFriday

Happy Thanksgiving!
Well I don't know about you but I think  I'm still full from yesterday's meal! Thanksgiving isn't just about the food though, it's about family and coming together to make a massive feast for all to enjoy. I can tell you I'm certainly so thankful for that! I ate so much yesterday between lunch at my house and dinner at my boyfriends! Typical fare like turkey, mashed potatoes, and homemade stuffing, but also other things like scalloped corn, cool whip fruit salad, and grandma's homemade banana bread. Not to mention some delcious pie that I made Wednesday! :) I don't think there's any better feeling than having your 82 year old grandmother stand in the kitchen with you to teach you how to make homemade whipped cream with her kitchen aid mixer that she's made very clear will be yours someday. It was just a great day all around. 

#BLACKFRIDAY

Today, my mom and I took our Black Friday extravaganza together. Unfortunately my aunt couldn't attend due to working in Long Island to help victims of Sandy. Typically my mom and I buy only a couple things here and there, some great deals for ourself that we wouldn't otherwise get; today was a different story. While my mom still has quite a bit to buy, I'm happy to report I am probably 3/4 of the way done with all my Christmas shopping already! I helped her get a great start on gifts for the family as well. It was a lot of fun but my bed is feeling pretty good after 10 hours of shopping!

Tomorrow is family Thanksgiving with my boyfriend's family so just when I thought there might be a bubble of room in my stomach I'll eat another huge meal! After that, it's back to school on Sunday (this break flew by!) and I'm so excited to be decorating my apartment for Christmas on Monday! Although I'm not sure Noey will appreciate it, he isn't a big fan of change or the fact the Christmas tree with sparkly garland and ornaments he can swat that he enjoys so much takes over the area where his infamous green moon chair is. Let's hope he makes peace with the tree this year! 

Happy Holidays!   

One Month Until the End of the Semester

Merry Cortaca!
Well Cortaca is over now but we went out with a Bang! For those of you who aren't familiar with what Cortaca is, it is "the biggest little game in the nation" (ESPN) held yearly between Ithaca College and SUNY Cortland. It is deemed a holiday in Cortland and this little college town is filled to the brim with rowdy college students. So here's an overview of my Cortaca weekend.

Friday: I took a test in the morning, only class of the day, then came home to be Cinderella! We had one of my boyfriend's friends from his previous college coming to visit who we hadn't seen since last year. Our apartment was a mess so I wanted to get everything cleaned up before the tornado of a weekend piled on top of it. By late afternoon my chores were done and we were able to watch a movie for awhile before our guest arrived. After that we all enjoyed dinner and just catching up until more friends came over to play cards and we ventured downtown. We strategically left at midnight to avoid the crowd for hours. After making our way to a local bar we enjoyed a drink and came home to order Zonies and go to bed.... silly us had to be up in 4 hours! So we all slept for a bit then got up to start the party of Saturday.

Saturday: Cortaca game day! My parents arrived at 8 am to get stuff ready to tailgate. We found a place to park over by the stadium so we could start tailgating. We had quite a feast! Pulled pork, chili, hot dogs, chip and dip, cookies, beer, mimosa, the works! It was truly just a great time. About half an hour before the game started we made our way to the stadium to find seats. What a game! It game down to the last minute of the game to determine who was going to win! Cortland won!!! Cortland 16 to Ithaca's 10 and the crowd went wild. After the game we came back to my house to get warm and eat our next round of goodies. We were all ready for a nap at that point. I napped for a bit while the guys hung out. After waking up we decided to go to a bar and grab a bit to eat for dinner so we went to Central City Bar and Grill. By far one of the best places in Cortland to get a burger. I tried a Saranac Caramel Porter which was really great. Then we went home to just hang out for the night, witnessing a brawl on the way home. We were really wishing we had a balcony just to people watch the rest of the night. 

Which brings us to today. Today has been a day of cleaning and recovery. The apartment was picked up and cleaned not long after we got up and said goodbye to our guest since I had a lot of homework to do and couldn't deal with the mess all day. It was nice getting everything cleaned up and laundry done. The rest of the afternoon I've been studying and getting work done while my boyfriend watched football with his cousin and I got to stare at this cute little guy all day. He spent his day recovering too. 

 

What a busy weekend it has been. This next week until Thanksgiving is going to be a hectic one, it will feel so great to go home and have a short break away from school work and professors who feel the need to pile everything on right now. Plus Thanksgiving means being able to decorate for Christmas! My favorite time of the year! Exactly one month from today I will be done with my fall semester of senior year. Where has the time gone? Until then I have a few tests, dance classes, an anniversary, a christmas party, a mini dance recital and two finals to get through. As much as I don't want time to pass quickly, I wouldn't mind if these next two weeks flew by so I can get to those two weeks of December. That's all for now! <3

First day of snow

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow?
Well, it's official. Cortland got it's first snowfall today. The flurries were flying off and on all day. Supposedly we're supposed to be getting 1-3 inches between 8pm and 8am tonight, I'll be sure to post pictures if we do! I think we're in it for the long haul now. Forecast shows snow off and on throughout the week. In all reality though, let's face it that it is the first week of November, we're lucky we haven't already snow for three weeks. Besides that, we can all see that it's snowing but if you have Twitter you would know without ever looking outside! I'll leave that topic on that note. 

Organization

I spent my afternoon organizing my closet. The past few weeks I've been having trouble opening and closing my dresser drawer where I keep my jeans and sweatpants. When I finally pulled it out of the dresser the other night to see if it had come off it's tracks, I realized the entire back of the drawer had fallen apart and was just hanging on by the metal track. I tried to put it back to together but it was just too full. I decided to buy Sterilite plastic drawers to put in my closet to put some clothes in so I bought them today and spent part of the afternoon organizing. It's so much better! Mornings start a lot better with an organized closet and dresser drawers that open and close! 

Dinner  
On a cold, rainy/snowy day, what's better than a nice hot, homemade dinner. Lasagna was perfect for tonight. It was so delicious and of course I made enough for four people for just two of us. Guess we have lunch tomorrow! Here's a couple pictures of it! 

  
Enjoy your night everyone! I'm going to watch Madea's Witness Protection then spending the night with a couple of friends tomorrow night!

Happy Halloween Eve!

#Sandy
While it may have been a non-event here in Central New York, my heart goes out to all of those affected downstate and on Long Island in addition to anyone in Cortland whose family is down there. I pray for a speedy recovery to everyone down there and restoration of power as quickly as possible.

So even though I didn't need it, I did make a storm kit for Sandy just in case the winds did knock out power. Since we didn't need it, I decided to pack it away and save it for a blizzard or whatever wacky weather event that might occur. Here's a (not so good) photo of my kit that could be saved.


Here's what's inside: Canned meat (Chicken, Tuna, Vienna Sausages (gross I know but in case of emergency!)), instant coffee and powdered creamer, honey nut cheerios, water, evaporated milk, A/C power adapters (so we can charge phones in the car), baby wipes, batteries, and storm candles. An old comforter bag worked perfectly!

FOOD!
So remember when I told you I'm obsessed with food, you're not allowed to laugh when you see the next photo! 

Since we had a bunch of leftovers in the fridge from the weekend, we decided to clean them out today for lunch! This is only like 3/4 of what we had, don't worry it didn't ALL get eaten. Here's what you're looking at. 2 homemade empanadas, 2 chunks of homemade pepperoni bread, 2 smoked wings from Piggy Pats, 9 Chicken nuggets and a couple french fries. We also had some homemade chips and a small dish of pulled pork.

PUMPKIN!

 So I bought a pumpkin over the weekend with hopes to get a picture of Noey sitting next to it like the great one I got last year

So much for that thought, he may be more mellow now but he's also got a mind of his own! So today I decided to carve his pumpkin into a kitten! It was messy and unexpectedly difficult because it was so small but it worked out as you can see by the photos above and it made some pretty great baked pumpkin seeds too. Noey finally came out to see his pumpkin and he actually sat on our table and kissed it twice but I couldn't get the photo fast enough so I guess what I have will do!


I hope that everyone has a fabulous Halloween tomorrow!

  

Calm before the storm

Who would have ever thought that central New York would be preparing for a hurricane at the end of October? Certainly not me! If you live on the east coast, I hope you have prepared properly, I'm not sure I have! Heading to the store tomorrow to stock up on a few minor things just in case. With 50+ mph winds they're predicting it's only a matter of time until the power is out so I'm posting now while I can.

I spent the weekend home with my family which is always so refreshing. Definitely helps me prepare for a new week. Friday night we made a trip to that favorite Italian restaurant I wrote about before, sorry no pictures this time, I was too hungry! I had this amazing seafood pasta; it was linguini with a light red garlic sauce with mussels, clams, calamari, and shrimp in it. YUM! I know what I'm eating leftover tomorrow! I also tried a new wine, Lambrusco. I'm a fan!

Yesterday I enjoyed a girls day with my mom while my dad and boyfriend golfed. We took a trip to Utica to get pedicures, do a little shopping, and grabbed a snack and drinks at Applebees. You can't beat that quality time! 

Today was a relaxing day, as Sundays usually are. My boyfriend and I took some time to go visit with my grandparents which is always entertaining, they're 82 and 84 years old. They were so excited to see us, it feels good to see them and make their day. After that we went to Piggy Pat's in Washington Mills for some lunch and football. If you've never been there, I highly suggest making your way up there some Sunday and ordering smoked chicken wings. Trust me, they're fabulous and like nothing you've ever had. Then it was time to head back to school. Since we got home I've been working on homework, cleaning up my apartment that looks like a hurricane already hit it (embarrassing!), and making cookies. Making cookies was quite the adventure! 

If you go to make cookies ( I was making chocolate chip) and you're out of brown sugar, you can use white sugar then just a couple of teaspoons of honey and you'll never know the difference. Everything online I read said to lower the heat and take the cookies out way sooner because they'll burn but that was not my experience. So delicious! Before I put my cookies in the oven we smelled something, it smelled like something burning! I figured it was cheese or something burning off in the oven (we could pizza in there frequently) but thankfully I opened it to look, it was a potholder! It is still a mystery how it got in there but I've never been so thankful to have an electric stove that just caused it to start to melt from heat not actually ignite. The oven hasn't been used since Thursday night and there was no potholder in it when I took the pizza out! What an experience!

Mom, you shouldn't cook pot holders! We'll weather Sandy together!

This week should be interesting with this storm hitting. I wouldn't mind having to stay put in my apartment for a bit. Hoping that everyone is safe and has everything they need. If we have power and everything is back to normal I'll be dressed as a cheetah to celebrate Halloween Wednesday night. Meow! 

That's all for now, stay safe!