2011 and beyond!

Here it is, New Year's eve, and yea, I am blogging for the last time in 2011. I am not even sure if more than two people even read my blog, but felt the need to post anyway.this past year has brought about quite a bit of change for me as well as my kiddo. We moved away from Arizona to join Robert in Texas, obviously the biggest change wss getting married to Robert. We are still adjusting, but that comes with the territory, and not quite sure if we will be fully adjusted, just to a level of comfort with the new life, because our way of living in the past is, well, behind us. I look forward to all the new adventures that lie ahead of us as a family. 2012 is going to bring more changed for us, the one most obvious one to me right now is that I am starting back to school in January, it was a nice break while it lasted, but should haven known I can't stay away from learning for too long. One thing I have enjoyed doing since moving is cooking! In my previous marriage, he was way too picky for me to fully explore the culinary world, Robert on the other hand, I feel is my own personal Anthony Bourdain, arm him with some hot sauce and I do believe is will be willing to try anything I cook once. I have been toying with the idea of getting work in the cooking industry (private chef or with a catering company) but I am beginning to feel that perhaps I should just stick to cooking for friends and family and continuing my persist of working in the mental health field.mincood workmwithncrazynpeople all day and get my release in the evening with a nice glass of wine and pounding out some chicken breasts to be rolled up with cheese and veggies and then pan seared to perfection (I am sure there are some technical terms to be learned here, but that will have to wait). Now onto something new for me, resolution. I had managed to make it up last year without ever making any resolutions, last year I resolved to take more pictures of the kiddo, well, started strong ended with a pft, so, renewing that resolution for the upcoming 2012 season, let's see how far I make it this go around. I also would like to blog abut some of my culinary adventures, triumphs, and defeats, is there anyone out there willing to read about them? If so let me start now, tonight I made a special desert to go along with the champagne, to me it is a triumph, to Robert, it was good but too rich for his liking (the perils of having a husband without a sweet tooth to match mine). What is this desert you might ask? Well, they are Oreo truffles! And so stinking easy to make, I always look on the Internet for ideas, today I put in cream cheese and cocoa powder as my ingredients and came up with several ideas, the only one that appealed to me however was Oreo truffles, and like most of the time wheni cook, I use the recipe as a base and add my own twists, so here is how I did mine tonight:

Half a package of Oreo cookies, crumbled in the food processor with the last piece of Christmas fudge ( my twist), add half a package of cream cheese, mix well. Freeze mixture until solid enough to rollinto balls, place balls on a nonstick surface, freeze again for approximately a hour. Sift cocoa powder and powdered sugar (powdered sugar was my twist) together in a small bowl, roll truffles in the cocoa powder mixture, freeze or put in fridge. When served, dust powdered sugar over truffle on plate.

Well that is all from me in 2011. Happy New year to all and please be safe and watch out for others if you are on the roads tonight.

CHRISTMAS!!!

So, another Christmas has passed and I managed to survive! It started off with me making a traditional Mexican Christmas Eve dinner, except I managed to forget the beans, how? No clue. Then Christmas morning I was enjoying snuggling in my warm bed when a I was a woken to a voice saying, is it time to get up and open presents? And no it wasn't Georgia, it was Robert asking that, Georgia was still sound asleep with visions of sugar plums dancing in her head. So, Robert kindly woke her up, she came running into my arms and then saw the pile of presents sitting under the tree!!!!!

For a little girl who will be three in two weeks, she is not what you expect when it comes to opening presents. Then again she never has been, she loves tearing into presents that are in bags, but when it is in a box and wrapped in paper, she would rather watch someone else open it for her. And unbeknownst to myself, I had mysteriously purchased wrapping paper that tears only when you are trying to cut it with scissors! But when you try to tear it off a box with your fingers? Forget about it.

Georgia made out like a bandit like I figured she would. She got presents from Robert and myself
aka Santa and Mrs. Claus, my parents, her father's parents, Rob's aunt Jen, Great Grandma and Grandpa Green, Great Grandma Houston, Great Aunt Debbie and great Uncle Randy, and now we get to make up what she didn't get with money from Great Grandma Maria and Grandma and Grandpa Green. Whew! And if she wasn't spoiled enough by all of that, her Birthday happens to fall exactly two weeks after Christmas Eve this year!!!!

As for Robert and myself, we didn't do to bad ourselves. We managed some clothes from my parents, and money from his family. With that money we purchased an iPad 2 that will benefit our entire family, will work for school and work, and as entertainment and help us educate Georgia. My gift to Robert has been games for the computer that he has been interested in, and shoes! He buys new shoes about every 6 months, now he has gotten two new pairs in the time span of a month, so hopefully now that he has two pairs at once, we can keep ahead of the purchase of shoes every 6 months. And me? Well, I got great deals on three magazine subscriptions, and a book that was suggested to me by a good friend who shares the same interest in culinary experiences (although I am not as daring as she is). I was also given permission to add games to my Nintendo dsi that are for all of us.

Now on to the buying of Birthday gifts. We have ordered one so far, and are pretty sure of the other two that we will be purchasing for her. And I for one am really looking forward to celebrating her Birthday. We are again going out to Rob's Aunt Debbie's place to celebrate because I figured where better to celebrate than someplace she can go running wildly outside? Since we live in an apartment, it is a little difficult to get her outside to play unless we take a bus trip to someplace where she can play.

But before we can conquer Birthday, we must conquer New Year's Eve!

Pictures will come later, when we have them all loaded onto the computer, again I failed in my mission to take lots of pictures, but I believe I got a couple and Robert got a couple as well. Georgia is now requesting that I play with her with one of her new toys that requires an adult to play with her, so I will bid fare well, and say that I will post again soon, most likely this week.

Whew, where has time gone

So Robert's birthday is 5 days away, Christmas is 9 days away, and Georgia's birthday is right around the corner after New Year's! But blessings are abounding upon us! We get to celebrate Christmas with Rob's aunt and her in-law family on Christmas Day (which means that is one holiday meal I am not making for Christmas) but I have great plan's for a Christmas Eve dinner (mexican per Robert's request) and my favorite breakfast casserole Christmas morning. I am excited though because I am taking two of my fav dips for Christmas day! Phew, I think I am determined to be a better cook which is a good thing because I want to start doing it for a living someday really soon, but can't decide which I like doing better, the main part of a meal or the desert. I have been indulging myself once again with the world of baking and cake decorating I have been secretly having mini Cake Boss marathons while the hubby is sleeping and the munchkin is watching her kiddie movies. And while Buddy gets on my nerves after the first 20 minutes ("that's how we do it, hoboken style baby") I can't help myself, their cakes are amazing!!! And I could just live in their bakery shop with all those other yummy treats they make!!! Getting off course here, don't know why my mind is on food, perhaps because I am always thinking about the next meal I am going to make my family. And tonight, seeing as how it is Friday, it is going to most likely be pizza!!! To wrap up this quick blog entry, let me just say right now I feel blessed, I have an overflowing kitchen of ingredients, a hubby who loves what I cook for him (quite a change from the past if any of you know about that), and a child that no matter what I cook, always says yay!!!!!!! and runs around like its the best thing in her day when mommy makes her something to eat!

Thanksgiving

Oh my! Where to begin. What a busy week it has been since last Monday, and it did not start out all that great. My poor hubby spent last Monday getting rained on to turn paperwork into the health and human services so that we can get assistance, and in the meantime ended up misplacing important paperwork somewhere around town!!!! But all that aside, what a roller coaster of a ride it was!

Last Wednesday, we packed up and made our way to the bus to start an adventure that I had no idea where it was going to lead except to say that I knew we would be spending a few days with the hubby's aunt and grandparents somewhere on the other side of Dallas. We took two buses and then two trains to get there and were greeted by Aunt Debbie, and Grandma and Grandpa Green, and to our surprise, little 2 month old Payton in the car as well! (Good thing I packed light!) The drive from Dallas was not what I was expecting, not that I knew what it was that I was expecting. It felt like I was visiting my family in Illinois! The drive from Dallas to the "ranch" felt like the drive from St. Louis to Oakawville! When we arrived, it was quite peaceful, and honestly, I had no idea what to do, so I just went outside with the hubby and the kiddo to explore, we got up close and personal with a horse and a donkey, and Georgia was not afraid at all, in fact, she tried to feed the horse acorns! And then she discovered the trampoline, and from that point on all she wanted to do was play "exercise jump". Robert would get nervous when she got to close to the edge, which I found rather endearing since I didn't get nervous over it. But little did I realize that the peacefulness would disappear the next day, for with Thanksgiving came about 25 more individuals to this house. Those of you who know me well, know that I get slightly uncomfortable in situations where I am surrounded by a large amount of people, especially people I don't know. But I think I held it together rather well, in fact, I made great friends with one of the hubby's cousins (the mother of little Payton) and ventured out to my first black friday experience with her! Yes folks, I had managed to avoid any type of retail shopping on black friday for 31 years, but could not resist this year since we are on a budget and WalMart had deals that were very appealing to me, and I managed to complete all Christmas shopping for Georgia that night!

The return trip on Friday was uneventful, with the exception that now I was also balancing a large sack of my loot from black friday shopping! We arrived home in time to get refreshed and a little rest before the next wave. The stressful part of the holiday, the dreaded visit from my parents who I had not seen since moving to Texas. Robert was even nervous about it. But they showed up happy, took us out to the mall to see Georgia play with other kids then on to WalMart yet again and finally to dinner. They brought us back home after treating us to Georgia's favorite treat of ice cream cones, and went to their hotel for the night. The following day, they showed up bearing gifts of a Christmas tree and ornaments and a KFC lunch. They left in the early afternoon since they were going back to my sister's in Lubbock. And we finally rested on Sunday! Stayed in our Pajamas most of the day and watched nothing but Christmas movies on the computer. So all in all, it was an awesome first Thanksgiving as the Houston clan!

Thankful

So, since November began I have been seeing people posting something they are thankful for each day. I choose not to do that this year because there is so much to be thankful for and the greatest is the love of my husband. I truly see a change in him just in the past few months not to mention since we first started our long distance relationship. I always heard how good he was with kids, but since he became a step-dad to my little girl, he has truly amazed me. He loves taking her out on father daughter dates! He has a special bond with her, true, she is still a mama's girl, there are times when she begs for his attention. Like last night when we had been out all day and our last stop was in the grocery store. She was a tired little girl and just wanted mama to hold her, but when Robert walked across the aisle from us she called to him, she said "Robert come here, I have a question", so he came and asked what her question was, she really didn't have a question for him, but wanted to tell him something that neither of us really understood.

I have heard of all the shows he used to go to and all the trips he made and all the bands that he allowed to stay over when they needed a place to sleep. Since Georgia and I have moved here, he has had one band stay over with my permission and it was a trial for us. We agreed that we would try it once to see how it went, and after that one time we have agreed as a couple that it doesn't work in an apartment with a two year old and that it would be better to have a bigger place before another band stays over. He has not gone on any trips, even though he has wanted to. But he looked at our finances and saw that the money that would have gone towards the one trip he wanted to take was much better used to take care of our family here. He was asked to be a tour manager for a month in January and I told him he should go because a record label would be looking at his performance on that tour and wanted to talk to him, which I felt was a good sign. But since we started talking about it, he has told me that he doesn't think he is going because he feels like it might be a waste of time.

As far as shows that he goes to, since moving here I can probably count the number of shows he has been to on one hand. There are times when I look at him and ask him, "is there a show you can go to tonight?" just so he can go and get some of his energy out. He has grown into such a family man recently and I didn't expect that to come for a few years yet! But he has made these choices on his own and granted, we are struggling some, he knows that Georgia comes first in every aspect and respects that fact. I love my husband with all my heart and every day (not just this month) I am so thankful for him in our lives. Last night, Georgia wanted me to lay with her to fall asleep, but wanted Robert to read her stories, when he was done, she gave him a kiss and told him she loved him, my family is complete. I couldn't be any happier.

Update

November first, oh my. Where has the year gone? This morning, woke up to Georgia giving me options of candy from trick or treating last night for breakfast. But I also woke up grateful to be able to wake up with the love of my life next to me in bed, and happy that he was ready to get up and go to his new intern job that he is liking a lot. So here I am, a stay at home mom again. Kinda feels weird but good all over again. I have started a new weight loss plan, and fully intend to stick with it. I have a step counter I wear every day and right now my goal is at least 2,000 steps a day. Georgia is getting bigger and smarter every day. She has even started counting in Spanish.... and is getting good at it. Guess I will have to start speaking spanish with her, better start brushing up. This morning Rob and I had a little discussion on Christmas and Birthday presents for her, can't believe we are already thinking of those things!!!! We have a new computer and I am still learning how to do everything on it. So I will make this a brief entry yet again and say that next time I will upload some pictures. (As long as Rob and I have the patience at the same time for him to show me how to put pictures and stuff on the computer.)

Ack!!!

Sorry for the lack of posts. I have been going through some difficulties. Phone is not working right now, still looking for employment, and laptop got drowned by a 2 year old with her daddy's glass of lemonade. So finally have a computer, and now that we are getting closer to the holiday season, I am looking for employment even if it is seasonal. Got married in September, and couldn't be any happier. I have to admit, I was kind of nervous about getting married again due to the way my last marriage was, but I took the plunge realizing that just because one was that way this one didn't have to be. So here I am, Mrs. Robert Houston and perfectly content with that fact. The only complaint I have is that since I have moved here in August, I have yet to have a date alone with my hubby. But that I can deal with, he often takes Georgia out on daddy daughter dates and they have tons of fun. Georgia is starting to look forward to them and gets excited and is more than happy to say "bye mommy". Speaking of Georgia, oh my, what a 2 year old she has become. She if very vocal about what she wants, I often wake up at 6 am or earlier with her in our bedroom hitting my arm and whispering loudly "mommy, Georgie hungry". When we ask her what movie she wants to watch it either turns out to be "cowboy" (any one of the Toy Story movies), "lion" (Lion King), or "got a dream" (Tangled). But my all time favorite new development of hers is wanting to sing and her two favorite songs are "wheels on the bus" and "Jesus loves me". Well, that is it for me right now, I hope that I can keep up with this blog better this time around!

Well, here it begins

So, I have been in Texas for a few weeks now and settling in. Have obtained some sort of employment to start some income coming in while looking for a more permanent and comfortable fit. Granted, there have been a couple bumps in the road, but that comes with any new life change that you make. I feel that since I am starting a new journey in my life, I thought I would start a new blog so that those who are curious can follow along and laugh when I laugh and cry when I cry. I have been motivated by such friends as Rachel Hall and others to start a blog, and along with the other new resolutions of this new journey, I have every intention to stick with it. If anyone has followed my past blog, you will know that I was looking towards doing a foodie-overseas exchange with my friend Natasha in Okinawa, and I am very pleased to report that the first package from there is on its way here. Now if only I could figure out some unique items to send back to her that she wouldn't normally be able to get there I would be a happy camper. I am also looking for ways to receive a very special package from my favorite child hood friend and BFF Ivy in Prescott. Wish she could send herself in a package as well. As much as I love living in Texas and am so incredibly happy to finally be with my love, I can't help but get homesick for my friends back in AZ. For the one that is going to have a baby soon (even though she always said she was only going to have one and is now expecting number two), the one that lives in Phoenix and was my source of sanity through the awful years of my now ex-husband. I miss the late nights of watching movies with my chica from Decision Point, and going to church and having a someone I can confide everything to and know that no matter what I say she will always be there through thick or thin. Well, I think this should be it for my first post, but I would like to end with this one confession; I am so very happy that I have finally followed my heart and that my heart has lead me to the happiest I could possibly be at this point in my life.