Gig 'em!!

My sister in law is the classroom mom for her daughter who is in kindergarten. She was put in charge of making an A&M basket that was going to be auctioned off at a fall fair that the school was having in October. I committed to making a wreath and donating it to her cute basket. Here it is!

This was my first ribbon wreath, there were definitely things to be learned!

I painted and antiqued my aTm letters. 

I polka dotted the next layer of ribbon (burlap). 

 Finished product!!

Thanks for following!!

~Nat

October Festivities

It's a constant battle to stay up to date on this thing, so here we go!

October started with Spencer's birthday! I can't believe we are getting so old. It's a love/hate relationship. I love how we've grown in maturity and all the new things we get to experience after High School. There is a new sense of freedom we have when we are living on our own. Then you get married to your best friend and it's like a fun sleep over every night! Not to mention you just committed to having the best travel buddy ever! Marriage is awesome in every sense. The things I don't enjoy about getting old are the physical aspects. Don't get me wrong, I'm only 24 and close to my prime, but I've definitely noticed a few things that hurt after working out that typically wouldn't have hurt just a year or so ago. (I blame most of this from sitting at a desk all day staring at a computer screen.) BUT I've decided I wouldn't trade ANY OF IT to go back to High School even just for a day. I'm sure most of us can agree on that one! ; ) o.k. I'm done rambling....

Breakfast and present opening on the morning of Spencer's birthday:

This was Spencer's birthday cake--Dark Chocolate Salted Caramel Layered Cake--Can you say ridiculous??! It was so moist and rich you could only eat a little slice of this thing! I'm not going to lie though, it's probably one of the best cakes I've made!!

Dark Chocolate Salted Caramel Layered Cake:

For the cake:
I did the usual Chocolate Mousse Cake recipe that I get from my mother in law. Instead of using 1 box of Duncan Hines Devil Food, I used Duncan Hines Dark Chocolate Fudge cake mix.

1 box Duncan Hines DCF cake mix
1 large box instant chocolate pudding
1 cup oil
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup warm water
4 eggs
1 cup mini semi sweet chocolate chips

Mix first 6 ingredients, stirring well. Stir in mini chocolate chips and bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes.

For the filling:

2 sticks unsalted butter, room temp.
1/2 cup shortening
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 pounds confectioners' sugar
1/3 cup caramel topping
1/4 teaspoon salt

1. Cream the butter and shortening in the bowl with an electric mixer. Add the vanilla extract, salt and caramel syrup and combine well.
2. Begin adding in the sugar and mixing thoroughly after each addition. After all of the sugar has been added you can try the icing and see if you want to add more caramel syrup. For a thicker filling you can add more sugar. I added a little more whipping cream and caramel which thinned up the consistency a bit since I was going to be using it as a filling instead of frosting.

For the frosting:
I made a dark chocolate butter cream frosting.

2 2/3 cup of confectioner's sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
6 tbsp butter
5-6 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla

Combine confectioners' sugar and cocoa in a bowl. Cream butter with a 1/2 cup cocoa mixture in another bowl. Alternatively add remaining cocoa mixture and milk. Beat to spreading consistency. Stir in vanilla. For glazed frosting stir in 1 tbsp of corn syrup (I did not do this step.).

After Conference we went over to the Sevy's for dinner and cake joined by my family also. 

One of Spencer's birthday presents was a Switchfoot concert towards the end of October. They have been one of Spencer's favorite bands since the band first got together. It was an awesome concert! They showed a movie to promote their newest album coming out in January. I think this is their 9th album!! It was so cool to see a band that focuses all of their energy on making music that's inspire and uplift and not the junk that most people sing about today! They even started the concert with a prayer--pretty awesome! 

All hot and sweaty after the concert:

We were even lucky enough to catch a little mini concert back behind the building by their tour bus. AWESOME. Just Jon Foreman and his guitar.

Thanks for following!!

~Nat

Our life in September!

After our D.C. trip we went to Austin to help my brother move into his apartment before school started up at The University of Texas where we attends school. We left early on Saturday morning. His roommates were awesome and helped us unload both cars and it literally took all of 10 minutes. Guys hardly have any stuff! If it were me/when it was me moving back up to school it would take hours. Oh the life of a girl.... ; )

Stopped at Gourdough's of course!

Stephen's-Granny's Pie

Spencer's- the Baby Rattler

My favorite-Miss Shortcake

That was one big gummy snake!!

On our way to dinner and we saw this!!

 There were so many!!!

It looks like this one has some type of collar on. Are they someone's pets???

And dinner of course, at Torchy's Tacos. 

Afterwards we went to campus and walked around for a bit. Got some pictures in front of the tower and got to hang out at the turtle pond.

 This turtle kept snapping at Spencer's finger:

Hook 'em vs. Saw 'em off!

It's always a fun time in Austin! The next weekend I had bought tickets for the Texas A&M game vs. Sam Houston State, so we headed to College Station! I miss this place horribly when football season starts back up!

We went to Layne's for the first time too! 

All this for $5!! You can't beat that! Their special sauce is so good! I'm totally craving this as I'm looking at it!

Shopped around a bit until the game started. The clouds got super dark and it rained/misted for about the first half of the game. We got lucky and had seats right under a deck.

So much fun! Spence and I have so many good memories in College Station! In fact, it's where he proposed to me!

Watching Aggie football vs. Alabama the following week:

Dinner at my Grandma's and it was "college night". This is what a house divided looks like:

The next day was Friday and when I got to work one of my coworkers was going around asking fellow Aggies if they wanted tickets to the game the following day. After a bunch of people turned them down (because they already had weekend plans and the game was supposed to be rained out anyway) I snatched those tickets right up!

So we headed back up to College Station on Saturday- September 21st.

What was supposed to be a rained out game, turned into a perfect day for a game! Not one single drop of rain.

He just looks gooood in maroon! ; )

 After our win. : )

As if our lives weren't awesome enough already, I had jury duty the following Tuesday. I was really not too excited about it and REALLY didn't want to get chosen for the jury. So it was just my luck so be chosen to sit on the jury of 12. : ) I showed up for jury duty on Wednesday and Thursday as well that same week. 

Driving to downtown Houston, TX for three mornings in a row was as much as I could handle. It would take me over an hour to get there every day. I'm not sure how some people make that drive every day in the crazy traffic. PLUS we would get out around 5 p.m. during rush hour. Talk about shaving years off of your life from the stress!!

I was really not too happy about getting chosen for the jury, (pretty much every juror that was chosen had the same attitude) but I'm actually really glad I got selected so I could literally see how the Constitution works and participate in that process. It was actually a really good experience after it was all said and done. Our judge was really awesome and the police officer that spent the three days with us was really awesome as well! It was really fun to get to know everyone on the jury. After talking, I found out that one of the jurors had a daughter that knew my younger sister because they went to the same high school and they were actually really good friends! 

We spent priceless hours together with people you would normally never spend that kind of time with.We were different races, religions, ethnicities, ages, and each of us had different careers. We would get breaks throughout deliberation and we would share life experiences with each other. It was so cool to see all the different walks of life for each of the jurors. 

All in all, it was a really great experience for me by the end, besides the fact that we had to sentence the guy to at least 25 years in prison (because it was his 3rd offense)! It really gave me a different perspective on life and just made me so much more grateful for even just the basic necessities in life I enjoy like food and shelter. It's crazy that some people don't even have that! We are so blessed.

~Nat