These Are a Few of My Favorite Things.

It's Wednesday and that means it must be time for some wedding talk!  Linking up with Cheltee and Kelly today for the Newlywed Blog Hop and this week's question is.....

drum roll please.......

What was your favorite part of your wedding?

And I can't believe they are asking that!!  Are we really asking a bunch of girls to pick the best part of their wedding?!  And more importantly, is that really possible?! I'm not sure it is.

Nonetheless, I'm going to be a good blogger and try and answer this question to the best of my ability.

I LOVED my wedding.  There really isn't anything I would change about it but here were some of my absolute favorite things about my wedding (I'll try and keep it to the top three five):

The coziness:

I know, I know.  We're in a giant wedding venue with 100 of our closest friends.  How cozy could it really be?  But our venue was so rustic and warm feeling and it wasn't spread out.  Everything was compact without it being uncomfortable. So once everything came together and the room was filled with excited wedding-goers, it really felt cozy.  It felt like home with all of our friends and family by our sides.

Our wedding party:

Our wedding party was freaking amazing.
And that's all I have to say about that.

Saying my vows to my husband:

When we were planning our wedding I wanted traditional vows while Jeremie wanted to write our own.  I explained to him that if I wrote my own vows and actually tried to say them out loud I would be such an emotional wreck that you wouldn't even understand what I was saying.  So, I of course politely asked demanded we have traditional vows.

In the end we ended up doing both and I'm so happy we did because it is a standout moment for me.  Was I an emotional wreck?  Hell yes.  But there is nothing like letting go and telling the person you love most how you feel about them and letting everyone else hear it.

My dad doing Gagnam Style:

Actually, everyone doing Gagnam Style.  I still think of my wedding every time I hear that song and I think it will always remind me of that night.  And you know what?  I'm ok with it.  It was a hilarious moment that I can't explain in words but I'll never forget it!

The weather:

This is a weird thing to appreciate since it poured on my wedding day.  And I'm not just talking showers and a passing thunderstorm.  It was typhoon season in Connecticut that day.  But I think it was a blessing in disguise because Jeremie and I both agreed that we liked the ceremony better inside than we would have outside.  Our venue just did a great job of setting everything up and it was so cozy and warm and comforting.  And we still got outside to take some pictures.  What else can you ask for?

So I'm gonna take a second and pat myself on the back for limiting the list to only five things.
Way to go, me!

Hope you guys enjoyed!

Bub.

I missed all my usual posts this weekend, The Newlywed Game link up, Wedding Weekend, Instagramazing Weekend, and I'm a little sad about it.  

But I had good reasons so today's post will be short.  Just want to bring you guys up to date on what kept me away from blogging this weekend.  

This is Jake. 

We like to call him Bub.  

We got him when I was a sophomore in high school.  I went to this thing called work camp every summer - I know, it sounds bad but I promise it's not. I went for a week with my youth group to rebuild houses for people less fortunate - anyway, when I came home from camp that summer there was a furry little fluff ball waiting for me.  

On Sunday, at almost 12 years old, Jake lost his battle with cancer.  

It was very, very fast.  Just a few days ago my mom said he was riding in the back of the car with his head out the window.  

He was a great dog.  Challenging, but great.

He used to run after deer in my parents back yard and he would be yipping along behind them as he ran.  You know how dogs sound when they are starting to fall asleep and they begin dreaming?  That was Jake chasing after the deer.  Only louder!

He used to sing while I played the piano and every time a siren went by within ear shot.

He chased the waves when we walked along the Housatonic or when we took him to the beach.

He wasn't a huge fan of other dogs but he loved his family pack - Sirius, Orion and Savannah, my sister's dog.  

I know he's happier and much more comfortable now and that makes it a little easier.  But Jake was a really special dog.  He was just so full of quirks and personality and we're going to miss him so much. 

Love you, Bub <3

Gotta Get Down On Friday.

Everybody's lookin forward to the weekend.

Partyin', partyin', yea!

Partyin', partyin', yea!

Fun, fun, fun looking forward to the weekend.

Yup, I did it.  I'm sorry about that.  I know the last thing you all wanted on your Friday was Rebecca Black stuck in your head but seriously, every time I come to my blog to link up with Ashley at the Sweet Season Blog to write Friday Letters I start singing that stupid song.  And it's only because the title of my post has the word Friday in it!  Please tell me I won't think of this song every time I hear the word Friday for the rest of my life. 

Ugh. Le Sigh.  Here are my Friday Letters this week.

Dear Rebecca Black, get out of my head!! Now!  Dear Paper Crane Project, you were my absolute favorite post to write so far and I think everyone enjoyed reading about it.  Now you look so pretty in the corner of my classroom and my students love you!  Dear Students, please, please, please behave well during my observation this afternoon.  You're usually the most fantastic group ever so please don't change that today. Dear Sirius, I can't believe you turned four this week and you're still pulling some of the same crap you pulled when you were six months old.  I love you and I don't want you to get older but if you could stop the annoying stuff, that would be great. Dear Husband, I just love you.  That's all.

Happy Friday!

The Paper Crane Project.

Have you ever heard the legend about paper cranes?  It says that cranes are mystical creatures that live for 1000 years.  Japanese legend says that any person who makes 1000 paper cranes, one for each year of a crane's life, will be granted a wish. Some even believe that doing this will bring you eternal good luck.

So, as you can imagine, paper cranes were a very popular item delivered in the mail to Newtown after the Sandy Hook shooting.  Hundreds of thousands of items were donated and one of the most beautiful things we received were thousands of paper cranes from all over the world, most made by kids.  We probably have at least 50 wishes coming our way! 

All the items that came to our town have been displayed at our town hall over the past couple of months.  People took hours and hours to sort through it all and put it out for all to see.  If you missed my guest post on Forever Newly Wedded you can check it our here to see some photos of the amazing things that were donated (also, check out her blog while you're there - it's pretty awesome!).

After a while, the town allowed people to come in and tag things they wanted to keep.  First the victim's families came in, then the Sandy Hook School community and finally Newtown residents.  My mom, who works at the town hall tried to tag a mobile for me that was full of the beautiful paper cranes to put in my classroom but we found out that Sandy Hook had decided to take all of them for the school.

This was fine with me.  Sandy Hook should take everything and anything they want.  And the papers cranes will be so perfect in that school.  

Bright.  

Colorful.  

Cheerful.

Excellent medicine.

Luckily, we were able to find several boxes of extra cranes and I took those.  The cranes I got came from Arizona and Washington.  They came in boxes that were littered with positive, healing messages.

My mom said, "the only problem with these cranes is you have to put all kinds of work into them to make them look nice."  She was right.  It was a lot of work.  But this project could not have fallen into my lap at a better time.  Last Wednesday, when I got the cranes, I had just found out that I would have an additional week of school off as they continued to try and clean up after the blizzard.  

Needless to say, I had the time.    

So, I started to work on it.  I got the rings for the top of the mobile.  I sorted it all.  I made sure all the strands were even.  I laid it all out, tied knots where they needed to be tied, glued, drilled and I finally got it all together.  It was the perfect project for me to work on during my spontaneous week off.  

And it 

came 

out 

BEAUTIFUL!

I really can't imagine it turning out any better than it did.  I love it and when I put it up in my classroom tomorrow, I know my students will love it.

Fun side note: the yellow crane at the very bottom of the mobile is one of one thousand paper cranes that Jeremie made me when my dad was diagnosed with cancer almost four years ago.  He's now cancer free and enjoying life.  So who knows, maybe the legend of the paper cranes is true.  

I can't wait for my students to see it tomorrow. I don't think I'll tell them where the cranes came from.  They don't need a reminder of what happened at Sandy Hook.  But every time I look at it, I'll know what it symbolizes. 

Hope.

Healing.

Happiness..

Home.

Newlywed Blog Hop - Advice For The Wedding!

 

Linking up with Kelly and Cheltee today for the Newlywed Blog hop!

This weeks questions is:

What type of advice did you get on your wedding day?

On my wedding day?  

Go make babies!  Hah!

No, but seriously, I didn't really get much advice on my wedding day. But I did get a bit of advice before my wedding day. One of the biggest pieces of advice I got (and it was from A LOT of people) was sit down and enjoy your dinner.  However, we all know how that turned out.  And if you don't know how that worked out, check it out here or here.

Because I followed the advice I was given, I ended up getting sick at my wedding and missed 45 minutes of my reception.  It is quite literally the only thing that was wrong with my wedding.  So if I were going to give advice to future brides I would definitely say listen to your body.  If it's telling you DON'T EAT IF YOU WANT TO ENJOY YOUR DAY. Then don't eat.  I mean, don't make yourself pass out or anything but your body knows what's right for you and it will try and tell you.  Listen to it.

I was also advised to take a few steps back a couple times throughout the night and just watch everyone else enjoying themselves.  It's a really hard thing to do.  It doesn't sound like it, but it is.  Jeremie and I were able to take a step back twice and just watch and it was definitely a memorable moment from our wedding.  

Even when we didn't step off to the side I would make these little notes in my head, like "you need to remember this moment".  Like watching my dad do Gagnam Style with us.  Or watching my 9 year old cousin break dance and everyone cheer for him.  I didn't sit back and watch those moments.  I was apart of them but I made sure to keep a mental video of it in my head.  

So that's my advice.  

Listen to your body.

Sit back and observe just a couple times.

Take mental notes.  

It goes by fast and you want to remember everything!

Maybe It's a Problem.

Hi, I'm Stacy and I am addicted to homemade granola bars.

There.  I said it.

Ok, I know it's only been a week since I made my first batch of homemade granola bars but I swear I'm totally addicted to them now.  I've got all these ideas for awesome granola bars running around in my head but I can't try them all at once because, well, my husband and I can't eat that many granola bars.  But I'm still bursting with ideas and all I want to do is make awesome granola bars.

Tomorrow will be my first day back at school in 13 days {!!!!} and I think that will help - or at least prevent me from making four batches of granola bars at the same time.  In all my snow days I've had a lot of time to think and get projects done and get new ideas for new projects.  Seriously, my DIY list is about 3 feet long at this point. 

Anyway, I think you know where this is going.  In my final hours of freedom today I made another batch of granola bars.  I'm calling them: 

Died And Went To Heaven Death By Chocolate Granola Bars.   

Too long?  

Here's what you'll need to make 'em:

2 cups quick oats

1 cup Rice Krispies cereal

2 cups crushed Oreos

2 1/2 cups chocolate chips

1/4 cup butter

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup honey (or anything sweet and sticky that comes from bees, trees or flowers)

1/2 tsp. Vanilla

How you make 'em:

First, grab an 8x8 baking dish, cover with foil and lightly grease it.

Next, combine your quick oats, Rice Krispies Cereal, crushed Oreos and 

1 cup of chocolate chips in a bowl.  Mix thoroughly and set aside.

In a saucepan, combine brown sugar, butter and honey.  Cook on medium heat until it starts to bubble.  Lower heat and continue to cook for two minutes.  

While that is cooking, place 1/2 cup chocolate chips into a saucepan.  Cook on low heat until it's completely melted, stirring constantly.

After the sugar mixture has cooked for 2 minutes, remove from heat and add vanilla.

Add melted chocolate to sugar mixture and mix thoroughly.

Pour the sugar mixture onto the oats mixture and mix until everything is thoroughly coated. 

Pour the mixture into the baking dish and spread evenly.  Place a piece of foil on top and press down firmly so that the mixture is packed tightly and evenly.  Remove foil.

In a saucepan, melt the final cup of chocolate chips. 

Drizzle over the top of granola mixture.

Place the pan in the fridge for at least 30 min. (I like to keep it in for a couple hours)

Cut into bars. 

Serve. 

Devour.

Be forewarned, these granola bars are more like candy bars so if healthy is what you're looking for, these probably aren't for you.  But if chocolaty goodness is what you're looking for, search no more! You've found what you're looking for.

On a completely different note this is my 50th post!  Woohoo! 

I'm seriously enjoying every second I put into the blog and everyone has been so supportive.

Thank you all so, so, so much for reading!

Instagramazing!!

I'm not gonna lie, my weekend was not Instagramazing.  In fact, I was a downright slacker in my instagraming this weekend.  So this weeks link up with Karla and Nicole isn't quite an Instagramazing weekend, per se.  I like to think of it more as an Instagramazing week.  Trust me, if I just gave you my weekend pictures you'd be bored to death.  And in my defense (although I guess there's always something to Instagram) I really didn't do anything this weekend worthy of an Instagram picture.  

However, I'll leave you with this - 

On my honor, I will try to have a better Instagramazing weekend next week. 

But for this week, here's what I got:

Earlier in the week I made some kick ass signs for my mom and aunt to carry during a march at our state capital.  They turned out awesome and my mom and aunt loved them!  See what I can do with all this time off?!

I celebrated my hard work that night with two of my favorite things - 

wine and piano.  Not sure you can go wrong with that combo.

For or first Valentine's Day as a married couple we really didn't do anything special.  The hubs was super sick so we just went simple and stayed in to have a nice, quiet dinner.  

Jeremie got me some beautiful flowers and left me a trail of messages to find as I came into the house. So sweet! 

I made him some delicious brownie cupcakes (brownie on the bottom, cake on the top).
Totally scrumptious.

Today I snapped this picture of Orion in just about the weirdest position I've ever seen him in.

I'm not sure how he didn't break his neck or his spine or at least pull a muscle or something!

I spent my day working on a fun project which involves....wait for it, wait for it -

Paper Cranes!!

These are Sandy Hook paper cranes and I'm working on a little DIY project so I can eventually put them in my classroom.  There will be a post about the final product, so keep an eye out!
How pretty are they?! I love them.

So that was my Instagramazing week.
Hope you enjoyed :)

Happy, Happy Birthday!!!

Three posts in one day?  That's unheard of!! But I have to post because today is a super important day and I feel kind of like an awful person because I totally forgot about it until 20 minutes ago.  Today is my crazy, ridiculous, super clumsy, snugly, super special puppy's fourth birthday!!! I don't know how it happened so fast but it's true. I think I may have subconsciously forgotten about his birthday on purpose thinking if I ignored it, it wouldn't happen and he would stay three forever.  Oh we'll, you gotta give a girl props for trying right? Since most of you have never actually met Sirius, here's some fun stuff about him:

Full name: 

Sirius Lee Black White And Brown Tomasko-Hittenmark

A fun story about the name - I originally named Sirius after Sirius Black from Harry Potter (yes I know I'm a dork and I'm damn proud of it). Shortly after I got him my roommate started calling him Sirius Black Tomasko which I thought was funny because I never intended his name to be Sirius Black.  He was just Sirius,  but it stuck and then eventually we thought it would be funny to call him Sirius Lee because, well, you get it. But we didn't want to lose the Sirius Black so we called him Siriusly Lee Black.  And that didn't sound right either!!!! So we added the other colors and he was Sirius Lee Black White And Brown Tomasko. And then I got married and he became Sirius Lee Black White And Brown Tomasko-Hittenmark.  So that's how it happened. Man, I could have a show dog with a name like that! 

The first day I met Sirius.
Look how teeny and cute he was!

Birthday:

 February 17th, 2009

Breed: 

Australian Shepherd (and man does he herd!)

Nicknames:

Crazy

Baby

Bebe

Big Butt

Quirks:

 He will always walk toward you in the shape of a c with his butt curved toward the front.  Weird. 

He LOVES to snuggle.  

He HATES to get his feet wet.

Loves Obsessed with rocks. 

Runs into everything. The door, the door frame, the coffee table, chair, 

the fireplace, other dogs, your legs.  You name it, he's run into it. 

Always in the way.  ALWAYS.  

Always up for a game of hide and seek. Better known in our house as "Where's Mom?"  

His favorite spot to sleep as a puppy.  He is a weirdo.

Got himself a little brother

Fears: 

Butts - oh yea, you heard right.  Want him to go away? Just point your butt at him and he'll run. 

Farts. 

Anything that beeps or "scary" noises in movies or on TV.

Wind.

When people wear masks or hoods. (it's all good fun when we put masks on and walk around the house....I swear I don't torture my dog)

The faucet. 

Citrus.

True Story:

I asked my husband to recall a funny story to share with you guys about Sirius and he gave me about ten so I chose one I think was the funniest.  This one time we were playing a game of hide and seek and the boys were looking for Jeremie.  Our front door was open with the screen door shut but our back door, which is where they would usually go in and out of was closed.  I think this made Sirius worried that he wouldn't be able to get into the house in the case of an emergency.

Jeremie whistled to give the boys a hint as to where he was and Sirius, being the panic driven dog that he is, freaked out and for some reason thought Jeremie had gone into the house.  He literally tore right through the screen door to get into the house without even noticing he had disturbed anything.  This would have been an epic way to find someone in a game of hide and seek, had he actually found Jeremie in the house.  However, Jeremie was outside and Sirius was not the one who found him.  I'm pretty sure he was scared to go back through the screen to get out of the house once he had ripped through it too.  Epic hide and seek fail.

Oh man, he's our special boy and we couldn't love him more.  

Happy Birthday, Sirius!

The Newlywed Game, Week 4

It must truly be a wedding weekend this week because I'm linking up with Karla and Veronica again for the Newlywed Game.  I love this link up and I've had a lot of people tell me that they love reading it every week. So here is the most recent round of questions!

one. In your opinion, who has the better in-laws?  You or your spouse?

Her: This question is so unfair and it's just asking to hurt someone's feelings!!!!  We both have fantastic in-laws.  Mine have accepted me from the moment they met me and have always treated me like family.  I love them!  We see my parents a little more often because they're just a town over and they've truly supported us in so many ways.  They think of Jeremie like their own child. I don't think we would be where we are now without either of our families.  So there.  That's my answer.  It's a tie!

Him: I do. It is a close race but they help us out a lot and I know they are reading this. Love you Mom!

two. Who decided on the wedding song for your first dance?  What was it?

Her: Neither of us had to decide.  We just knew because it's been our song since we first started dating. It's Fix You by Cold Play.  Jeremie had the a cappella group at our college sing it to me on Valentine's Day 6 years ago and it's been our song ever since.

Him: She did, it was the Wedding Song by Peter Paul & Mary. I'm pretty sure that's who did it. She had that picked out 12 years ago (wow, way to read the question babe.  Our first dance song was Fix You, like I said!)

three. Which song would you say is your spouses theme song and why?

Her: Oh geez, that's a tough one.  I think it would be Dirt Road Anthem because he loves just being outdoors and rugged.  He's definitely not a city boy like he was raised!

Him: Gangnam Style, because it is fun and ridiculous just like my wife. She would look way better in the video than Psy though.

four. What is the first thing your spouse takes off when they come home from work?

Her: This is a boring answer but I'm pretty sure it's just his coat.  If he's not wearing a coat it's his shoes.

Him: Her jacket. It would be impressive if she started with her socks. Besides the outside clothes, it is probably pants so she can switch to something comfy (sweatpants).

five. Fill in the blank. When it comes to __________ I definitely wear the pants in this relationship, but when it comes to ___________, my spouse definitely wears the pants.

Her: When it comes to finances I definitely wear the pants in this relationship.  Not that I tell him what to do and not that I'm perfect but I think he's gotten better with his spending since we've been together. When it comes to anything involving communication my spouse definitely wears the pants.  I swear we would be together if Jeremie hadn't taught me how to talk about stuff!

Him: When it comes to handling arguments and fun , I definitely wear the pants in this relationship, but when it comes to being beautiful and making sure every detail is taken care of, my spouse definitely wears the pants. (when it comes to handling fun...what does that mean?!? I'm not fun? Geez...)

six. What's one this that you could do that would make your spouse the happiest person in the world? 

Her: Do all his homework for him and then get him a job.  And a new car.  Can I count that all as one thing?

Him: Besides singing her every song I know, if I could eliminate all of our debt, she would be super happy. The weight of education loans lifted off her shoulders would pretty much make her fly.

seven. What is the most unusual thing you've ever found in your spouse's pocket/purse?

Her: Sometimes I just find notes with a bunch of kids names or a teachers name written on it because when he was subbing that day they gave him a list of everyone he needed to see or what teachers class he would be covering. 

Him: Pills of varying shapes and sizes just laying at the bottom. She's not a junkie, don't worry. But I guess that happens when you don't just turn your purse upside down every now and then.

eight. In your opinion, does your spouse communicate better with talking, touching or eye contact? 

Her: Definitely talking.

Him: Eye contact. I can tell what she means by looking at her which is more reliable than her saying it.

nine. What would your spouse ideally want you current/future children to do for a living?

Her: We've never talked about it but I don't think he would really care as long as they always try their hardest, achieve the goals they want to achieve and make themselves happy.  Man, that sounded cheesy but I think we just both want our kids to be happy.

Him: Whatever they wanted as long as it helped people in some way. I think we both want them to do their own thing that is respectable which in most cases is watching out for other people.

ten. Keeping this as PG as possible....if you were blindfolded and need to pick you spouse out of a crowd, what would you search for?  

Her: First, I'd look for a guy the same height as me.  That should narrow down the field quite a bit.  They I'd look for facial hair and glasses and then I'd listen for his voice.  

Him: I would just hold hands with every person until it felt right. And hopefully that is either Stacy or Emma Stone. (nice.  I applaud your choice in an alternative woman)

A Date By Any Other Name.....

Is still a date, right?  It's Sunday and that means you can most likely find me sitting at a table in the library doing school work.  Sounds like a bummer and it definitely used to be.  For the past couple of years, I've been working on my masters all alone with no one to share my pain.  But this year, my husband started his masters and now I have a date every Sunday at the library.  

It's interesting because I used to dread going to the library (or Starbucks, as it used to be before Jeremie started coming along and he can't work at Starbucks because "it's too loud and busy to concentrate") but now I actually look forward to our Sunday school work time.  In my head I've actually started referring to it as our Sunday Library Dates and it got me thinking...

Is a date only when we go out to dinner and a movie?  Or can it be other things?  Jeremie and I are always together.  And I mean always.  His mom once referred to us as "sardines".  It's just who we are as a couple and we like it that way.  But if we're always together, when are we dating?  Is it dating when we go to target to pick up a few things?  Is it dating when we take the dogs for a walk?  Is it dating when we're at the grocery store, or the library, or at my parent's house?  And then I realized, we make a lot of things into dates.

When we go to the grocery store we like to play a guessing game with the self scanner things.  We walk in and go to the giant rack of self scanners and we each guess which scanner we thing we'll get.  Whoever guesses closer to the scanner that we actually get after we swipe our card wins.  We actually used to bet things on this but we haven't done that lately. 

We also used to race in the self check out line to see who could swipe their credit card and get through the whole check out process first.  We actually had one lady who worked at Stop & Shop who used to watch us all the time and she'd get a good laugh out of it.  Then we got a joint checking account and that fun tradition stopped. That makes me a little sad :(

So I guess a date is whatever you make it. If Stop & Shop is date time then the library must be date time as well.  And is that so wrong?  That I go on dates with my husband to the library?  Does that make us boring people?  I don't think so.  I think it's just one thing that we do in our relationship that brings us even closer together.  Jeremie is literally my best friend and who's better to go to the library with for four hours than your best friend?  At least you can keep each other sane!

Do you and your significant other have any quirky dates?  

I'd loooovvve to hear about them!

Wedding Weekend - Solving the Kids at Dinner Problem.

It's a tough decision and most people have to address it at some point in the wedding planning process.  To invite kids or not to invite kids?  With us, it was an absolute from the moment we started planning.  We would be inviting kids.  Jeremie has several nieces and nephews and I have a young cousin, not to mention I babysit for two kids that I'm extremely close to.  We didn't want to celebrate one of the most important days of our lives without these little people by our sides. 

So the question became not whether or not to invite kids, but how to keep them from disturbing everyone else at the wedding especially during dinner.  Let's face it, people don't care about kids being invited to a wedding.  They care when the kids are running amuck when everyone else is trying to enjoy their dinner.  After that, everyone is up, dancing and laughing and having a great time.  Nobody even notices the kids!  So what do you do during dinner time so that everyone is happy?  

here's what we did:

We made kid packs!  They're simple, cheap, can be made weeks before the wedding (definitely a plus) and they really help to solve the problem at hand. 

To make them I shopped around for fun, kiddy items at the dollar store and at Target.  I originally planned to just put them together in paper bags because it would have fit in with the rustic theme of our wedding, but we found these cute little chinese food containers at the dollar store and they were 4 for $1!  I call that a win.

I purchased a variety of items that I thought would be fun for the kids like toy cars, crayons and drawing pads, silly straws, stamps and the icing on the cake - glow sticks.  I found that the hardest part of the process was trying to pick items that would keep kids of all ages busy.  We had kids as young as 2 all the way up to 12.  But it all worked out in the end.

Finally, we put a little note on top that said: 

"Something to keep you happy while the grown ups are being boring at the dinner table!"

Stacy & Jeremie

I'm so happy we did it because I had several parents come up to me during the wedding to thank me for the kids packs.  If nothing else, I'm sure it gave parents a few minutes of peace during dinner time where they could enjoy a couple bites of food!

So if you have kids that you absolutely must have at your wedding, go ahead, invite them!  Just make some kids packs to help them out during that long and torturous dinner time before the real party starts!

Friday Letters.

Well, it's Friday and I'm linking up with Ashley for Friday Letters!  I've pretty much lost track of the days at this point.  I got out of the house today with a fellow teacher and we did some shopping and just kept ourselves occupied for a while.  It's amazing that we are now on snow day number six from this blizzard!  I love, love, LOVE snow but I can't imagine what we're gonna do if we get anymore snow.  We'll be in school till July!  Oh well, only time will tell at this point.  

Here are my Friday letters today:

Dear Blizzard Charlotte/Nemo, really?  I guess they were pretty serious when they called you "one for the books."  Dear Sirius and Orion, thank you for all the snuggle time this week.  Even with all the cabin fever you really made it more bearable.  Dear Husband, I loved my first valentines as your wife!  Thank you for all the surprise messages and the beautiful flowers! Dear Sandy Hook, it's been two months and my heart is still broken.  It's getting easier but everyday is still a struggle.  I love you, Sandy Hook.  You are and always will be my home :) Dear Students, I can't imagine what you'll be like when we get back next week after almost 2 weeks off.  Go easy on us teachers, please!!   Dear Ski Butternut, watch out!  We're coming for you this weekend!

Happy weekend everyone!

Thriftable Thursday.

It's Thursday again and I'm officially on snow day number five!  They originally called school off for tomorrow too, but they are readdressing that as we speak.  So there's hope that I will be in tomorrow!  I know you're probably all wishing I would stop complaining about time off but the fact of the matter is, the more snow days we take now the more we chip away from vacations later in the year.  And let me tell you, when you work with kids everyday you NEED those vacations! On top of it, when the days are unplanned (not to mention you have three feet of snow on the ground outside) there's not much you can get done.  But I'm making the best of it and I've been doing some errands, cleaning and getting some DIY projects started, so that's all very well and exciting!

Because of all my time off this week I was actually able to get to Savers and do a little thrifting and I'm super excited to say that I have an awesome thriftable to share with you today.  I actually went to Savers to look for a pot for a house plant I have and because I went looking for a pot, I of course came away with a new coat.  I just never actually seem to buy what I went there looking for!

So here's the coat:

Cute, right?  And here's the best part - it was 12 bucks!   You really just can't beat the price.  It looks brand new, it was the perfect size and I have nothing like it in my closet.  There was just no way I wasn't getting this coat.  So, at least I got something accomplished this week and I'm pretty damn happy with my purchase!  

Happy Thursday everyone!

Snow Day Granola Bars.

Ok, so I'm on snow day number four today.  The city I work in still has unplowed roads and side walks so it's impossible for us to go back to school right now.  While I'm enjoying my time off I'm also going slightly insane.  Today I was at least able to get out and do some errands.  I also made some kick ass granola bars that I want to share with all of you.

Here's what you'll need:

2 cups quick oats

1 cup Rice Krispies cereal

1 1/2 cup chopped oreos

1/4 cup butter

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup honey (or maple syrup, we use agave nectar...you get the idea. Anything sweet, thick and sticky is perfect)

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 cup chocolate chips

How to make 'em:

First, grab an 8 X 8 pan, line it with foil or wax paper and lightly grease it.

Mix your quick oats, Rice Krispies and chopped oreos in a bowl.  Set aside.

Next, mix your butter, brown sugar and honey in a sauce pan and turn to medium heat.  Heat until it's melted together and begins to bubble.  Lower the heat and cook for an additional 2 to 3 minutes. Remove from heat and add vanilla.

Pour your caramel mixture over your oats mixture and mix it thoroughly until all the dry ingredients are covered.

Put the mixture into the baking tin and spread evenly.  Place a piece of foil on top and press down firmly until it is packed tight and evenly.  Set aside.

Melt your chocolate chips on the stove (low heat, stirring constantly).  Drizzle over the top of your granola mixture. 

I put mine in a plastic baggie and snip off the tip like a pastry bag to make it look nice.

Finally, put the whole thing in the fridge for at least half an hour.  I like to keep mine in the fridge for a couple hours to make sure it's nice and firm.  Remove from fridge, peal away foil and cut into bar shapes.

Finally, serve and enjoy your delicious homemade granola bars!  Just FYI, my husband has already eaten half the batch and it hasn't even been 24 hours!  So be prepared.  They go fast with a guy in the house.  If you want more than one, you may want to hide some in a secret stash!