Wednesday, November 25, 2009

wii fit i hate you...

So today we went shopping for our Sharing and Caring kids.. It was supposed to take 30 min. It was me and 2 girls from work, then we threw our boss in to the mix.. which meant the trip ended up taking an hour and a half.
I should have know we were going to have problems when I had completed my toy section purchases and he was still debating on clothes.. bad deal.. then after I had completed my clothes shopping he was still trying to find elastic wait pants!
It was a lot of fun we got all the kids taken care of after we had to take off about 50 bucks worth of toys cause our boss didn't so much add up the items right! the poor angry walmart associate.

So after our shopping expedition I went by to see my grandma to help her get ready for tomorrow. Then I headed home to meet the carlson's for a thanksgiving eve shopping trip. We went to Gap shopped for some sweaters, then went to Mimi's for dinner and I branched way way out on my food order. I don't like seafood at all or even lake food for that matter..
Well I skipped lunch today and was so hungry and decided to branch out....a BIG branch out.
I got Butternut squash ravioli with scallops!! It was so good though I ate it all!!


Then we came home and played a little wii.
Which leads me to my title.. we did  the fitness test and you had to play three sports. Baseball, bowling, and tennis! We all created our wii profile and took the fitness test. Kaylee was 79, Julie was 72, I was 72, Kelly 69, and Kurt was 26!!! Bobby, my FIL will be in tonight so we will see, knowing how athletic he is he will be a minor.


Tomorrow morning is our annual Turkey Trot. Even before Kelly and I were married. We were both still in school at Harding and we went to AZ for Thanksgiving. Well when we got there Julie informed us that we were going to be running a 5k (3.1 miles) on Thanksgiving morning, hence the tradition was born. That was in 2003 - 6 years later it is still going strong. Only difference this year is Kelly and I have to run 10 miles as opposed to 3!  

u create


new favorite site..
Such cute stuff!
Kari's site is wonderful check it out!

birthday boy



Happy 28th Birthday Robert Kelly



For those of you who know me, you know that I love love love my birthday! So whenever it is anyone elses birthday I want to make a big deal about it. So I tried to make it a big deal. Unfortunatley Kelly doesn't care.. Well I invited some of our friends over for cake. I tried the homemade cheesecake again, and this time.. it was not soup! Look what happens when you actually follow the instructions! So I took a picture to show everyone!
                               

                                 
I love it when abby comes over... she is so sweet to callaway and he gets so excited to see her his little deer tail just wags and wags
           
                                
                                               
The in-laws are in town this week, which means it will be a fabulous week! I say that with 100% enthusiasm to, no sarcasm! I love my in-laws, I am one of those freak situations that happens rarley when the bride actually loves the in-laws and enjoys spending time with them. We even have family game night! Which again I love! So tonight we may do a little pre-shopping. We have family pictures on Saturday and I am still without an outfit... I have the perfect dress in mind, now I just have to find it!




Tuesday, November 24, 2009

call me the firemen thats my name

So Saturday morning was girls on the run...Kelly and I volunteered to be course marshal’s for the 5 k & 1/2 marathon in Bentonville. It was really neat to be able to cheer for those girls and their parents as they ran the 3.1 miles. I thought it was a really neat program and I was very impressed how many families participated. One of these days when we decide to have bebe's we will do that!


After the race we headed home to get the house ready for the family that is coming in this week. Well unfortunately I decided to pick up Twilight, and I became obsessed and never really got in to cleaning the house. Good news is I finished it.. bad news is I have 3 more to go!

Saturday night we had the Hospice benefit Voyage 2009. It was at the Fayetteville Towncenter and a "black tie optional" I could not find any information on what the event was going to include, which meant we had no clue what was going to happen! It was a lot of fun though, they had this big buffet of food, and then all of these local restaurants set up stations and you could try their food too. We got cherries jubilee from Soul, ribs from Freds, lasagna from Pesto, and this AMAZING pumpkin squash soup from Tyson.

After dinner there was a silent action with these amazing items, but they started the bidding at like 1,000 bucks.. so needless to say we just got to pretend what we would buy. Then about 1/2 way through the night the festivities were interrupted by none other than Dr. Evil? He had kidnapped Frank Broyles, Pat Walker, and Dick Trammel. Thank goodness Austin Powers showed up to save them!





Sunday morning we got up and went to church and had to run 15 miles. Let me just tell you that it was a little warm for a November day! The run was well worth it though; Kelly and I made meatloaf and mashed potatoes for dinner!

Then I got this bright idea to make this recipe my friend Sarah gave me. Well part of the recipe calls for melted chocolate chips. I made a special point when purchasing my chocolate chips to buy the good stuff.. Nestle Tollhouse.. BS! I will never by them again! You are supposed to sprinkle them on top of this mixture and let them melt... THEY DIDN'T MELT! I put them in for about 5 min, then checked them, not even close they were still in a kiss shape, 5 more min, nope still not melting.. After about 15 min I finally thought surely they didn't mean this much time? So I talked them out. The chips have still not melted but instead become burnt. I was sooo mad! They ruined my dessert! So sadly I had to throw the WHOLE thing away!!

Well then after that I decide I needed to clean my oven with thanksgiving coming up and all..

ps. this takes 4 hours.. Why did no one tell me this? I was up until 10:30 monitoring this! Well I continue to clean the house and all the sudden i realize there is a HUGE cloud of smoke coming from my kitchen! Crap! I start to get flustered. I run over to the oven only to realize there is a fire in the over. I mean is it just cooking off all the crap or is this a legit fire?? I then become worried, kelly is gonna be soo mad if there is a fire.. even if it is the ovens fault-it will somehow circle back to me & that I didn't use my head...I start looking for the phone book (YES they can still be useful) ready to call incase the fire rages out of control. I removed all things around then oven, put my oven mitts on and waited. What I was planning on doing with the cloth oven mitts I don't exactly know, but at the time I thought I was prepared! Thankfully though the fire subsided and the catastrophe was averted.. whew!


no this isn't my oven.. but this is a great visual for the fire!

Today is Kelly’s birthday! I made homemade cheesecake for his birthday.. Hope it is good!

Friday, November 20, 2009

musing of martha

I have my moments where I am creative... and I get very excited when I make something that is martha worthy in my mind.
Here is the "creation" that I made this week thanks to the help of Hobby Lobby. Everything Christmas was 50% off.. Which pretty much gives me a free pass to go shopping..especially because my husband will look the other way in the means of the budget if it has something to do with Christmas!


I was pleased how cute they turned out!
I have been looking for the perfect combo of glass vases I got 2 at walmart for about 5 bucks a piece.
The other 2 I got at hobby for a total of 10 bucks.
I also got 2 boxes of mini ornaments for $4 at walmart, at Hobby Lobby I got 1 large box of silver ornaments for $3, 1 bag of red jingle bells for $2, and a small bag of bells for $1.
Grand Total for piece = $25



We also finished our #2 tree! I am excited to have 2 trees this year. It did make me a little sad that Kelly and I weren't as cheesy about the tree decorating.  Last year Kelly videoed the whole thing and we did the whole thing together. This year he was a little preocupied with homework and he wasn't as hands on.. which made me a little sad, because I really love how excited he gets for Christmas!! Here is our second tree!


I have been a little MIA this week, thanks to my friends at work. I will blame it alll on them! It first started when I was talking to them about Harry Potter. I have seen the movies and like them.. I have not read the books, nor did I really care to, but thanks to the group at work they convinced me. I am on the Order of the Pheonix right now with 2 books left. I have currently switched to books on cd due to the fact that it 1. alows me to be engrossed in 2 books at one time, one I can read at home and the other that I can listen to in the car. 2. I have a 15-20 mintute drive to and from work each day... so this alows me to get lost in the story rather than be pissed aout traffic! The books are very good and I am glad that I have been introduced to them, there really is so much more to the story than in the movies.
Then they brought up twilight...really? I remember about 4 years ago I was with my friend Emily and she was reading this book and refused to tell me about it. After much persuasion I found out that our mutual friend Brittney had given her this book about a girl that fell in love with a vampire. I laughed at her and didn't think another thing about it. Until all this stuff came out about twilight and even then I didn't bother to see the movie until it hit the red box. THEN JENNI AND KERRI came in to the picture and made it sound just so dang interesting. So at lunch on Monday Kerri brought me Twilight. It has all been down hill since then. I have go so far as to cover myself in a blanket and hide the book under it while we were "watching tv" I was unable to read on Tuesday night due to some meetings. I was very tempted to pick it up before bed on T , but I very strongley resisted the urge as to not fall in to a very long night of sleeplessness...
Well Wed and last night I was not so lucky! I became engrossed in the book and can't stop thinking about that happens next! Needless to say I am now hooked and hope to finish the 1st one tonight.




Tuesday, November 17, 2009

it is begining to look a lot like...

CHRISTMAS!

If kelly had his way we would have had our tree up in October.. thankfully I won that one and we waited until Sunday night! Please see our 1st tree below. Don't worry we have another one that is not so formal.
Now let me tell you about our battle with the décor. Now for those of you who don't know, this is our first Christmas in our new house and thankfully we have been blessed with friends and family that have donated things to us for decoration! With that being said Kelly has this overwhelming urge to place every single item that we recieved for donation on display throughout this house. So on our way to life group on Sunday night I asked Kelsey. "kelsey, what do you think of those blow up santa's in the yards?"
"EWW those? They are tacky!" she replied.
YES i replied in vendication! Point made!
Now, don't get me wrong I love the holidays and i love how in to in my husband gets!! I do not love the griswold style decorations though. I like the white lights all over the exterior of the house and simple things inside.. Kelly however has somehow made our house look like santa threw up Christmas in everyroom. So little by little i am trying to remove a few things and place them back in the boxes where they came from.

O Christmas tree!

Kelly enjoys teasing callaway and didn't miss a beat with the tree.
He chased him around until he was so scared he ran outside.
This is where I found him 20 minutes later!

I tried to get a picture through the window.
I laughed so hard when I saw him out there!
I think he was scared of Kelly and the crazy Christmas tree!

Tree #2

this was our first tree.. we got it for our 600 sqft apt in Dallas.
It has now moved to the kitchen of our new house.
NO, those are not really presents under that tree, they are decorative boxes that kelly throws all of my presents in each year and calls it "wrapping"

Friday, November 13, 2009

canceled :(

I have been so excited for my pampered chef show...
Last night we got a very sad call from my mom. My great grandmother passed away after a full 100 years of life. 100! She has been sick for a while and we knew that it was coming, but it is still hard.
So, my pampered chef party is canceled. :(
I just wanted to post that in case i forget to tell some people, but if you want to orderstuff go to:
pampered chef
bottom left corner click shop online
enter cortney for the host name

*here is another link incase..
http://www.pamperedchef.biz/kimpel?page=2ways-order-products
here are some items that are great:
These were mentioned at kelly's korner



#2540 Medium Scoop - $13.00 Medium Scoop
Get the scoop! This heavy-duty stainless steel scoop is great for evenly portioning batters, doughs, fillings and salads. Squeeze-action handles allow for convenient one-handed use. Approximately 2 tbsp. Dishwasher-safe.













#1187 Egg Separator - $6.50 Egg Separator

Separate egg whites from yolks while keeping your hands free. A notch on the handle lets you hang this clever tool right on the bowl to eliminate messes. In a pinch, you can use it to whisk light batters. Dishwasher-safe.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Black Friday FREAK

The 12 weeks of Christmas
WEEK 6!

I am a freak.. I love love love black friday!!
To give you a clear expectation on how much of a freak i am..every year excluding last year, i have gotten myself up at 4am to experience the rush-WITHOUT having a single item to bite, scratch, or claw my way through the masses for. To most people this is crazy. I can not help it. I love to shop whether i have a recipient or not. My favorite way to do it is this:
Thursday-purchase a paper
Friday set alarm for 330 and proceed to drag on clothes pre-coffee.
4am-stop at starbucks for life blood
head to the mall to amble through the gloriousness that is BLACK FRIDAY!
Stores I will hit:
Wal-Mart
Belk's
Best Buy
Sam's
Bath and Body Works
My Favorite black friday was when kelly and i had just started dating.. i remember it soo clearly.
Thanksgiving day 1999. We (the carlson family and myself) left Bentonville early thanksgiving day and drove to Dallas to go to the cowboys game! So fun! After the game we came back to kelly's aunt and uncles house (Jeff, Amy, Kayla, & Blake) I slept on Kayla' trundle bed in her princess pink bedroom.
The next morining our first stop was walmart for some item that santa was supposed to bring kayla. I think it was a barbie playhouse. Amy gave me that as my item to bite, claw and claw for. Well I did and I think i drew blood on the mean lady that tired to steal it from me. (have you ever seen the frineds episode whe monica goes bargin shopping for her wedding dress in queens? That episode makes me think of that day!) Needless to say our morning pretty much summed up our day, going from one store to the next to get all the best deals and to complete the items on the oh so important Christmas list.
ILOVE IT!
Last year though I did get up super early and go with a purpose. 1. I had to work the friday after due to no vacation time 2. belks had these 1000 thread count sheets and they were on sale for 50 bucks. That was my big huge purpse for the day!
I am off this black friday! I am so excited to have the whole day to bargin shop.. now if only my family would tell me what they want!

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Lions and Tigers, and Vikings... OH MY!

WOW..I got 3 friends!
Hannah-the cutie in the pic is none other than Adrian Peterson the BA running back for the Minnesota Vikings.
Abby-WOW that is all i have for your Hot-lanta comment!
YEAH for Amanda! I knew the teacher could get it!

I am going to Minneapolis, MN to spend 4 days doing sales calls! I am very excited to get to travel. I am NOT excited to be missing my Susan G Komen Christmas party or for missing  my young wives party.
One of these days I hope to be important enough to be that person that people will change schedules for.
Today however, I am not that person.

On another note.
HOT YOGA.
My friend Carrie called me on Monday and asked me to go to Hot yoga with her.. I at first told her she was dirty and I refused to be a part of that. I guess I am the only person who has never heard of "hot yoga"
For those of you who are under a rock or live in a cave.. It is yoga, in this little bitty room where the heat is up to about 150 degrees and you sweat like crazy!! Here is the deal, I hate hate Hate to be hot. I don't like to be sweaty, which is why I agreed to this torture to begin with!
The instructor kept getting on to me for closing my eyes. I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs at him and tell him... "I HAVE TO KEEP MY EYES CLOSED OR MY SWEAT WILL BLIND ME!"
They hand out face and body towels for you to use but it still couldn't contain all of my persperation.
On top of all of that, the class lasts 90 minutes... are you kidding???
The only reason I would put myself through that again is becauase I was very sore on Tuesday.. which makes me feel like I got a workout!

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

GUESS where I am going????

I am sooo excited... This is probablly my favorite things about my sales job!!

any guesses yet?


warmer??


well??

I am not going to tell.. I am hoping that some one is able to figure it out by my clues?




bebes

Miles Lee Wilson's
Baby Shower


M
Me, Emmy, & Sara

The bebe cake


the hostesses


some lady made him a cape!!!
how flippin cute is that?

Monday, November 9, 2009

trash-tac-ular


PINK TRASH BASH '09


Me, Andrea & Casey
Friday I took a half day off from work. Why? I needed to run.. crazy to most-i know! In all fairness though I knew that this weekend there would be no way I would have time if I didn't.
So I left work, went and stashed water bottles in to trees (so I would not have to stop to pick up the water, this way I could keep on keeping on) and parked at the bentonville trail. I was set to do 15. My friend Carrie Jo was supposed to run with me, but she shaded out.. typical fayetteveille girl! Anyway, the run was a bit of a struggle it was warm on friday and I was out of my routine.. but I finished it!
I then had to rush home and get ready. We go to First Friday's every month and this time our friend Jermey opened up his studio so I really wanted to make sure that I went to show support! He is awesome! Check out his pics HERE! So I had to get ready pretty quick then meet Kelly at the square!
Well I also necded to do make-up for Pink Trash, but I didn't want to be tooo crazy for the wholesome Bentonville square! So I opted to go understated for the First Friday's then head to Mac afterwards.
Well i guess I am a simpleton and thought that I could just walk in and get my make-up done and then end! Well the Mac girl told me that, "YOU need and apt here on the weekends. We have a ton of events!"
Don't get me wrong she was a life saver and worked her magic on my eye's and I looked like a product of the 80's & I loved it!


Casey & I

Kelly, Kurt, & Jimmy came later to show their support.. they even wore PINK!





Kelly & I
I ended up getting home about 2am...I will post more about the baby shower & LR trip later!

Thursday, November 5, 2009

healthy woman!!




 
 
 
abby's paraffin hand treatment!
It was pumpkin scented


Hand massages.. so good I almost fell asleep!


I had one of abby & I too, but i was looking rough! So sorry abs! not posting it!

Tonight was our girls night at the Embassy! It was a lot of fun. My two friends from church went with me..The blonde is Kelsey married to my friend Jimmy from college, and the brunette is Abby we met at church. They are both precious!!
Anyway the three of us went to the Healthy Women thing with northwest health and got to sample some WONDERFUL services from the spa botanica. It is the new spa inside the embassy and WOW it is nice and relaxing.
We each got a hand massage from Angie Blevins... She was great! Then we got chair massages from Breezey and again I wanted to just climb in to a robe and stay there.
Kelsey and I decide that we would email each others husbands and let them know a say at the spa would be a great gift from santa!
But needless to say I am tired from my relaxing & fun night...

Blonde Ambition give away!


I FOUND A NEW GIVE-A-WAY
If you to go to this through my blog and you win.. can I please request at least one of these fabulous items??
Not to much to ask right?
I mean if we are being fair.. I told you about the give-a-way??!!!

http://www.blondeambitionblog.com/

Save the TaTa's

I need everyone to sit down for this one.. I procrastinated… I KNOW that it is hard to believe! In case you haven’t heard me talk about it I volunteer for Susan G Komen and our NWA chapter is having a fundraiser on Friday night…
PINK TRASH BASH!!

Well you are supposed to dress up. When I say dress up I mean people go all out in crazy pink outfits! As volunteers we were supposed to get t-shirts. So I breathed a sigh of relief that I wasn’t going to have to worry about what to wear for this occasion. Then last week they told us we weren’t getting shirts. Which should have been my clue to start shopping for something to wear!! I didn’t though! I decide to wait until Wednesday to look!! I go to Wal-Mart on my lunch in hopes to find something for me and my friend Casey, who was also banking on the volunteer t to say her from an outfit crisis! Nothing, I couldn’t find anything that would work, unless you count a child’s double bubble shirt that wouldn’t leave much to the imagination.


So then Casey tells me about the save the tata’s shirts. WOW. I don’t think I could rock these.







So since I won't be rockin' one of these babies... I now have to figure our what I will wear before tomorrow!! I could go tonight but I have a Christmas open house tonight, so I can't.
I am going to get a new battery for my camera today so I can take pictures tonight at the open house and tomorrow at pink trash bash!!
*side note.. kelly and i have 30 days until our marathon.. please keep us in your prayers that we can have determination and injury free!

Monday, November 2, 2009

goodbye sunshine hello sleep!

This weekend we opted to stay in and lay low for Friday night. We had a long run on saturday morning and wanted to turn in early. We had a few trick-or-treaters at work on Friday and that added a little spice to the day! So after work I went over to visit my grandma. My papa (whose was pbly my most favorite person in the world) passed away a few years ago and since then I try to visit grandma as much as our busy schedule allows! She did inform me during my visit that the new Nora Roberts book is out & I NEED IT! Bed of roses.. it is part of her new series & let me tell you it is taking alll of my willpower not to run out and buy it right now!
After quality time with her I came home to a welcome surprise. Kelly had made us dinner! Only problem was it varied from our norm. We normally have pizza every Friday night. That way we know exactly how it effects our tummy's on our saturday run. Well my precious deviated from the norm and MAN was it bad (more to come) Well we ate dinner, spent a little quality time with each other and were in bed by about 10. AARP I KNOW!
Saturday morning... cure the scary dungeon music...
So it all started bad when kelly couldn't find his running shirt. He wanted a very specific running shirt. So he starts stomping around pulling things out of his "running clothes drawer" and muttering. So I calmly tell him to look in the closet and the dirty clothes.. "I DID CORTNEY!" Well I know from experience that kelly has this odd ability to "look" without looking, nor does he move anything if there is a pile.. I head to the dirty clothers and retrieve said shirt expecting a grand thanks.. not so much. "THIS ISN'T THE SHIRT!!!!" It took me a bit to realize I pulled th light blue & he wanted the dark blue--- difference? None! By this point I am annoyed, and I not so calmly tell him that, "if this situation was reveresed and I was having a 6 year old style meltdown about a shirt, that YOU would tell me to suck it up and deal with it." Surprisingly.. that didn't work, it only made it worse! He then refuses to leave the house until he is wearing the dark blue shirt. I then did the only thing I could..walked away and prayed for patience. Five min later he walked out of the bedroom sporting the dark blue shirt!!! I sweetly said where did ya find it??? "In the closet"
HUMMM.. I kept the smirk to myself! Needless to say on the way to the run he appologized for the behavior, but as most women know.. I was still a little rattled & effected by the issue so.. the run was bound to be a bad one!
Well about 5 miles in I was already hurting so i asked kelly to stop for me to have a bathroom break. I still felt off-like I wasn't in my normal rhythm. Well 5 more miles I had to stop again. I was so dishartened with myself. The we start off for the 2nd half of the run, and at one point I stopped in the middle of the road. (now some people are walkers, they stop and walk and start back up again) I don't stop so this was a big deal. I just stopped looked up to the sky and prayed. I prayed for strength and for determination. Well it worked for a bit. Then about mile 15 I had him stop again. He asked if I was gonna be ok. He said we can stop now if you need. I firmly told him no, if i don't do this it will be a mental block. I HAVE to finish. Well at mile 18 Kelly's legs pretty much quit. He litterally had o grab on the a fence to keep up. So with my issues and his we only did 18 of the 20 mile training run.
I honestly felt this huge burden of disappointment. Why couldn't we have just willed our legs to go on for 2 more miles? It still bothers me and I deel like a quiter. I know that 18 miles is still a big deal, but it still weighs on me that i couldn't meet that goal.
So we came home dejected, and rushed around to get ready to meet our friends kathryn & dave. We were going to the razoback game with them & were due to meet them at 2. When we got there Dave had smoked these amazing ribs! After dinner we headed to the game, were surprisingly we were bored!! It was a great feeling to know that we rockstared that game!
THEN Sunday came.. oh wonderful Sunday, when I woke up and realized that my clock was wrong it really was 7am not 8am!! It felt like Christmas, and Santa had given me the present of a whole extra hour!

We went to church Sunday morning to find out that our DEAR friend Paul Carter had lost his battle with cancer. It really is amazing how some people can really touch your life and make you want to be a better person. Paul was that guy. He was always the guy with a smile on his face, and like my husband said he always had a twinkle in his eyes. Everytime he would smile his whole face was a smile. He was a hugger too.
I like that. I like that every Sunday after church he was there waiting for Kelly and I and we didn't handshake Paul we hugged. I lost my grandpa a few years back and Paul's death really felt like I was losing another grandpa figure. Please Pray for the Carter Family.

Although we had such a loss we were still responsible for hosting life groups. Even with the extra hour I still didn't get everything done in time. I even picked and easy dish to be able to do it all... but I didn't even think about my oven space!! I made a homemade cheesecake thanks to my friend carrie evers, and well I obviously didn't read the recipr all the way through before setting out to cook, cause it needed 4 hours to chill.Well I got it out of the oven at 430....life groups at 6.. you do the math.
Then came the chicken debocle. I had 3 dishes of chicken and 2 dishes of green bean bundles. Needless to say they weren't all fitting in our oven. So we had to improvise.. We had our lesson first and our meal second. Which we did have some grumbles about how people were going to starve to death.. but it worked out ok until it came to the cheesecake.. I went to cut in to it and it all just colapsed. Ross told me I should have called it a new dish.. like I had meant to do it.. Dang it!
We did find out our love language though..
I am a Acts of Service & Physical Touch.
Kelly was a Words of Affrimation
**side note..Kelly scored a 1 on physical touch.. I scored a 10.. this should be an interesting book.

This is my twin Jimmy & I at life groups!