Yay work!

I am really upbeat today. Not only is it B-E-A-U beautiful outside, I found out at work today that I had awesome numbers for the month. For those of you not in Vending Management, the business is all about good numbers. Meeting food cost, labor, etc. January wasn't so great for me, but February was right on track! Woot!

I am also in a great mood because even though I worked a long 14 hour day yesterday, I got a lot of great compliments on some garnishing and table presentations that I did for a really important meeting on campus. Even though I may not be a practicing chef anymore, I occasionally help with some events and it is always nice to get compliments on my "work".

Here are some pics:

These really aren't some of the best that I have done, but the event coordinators were blow away by everything (I also did a pretty fruit display, but I don't have a pic :(.) which is always nice to hear.

One of these days I will try and post a blog with more food pics since they are kind of like my "art".

Happy Friday!

My wedding album

Just over two years ago I was married. It was a great day, and I owe a lot of that to my fabulous wedding photographer, Sheila. She was the perfect person to capture all my favorite and crazy details of the day from my beaded bouquet to the 350 mini wedding cakes my mom and I made. She also put out quite an amazing album for Nathan and I. Recently, I have been telling more and more past and present brides about the album. Even though taking pictures of it with my crappy cell phone camera doesn't give it near the justice it deserves, I still think it is pretty sweet! Enjoy!

Now that you are all totally in love with Sheila, here is her website: http://www.goportraitgallery.com/. It has more of her amazing work and I am still honored to have two photos still on the wedding page. Plus, if you venture over to the family page, you will see the super cute picture of my grandparents with all of my mom's brothers and sisters.

I can only hope that one of these days Sheila will follow in the footsteps of other great photographers like Browers (http://www.browersphotographyblog.com/) and SJ Macky (http://sjmacky.blogspot.com/) and start a blog. Come on, Sheila, you know you want to!

I need more!

After two days of only having about 10 new blogs on Google Reader, I have decided that I need more! So please post your blog or blogs you love to read in my comments section. They can be personal, money, cooking, or whatever! Please help feed my new found addiction!

Favorite things (part 5 of 83)

I think a favorite things post is long overdue. Part 5 of 83 is a favorite thing that was very recently come into my life. Drum roll please.......

My new coffee mug! No my 8 year cousin didn't paint it, I did. It was purposely painted with annoying colors and dots because I planned on taking it to work and annoying my boss a bit with a cute but a little ugly big mug. But after discovering that it fits perfectly under my Tassimo, I think I may just have to keep it at home.

The only part I don't like about it is the purple came out darker than I thought it would. Other than that I think it is pretty cool and a little vintage looking.

Not to shabby on the inside either, right?

Yay for bright big coffee mugs!

Oh and another yay for having the company of super cool ladies while painting the mug!

Another weekend didn't go as planned.

Freaking floor drain didn't get fixed correctly last Saturday. Grrrr. Luckily for us, when our neighbor (who actually lived in our house for a short time) saw a plumber poking around outside she came over and informed him that we do have outside access to the lines and she pointed him in the right direction. None of us found the access, but we will! The progress was of course stopped by the fact that it snowed again. I had no idea that was supposed to happen.

But anyway, Nathan and I were supposed to make a last minute winery trip with his parents, but because of the drain, we didn't. So we started cleaning which was become an every week thing due to one major factor: dog hair. Roxie sheds just as heavily in winter as she does in summer and her hairs were staring to be long.

So we finally broke down and took her a groomer. After 3 hours of doggie day spa treatment, Roxie is adorable, soft, happy, and (for at least the time being) will not be leaving little white hairs all over my house. She really doesn't look that different except for the fact that she has a wayyyy smaller tail. Who knew she had so much hair on her tail! And we can see some new spots all over her body.

These are not the best cute pics of her, so here are a couple bonus ones of Roxie from last weekend, in one of her favorite places...the car!

Roxie is really super cute with a bandanna. Don't you think?

So much...

What a crazy weekend! After the plumbers fixed the floor drain issue, Nathan and I got ambitious and drove all the way down to Dexter afterall. Short trip but super fun. We ate at this total out in the middle of nowhere place called Cowtown. Cowtown had great catfish and sides, I am sure the steak is good too, but I was in the mood for good ole fried fish.

On Sunday we got back home just before noon which was just enough time for me to unpack, repack and shower before heading to KC for a short business trip. What a crazy few days! I am soooo happy to be home and even happier because this week Nathan is on day shift so we get to see each other and I get to cook!

I plan on posting my fabulous menu for this week so stay tuned!!!

Not the best day for Teresa and family

Ok, so earlier this week I posted about my washer needing to be fixed because it was leaking. Well, the washer is fine. The floor drain in the basement is clogged. Nathan and I being smart and ambitous (and cheap) decide to try and fix the problems ourselves. We rented a mini rooter from Home Depot, got it home and tried to fix the clog. Father in law comes over because he is the neighberhood for work and tries to lend a hand. What a mess. I suggest that we use our Christmas present wet dry vac and get some of the water out so we can maybe see the problem a little better or at the very least the guys wouldn't have to keep sticking their hands in ice cold nasty water.

Great idea until father in law doesn't latch the vac, drops it and water goes everywhere. I instantly laugh, because honestly when black nasty water goes all over your basement you really have three options: 1. laugh 2. cry 3. curse. Laughing was the first thing that came to mind.

We seemed to be making some progress, so we tried using a plunger just in case it was a clog that could come up and again me made some progress, then all of a sudden major back up.....and I won't go into detail and gross anyone out, but let me just say it was bad, really, really bad. By this time our 4 hour rental is almost up on the mini rooter and Nathan had to go to work. Um, isn't this the kind of thing you can skip work for? Really. But he insisted on going.

I finally mustered up enough courage to put on old clothes and go back to the basement and try to shift the washer even further away from the drain and clean up. I can't believe I was able to do this. I dumped bleach on the floor and got up what I could with a towel and old mop combo. Not much left, but still not real clean. I think to myself, I just need a few rags and I could get the rest of this up.....

The next part of the story just shows how freakin crazy I am. I took off my shirt, shook my head and put it on the floor. So there I am, shirtless in old jeans and mud boots, cleaning up the floor.

At least it is semi clean for when the plumber comes tomorrow. But it looks like no visiting friends this weekend....unless the problem gets fixed quickly and we can hit the road at a decent time. But it is really doubtful. Plus if we have to drop some obscene amount of money for this to get fixed we really shouldn't be making road trips.

Well, what can you do? Shit happens. We shall see what the plumbers say tomorrow.