Archive for June 2011

MPM June 27 - July 3

June 27, 2011
Breakfasts - Cereal, fruit, zucchini bread, pancakes

Lunches - Sandwiches - BLTs, Chicken, PB&J, Egg Salad, Grilled Cheese, Tuna
                 Fruit - strawberries, grapes, bananas, apples, watermelon
                Snacks - carrots, celery, cheeze its, pretzels, yogurt, applesauce

Dinners -
Monday:  Root Beer Pork Chops, Peas

Tuesday: Asian BBQ chicken, seasoned potatoes, carrots

Wendesday:Chicken & Rice Casserole, bisquits

Thursday:  Peanut Coated Drumsticks, seasoned potatoes, green beans

Friday:  Southwest Rollups, Mexican Rice, Corn

Saturday:  Beef Kabobs with Orange Glaze, onion, cherry tomatoes

Sunday : Lasagna, Garlic Bread, broccoli

All recipes can be found under the recipes tab,
linking up with Organizing Junkie

The Jersey Shore

June 26, 2011
And I'm not talking about these clowns :)
They bring a bad name to a wonderful place, let me tell you.
Anyways, I'm talking about this Jersey Shore.

After we left Philadelphia, it's where we headed. While we were there we were able to celebrate Dan's Mom's Birthday with family.




We also spent a morning walking around historic Smithville. Full of shops, restaurants, and games.


MI friends, think Greenfield Village, very similar.
boys will be boys.
shooting practice
We also got to spend a night down on the Ocean City boardwalk, one of my favorite places. We played mini golf, ate ice cream, browsed in shops, and got a big tub of Johnsons popcorn to take home with us. It may or may not be empty now. (Note to self.... check if they ship to FL)

me and Gia
brothers
she beat us all!!
It was a wonderful trip and we are sad to be back home!

The Office

June 24, 2011
You all know I love a good pop culture reference :)

One of my goals this year was to organize our office space, which is really just a corner between our living room and stairs. We previously had an L shaped desk their, but it was a little worse for wear after moving.
notice any problems? Look closer....
If not for these wood stumps, the entire thing would collapse onto itself. Not exactly safe. Or pretty for that matter. Their other issues with the desk were a) no drawers or cabinets, which required everything to be out in the open and look cluttered b) no shelves for storage and c) I didn't like the L shape, I wanted something a little more streamlined.

So we started watching the sale ads and when nothing turned up we ventured down the street to office depot one Sunday to see if we could find anything reasonable. We ended up with THIS desk and hutch for a reasonable $200. Lucky for us the desk came in about a million pieces.
It took us a good three days to put the two pieces together and during that time desk building became a new spectator sport for our pups.
The desk went together relatively easy once we got an electric drill and stopped torturing our selves with all those little screws. Some of the steps didn't seem to make any sense, like assembling the whole thing flat on the floor and then picking it up (causing screws to come back undone) so we figured out our own way to do some of the steps that made more sense to us.


Eventually we got the basic structure together enough for it to be functionable as a desk and over the next few days put together the drawers and cabinets. The dogs had long since lost interest by then.


While my husband was putting the finishing touches on the desk I started thinking about that blank space between the top of the hutch and the ceiling. Besides the cats, who love to lounge there, I wanted something decorative. I decided on some canvas prints after seeing this picture:
Michelle's Living Room
So I picked out a few prints of us and our dogs that I love and then debated for a few days with what size to get and where to get them printed from. I eventually decided on 4 12x12 canvases after doing some very "rustic" measuring with a ruler. I landed on Color Inc. because it's been so highly recommended by the Pioneer Woman. A little pricey, but good quality. I ordered the prints and then we went on vacation and I forgot about them. A few days after our return this large box was waiting for me when I woke up from my afternoon nap ( a summer essential!). I contained our prints of course and I wasted no time laying them out above the desk so my husband could hang them as-soon-as-he-got-home-no-you-don't-need-to-change-your-clothes-first.


 Berore I show you the finished project let me share a few things I really love about this desk. It had all the things I wanted but didn't have in the old desk.
1. Shelves
2. cabinets for storage
3. A file cabinet.

And here is our finished office area!!!!

Summer in the City

June 22, 2011
The last week has been a whirlwind of packing, traveling, and unpacking for our family. We left Fort Lauderdale late Thursday night and arrived in Atlantic City even later. A quick drive to Cherry Hill and we settled in for the night with friends. We spent precious time catching up till early morning hours and finally called it a night. Friday we were treated to breakfast at the diner before running some last minute wedding errands. Oh, you see, these friends were getting married SOON. I had the priviledge of helping the bride pick out some make up and flip flops - very important for sore feet at the reception :) I myself am an advocate of switching from cute ceremony shoes to reception flip flops. Then we headed to downtown Philly.



The rehearsal was at the beautiful Le Meridien Hotel near Love Park where the ceremony would take place the following day. I loved the interior design of this hotel.
Then we quick drove across town to M Restaurant which was equally as charming for dinner. This place had serious old world charm and plenty of greenery right in the middle of the city.
Dinner was absolutely fabulous - salad, polenta, short ribs, and tiramisu :)
Another late night as we headed back to Cherry Hill to crash for the night. We slept in Saturday then escorted the groom back to the city and checked in at Le Meridien.  We walked a few blocks past city hall and got a quick lunch down at Redding terminal - cheesesteaks of course!
The rooms at Le Meridien are gorgeous, and ours had a view of love park :)
And then it was time for me to relax while the boys got ready for the wedding. I watched a little Wild Animal Repo, before getting called down to pin some bouts since no one else knew how. The rest of the night went very quickly.... pictures were taken, vows were said, and then it was time to party :)
The wedding lasted well into the morning, as weddings often do, and then we crashed before the brunch the next morning. A beautiful brunch, a farewell to friends, and we were back on our way to Atlantic City. I've gotta say, I sure wouldn't mind living in Philly some day. It really is a beautiful city, full of life and energy, art and culture, I was smitten.