365–Week 1

The first week of January was crazy! We went from Phoenix to Denver and spent the whole week vacationing!

1. Flying into Phoenix I was so, so excited to see all the snow! and the Mountains!

2. We sent our luggage to Denver with Garrett’s parents and as soon as we arrived I busted that thing open, I missed my stuff! ha!

3. Monday was such a lazy day of recovering I spent the day in my littlemissmatched socks!

4. Tuesday was our first day skiing!

5. Wednesday was day two of skiing (I never made it down that slope, but it was fun to watch other people come down!)

6. We saw two huge heads of Elk. I was so freaking excited!!

7. Garrett headed back to the ski slopes I opted to stay home, and went for a lovely walk. I wish I could take a picture of how clean it smelled up on that mountain!

 

Tomorrow I’ll start the posts of our Grand Adventure!!! Today it was back to work, and school. I wish we had gotten a snow day!

oh…hello…

I never meant to go on this vacation and unplug from the world. I had to plans to blog our vacation as it went along. But, instead I turned off my computer, and more surprisingly my cell phone and have embraced this adventure (and oh what an adventure it has been)!

I will blog about our trip but in order to stay up on my New Year’s resolutions I thought I’d better blog a recipe before this week gets away from me. Since I have been spoiled beyond belief this week with delicious meals I haven’t even thought of cooking. These cookies Garrett’s Mom makes are AMAZING (hopefully I can share) and I wake up to bacon every single morning am I in heaven?

Oreo Truffles and Nutter Butter Balls are so super easy to make and everyone loves them!!

1. get a package of cookies (oreos or nutter butters)

2. crush them up (in a food processor)

3. Stir in a brick of cream cheese

4. shape mixture into balls.

5. put balls in the freezer for a bit.

6. Melt almond bark. (I like white chocolate for oreo, and milk for nutter butter)

7. dip balls in melted almond bark.

8. put chocolate covered balls on wax paper.

 

Really mine are usually prettier than this, but this bunch was made very, very late at night for a last minute boys poker game and I just didn’t care about pretty!!

I hope everyone’s New Year has started out great! So far so good around here! But we are on vacation :)

We’re fiesta-ing!

If everything went according to plan Garrett and I have just landed at the Phoenix airport and are getting ready to head to the Fiesta Bowl to watch our Sooners secure a New Year’s Day victory! This is my first Bowl Game, and despite the fact we are only going to be in Arizona for 18 hours I cannot wait to soak it all up! Here’s hoping to a great start to 2011!!!

Cheer Like a Champion!!!

and Happy New Year!

It’s Resolution Time!

Well yesterday we saw how I did last year, today it’s time to see what I want to accomplish in 2011.

11 in 11

1. Reach my Goal weight

I did a good job of getting started in 2010, time to get the rest off this year!! (preferably by my 10 year (oh my god I cannot even believe I am that old!!) high school reunion)

2. Stay on track at school.

To reach the goals I’ve set for myself academically I need to complete 18 hours (if I can fit in a few more that’d be okay to!)

3. Attend the Oklahoma vs. fsu game!

We had so much fun when Natalie, Hunter, and my Mom came up for the game this year in Norman, I can only hope that Garrett and I leave as happy as we did this year!!

4. Read 12 non academic books

I love to read, but when I started back to school fun reading kind of took a backseat, I think I can do one a month though!

5. Once a week blog a recipe.

I love, love, love getting cooking ideas from other blogs, who doesn’t? I’m going to commit to blogging 52 things I make this year! Stick around for some yummy new ideas!

6. Cook 6 meals for the Ronald McDonald house.

The RMH is such an amazing organization, it’s something I’ve wanted to get involved in for a long time. This year I’m going to find the time to take a meal for the families staying there once every other month.

7. No Traffic Violations!

 

I got pulled over twice this year (that’s the amount of times I’ve been pulled over TOTAL before this year!!) Luckily I only had to pay one ticket, but I’ve got to get my road rage under control, and maybe slow down a little bit! No visits with the nice police folks in 2011!

8. Save, Save, Save!

 

I’m pretty good at saving, but you can always be better! I have a number in mind what I want my savings account to look like at the end of the 2011. I’ll have to budget and be a little more frugal to get there.

9. Establish a skin care routine.

It’s no secret I’m getting old. I have been blessed with pretty good skin, which as led to a pretty lax Ashlee when it comes to skin care. I love to buy face products but I never really follow through. Lately, I’ve noticed that the wrinkles on my face are starting to run rampart, I think it’s about time I get serious with taking care of my skin!

10. Exercise Three Times a week!

2010 wasn’t a bad year for exercising I really embraced running. BUT I need to get better at sticking to a routine, year round! Not just when the weather is best for running outside!

11. 365 Picture Challenge.

This is the resolution I feel is the most likely to fail, but the one that could potentially be the best! I want to take a picture every day of something that is going on in my life. My hope (but not my commitment) is to do a weekly blog update showing the pictures. So fun! I’ve seen lots of people start this but few (none?) finish it.

 

Alright those are my 11 for 2011!

I’m such a list person I have different goals listed different places but I like to have some public resolutions.

What about you? Do you make resolutions? 

2010 Resolutions

 

I did much, much better accomplishing my 2010 Goals, then I did my 2009 goals!

1. Have Christmas presents ready by the end of October. Haha not so much…BUT I was not buying or wrapping presents on Christmas Eve, so that’s a start!

2. Attend a SOONERS away game. We went to two! and lost them both! (so sad) if we had won, I think we’d have gone to a few more…but we’re headed out to Glendale to attend my first bowl game!!!

3. Try at least one new recipe a month. Yes! I didn’t do a very good job blogging about new recipes but I tried more than 12!

4. Go on a cruise This is one of the failures…sad. I decided maybe we would go this year but there are already so many trips planned, I don’t know if we’ll be able to fit one in…

5. Head to the Big D three times to see those Texas cousins. Yes! I headed down quite a few times, once I even stayed an entire week! I’m pretty sure I’m up for cousin of the year this year!

6. Attend an activity of each of the cousins. I made it to the 3 littles games, and to one of Jeffery’s concerts, I did not attend a soccer game for Jack, or a Cross Country meet for Blake (but I ran with Blake in several races, that has to count for something…)

7. Send/Give Birthday Cards to the kids. Yes! All kiddos got birthday cards and presents this year! I told you I was up for cousin of the year!

8. Track calories daily not so much…

9. Eat lunch out no more than once a month when at work. big fat fail…

10. Exercise 2 hours a week. I averaged out to 2 hours a week, some weeks I got a lot more, and some weeks I got quite a bit less!

 

Goals 8-10 while these could have been improved upon GREATLY I am ending 2010 25lbs lighter than I started it, so I did something right, even if I didn’t do it the way I had hoped!

I’ll be posting 2011 shortly, hopefully I’ll do even better :)

2010 in Review

January

January I saw Food Inc and decided it was time to cut fast food meat out of my diet. I have visited a few fast food restaurants since January but not nearly as much as I had before. For the most part I still do not order meat when I decide to visit a drive thru.

 February

February Garrett passed the CPA exam!!! Finally all of the studying was over! I could not have been more proud! and a little bit excited that another would never be devoted to studying for that silly test (at least by him!!)

March

In March we headed to lots of OU baseball games.

April

I ran my first 5k!! I was slow as anything but it led to lots and lots more running in 2010!

May

To Florida to see my family, and it went MUCH better than expected! I <3 Bradenton!

June

We headed to Nebraska for the College World Series. What a fun trip! We also visited the University of Nebraska.

July

We headed to Colorado for the Fourth of July and to see Garrett’s parents new house! We also visited the University of Colorado, which means we visited the campuses of both Big XII traitors in 2010.

August

I headed back to college, with a plan! It was kind of scary at first and more work with a full time job this time around. But, I’m so excited for the future and I don’t think I could say that when I finished the first time around!!

September

Football starts! finally! Natalie, Hunter, and my Mom come for a visit and to watch the OU v. fsu game! What a great weekend!!

October

Road tripped to Missouri for a football game (a sad, sad football game)

November

Road tripped to College Station for another disappointing football game. (and by this point I was so sad that we kept losing this was the only picture I took of the entire trip!)

December

As always was a wonderful month packed full of celebrating birthdays and Christmas.

2010 was a great year! I cannot wait to see what 2011 will bring!!

and just like that it’s over…

 

Doesn’t this picture just sum up going back to work today?

364 days of anticipation and then it’s over so fast kind of sad,

We have so much to cram into December around here sometimes it gets overwhelming trying to get everything in, I feel like I don’t have enough time for everyone and to do everything I need/want to do. This year I was a little bit more organized than I usually am and that made everything easier. 

Overall I’d say this year was a success!

There is no rest for the weary though, Saturday we fly to Arizona for 18 hours to watch my beloved Sooners play, then Sunday morning we head to Denver for a week of skiing (I’m a little bit terrified) and fun in the snow!

I hope you had an awesome Christmas!