Grandma's 90th Birthday

After our Orlando trip, I turned around and went to the great state of Indiana with my mom. Her whole family lives there and we went to celebrate my Grandma's 90th birthday! I think ninety is a pretty big deal and we wanted to do it up right. 

My original vision for Grandma's 90th was a big outdoor party with everyone she had ever known. But this spring, some significant health problems landed Grandma in nursing care. So I had to tone down the party ideas. So instead of one big party, we had two smaller parties. 

The first was with all of Grandma's bffs. She has known most of these ladies for 50+ years. Ca-razy. I tried my hand at angel food cake for the first time and it was a hit. 

I think this is the sweetest picture. Looking good for ninety, Grandma and friends! Mom and I stayed with Grandma's sister, Aunt Marge (top right) and had a blast!

The second party was for our family that was in town. Grandma's children, most grandchildren, and some of her nieces and nephews.

Check out my giant 90 balloon wall. One of my balloons is getting a little saggy there.

The super delicious cake. Wal-Mart, friends. They do good work. Also, pink was the theme, in case you were wondering.

Grandma and her four children, for l-r: Kent, Keith, Kurt, and Kaye.

I think the weekend was a success! We loved spending time with Grandma and our family and celebrated in style.

Mom, Grandma, and I

Happy birthday Grandma! (Don't you just love this vintage photo?)

Family vacation in Orlando: Magical

Happy August friends! I feel like its always so crazy how fast the summer goes. And then you see school supplies in Target and it's like BAM over. Except it will still be hot for like three more months. You'll see.

July was ca-razy for us. It went like this.

1. Start orientation for my new JOB.
2. Fourth of July
3. Trip to Orlando with Caleb's fam
4. Trip to Indiana with my mom
5. Buy a house
6. Start my new JOB for reals.
7. Sleep for like two days straight after all that.

So I have a lot to catch up on. Let's start with Orlando. We went on this magical trip with Caleb's family to celebrate his parents' 30th anniversary. Amazing.


Because Disney World really is the happiest place on earth.

We arrived to the Disney resort late on a Wednesday night. And that place is huge. So huge that we had a small tiff about navigating through it. No worries, we got to our hotel with unharmed.

The next day we set out for the Magic Kingdom. As soon as we got inside, I saw Cinderella ride by in the parade. I cried a few tears of joy. Magical.

George, ready to get his Disney on.

Cinderella's castle!!! And a few ominous clouds...

We hit up the teacups and It's A Small World. Junie B and I bonded. As you can see, our excitement was equal.

We rode the Pirates of the Caribbean. Which I'm pretty sure was the last straw for George and June. They bounced. Good thing, because storms broke loose. We hunkered down at the Peter Pan ride. It was indoors, obviously.

The storms passed. We rode Space Mountain. The best ride ever. Then we tried to tour Cinderella's castle on our own. We were denied.

We finished off the night with the electric light parade (amazing!) and the best fireworks I've ever seen. I also may have shed a few tears at this point.

Thanks tall dude, for getting in my pic.

My first trip to Disney World was magical. That's all there is to it.

The next day we headed to Universal Studios Islands of Adventure.

In case you were unaware, this is where Harry Potter World lives. I don't know if its really called that, but we call it that. Actually, its called The Wizarding World of Harry Potter. But I like Harry Potter World.

Audrey and I, getting ready to respect the spell limits.

We rode a lot of rides that day. A lot. By the end of the day, I couldn't ride any more rides. Harry Potter, the Hulk, Spiderman, and more. We rode the main HP ride like 4 times. I lost count. We went to the sweet shop in HP world and ate things like chocolate frogs and fizzing whizbees. Again, magical.

Caleb and Jordan, with Hogwarts in the background.

We finished up the day with dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe. Which I love so much I didn't take a picture of. But I do love some Hard Rock.

After a couple theme park-packed days, we took it easy the next day. Got our shop on at the Mall at Millenia. Which is a wonderful, magical place all on its own. I've been there before, for our first anniversary. It makes me feel like a rich person. Just to walk around there. Also, we visited IKEA. Is there a campaign to bring them to KC? Because I will be part of it.

For our final day in Orlando, we hit up the beach. I almost drowned and got super sun burnt. Again, magical. We had a delish dinner at PF Changs.

Hello, sun burnt shoulder. Good thing it matches my neon dress. (R to L: Zach, George, Jordan, Audrey, Jim, Bev, June, Caleb, Audrey, and me!)

Spending time in Orlando with my sweet in laws was just...magical. I know.

Twenty Six

That's right people. I moved to Kansas, lived in a hotel for three weeks, moved to an apartment, started a job, and have been house hunting. And somewhere in the middle I turned twenty six. 26. Two Six.

I feel like once you get to a certain age, the older you get, the less exciting your birthdays are. Until you get to a certain age, where each birthday is so excited because you are still alive. Like a curve graph of some sort. Which is probably the official name for that. Anyway.

Twenty six is kind of a boring age. Mid twenties. I think I'll pick twenty five as my age to say I am forever. But my birthday was really fun. I loved being in Kansas to celebrate with my favorite people. Here's how my day went down.

1. Breakfast at First Watch with my parents. Deliciously amazing. When I was little, my dad used to take me out for breakfast on my birthday. We haven't done it for years and it was a blast to do it again. Also, my mom made me Funfetti cupcakes, my birthday cake of choice for the last 23 years. Boom.

2. I went to the grocery store and unpacked our apartment. I have no photo evidence of this.

3. I went to the plaza with Kerry and Cara. It was epic. We started out with some shopping and then stopped at McCormick and Schmick's for their happy hour. Seriously delicious.

4. Then we raided the underwear sale at the Gap. Awesome. Then more shopping. Are you seeing a trend here?

5. After work, Caleb drove up and met us and we decided to to to the cheesecake factory for more eating. Since happy hour was two long hours ago. I choose the Cheesecake Factory like every other year for my birthday. Because I'm boring and also because cheesecake is one of the best foods on this planet.

We all order the same thing: chicken bellagio. But we shared it. Because I'm on a diet people. Obv.

Now it's cheesecake time. Lemon raspberry for me please. This was my wedding cake. You think I'm kidding, but really it was.

Eating, shopping, eating, shopping, eating. A good day.

Oh twenty six. I can't wait to see what you have in store!

Nutella Stuffed French Toast with Mixed Berry Sauce

Happy Friday! I hope you caught Justin Bieber on the Today Show this am. It was hilarious/awesome. Other awesome things about today include:

1. This will be our last night in a hotel.
2. We are moving into our apartment tomorrow.
3. This amazing nutella stuffed french toast.

I made it several weeks ago in Tennessee when I was trying to use things up from the pantry/fridge/freezer. It is delicious weekend food. And the weekend is upon us, friends.

Nutella Stuffed French Toast with Mixed Berry Sauce

Serves 2

Ingredients

4 slices bread
Nutella to taste
4 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla

Heaping cup of mixed berries, any combo (I used strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries)
1/4 cup sugar (more to taste)
Just enough water to mix up berries and sugar

Get your french toast on

1. Mix up the berries, sugar, and water in a small saucepan. I used berries that were going bad but you can use any, frozen berries would work too. Bring to a boil and then turn down to medium and simmer.

2. Whisk together eggs, milk, and vanilla. I like using a pie plate because the bread can lay flat in it.

3. Spread two slices of bread with nutella. I like it a little thick, but make it as thin or thick as you want. Top each piece with another slice of bread.

4. Heat up your griddle. Soak the bread in the egg mixture. Melt some butter or oil in your hot griddle and throw the bread in!

5. This could be the finished product. A little syrup, a little powdered sugar. Yum.

6. Buuuuut if you want that yummy fruit sauce, make sure it's cooked down so the fruit is broken down and most of the water is gone. Taste it. Add more sugar if you want.  Add some cornstarch if it is too thin for you. Strain the fruit out if you don't like chunks. But I do. So I didn't do that. Pour it over your french toast. (So basically cook some fruit however you want and it will go deliciously with your french toast!)

7. Eat it. Be happy. Go to the gym later.

Enjoy the weekend!

Goodbye, 5200! You can keep your snot.

Have I mentioned that I loved my job in Tennessee? It was awesome. Not the butt wiping, snot sucking, drug dealing, and restraint charting parts. But the people I worked with. They made it great. And I will always love them. (Oh, I didn't always hate the patients either. Just sometimes.) On my last day they threw a little going-away shin dig for me and another coworker who is moving to North Carolina, Cecile. It was pretty sweet.

Pizza par-tay!

The cake: super awesome. Thanks Stacey!

Cecile and I. There may or may not have been tears involved.

Tammy and I. I know you were the party instigator. I love this woman.

Loved my coworkers! Niki, you look amazing. Something was obviously hilarious.

5200 (and 5300) you will be sorely missed! You guys really are the best!

My husband built a power plant.

I just uploaded pics of my camera and found these that someone took. My husband built this, with lots of other awesome Kiewit peeps. Tell me this is not super cool. It's a power plant. And it works. Thanks to my hub's sweet skills.

We saw this go from the ground up, in just a little more than two years. So cool. And so proud of my hub. Just had to brag a little.

Strong work, ladies and gents. Strong work.

Kingsport Faves: eateries

Hey friends. Have I mentioned that I like to eat? I know, it's hard to believe. But I do. Kingsport had some amazing little places that I loved and don't want to forget! I'm going to start with breakfast and then work my way through the day, ending with dessert. Mk? Get ready for serious deliciousness.

1. Jan-Mar Restaurant: This is the best old school diner breakfast food, ever. The biscuits and gravy are magical. The pancakes are light and fluffy and the size of your head. The omelets are huge. And the hash browns. Oh the hash browns are the best of all. Also, you can buy all this food for like 94 cents.

2. The Mustard Seed: Alas, I have no pics of this. I don't really know why, since I went there a ton. They have super cute southern decor. Their chicken salad is yummy, tomato soup is velvety, their caramel cake is amazing. They also have a sandwich called the Micah's Smash, which is a panini with turkey, bacon, cheese, and some other stuff=my fave.

3. Korner-Copia: Another great lunch place that recently started serving dinner. They have tons of great sandwiches but the reason that I love the Korner is their chicken salad. To Die For. It has curry in it and the flavor is ah-mazing. I could eat this chicken salad every day. Of my life. I like it in a spinach wrap. Too much bread gets in the way of the chicken salad-y goodness. I begged for the recipe before I left. I was denied.

4. The Courtyard: This little place is open only from 11-2 on week days. It has a fountain in the middle of the restaurant and lots of fake ivy and flowers everywhere. Adorable. There are two reasons I love this place: the peach tea and the salad dressing. I probably drink a gallon of the peach tea every time I come here. I don't know how they make it, but this is magical nectar. The salad dressing is some kind of strawberry poppy seed goodness and they put it on a strawberry spinach salad. I could just put a straw in the dressing and drink it like the tea. But over spinach is the more normal choice. They also make some great quiches, the one below is chicken pecan quiche. Yum.

Stephanie, my fellow peach tea addict.

5. T.K.'s Big Dogs: this is the just straight up hot dog goodness. This guy gets classic hot dog combos from ball parks across the country, orders ingredients from where the parks actually get them, and serves them up to local Kingsportians. There is honestly every hot dog combo you could ever imagine. But we get only two: the West Coast dog, a hot dog with guacamole, sour cream, and chili in a pretzel bun, and the Chicago dog, pictured below. My mouth is watering.

6. Pal's: this is a fast food chain that is not Kingsport exclusive. But we don't have it in Kansas and I love it so I'm including it. My favorite food is probably a good burger. This place has huge juicy burgers. When you unwrap them, grease has already soaked through the paper. Judge me if you will, but it is good artery clogging food. The fries have some kind of delicious seasoning on them. And the peachy tea rivals #4's. Also, the front of Pal's just makes me laugh.

7. Stir Fry: Just a block from our loft on Broad Street, I have probably been to this restaurant more than any other non fast food restaurant ever. We ate there so much that we ate almost everything on the menu: sushi, stir fry, noodle bowls. After we got tired of eating these things, we switched to the American menu of burgers and fries. It was all good. Stir Fry also had delicious cocktails and insanely amazing carrot cake.

8. Zaxby's: I'm throwing this one in for my husband. Fast food chicken that we do not have in Kansas, honestly this was not my fave. But my man craves this like clockwork on Sunday afternoons. I will give them one thing: their fried white cheddar bites. So good. But who hates fried cheese?

9. Sweet CeCe's: this is a new frozen yogurt place and we only went there once. But it is definitely worth a mention. I had the pomberry sorbet with wide variety of toppings. Perfect for summer.

10. Babycakes Cupcakery: this place was right next door to my loft and my downfall. Amazing cupcakes, a free cupcake on Wednesdays, the reason I gained lbs. Lemon crumb, chocolate ganache, red velvet, carrot, fresh strawberry, blackberry, birthday cake, wedding cake, nutter butter...I could go on and on.

Lemon crumb. My favorite.

So there it is. Excuse the mix of instagram and other photos. But this is the good stuff. I loved discovering Kingsport through food. Check these places out if you are there!

And now I go to work off the damages done by all this goodness.

Happy Tuesday!