Thank You!

      Hey guys, just wanted to say thank you for reading my blog :) It's great to have friends message me or tell me that they like what I write for this. It really is wonderful to have such supportive people in my life, even if I'm living far from them right now. (Can't wait to come back in a couple weeks!) They've been just so kind and helpful, giving me tips here and there or giving me some more ideas of what I should do. So if you have any ideas for recipes or anything you would like to see, just let me know :)

     On another note, I just recently started doing some yoga here at the apartment. I throw on yoga music on Spotify and just kinda go for it. I'm just kind of doing whatever, so yeah. It will just be here until I'm brave enough to maybe go find somewhere to do this haha. Need to get the basics down first so I don't look silly if I do try to go somewhere else. So far I really like it though. If anyone has any tips, I'd really appreciate it!

     Online classes from USI are going really well for me too, even though there is a lot of busy work. It's definitely a lot different, but it's nice at the same time because I can do everything on my own schedule. That is definitely a plus since I'm mostly on night schedule because of Derek's work and everything. I really do miss everyone though. Hope all is going well! Just wanted to catch up! :)

Love your face and such,
Sara♥

Another Recipe :)

Oh, I love cooking so much :) We were pondering what to make for dinner earlier, and decided on honey chicken, corn, and mashed potatoes. Wanted that hearty meal like when we were back in Indiana with our families, I guess. Nothing wrong with that at all. :) I never like to do things the simple way, so I told Derek that I wanted to make mashed potatoes homemade, since we already had some whole potatoes. It had been forever since I'd done that and it sounded like fun. It's really basic to do, but I love using a recipe by Julia Child. Amazing chef right there. If any of you don't know who she is, definitely look into that. 

 Here's the link for the recipe :)
(makes about 5 or 6 servings)  

http://www.cookstr.com/recipes/homemade-mashed-potatoes

So I convinced my hubby to peel all the potatoes for me, then I peeled them. As they were boiling, I realized that I had no idea where I put the electric mixer. Silly me. That basically doubled our cooking time, but we had a really fun time taking turns mashing the potatoes and laughing at each other while doing that. We joke around way too much haha. They turned out to be pretty great, and we had them with honey barbecue chicken and whole kernel corn. Delicious. Have a try at the recipe. It's pretty straightforward.

:D

Love your face and such,
Sara♥

Around the Apartment

Hello :) So we've been keeping pretty busy with everything lately, so I haven't had a chance to show a couple things I've been doing around the apartment. I started online classes from my school back in Indiana this week, which has been kind of hectic, but I'd like to think it's in a good way.  Positive thinking, yeah? We're also watching a pretty adorable cat for some friends who are out of the state for a couple weeks. This cat is fantastic, but I swear he's like a ninja. So that's been fun as well. :)

So here are a couple of the little projects that have been going on recently. 

  

These were originally plain wood like on the right >>>

I just wanted to paint and make them a bit more fun.

We also can't paint our walls at our apartment, so I decided to put this together. I painted acrylic paint paper and cut it out for the trunk and leaves. It's not done yet, but it's fun to make so far.for the pictures, I just cut a tiny slit at the top and used some of the background and wove the ribbon through, then used a little metal fastener/brad for it. I think the photos were a nice little addition to it since it just looked a little bare otherwise. P.S. all the scrapbooking stuff and ribbon on this post is from that scrapbook score I made a while back :)

               

It's up in our living room, behind the TV area, leading to the bathroom and bedroom. It's looking pretty autumn like now, so we may do stuff each season for it. We're not sure yet. So yeah, that's what's going on here right now. :)

on our balcony :) 

love your faces and such,

Sara♥

Smoothies :)

So ever since my hubby's mom got me a Ninja blender, I've been obsessed with making smoothies. I just made peanut butter banana ones for us today, which turned out fantastic. They're almost like a dessert smoothie, but are really good for a thick breakfast on the go. Here are some of my favorites that I've made. (p.s. sorry for no pictures. We finished those smoothies so quickly!)


Peanut Butter Banana Smoothie

1 banana
1/8 cup peanut butter (or more if you'd like)
1/2 cup milk (soy works really well)
2 tablespoons plain yogurt (optional)
2 tablespoons of honey


Banana Pineapple Smoothie 1 banana
1 cup pineapple juice (frozen)
1/2 cup fat free milk or plain yogurt
1 tablespoon of honey


Strawberry Raspberry Smoothie

1/2 cup strawberries (hulled)
1/2 cup raspberries 
1/4 cup pineapple juice
1/2 cup plain yogurt (lowfat, natural)
4 ice cubes

Enjoy!

Also, What are some of your favorite smoothies? Comment and share them below. :) 

Love your face and such,
Sara♥

Quick Craft!

So hey, I know that I blog really frequently, but I just get excited to show what all is happening over here :) After our lovely day at the beach yesterday, we just relaxed the whole evening. Today however was the last bit of organizing whatever is left in boxes and putting the rest away. After our big cleaning frenzy at our apartment, I just kind of looked around at everything. This apartment has sooooo much space and potential for DIY! Sadly, we can't paint the walls, but that won't stop us from being creative.  I also had a few minutes after dinner to just do a quick makeover for a lampshade that was just so dull. It was for a cute little lamp that I got at a garage sale before moving, but it needed a little love. I just used a sharpie for it (couldn't find my fabric marker) and drew some quick designs such as Y for Young (our last name obviously) and a fleur de lis. Note that you should probably use a stencil of some sort if you're unsure. I just kind of live on the edge and go for it when making stuff.... not always the best approach, but it usually works for me :)

I should have centered the designs better, but one side of the lampshade was a little flat, so I drew on it versus the lamp looking a little funky shaped on the sides.

Boom. instantly more exciting. It's super simple, but made that bit of difference that we had hoped for.

Love your face and such,
Sara♥

The Beach!...and a Simple summer snack!

Hey there everybody! Today was such a gorgeous day here in New Jersey that we decided to go to the beach! :) It turned out to be such a fun adventure. Especially since we live just an hour away from the shoreline over here. How convenient! It seriously was like the perfect day for the beach, mid-80 degrees and sunshine all over the place. It's been so long since I've been to the ocean, so it was wonderful. It was also fantastic for Derek since it was his First time ever being to the ocean! I'm so excited that I got to share his first trip there with him. We got there a little earlier in the day to lay out and play in the waves, so it wasn't even that busy. We got a huge spot all to ourselves to stretch out and chill. Today was seriously what we've needed, considering the stressful weeks of moving and his work. Just a little mini-vacay for the two of us!

Well, how adorable :)

so peaceful

I also did a super duper easy (I mean seriously simple) tasty snack recipe thing yesterday. I just took a couple cups of Yoplait yogurt and made frozen yogurt dots for simple snackin'. I found the original directions on Pinterest. Here's the original link for her wonderful blog. http://www.onegoodthingbyjillee.com/2012/03/frozen-yogurt-dots.html 

You need:
mug/cup

plastic Ziploc or resealable bag
Yogurt- pick your favorite flavor :)
cookie sheet

and a freezer of course.

You just take a plastic Ziploc bag and open it up over a cup or mug. I chose my festive Christmas poinsettia mug for this. Fancy, huh? You only put one corner down into it and open up the bag over it. Make sure one bottom corner is sticking up out of the mug. Then you put all of the lovely yogurt in the cup, trying to keep it as neat as possible. Once you're done with that (I used two yogurt cups), you just close the bag and make sure you cut a tiny bit of that unused corner so that you can squeeze the yogurt onto a cookie sheet into dots. You're basically just making a little makeshift squeeze tube for the yogurt.

Then make sure to squeeze the yogurt into small dots (most of the dots I made were around one inch in diameter each) and Voila! Just toss them in the freezer for a few hours and you have frozen Yogurt dots. They're super tasty and have close to an ice cream texture when you eat them.

 

                                 

Oh, also to keep from them being frozen too badly, I would use like a newer cookie sheet and/or wax/parchment paper for these :) But the most important thing of all...Enjoy!!

      Love Your Face and such, Sara ♥

Scrapbooking Score/ Recipe

Hey guys! So, I was just browsing my facebook (cause I have such a social life..) and came across something on one of the online yardsale pages for near the Air Force Base. A lady was getting rid of all of this great quality scrapbooking and stamping stuff. Needless to say, this girl jumped on the opportunity for everything. It cost me like $20 and there's easily $100 worth of stuff in here, since a lot is Creative Memories and brands like that.

    I'm pretty pumped that I got it. I mean, there's some baby stuff in here, which Obviously won't be used for myself for a couple years, I'd say. Worth it though. I can make so many fun pages now for me and for others. All I have to really buy is the background paper if the ones I have don't work out. There was a little bit of love and wedding stuff in there, which rocks.

               

Some of my favorite things in this pack were the Vellum quote stacks with inspirations and love quotes. They are extremely cute. I may just make some designs to hang up around the apartment. So yeah, Here are some shots of all of this loveliness that I scored the other day.

I also made the baked potato wedges that I mentioned in an earlier blog. I just opted to go the simple way with seasoning salt instead though (plus I haven't gotten the chance go get more spices yet since we moved.) They turned out pretty well.

Baked Potato Wedges

Ingredients:
5 potatoes

1/4 cup of Olive Oil

1/8 cup of butter, melted

1 tablespoon Seasoning salt

1. Preheat the Oven to 425 degrees.
2. Cut the potatoes length-wise into 6 pieces 

3. Mix the olive oil, butter, and seasoning salt in a bowl.

4. Lightly dip wedges into bowl (make sure they aren't completely dripping afterward), 

    then set them in a single layer on a baking sheet (or two if necessary). 

5. Let bake for 20-25 minutes while sitting on sliced side (ovens may vary), 

    then turn each wedge over to other sliced side and then bake for about 20 more minutes,

    sprinkling more seasoning salt as/if desired. (I added more so they weren't really bland.)
     (make sure to watch them so they don't over bake)
6.Let cool and enjoy! :)

Tip: you can also add a dash of garlic salt or salt with black or cracked pepper too for an extra little taste.

TIp 2: You can also just baste the potatoes versus dipping them in the mix if you don't want  
          quite as crunchy of an outer part

right after being sliced

Yummy!

 Love your face, 

Sara ♥

Finished a Project!

Hey again. So, we've been getting settled in our cozy apartment the past week or so, so it's been crazy. You guys have already seen the kitchen , but I'll show more later on of the dining area and such. Pictures of our room will be up later on since we still have a lot to organize in there haha. I did get the bathroom partially decorated, so it looks pretty cute. 

Our Cute Little mirror and sink

Our Adorable Monogram Towels From
Missy and the gorgeous shower curtain from my mother-in-law.
They're awesome. :)

More Wedding gifts. From Kohl's, I believe.

Still trying to figure out what to put in the
 blank area, but I'll get it figured out. :)

Oh, and I also finally snapped a picture of the new sofa that we got, as well as our adorable itty bitty ottoman that I picked up for one dollar at a garage sale back in Indiana.

Also, Remember this guy?? Well I gave it a little TLC and made it a little more personal for us. Not a huge change, but enough that it works out a bit better.

I sanded down part of it to get rid of all of the chipping parts, and the bit of paint that had bubbled from when the prior owners used it. Then I repainted over the whole thing with a satin finish black paint so that it had a nice, even look. It took me a bit to decide how to paint the doors, but I finally figured it out. 

Also, the poor little handles had seen better days as well. I opted for just a little knob instead of the full handle so that the designs weren't covered up as much. Sorry I didn't get a close up of them. There were way cute little textures on each knob.

Done!

I'm rather pleased with the results. It turned out pretty well, though it wasn't a huge transition. It's a much better fit for our style. :)

Thanks for bearing with me and with all of the pictures that I put up this time.

♥ Sara

Yumm!

So hey, I just wanted to say that I tried this recipe earlier today, and it's super simple, and super delicious!

I got it off of Pinterest (surprise, surprise.. I loooove that site!)
Surely everybody loves chocolate chip cookies, and this is a nice twist on that. It's a homemade dough recipe that's nice because it's egg free and obviously super yummy! I'm honestly surprised that I even made it to rolling the dough, instead of just eating the dough straight out of the mixing bowl. I also used peanut butter chips in mine, just for a little extra kick. It turned out pretty darn delicious.

Here's the link back to the original site.
http://family.go.com/food/recipe-639377-cookie-dough-bites-t/#memberViews
 

I'm also thinking about making my own potato wedges with some rosemary and salt. I'm going to bake them instead of deep frying them. so that they're just a tiny bit healthier. :)

I'm also making progress on our TV stand. I'm pretty pleased with the design so far.
Still debating on what type of handles to put on it instead of the basic, square ones that were on it beforehand. I'll put pics up in my next blog, hopefully :D

♥Sara

Yay for having our stuff!

Hello again :) So, we've been kind of crazy moving the rest of our stuff into our apartment this week. I'm soooo glad we have everything, thanks to our amazing families helping make it possible to have it all moved from Indiana to New Jersey. It was definitely not simple. Our apartment has been pretty darn full of just cardboard boxes from all of the new stuff (yay)  we got from our wedding and such, as well as some other stuff we bought recently. Finally, we got most of that out, making it a lot more homey here. I'll post lots of pictures when we're more finished decorating this place.

My big 1940's/1950's desk sadly didn't fit through our doorway to our bedroom, so for now, it's in our kitchen as an island/kitchen table, which is definitely interesting. At least it would be a conversation starter for when we have people over haha. I'm loving how the kitchen is starting to look, considering it was the central location for all of the cardboard a few days ago.

The living room is in the middle of being decorated too right now, obviously. I'm going to put some pictures up. as well as one of my paintings. We picked up a nice, tan microfiber couch that a lady and her husband didn't need anymore, since they were getting new furniture. We got is for the very nice price of... Free. Can't argue with that. It's about 5 years old, and just needs a little TLC. I think I can manage that. It was definitely a pain to take up the stairs to our apartment, especially since it was just my hubby and me doing that. We Finally got it up and situated after a while of trying different strategies to make it happen.

I'm super happy that all of my art supplies are over here now, so I can finish working on the TV stand in the living room, as well as paint a couple more canvases for our place. That should definitely be interesting. If anyone could give me some ideas as to what I should paint for another living room picture, let me know. It would need to at least kind of go with the most recent painting I did, which is basically done (pictured below), so probably warmer colors. I'm thinking of like flowers such as Poppies, but not sure yet. It will be figured out eventually :)

Thanks!

♥Sara