It's me again!

Hey guys, I know it's been a long time! I'm still here, but life always gets so busy, and all I want to do when I get home from work is make dinner (not even make it sometimes!) and sit on the couch and watch an hour of TV. Lately, I am so tired I start falling asleep around 8:30, which is too early to go to bed! So I make myself stay awake until around 9:30 or 10, and then it's actually a normal hour to go to bed. Exciting huh? On the weekends, I am usually doing all my errands, like grocery, laundry, cleaning the house, and now that it's warm - mowing the lawn!

We bought our first house last August, and it's been SO nice to have a big yard for Wyatt, more room, a bigger kitchen, and privacy (not hearing your neighbors every time they come home). Having a garage is pretty awesome. It's all the things we didn't have for the last 8 years in an apartment that are amazing to have. So I am just enjoying living here and trying to decorate and make it feel homey, slowly but surely. 

There are some things we still need to do, like paint the whole inside of the house, before I can hang pictures, but we'll do it eventually. It's a lot more to keep up with than an apartment, so things take a lot longer to happen. One thing I'm trying to learn about is gardening, but I have a black thumb... I think that's what you call it. So I am not the best at keeping plants alive. I also wish decorating came easily to me, because it's hard to decide what will look good in a house before buying it, and matching everything. It kind of gives me anxiety! But I am slowly getting it decorated in here.

 

I've baked some things here and there in my new big kitchen, including these Cherry Almond Shortbread Cookies from Sally's Baking Addition. If you like maraschino cherries, then you will love these cookies! We were talking about renovating the kitchen this summer, which would be awesome since it's a little old and outdated. But that might have to wait until next summer, so I'll make do until then.

I am pretty excited that it's finally warm outside, although this weekend it's been raining and in the 60s! But it will be warm soon....

Okay, I'll leave you with some crazy sleeping Wyatt pictures in his favorite spot, and this picture of Wyatt when he graduated from his obedience school class. Can you believe he sat there with all those other dogs so calmly? It's amazing!

Chocolate Chip Carmel Peanut Butter Bars

Now that we are old and married (almost 2 months now) I've been trying to cook dinner more nights, and on top of that, keep up my love of baking, which is hard after I've already been in the kitchen for 3 hours every night prepping and cooking and washing dishes and cleaning up. It's hard to not fix the same thing over and over, so I started a recipe binder and once I make something we both like, I add it to the binder!

These bars are from Mel's Kitchen Cafe, which I have been getting most of my dinners from because they have all been so delicious! So I had a feeling her desserts would be pretty tasty as well. And yup, I was right. This one is going in the binder for sure.

 

Chocolate chip cookies are so good, and with peanut butter..... oh man even better.... and with CARMEL!?!?! That puts these in the best flavor combo ever ranking. My crappy phone pictures don't do them justice. But hopefully they tempt you just enough to go and make them right now!

Chocolate Chip Carmel Peanut Butter Bars
Yields 9X13 pan

Ingredients 

Chocolate Chip cookie bottom:

• 12 tablespoons butter, melted
• 1 cup (7 ounces) brown sugar
• 1/2 cup (3.5 ounces) granulated sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 3/4 cups (13.75 ounces) all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 2 cups chocolate chips 

Peanut Butter Caramel:

• 10 ounces soft caramels, unwrapped
• 1/3 cup cream or milk
• 1/3 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a 9X13-inch baking pan with foil and spray liberally with nonstick cooking spray.
2. Whisk the melted butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar together in a large bowl until combined. Add the eggs and vanilla and mix well. Add the flour, salt and baking soda and mix until just combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.
3. Spread or press about half (or just slightly more than half) of the batter in the bottom of the prepared pan and bake for 8-9 minutes.
4. While the cookie dough base is baking, add the caramels and cream to a saucepan, heat on low on the stovetop, stirring constantly with heatproof spatula or wooden spoon, until the caramel is melted and smooth. Stir in the peanut butter and vanilla extract.
5. Drizzle the caramel mixture over the top of the baked cookie dough and spread evenly.
6. Pinch the remaining cookie dough between your fingers and crumble over the top of the caramel.
7. Bake for 18-20 minutes until the bars are puffed and the edges are slightly golden.
8. Let the bars cool completely before cutting into squares.

Recipe Source: slightly adapted from Mel's Kitchen Cafe 

And now, I will leave you with my usual cute Wyatt pics. Here he is looking like a person with his head on the pillow. And his Halloween costume didn't quite fit this year.

Chchchchanges

Well guys, it's been the craziest and busiest 5 months of my life since I last  posted, so I have a good excuse! A few things happened like: we moved out of our tiny 550 sq ft 1 bedroom apartment in Chicago to a huge (not really but feels like it to us) 2 bedroom 2 bathroom 10 million closet apartment in Indianapolis, we started new jobs, bought a new car, did wedding festivities, I turned 31, aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand we got married!! And went on a creepy/scary short honeymoon. So lots of big changes in a short amount of time! Plus little things I didn't even mention cause my brain is just now getting back to normal.

Before we moved, I tried to go to all my favorite restaurants or places that I REALLY had been wanting to go to in Chicago. This is the famous burger from Au Cheval that people say is the best burger everrrrr. It was pretty good, but I don't think I would go that crazy over it like some people did.

This bone marrow was more interesting, because I'd never tried it and it was so freakin expensive for what little amount you get! However, it's really really really rich, so you don't need much before you get kind of grossed out. I'd still try it again though!

My matron of honor threw me a bridal shower, even though she is not the party planning type and hated doing it, ha! But she did an awesome job. It was simple and cute and not over the top, which is my style. I loved her cucumber tea sandwiches! All homemade and each crust cut off with love.

 

My maid of honor threw my bachlorette party in Chicago, and it was after we already moved to Indy. So we drove up for the weekend and I had so much fun! We went to the beach that afternoon and then went back to her house for a pasta making class from TipsyCooks. They come to your house, bring all the ingredients, cook the pasta for you and clean up everything, all while you sip on your cocktails or beer :)

She also decorated with old pictures of me everywhere! Eeek! It was so cute that she had everyone send her pictures they had of me, cause some I had never even seen! And then of course there were 7th and 8th grade yearbook pictures that weren't as cute. My dark lipstick and tshirt under a tank top phase was greaaaaat.

The pasta that we made and they cooked for us was pretty good, but it needed some veggies or something else to add flavor or crunch. Homemade pasta is so different than box pasta! I wish I could make it all the time, but I never have time!!

 

The best part of all was finally getting to marry my bestest friend. We've been together 7 1/2 years and it was almost like we were married already! But now it's for real, and it feels awesome. 

I made my 2 girls get their hair done with me, haha! None of us are girly girls and I wasn't going to have my make up done, but then decided I would probably never have an excuse to do it again. It was really nice to just chill with them that morning and not just be waiting around!

 

 I'll post some real wedding pics next time :)

 

 

For our honeymoon, I only had 2 vacation days from work, so it was a short and sweet stay in Nashville, Indiana. We hiked at Brown County State Park and stayed in a very secluded log cabin with a lake in the backyard. It was a little tooooo secluded though, and there was a creepy abandoned house down the trail from the cabin with old mattresses in it, and a bunch of weird stuff happened that made us not enjoy it as much! I think we might have psyched ourselves out a bit.

 

So now we're just getting back to normal in our apartment. Wyatt is loving being around more grass and trees and riding in the car more often. 

 

He loves to chill on the back porch by himself sometimes, which is still not quite a fenced in yard, but it's a step up!

Winter and Wyatt

 Man, time flies! I always tell myself to update the good ol' blog, but never get around to it until a whole month later. Currently it's a blizzard outside, so today is the perfect opportunity to catch up. I haven't been doing a ton of baking since we traveled to Indiana for the holidays, and it's hard to bake something and bring it in the car with all our other crap, plus a dog! But on Christmas, I did make a breakfast casserole for the fam in my mom's kitchen, and it was so nice to have a huge kitchen with lots of counter space to use! I am really looking forward to the day I have a bigger kitchen. It will honestly make me less stressed when I cook and bake! 

I was able to sit and read while enjoying a french toast bagel with maple cream cheese and coffee while we were in Indiana at The Caffeinery. It was so nice to not have anywhere to be and relax.

 

This veal and beef ragu was delicious from Cafe Spiaggia, which is where former top chef Sarah Grueneberg worked for a while, and plus it's Obama's favorite restaurant, so that's cool. I've been wanting to go here for a while, so I'm glad I can cross it off the list! 

 

My friend Sharyn and I took a cake decorating class before Christmas, so we could maybe decorate something for the holidays (which didn't happen). I thought it was actually really informative! I'm not sure when the next time I will be decorating a cake, but when I do it will hopefully look semi-professional!

Here is another breakfast that I LOVED, and it's only a few blocks from our apartment at Cafe Selmarie. Cheddar Zucchini pancakes. It sounded risky, but tasted amazing. I want to go back for more, but they probably don't have it on the menu now since they always rotate things in and out.

One thing that I've been wanting to do for a while is see the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and someone from work offered me a ticket for one of their Friday night concerts. Of course I accepted, and loved every minute of it! The theater is so pretty inside, and makes you feel like you've gone back in time. The orchestra is SO good, and it seems so effortless when they play.

We've been keeping busy with Wyatt, and he is such a baby sometimes but we love him anyway. He goes crazy in the snow! We took him outside today and he ran around and around and ate a bunch of snow.

  

We tried to see if he wanted to wear boxer shorts, but they didn't fit so well.

 

  

Wyatt and his best buddy Ruger loved playing together over the holidays, and he was so sad when we had to come back to Chicago.  

All kinds of exciting news!

September 5th weekend was the best weekend ever! Turned 30, got a dog, and got engaged!!! Cool, huh?

 I LOVE my ring! It has a vintage look, but it's nice and simple which is what I wanted.

We had reservations at Table 52 for my birthday dinner, which is a place that I've been wanting to try for years! It's a little on the expensive side, so it was a perfect place for a special dinner. Art Smith is the chef (used to be Oprah's personal chef!), and his food is southern cooking with awesome flavors. The complementary goat cheese biscuits that came out first were so good, I almost missed getting a picture of them.

I had my heart set on the fried chicken, and it was pretty darn good. I wouldn't say it was THE best fried chicken I've ever had, but still really good!

We also got the mac and cheese in a cast iron pot, which was SO rich and creamy. I loved the top slightly burnt parts of the cheese the most. The best thing we ordered was actually the prime rib that you can kind of see behind the mac. It melted in your mouth and has the best flavor! It wasn't cheap, but it was a really, really good steak.

I also ordered the Hummingbird cake with blueberry sauce to bring home because we were so stuffed! It was pretty delicious, but I almost thought it had too much icing!

So after we got home, we went on a walk in the park near our house, and B got down on one knee and asked me to marry him :) It was the best birthday present I've ever gotten.

We had already planned on going to the shelter and looking at dogs that next day, and we said we were just going to "look", but if we saw a dog we liked we could decide then if we should adopt it.

And of course we found a black lab that we loved! We named him Wyatt, and he is 1-2 years old. He had only been there a week, so if we didn't take him home that day, he would've been gone the next week I'm sure.

That night we were going out with friends for my birthday, so we got to tell everyone our big news! It was a pretty crazy few days of telling everyone and getting used to the doggie, but now it's all soaking in and it's awesome.

The next weekend, my brother and niece came up to visit and go to my company's annual picnic! It was so much fun riding the Frog Hopper, and I made sure there wasn't a weight limit!

P had a blast doing all the activities without waiting in line or anything! It was pretty cool. We went to Ed Debevic's for dinner because I'd never been, and I figured P would like that the servers yell at you and and dance on the tables. She definitely liked it there. The food was pretty average though. Definitely a tourist spot!

So now we're just getting used to having another thing living with us, and having more responsibilities like feeding and walking him 3 times a day!

His favorite hobbies so far include looking out the window at squirrels, stretching in downward doggie, and chewing on shoes and potholders. We're trying to give him antlers and treats to chew on instead, so hopefully he will learn!

 

Just look at that face! Now I understand why people take/post so many pictures of their pets! I might start to become one of them...