Currently

• Have you ever put cream cheese in your mashed potatoes? You totally should! I rarely make them, so when I do I feel the need to indulge. I add butter, cream cheese, garlic, salt, pepper and milk. I always mash, never whip! I hate how gluey potatoes get when whipped. I'm a high maintenance when it comes to my mashed potatoes, much like I am in all aspects of life. 
• Italian Quinoa Risotto Lasagna with Truffle Oil. I mean... Get. In. My. Mouth!
• THIS cake!!! Uh, yeah Ima need to make that!
• Have you watched Forever? I am obsessed. It may be my new favorite of this season.
• All the pumpkin things!
• This Pasta! And this one too!
• I've been feeling like super poo for the past couple of weeks. I'm trying to keep it together but I am exhausted. Why do I love the fall season, when it hates me so much? 
• Last night, we went to our local zoo for Boo in the Zoo. The boys got to see tons of their favorite characters, play games, do a scavenger hunt, get tons of candy and of course see the animals. So much fun! We loved it! 
• Aaaaannndddd! They got to try out their costumes!

How adorable is my werewolf and Mickey Mouse?

• My Mom made both costumes just like she always did for me. She amazes me with the things she creates! I wish I had payed more attention to learning to sew when I was a kid. 
• Last night we introduced my parents to Pure Sodaworks. It is amazing! If you are from the Chattanooga area I highly recommend you find some and try it all! Behind the Root Beer my husband's favorite is the Strawberry Jalapeno. I love the Honey Lime and the Hibiscus Lemon. 

Now to dive into making some caramel pretzel brownies! Yummmmm! (I hope!)

Happy Sunday!

xoxo,

Ashley

Snapshots

Sally girl previously known as Shark Bite. 

Caleb decided to change her name and went to Nightmare Before Christmas for inspiration.

Salsa before blitzing.

Chocolate Heath Doughnut

Found this shot of one of my iris from this summer. Is it really already fall?

Oatmeal Cookie Granola from: Seriously Delish: 150 Recipes for People Who Totally Love Food

veggie lo mein with a fried egg and black sesame seeds. 

Asian inspired BBQ pulled pork stuffed sweet potatoes with bok choy, sesame slaw.

coconut berry smoothie

 Spinach and Broccoli Cheese Soup (Recipe coming soon!)

Ramen Noodle Bowls with alllllll of the toppings!

This is Denmark. Love her eyes!

Date Night, well sort of...

Both kids were gone to church and I was sick but we were alone for a couple of hours. 

We sat in the floor, ate and watched Selfie. 

You take what you can get. 

OK, last picture of this meal. It was so dang good! I think this recipe will be coming soon too!

Starting him young. 

 I doughnut see you! Get it? Get it? I'm lame...

 Made my Mother in law red velvet no bake cheesecake pots for her birthday. 

 We went to a pumpkin patch recently and the boys LOVED every second of it! 

This slide got tons of use from Caleb.

 Sudden and unexpected naps are the best!

 My newest salad creation. It was missing tortilla chips. I should have hidden them!

It consisted of chipotle orange shredded pork, Monterrey Jack cheese, quinoa, spinach, homemade salsa, cilantro lime puree, avocado and bell peppers. It was sooo sooo good but sooo sooo ugly! 

 Veggies!!!!!!

Whipped cream is the bestest!!!

Happy Tuesday!

xoxo,

Ashley

A Day at the Pumpkin Patch (and how to streamline your scrapbooking projects)

I had planned on a food post for today, but I've been feeling pretty under the weather. Since I haven't been cooking much, I thought I would share some cute pictures and tell you about how I keep my scrapbooks up to date, even when life is hectic.

We recently went to a local farm that does a big pumpkin patch with tons of activities during the fall season. 

The boys LOVED every second of it and honestly so did we. 

   One thing, that I have started doing to keep some of my scrap booking up to date, is making collages using Picmonkey. This isn't a sponsored post, I just use the site all the time. I edit all my pictures either in Picmonkey, or in Photoshop. I then go to Picmonkey's home page and select collage and add all the pictures I want to use. It should automatically come up as a square and I keep it that way for these. I'll be printing them to be 8x8 when I'm done. I build my collage the way I want, then I save it and open it back in the regular editor and add whatever words or journaling, or even decorations, I want, then it is ready to be saved and printed. Another nice thing about this, I can make double copies so that each boy can have his own book and I don't have to make two different pages for every single event. It can be hard to keep up with chronicling all of the big, small, meaningful, silly, fun, serious, heart breaking, fleeting and life shaping moments now that I have so much on my plate, but these are the memories I really need to keep immortalized on paper. This allows me to do that and still enjoy my bi-annual fun field getaway of crafting, eating all weekend, drinking tons of coffee, and staying up all night watching bad movies I call "ladies retreats". I can focus on doing the pages I want to do in 12x12 or 8.5x11 not what I feel obligated to do.

So maybe not really a DIY, but a craft streamlining suggestion post.

Happy Monday!
xoxo,
Ashley