Make this NOW

This was my first ever homemade bread, WITHOUT a breadmaker!

3 cups of bread flour
1 packet of yeast
1/4 teaspoon of salt

Mix it all together and cover bowl with plastic wrap. Leave OUT, room temp, for FOUR hours. It will get all bubbly and yeasty. Pour some flour on a counter surface - and dump the dough out. While this is going on turn your oven on 450 AND put a dutch oven in the oven to heat.

Back to the dough: dump out on the floured surface and just sort of get flour on it, lightly ... and put BACK in a bowl, cover with a towel and wait 30 minutes while the pot is heating. After thirty minutes pull the pot out of the oven and put the bread in - flat side down. If you have any seams, those need to be facing up. Cover the pot and cook 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, just remove the lid and bake for 15 more minutes.

THEN HEAVEN. It is the best thing !!! With some rosemary and garlic salt added it could be just like the bread from Macaroni Grill. This stuff is SO good. I will never buy artisian bread from the store again.

Kah

Grateful

I am grateful too!

1. I am grateful my parents are also my friends.
2. I am grateful for Conrad.
3. I am grateful I am employed.
4. I am grateful that I'm smart.
5. I am grateful for my friends.
6. I am grateful I'm almost out of credit card debt.
7. I am grateful I kicked many toads to the curb.
8. I am grateful for Tivo.
9. I am grateful that I'm brave.
10. I am grateful for my sense of humor.
11. I am grateful I have Kelley, Tracy, Toni, Debbie, Carolyn, Lori and Tosha- I can tell them anything.
12. I am grateful for my sister in law - she "gets" me.
13. I am grateful I love my mother in law.
14. I am grateful for 70's Show re-runs; they make me laugh.
15. I am grateful for blogs; they inspire me.
16. I am grateful for the library - I would be BROKE if I had to buy my books.
17. I am grateful I can go back to school.
18. I am grateful for my ambition.
19. I am grateful for my compassion.
20. I am grateful Conrad loves me.
21. I am grateful I learned to be a FAB "dog mom".
22. I am grateful to be from the South!
23. I am grateful for coffee.

Kah

I Wish

So I saw another blog where the blogger just let loose with a lot of her wishes and it seemed like a good idea ... so I will do the same thing. I won't worry about politics, other people's feelings, offending people or appearing selffish. It's just a stream of consciousness which I am actually a huge fan of. No better way to channel your feelings... and as of late, I seem to have a lot of them. Maybe this will help me figure out what I want. Here goes.

1. I wish family were easier.
2. I wish the government would get their STUFF together.
3. I wish I had more time to craft and create.
4. I wish the cool weather was here.
5. I wish I could lose 50 lbs.
6. I wish my wedding dress had fit better.
7. I wish I had picked a different song for our "first dance".
8. I wish we were already building our new house.
9. I wish I lived closer to my family or they would come visit ME more.
10. I wish all my friends were close by.
11. I wish Blanca would let us get another puppy.
12. I wish I had more energy.
13. I wish I lived closer to work.
14. I wish I were a gourmet cook.
15. I wish my best friend had not betrayed me.
16. I wish health and happiness for everyone I love.
17. I wish I wasn't getting these weird, hormonal headaches.
18. I wish I could sleep 100% through the night.
19. I wish my grandparents were still alive; I miss them terribly.
20. I wish Blanca were better behaved.

Tomorrow, because this does seem INCREDIBLY self serving and narcissistic, I will write down the things I am grateful for... it did help me see where my priorities lie ... or maybe it's better to say it has helped me to see what route I want to head in at work, at home, emotionally, physically, etc - might be time to print these babies OUT and hang them up.

Kah

House Plans

Today was an exciting day!!!!

My friend Amy sent us in plans for our new house. WHOOP! They are so nice. It's almost exactly what we want. We made some small revisions which I will send to her tomorrow ... but almost spot on. Now I am pretty excited and ready to start interviewing some builders.

I can't wait to post the plans here, but want to wait until we have the final floorplans. Then we're off to get the architect started on them and then BUILD BUILD BUILD !!!

Kah

VADO

I finally learned how to use my VADO camera I bought off Amazon this past Christmas. LOVE it. So easy to download. It takes pretty great quality movies AND you can of course download stills.

Maybe soon I can start filming EVERYTHING - and uploading it here.

Conrad will simply LOVE this!

Kah

I Have a Really Cute Husband

Yeah, So?

Yeah so my Cowboys got their butts handed to them last night. I'm getting over it ...
I have lived through a good 15 years of disappointment - I have become used to it.

I guess I figure if I put it out in blogland SOMEONE will hear me - please please please hire me a new coach! Mr Wade is probably a good guy - Lord knows he's a good ol' Texas boy, but he is NOT a good coach for us. We need a new one and we need one THREE YEARS AGO.

I was sooooooooooo looking forward to fall - to the cold weather, boots, football all weekend, chicken wings .... please no more of these stupid games. If you're gonna lose OK lose - but don't just HAND people the game ... you may as well have not even gone to D.C. you know what I'm saying ???? You could have stayed in Dallas and did what you did.

I mean for REALZ Jerry Jones ... I am just one little ol' girl here in Houston, but if this is a decision that needs to be spurred on by some good ol' fashioned ass kicking then OK, I will come home for a weekend and take care of business. SOMEONE needs to.

Kah

Ballard

About three years ago Conrad and I looked and fell in love with a house in Tomball, built by Plantation Homes. We loved it SO much we ran home and immediately and did our budget to see if we could afford it. We COULD - but it would have been hard especially if we had to hang on to this house for any period of time. I was honest with Conrad and told him I loved the house, but I really didn't want to have a house that caused us stress and we had the floor plans so we could always build it later. It had a lot of cool nooks and crannies and one of them was this cool small bedroom they had set up as a nursery. (It was a former model home, still set up as a model)

Back story is that for about a year I had been watching this one item in the Ballard Designs catalog. It was a giant safety pin that was $45 and I LOOOOOOOOVED it. But $45 ??? I don't even know why I am so drawn to it, probably because it's very different and I've never seen anything like it. So when we walked into this Plantation Home imagine my SHOCK when I walked into the nursery and saw my safety pin hanging on the wall. It was JUST as beautiful as I knew it would be, only for me I would have hung it in the laundry room ... the salesman noticed and said we if bought the house he guaranteed he would throw in the safety pin. LOL!

Well we decided not to get the house but since I had seen the pin in real life I decided $45 was worth it. I went online to order it and they didn't CARRY it anymore! HEARTBREAK! I looked on Google, Ebay, you name it ... I looked EVERYWHERE for my pin. Nothing ...

Well imagine my surprise this weekend when I logged on and it is BACK. Not only is it back, it's back in a set of THREE (including the original one) for $35. I am pulling the trigger on this one! I am ordering it today ... and I am so excited! It's on backorder until 11/21 but I do not care! I have waited three years for this!!!

Kah

So it was a surprise party

That was the thing I haven't been able to talk about for MONTHS ... I am so glad it's over so now I can stop worrying every time I post something on Facebook or talk to the birthday boy!

So our high school buddy (from Dallas) lives here in Houston. He turned 35 today - and his wife planned him a surprise party and he really WAS surprised. You'd mostly expect this for 40, 50, 60 year old birthdays .... not 35 so I think he was completely caught off guard.

The fun part was the Lindsey's flew in from AL - old poker playing and church buddies .. and his dad and brothers were there, his best friend from high school, Bob (now lives in Michigan) and good friend from high school Candice who lives in Dallas - she came with her family. So he went on a fishing trip with his dad and bros for three days and all these people snuck in then.

Saturday was a fun day - Conrad and I went to breakfast with Bob. I haven't seen him since he flew in for our wedding 2.5 years ago --- then Bob and Conrad went to the gun range. They came back to our house and while we were catching up, Candice and her brood showed up at our house. It was a really good time! Then we went over there, had the surprise, the party itself was a lot of fun - and these two old people here (us) partied it up til 2 AM . WHOOP!

This morning we all drug ourselves out of bed feeling like 84 year olds - and went back over to Adrian's to tell Bob and the Lindsey's goodbye. They all decided they wanted to see the land Conrad and I bought for the new house- so we took a field trip over there and then hugged everyone goodbye on the street and separated from there.

We are a REALLY close high school group. I have no idea why  and I don't know many other ones that exist like that. We were good friends as kids and had each others backs as young adults and maybe it's not so easy to let that go. As good things happen in life with marriages and kids and jobs - you want to share it with your friends and we have always done that. We have people here in town with us and some as far away as Michigan and Ireland, but we still stay really close together and I am super proud of that. When Conrad and I met back up at one of these little reunions five years ago it was REALLY easy to start dating him. We had the same friends and we both knew they would have never approved the union if we weren't both really good people. It was easy to trust that.

So it was a super fun Labor Day and it was sort of sad to see everyone drive away this morning ... but it was so nice to have them all back for a day.

Kah

Labor Day

I think Labor Day (with the exception of Thanksigiving) is my favorite work holiday. I sooooo very badly needed this long weekend. We have something exciting going on tonight (can't talk about it yet). Tomorrow the excitment continues and then dinner at Texas Roadhouse ... and Monday not a DARN THING ...

When I got up this morning it was almost cool outside, there was for sure not much humidity. I have college football on, it's nice and breezy outside, I can hear the washing machine, the house is SUPER clean ... and my precious baby angel is just layng around enjoying her weekend too. I have one of my fall Yankee candles burning and am in absolute HEAVEN. 

I adore fall and all the things that go with it. I come ALIVE in fall. I dress better, look better, have more energy. I get creative, I cook, I bake - I am just all around a nicer person. LOL 

I am so excited Labor Day is here- because it means fall is literally less than a month around the corner. GO FALL! ....... oh and for me, GO COWBOYS! 

oh and for my husband and also a good friend - GO TEXAS A&M!

Kah 

Another Busy Week

It was end of the month at work - which is always busy ... I have a busy Labor Day weekend coming up. My friend Tosha will be 40 tomorrow so I have a nice lunch and present planned for her. She is SO excited ... today Kelley and I had matching doc appts which was funny. Same doc. Hers was 15 minutes before mine, so we just went together ...

and all of that adds up really to a pretty busy week. Conrad and I came home tonight and started cleaning the house. We have had no energy (lazy) these past few weekends - so tonight we Swiffered and vacuumed and washed guest room sheets, dusted, cleaned the bathrooms ... I washed all the cool Pampered Chef my sister gave me last week on her way out of town ... so I've been busy tonight.

Another week has sort of come and gone. I will be SO happy for Monday off. YAY!

Kah