We caught it.

Guess what this is:

Go ahead....no, it's not dog poop. Duh.

IT'S THE MOLE!  Yippee!!!!!!

My neighbor (who was nice enough to "install" the mole trap in my yard also volunteered to remove it should we catch the little sucker) rang my doorbell yesterday afternoon (which makes my dog
batsh!t crazy) and told me that he had a present for me.  I was like "oh yay! what is it?!"

Then I realized that he was probably talking about something home related (also, side note: my neighbors are the greatest, they gave me a fertilizer spreader, they help me with yard work, and they watch my dog for me occasionally among other things.  Love.  In return I make my famous cookies, give them stuff from my mom's garden or buy them beer :)). 

My neighbor got really excited when he told me that he caught the mole.  "It was so cool!  It got him right in the head!  I put it in a plastic bag and hung it on the side of your house!!" Oh....ok! (insert awkward laughter)  One might ask why he didn't just put it in his trashcan, but we share trash and I keep the trash bin in my garage.

So, I had to get the little buddy in the bag off the side of my house.  Part of me was a little sad, I mean, yes I hate that it tore up my yard, but I don't like dead things.  I also had a really strong fear that it was going to come back alive and tear it's way through the bag. 

My neighbor seems to think that moles are territorial and that this is the only one that is tearing up my yard so cross your fingers that this is the one and only!!

get. excited.

My very FIRST blog giveaway is coming up SO Soon!

I can't wait.  And I'm very jealous.  But it will be soooo awesome for one of you for the upcoming holiday season!  Trust me.

So, if you don't follow my blog already (see it--it's over there to the right, that big button that says "FOLLOW" click on it, I dare you), you probably should...jus sayin'.....

home, sweet home.

I'm from a map dot; a stop sign on a blacktop...

That is totally a country song.  I didn't make that up myself just in case you were wondering, Tim McGraw did though.  But it is true.  Except that I live on a dirt road BUT it leads up to a stop sign on a blacktop, so that counts, right? Yes. 

I recently went home to help finish up harvest and I totally played a huge roll in harvest being done so early this year. 

I made my super secret chocolate chip cookies (OK, it's not so secret, it's the recipe on the back of the toll house (milk) chocolate chip package plus a small box of vanilla pudding just added into the mixture and it makes them soooo much fluffier and tastier, trust me on this one and try it on your own) that my dad requests when I come home and took them out to the field for all of the guys working that day.

And then I went and rode in the combine with one of my uncles who was cutting soybeans.  He wouldn't let me drive though...(ok, I didn't ask, but I don't think I could figure out all of the buttons and noises that were going on in the combine anyway).



And then I helped my dad unload the truck.

I was really good at this part which is why I got these pictures from the inside of the trailer.  As kids we used to play in the beans or corn and we'd end up with corn and beans everywhere.  But it used to be so much fun!  I would probably be too scared to do it now as an adult...

And then it all goes into the bin.  Like magic.



All in all it was a successful weekend.  I attempted my first batch of squash soup, rode in the combine, got in some fall shopping, and attended my aunt's 50th surprise birthday party.  It's always so fun to see family and being back home out in the country is the best; it's like time slows down for just a little bit and I'm not rushing around to get a million things done during the day.  Also, Laila loves being able to run around without her leash on--freedom!!

deliciousness

Look at what I made for dinner

Roasted pine nut couscous, shrimp and asparagus with garlic, almonds, and Gorgonzola cheese. MMM!

 And then I topped it off with a big glass of Shiraz.

And then I may have had a few bites of this.  It is to DIE for. I'm not even a big ice cream lover, but this stuff is amazing.  It has 1/2 the calories and fat of regular ice cream and tastes just the same or better! Go here to see all of the different kinds, I've tried most of them....(BTW, I worked out tonight, so all of this food was warranted, mmmk?)

happy halloween from my neighborhood to yours.

Do people decorate this crazily for Halloween in your neighborhood as they do in mine?

Unfortunately I took these in the middle of the afternoon, so you don't get the full effect--there are lights involved at night!

Laila is SUPER scared of the decorations and locks her little legs into the ground and whines non-stop so that I have to pick her up and carry her past the houses with decorations.  She's such a baby! 

Guess what?

Yesterday I celebrated my two year anniversary at work!  You know what that means, right? A raise.  Yep.  I don't even know what it is yet, I'm guessing it's probably going to be huge...ok, maybe in my dreams, but my review did go swimmingly. 

Also, that means that it's close to two years that I've been a homeowner.  Only 28 more years and a bazillion dollars left on that home loan.  Yow!

just for good measure...

I mean, why not try them on again??

As promised, a new glamorous picture of my dad sporting his favorite pair of coach's shorts from 70 years ago.  Good thinking on my mom's part for pulling out the camera for this golden opportunity.  Hey mom, I think you can toss them now...and dad, wow, there are no words. :)

the Prius.

I have this weird phobia of the Toyota Prius. 

OH and it may have stemmed from this creepy guy who used to park on a side street at my old apartment complex in the mornings.  And he only wore scrubs.

Also, I don't think they can go very fast so I don't like being behind them. 

And they look strange.

That is all.

stewpid deck guy

Last year around this time I decided to add on to my deck.  My original deck was big enough for my grill. And only my grill.  I also decided to keep the original deck and just add on to it since it seemed to be in good shape (if I had to do it over again, I would've started from scratch...that or hire someone who doesn't suck).

I could tell from the get-go that this guy that I was working with was kind of a tool.  He would call me every morning on my way to work to tell me what he was doing. 

Most mornings he was taking his kids to school or drinking coffee on his way out to my house.  As much as I tried to screen his phone calls I would eventually have to call him back to get his update on how the deck was coming along. 

Kansas weather during this time of year is very unpredictable; this year the days have been in the 70's-80's and at night the temp's get down to the 30's-40's.  By the time my deck was actually finished last year, there was snow on the ground, so really...the nice days are usually hard to come by; this year has been amazing though.

So, anyway, I tried to make sure that he was there working when the trusty weatherman said it was going to be nice and not freezing cold outside. 

One evening I was out to dinner with some friends and crazy guy calls me on the phone.  I decide to answer, since he never really calls at night, in case something was wrong.  I definitely should have screened this phone call.  I was out to eat, after all.

I remember very clearly that the weather the following day was supposed to be really nice, so I was thinking that he was calling to tell me that he'd be out there early.  The phone call, however, went something like this:

Deck Guy:  Hey, uh, Kristin, how's it going?
Me: Good, how are you, what's going on?
DG: I just wanted to let you know that I'm not going to be able to work on the deck tomorrow because I have to take my wife to get an IUD put in.
Me: Oh. Uhhhhhh.....ok? Um....right. Ok.
DG: Yeah, we just had a baby and we don't wanna have any more for awhile and I just need to take her to the doctor.
Me: Sure. Fine.  Um, so when's my deck going to be done?

REALLY? I did NOT need to know that little tidbit of information about your wife.  Thanks though, buddy.  Make something up for all I care!  Your personal life is just that: personal.   Gross. 

Also, my friends that I was eating with were all trying to figure out what was going on as this phone conversation was taking place because I'm pretty sure my face was full of pure shock.

SO, just as deck guy promised, he "finished" my deck that weekend.  Below is the finished staircase.  Looks good, right?



Really?!



I realize that the color is two-tone (this is because it's old deck/new deck-it doesn't look that way anymore, obviously) but this guy shoved scraps of wood under the bottom stair to make it even and decided to not replace the posts of the staircase.  So, essentially, my staircase is floating over the ground.  Perfect!  Just what I wanted, a deck that won't pass inspections.

The big boss guy from the company I hired came out and found a lot of things that my stupid deck guy messed up and they fixed a few of the problems but not that ugly bottom stair.

Luckily, my parents live close by and are very smart so we were able to fix this little problem because the company that I hired refused to fix it. 



OK, it looks ugly now, but it's so much bigger and nicer! Er, kind of.

Thanks to one of my good college buddies, he and I were able to stain my deck back to one pretty color.  I had to outsource the ladder labor...I was too scared to try to hang on to the stain bucket, the ladder, and the paintbrush, but luckily my pal Joe loves doing that kind of thing :)

Dan, Trish and Pete enjoying the new bench on my new deck at Laila's first birthday party!

Puppies playing :)

Long story short, use a decking company or person that someone recommends to you and not some weirdo or a company that sucks.  While my new deck is great and serves it's purpose well, the process caused me many headaches and freak out moments to say the least.  This is only one of the stories from my deck guy, unfortunately I have many more...

laaaaazy

Instead of going to the gym tonight, I decided to take my dog for a long walk and then gave this bottle of wine a run for its money.  I'm usually a red wine drinker but for some reason a riesling just sounded better; so much better that I came prettty close to not having any left for a party later this week.  Good work, team.

I'm also working on some new blogs, so bear with me.  I need to download some pictures from my weekend on the farm. :)  OH, and I need to convince my mom to send this picture off of her camera to me; my dad decided to try on the coach's shorts again and apparently they were too big.  Good news though: his shirt matched and my mom did a photo shoot.  Look forward to that.

Cankle.

So there was this one time in college when I used to drink too much. 


OK, let's be real.  All of college I drank too much.  I was a very responsible drunk though; I always made it to class, I got very good grades, and I worked quite a bit as well.  I just liked to have a good time after I was done with work and school. 


I was in a sorority so we had too many date parties to count.  In my four years of school, I'm pretty sure that I only missed one.  I love playing dress up, what can I say?!

The thing about date parties is that if you're under 21, you had to drink enough before hand to last you through the entire night.  This is what got me into some serious trouble.  (Ok, not really serious trouble, like there were no cops involved.  There were a handful of times where I probably should have been kicked out of the house...like when I brought alcohol into our dry house and then that other time when I puked at formal and my date had to go by himself...)


Anyway, my sophomore year we had a date party with another sorority and the theme was salad dressing.  Weird, right?  There were four different kinds of salad dressing that you could choose from: Italian, Ranch, Thousand Island, and French. 


Of course I chose Thousand Island because that meant that I could make a fruit hat and be the chiquita banana lady.  I was going to look awesome. 


SO I got to work on the fruit hat which turned out to be way more time consuming than I originally thought.  Trying to attach plastic fruit to a straw hat with flower wiring is not easy.  After finally getting all of that assembled right before the date party, I figured that the perfect way to finish off the outfit was with a Hawaiian printed sarong.  Hawt.



The infamous fruit hat post fall...

We always had big pre-parties before the actual party and that was no different for this particular date party.  I have no idea what exactly we drank, probably something tropical to go along with the rest of the theme... 


After getting in a sufficient amount of pre-partying in, it was time to load up the school bus to go to the Holiday Inn. 


Once at the Holiday Inn, I made my way off the bus and patiently waited for my friends to go inside.  This is where things start to get a little blurry...on my way inside I missed a few steps and tumbled down a few stairs thus ruining my beautiful fruit hat.  Nevermind that my foot is throbbing; I was more concerned with collecting all of the fruit that fell off so that I could attempt to reattach it for party pics. 

The alcohol that I consumed that night apparently served as a buffer to the pain that was beginning to take place around my ankle.  I danced all night long and I vaguely remember throwing my (c)ankle up on the table that the DJ was using and explaining to him why my foot was turning black and blue.

I went home after the date party and smartfully elevated my foot above my heart for the night.  And probably put some ice on it or something.  I woke up in a LOT of pain the next morning and decided to hobble on over to the campus Dr.'s office.

After convincing the doctor that was on call that Saturday morning that I, in fact, did NOT need a pregnancy test (FYI-this was a standard question that was asked to everyone who went to Lafene (the campus health center)...even if you went in with a cold or a broken foot for that matter), I had an X-ray done on my foot.  Apparently I should have been in a walking boot at the very least, but that would cost money...so I just decided to walk it off.  They said I'd probably be fine trying to walk off my brokenness.  Very smrt.

Eventually the swelling went down, the bruising disappeared and my foot was semi back to normal.  Of course at every chance that I could get I would take off my socks and shoes and show everyone my giant foot.  It was a good conversation starter at parties. 

This isn't the greatest picture but you can at least see all of the bruising that was starting to form that night as well as the swelling around my actual ankle bone. 

My bum foot. (also both of my feet look gargantuan in this picture...I'm blaming this on the freshman 15, weight gain can go to your feet, right?)

Unfortunately with age that little fall is coming back to haunt me; the ankle just doesn't quite work like it used to...damn the luck.  Oh, and also for the record, my feet don't look quite that big anymore and I do not have cankles.



buddies.

Aren't we the cutest things ever?!  That's me and my friend of like 28 years when we were little babes.  Apparently I thought sitting on her lap was a good idea.  I'm not so sure that she agreed though.  Love ya Ash! :)  Apparently this was her first day away from her mom for the whole day...it's a wonder that she came back over after this day!


 I have a handful of people that I am still currently friends with that we've known each other since this teeny-tiny age, isn't that crazy!?  That's what growing up in a small town gets you!



It's also crazy that I've known my college buddies now for close to 10 years!  I guess they weren't too embarrassed by all of my crazy college ways...you  guys are the best and I love you to pieces!

what a lovely little weekend!

My mom was in town for the weekend, so we went to one of my favorite spots in KC, the City Market.  There were so many delicious fruits and veggies and yummy treats, I had a hard time passing things up!

I found a delicious pineapple, some pears, strawberries, some yellow peppers, and some gorgeous flowers (that you'll see below).

Aren't these fun?!

After hitting up the farmer's market we found a cute little place for lunch, the Farmhouse and sat outside.  I had a delicious little salad and squash soup, my sister got the same and my mom got quiche--she wished she had gotten the same things as we had; but we shared!  The soup was awesome!  

Here are those pretty flowers I was talking about!  It was this giant bouquet for only $10, I fell in love...



I also picked up some mums and a cute little pumpkin for my front door step.  This fall weather is really making me in the mood for all things fall.



s

The ending to our perfect little Saturday was dinner at the famous Stroud's restaurant.  I meant to take a picture of the massive plate of food that we all ate, but I forgot, so this is what you get :).  It was sooooo good; they're famous for pan friend chicken served family style and then you can pick your sides, so we got mashed potatoes, gravy and green beans.  AND THEN, they bring out a giant basket of cinnamon rolls. I'm pretty sure the food was all good for you, it was pan fried...that counts as better, right?



Coach's shorts.

Editor's Note: This picture is solely to look at my dad's shorts and not meant to showcase my permed hair and "Big Dog's" t-shirt or my sisters huge teddy bear t-shirt and giant glasses.  Thanks.

Ooooh, Dad. 


Those shorts.


Coach's shorts to be exact.


I'm not sure if you should've worn those.  Ever. 


And I'm just going to go ahead and state that you should never wear them again.  Ever.

I know they're still in your closet (partially because I cleaned out your closet for you recently and partly because you recently told me you thought about wearing them). 


And I know that you think they still fit.  I'm sure they do; I'm not doubting that you can still get them on.  The question, however, is do they still look as good as that picture up there? 


Answer: No.


The ultimate question: do you have to be a coach to wear coach's shorts?


Apparently the answer is no again.
As far as I know, dad, you weren't a coach...right?  I mean you helped me out when I played sports in my younger years, obviously--that's why I was so awesome at anything that I attempted. 


100% polyester doesn't look great on just anyone and everyone and especially on the lower half.


In conclusion, dad, I think it's time to put the coach's shorts into permanent retirement (along with a couple of sweaters still in your closet...just sayin....) 

I mean you're getting ready to move and a good closet clean out is a must; I think most would agree with me.  As always, I'm here to assist you with getting rid of all of that stuff that you just shouldn't wear any longer...

This guy: obviously a coach.  Duh.  I mean he has a matching coach's shirt for goodness sakes.



Moles

I bet you thought this was going to be about moles on your skin, right? 

I could talk about those kind, or else I could tell you about my other pet(s) besides my little baby Laila. 

Isn't it cute?  I haven't named them yet so if you have any ideas, offer them up!

These precious little creatures first invaded my yard last spring and ever since I've been trying to kill them off. 

They create these awesome paths and tunnels and holes all over your yard and then when they decide to poke their heads out this huge mound of dirt protrudes up over the grass and makes the yard look amazing.

This afternoon I looked out my kitchen window and I noticed a brand new mound of dirt.  So, I put on my work gloves, grabbed the cone of poison peanuts and dumped them down the mole hill.

Luckily this isn't my yard...or at least not yet.

Every time I put poison peanuts down the mole hill I say a little prayer that goes something like this: "Die bitches".

...and the road rage continues.

So today while driving home in rush hour traffic I pull up next to this guy.  I glance over because he wouldn't let me in front of him earlier so I wanted to see what the rush was.  Apparently he was in the middle of a good book.  

That's right, this ass hat is reading his nook while attempting to drive.

Ironically, he was right behind an ambulance so I guess if he got to a really good part of the book and decided to ram his car into someone driving next to him he was in good company.

PUT YOUR PHONES (or books, or nooks in this case) UP WHILE DRIVING! Duh.

Don't you people watch Oprah?!  Geez.

feeling fallish.

I don't know what the weather is like in your neck of the woods, but in mine, the weather has been absolutely fabulous lately.  Cool, yes, but the sun is out and it's been perfect for dog walks, yard work, and enjoying a cup of joe on the deck.

It even smells like fall outside; the combination of leaves, bonfires, and the crisp air make me want to spend all day outside. 

Up until today I've had my windows open in my house, but this morning it was just too chilly.  So much so that all I've been wearing today has been sweats and my slippers. 

This cooler weather also makes for great football weather, pumpkins, colorful mums, and yummy fall treats.

Recently, I made these delightful glazed apple bars that one of my favorite bloggers led me to.  Don't they look delicious?!

mmmm, straight from the oven!

spandex pants and windsuits.

That used to be all my little sister would wear.  Bless her heart. 


We all go through that terribly awkward stage around the age of like 10 where you have a little growth spurt and nothing fits like it should and you just don't feel pretty, gosh darnit.


My sister for the LONGEST time would only wear windsuits or stretch pants.  She had a multitude of colors and could mix and match so the outfits were endless.  Usually the shirts had a pretty pattern on them, like teddy bears, bees, farm animals, you get the idea, right? 

My mom and I tried for centuries to get her to try on a pair of jeans or at least something that didn't resemble stretch pants or nylon but it was no use.  She loved her stretch pants and windsuits like nobody's business. 

Looking back now, she realizes that the spandex and windsuits weren't the most flattering thing, but the pictures make for great stories.

I remember this one time when we were little I made her do glamour shots.  You know where they tousel your hair and put in way too much aquanet and make you wear hideous outfits?   

This is not my sister, but I wish she had that jacket....

(PS-they are still in business, who knew?!)

She would seriously kill me with her bare hands if I put that picture up, but just imagine:  dream pose + dried flowers + denim + that awkward stage we discussed earlier. 

doggie day camp, how I love you...

Such a sleepy baby! 
It's our one year anniversary this weekend :)