All Hallow's Eve Eve Eve

TGIF!  We've managed to survive another week.  There hasn't been anything super exciting to happen this week and that's kinda ok with me.  I'm all for fun exciting, but stressful exciting?  Notsomuch.  This weekend the hubs has to help at his office for a remodel (better him than me) and we're having Ms Makeup Zombie over for dinner to celebrate her birfday and Halloween.  You should check out her Halloween Zombie makeup look.  It. is. awesome!

Well, despite my kicking and screaming, Halloween is upon us.  I can NOT believe Halloween is this Sunday!  I picked up an adorable lion costume for Mr Mason and Nate decided to be Darth Vader.  We didn't do trick-or-treating for Nate at this age, but since he's going out, we decided to go ahead and get a costume for Mason.  I don't think he'll be grubbin' any goods, but this way he'll be able to go out with us.  I can't wait to see them both all dressed up.  Of course I'll post pictures!

In honor of Halloween, I have two Halloween-ish manis to share with you.  I haven't felt very inspired in the department of nail art lately, so you get what you get here.  LOL

This is ChG Orange Marmalade with SH Black Out.  I picked up the lovely Orange Marmalade through Magic Maid's blog sale a couple weeks ago.  It is a medium orange with gold shimmer - it reminds me of Strawberry Fields, only in orange.  This pic was taken indoors with flash.

Early morning, direct sun.  You can't see the shimmer quite as much in this pic, but it still looks good.  I really liked this one and Nate even said "Mom!  Your nails look like Halloween!".

This second mani is what I've been wearing since Tuesday night.  I've been kinda busy at home and finding time to do my nails has been a little difficult this week.  Good thing I like how this one turned out (though the pics don't really do it justice).  I initially tried to do another orange and black look, but I ended up having a serious fight with the orange (a neon from Nina) and decided to bag that one and go with this.

I started off with Sinful Colors What's Your Name.  It's a black base with subtle teal/purple (it changes depending on the light but I couldn't get anything other than teal to show up on pics) shimmer.  I was so excited when I heard this was a dupe to OPI Unripened (as seen on The Polish-Aholic).  I'm not devout to one specific brand, but if I can get a dupe of a more expensive color in a brand like SF, you bet I'm gonna pick up the less expensive brand.

A close-up of the sparkle in the bottle.  See...it's pretty subtle.  And I wasn't going for subtle.  This is Halloween, after all.

So, I went digging through my collection and I happened across this beauty that the lovely Ms Zombie gave me for my birthday!  This is Confetti Ice Ice Baby (cue the unescapeable early 90s "hit").  I don't know why I didn't use this one sooner!  Ice Ice Baby has iridescent glitter in a clear base.

There YOU go!  That's a lot less subtle and just what I was going for.  Please excuse the orange paint on my thumb - I told you I had a fight with that neon orange polish!  The finish of Ice Ice Baby is a little rough because it's a glitter rather than a sparkle or shimmer, but a coat of TC cures the bumpies.

What I like best about Ice Ice Baby is that it shifts from royal blue to Kelly green to purple, depending on the angle and the light.  I wish I could've gotten better pics with this mani.

Those first two pics were indoors with flash.  This is early morning, direct sun.  You still can't really see all the pretty glitters.

Though blurry, you can see the glitter a little better.  And you can see a couple of the colors, too.  These pics were taken this morning - coming up on over 3 days of wear!  I don't have any chipping, but there is some tip wear.  I don't know that I can totally attribute that to actual wear because SF had horrible shrinkage with ChG FFTC.  Either way, I like this one.  And, it seems, everybody else does, too.  People (I don't even know!) have actually grabbed my hands to look at my fingers.  LOL  I'm not a touchy-feely person so that always takes me by surprise.

There ya go!  Two Halloween-ish manis on the eve of the eve of Halloween.  I want to do another Halloween-ish mani before Sunday, but I don't know that I'll have time. 

What are your plans for Halloween?  Do you dress up in costume or do you leave that to the kidlets running around the neighborhood?  Enjoy your weekend!!!

Listening to: The Funeral by Band of Horses (rather fitting, don't ya think?)
Mood: tired

 

It's the Great Coffeecake, Charlie Brown!

 Image Source

Good evening, Kitschies!  Did ya miss me yesterday?  My mind has been in a hundred different places at once lately, and tomorrow was no exception.  Maybe some day I'll share with you what's going on, but for now, I must keep it under wraps.

Anyway...One day closer to the weekend!  I hope your Thursday went well.  It was a pretty good day for me.  I'm the late person at work so technically I'm not due in til 9.  And then both my docs were gone this afternoon, so I was out by 1:30.  It was nice to hit the grocery store sans kids (and before 8 at night).  Tonight I bring you a recipe I included in my recipe exchange.  This is my hands-down favorite coffeecake.


Pumpkin Coffee Cake
Topping:
1/4 c packed brown sugar
1/4 c sugar
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 Tbsp cold butter
1/2 c chopped pecans

Cake:
1/2 c butter, softened
1 c sugar
2 eggs
1 c sour cream
1/2 c canned or cooked pumpkin
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 c all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/4 tsp salt

In a small bowl, combine sugars and cinnamon. Cut in the butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Stir in pecans; set aside. In a mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Combine the sour cream, pumpkin and vanilla; mix well. Combine dry ingredients; add to creamed mixture alternately with sour cream mixture. Beat on low just until blended. Spread the batter into two greased and floured 8-in. round cake pans. Sprinkle with topping. Bake at 325 degrees F for 40-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. 

NOTES:  Instead of just a half cup of pumpkin, I use an entire can.  I was afraid it would make it too mushy, but it doesn't.  Combine that with the cup of sour cream and you get an awesomely moist coffee cake.  I make this in a 9x13x2-inch glass baking dish and it comes out perfectly at approximately 45 minutes.  

As soon as I heard that pumpkin was out in the stores, I went to buy some only to be disappointed because they had already sold out. D'oh!  On my second trip, I picked up a couple cans.  I think I've bought a total of six.  So far.

I made this for work a couple weeks ago and I can guarantee you that it did not stick around very long.  I printed out more than a few copies of the recipe.  Seriously awesome coffee cake!

So, on the docket, we have a couple pumpkin recipes (before the hubs and the office peeps get burnt out on pumpkin goodies).  Included in the list are pumpkin cookies (Yes, B.  I said pumpkin cookies.), pumpkin bread and maybe some pumpkin gingerbread.  My mom has a recipe for pumpkin custard - it's been YEARS since I had it, but I might just give it a try.  I just have to pick up a couple glass custard dishes because I've mysteriously lost one or two over the years.  If you have a kickass pumpkin recipe, I'd love to get my hands on it.  You can email me at megharmeyer at gmail dot com.


In other news, we have finally weaned Mason off formula!!!  Stoopid formula is so freakin expensive and breastfeeding only lasts so long (for me, anyway).  It seemed like this transition was a little more difficult for Mason than it was for Nate.  Either way, we have a completely moo-juice baby and it's about dang time!  And just for fun, a comparison of Nate and Mason, both at 16 months.

Gah!  It's simply amazing how fast the time goes by and how much each of the boys have changed.  At this point in age, they look a lot alike (to me). 


I'm off to watch the season finale of Project Runway.  I really feel bad for Michael C - I think they should've made an exception and let all 4 designers participate in NYFW.  All I have to say about the finale is that I hope to jeebus that Gretchen doesn't win.  Seriously.  See you tomorrow!

PS: I am SOOOO ready for this dang election to be over.  I've already sent in my absentee ballot - there should be some way that automatically disconnects every political ad from the TV, radio, computer (and even youtube) since I sent mine in.  Gah!  It's not like we have any good choices anyway.  *steps off soap box*


Listening to: Fall Into Sleep by Mudvayne (I don't usually like Mudvayne, but this isn't half bad and the vid is good)
Mood: full brain

I heart my boys!

Hellooooo Kitschies!  I hope this day finds you well.  This is my first attempt at "auto scheduling" a post.  I haven't heard very good things about auto posting, but I'll give it a try.

Last week I took Thursday off and took the boys to the ABQ Bio Park Aquarium.  I had originally wanted to go to the zoo, but it was supposed to rain that day so I decided to play it safe.  I think I'd only been to the aquarium once - and that was way back when the hubs and I were dating.  After I took the boys through I realized that I hadn't missed much.  Now, I can't really compare it to anything because the only other aquarium I've been to is Monterey Bay Aquarium and, really, nothing compares to that!  Anyway, the boys had a great time, despite how small it is.

There's a big square that connects the aquarium to the botanical gardens - it was all decorated for Fall.  Since we're not going to the pumpkin patch this year, we had to take a picture!

Gotta get Mason in there, too!  It had rained the night before so the hay bales were wet - Nate was disappointed he couldn't climb all over them.

Nate was so excited to see all the fish.  I heard "Oooh, Mom!  Look at this!" a lot.  I didn't mind - it was better than hearing the whining that would've been nonstop had we just stayed home.

Mason wasn't too sure about it all.  After a while, though, he enjoyed watching all the different colors and all the different fish speeding by.  I was glad they had open tanks low enough for him to see, too.

My favorite part of the aquarium - the stingrays!  The had a big tank for them and they just kept circling and circling.  A couple of them even popped up and slapped the water a couple times.  Remember the Monterey Bay Aquarium?  I can not even tell you the last time I went - I was in grade school - but I do remember the stingrays.  I thought it was so awesome you could pet them.

And...my not so favorite part of the aquarium - the eels.  OMG those things are disgusting!  I did learn, however, that they come in a bunch of different colors and some of them even had spots.  Still.  Yuck!

Mr Nate taking a break on the big starfish.  We hung out here for a few minutes to eat some gummies and some Goldfish crackers.  Rather appropriate, I thought. :)

After the aquarium, we headed to the big park across the street from the zoo.  The weather ended up being perfect (of course), so we played while we waited for the hubs to meet us for lunch.  The boys played and played, ate lunch that I put together and then we headed home.  Mason took an epic 3-hour nap and Nate got to play some video games.  Side note: I have *no* idea where Mason gets those facial expressions! HA!

We conquered the aquarium.  I think we'll brave the zoo next time - even if they say it's going to rain.   
It *is* starting to get chilly, so we may have to hit the zoo some afternoon (after morning nap).  As always, thanks for stopping by and have a great rest of the day.

Pssst!  Keep an eye out for a giveaway some time in the near future. :)

Hot Tamale

Meh Monday, Kitschies.  I am just not feeling it today.  I don't know if it's the lack of sleep (didn't get my usual amount last night) or the weather (gloomy but going to be *super* windy this afternoon/evening) or what, but I am just not with it today.  Let's just say I have a lot on my plate right now that's causing this meh-ness.

On to the goods!  A couple weeks back, I participated in Fab Ur Nails "Autumn" challenge.  I so miss Polish Hoarder Disorder's weekly challenges. :(  Anyway, I saw this challenge and I had to do it!  I saw the ChG Vintage Vixen collection at Sally Beauty all over the boards and when I saw the collection in person, I have to say that I wasn't too overly excited about many of the shades.  But, that didn't deter me from picking one of them up (of course).

This is ChG Foxy, a gorgeous deep burnt orange red - perfect for fall!  I was afraid I wasn't going to like this color because it seems a little more brown in the bottle.  But once I applied it, I loved it!  This and the next picture were taken indoors with flash.

This color glows!!  It's not really brown.  Nor is it orange.  And not completely red.  That's why I call it a deep burnt orange red.  Now, this color doesn't exactly scream vintage to me, but it does scream Fall and elegance.

Since this is a Fall challenge, I couldn't just leave it at a pretty color.  I grabbed my gold and green metallic acrylic paint, striping brush and two gold gemstones.  This picture was taken outdoors in direct morning sunlight.

Indoors with flash.  You can really see the gold shimmer in the bottle, but I didn't notice it as much when applied.  I loved this mani and I want to do it again, but I don't want to keep doing the same art over and over again.

A bit closer picture.  You can see the gold rhinestone better here.  *sigh*  I loved this.  I know I just said that, but it's the truth!  And the wear on this was awesome!  If I'm remembering right, this mani lasted at least 3 days without any chipping or visible wear.  I think the only reason why I took it off was because I did my coworker's nails that weekend.

A bonus mani!  This isn't the mani I did for my coworker, but the mani I did for my bestie.  This is Orly Monroe's Red.  This is an awesome bright red with a hint of red shimmer.  You can see a hint of the shimmer in the bottle pic above.  The bestie posted that this color doesn't get enough love and I totally agree.  This is one hot red!  She wanted stamping, so stamping she got!

I used one of my Bundle Monster plates (I'm horrible at writing down the plate number) and Sally Hansen Black Out.  She has narrower nail beds than I do, so this image covered her whole nail nicely.

And now for the typical "salon" pose.  LOL  These looked SO good!!  I'm going to have to borrow her Monroe's Red so I can do this for myself.  We were going to put a little sparkle in the middle of each big star, but we forgot.  Next time!

I hope I get back in the groove today.  I think it's just all that's on my mind lately.  I'll get out of this funk soon enough.  Until tomorrow, my dear, dear readers.

A Stormy Chicken

Yay!  It's Friday!!  Friday comes much quicker when you have an extra day off during the week.  I think I'm going to have to negotiate that in to my next contract.  As if.  LOL  I am NOT going to complain about my job - I really do love it.

Today I bring you one of my favorite chicken recipes.  I got this recipe from my Mom, who got it from Allrecipes.  The original recipe (linked in the title of the recipe itself) is for kabobs, but we always do it on chicken breasts.  This is a recipe that can be made year-round - if you BBQ year-round like we do. 

Rosemary Ranch Chicken
1/2 c olive oil
1/2 c ranch dressing
3 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 Tbsp minced fresh rosemary
2 tsp salt
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp white vinegar
1/4 tsp ground black pepper, or to taste
1 Tbsp white sugar, or to taste (optional)
5 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves

In a medium bowl, stir together the olive oil, ranch dressing, Worcestershire sauce, rosemary, salt, lemon juice, white vinegar, pepper, and sugar. Let stand for 5 minutes. Place chicken in the bowl, and stir to coat with the marinade. Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Preheat the grill for medium-high heat. Thread chicken onto skewers and discard marinade. 

Lightly oil the grill grate. Grill over medium-high heat until the chicken is no longer pink in the center, and the juices run clear.

NOTES:  I usually let this marinate overnight or the entire day (which ever I remember to do).  My Mom uses dried rosemary, but I prefer fresh in this recipe even though it's a bit more work.  I also omit the vinegar (I wasn't sure whether I did or not until I pulled up the picture).  This recipe makes awesome leftovers!

You can use any variety of ranch dressing - I use whatever we have in the fridge at the time.  Oh, man!  Making this post makes my mouth water.

If you have a rosemary bush in your yard, that's probably the easier way to go, but seeing as how our two dumb butt dogs demolished our rosemary, we have to buy little packs of it.

I was in such a hurry to eat, I forgot to take a pic until I cut up a bunch of mine!  LOL  You get the idea, though.


And as a bonus, I'll share a couple pictures I snapped yesterday afternoon.  Click for maximum goodness.

It looked like we were in for a doosy of a thunderstorm yesterday afternoon.  The skies to the northeast (pictured here) were SO dark!

And it was starting to extend to the northwest, too.  But...we didn't get much rain.  In fact, we got about 1 minute of the stuff.  However, the northeast of Albuquerque got dumped on!

We did, however, have a pretty rainbow (and a barely there double) for the minute we got rain.  I the stark bright colors of the trees and houses against the foreboding dark stormy sky.

Guess I should get some work done.  It's shaping up to be a busy weekend (which will be the case for the next couple of weeks).  I hope to keep my sanity and to return with more posting fun on Monday.  Oh, just a little note: thank you to everybody who voted in my little poll this week.  I have one question, though.  I listed "Other" as an option and one person clicked that - WHAT, may I ask, do you want to see more of (if not more cuties, yummies or pretties)?

Happy weekend!

Going Green

Totally Terrific Thursday!  My, my.  SOMEbody's happy today. :)  I took the day off to give my MIL a break and to take the boys to the zoo.  Well, it was planned to rain ALL day, so I changed the plans a bit and took them to the aquarium.  I'll post about that later.  For now, I have a pretty mani I did a couple weeks back.

Months ago I placed my first order with 8ty8beauty.com.  I ordered a couple Color Club colors, a nail art brush set and ChG matte top coat.  I had seen What A Shock on Scandalously Polished and Scrangie quite a while ago and as soon as I saw it, I had to have it!

Color Club What A Shock! is a neon lime green with a blue flash - it's bright!  And gorgeous!  It's pretty sheer, so I applied a layer of Finger Paints Gossamer White (a super pale pink) first and then at least 2 (but probably 3) coats of What A Shock!

I wore this on my toes once and it got all sorts of attention.  I call it my alien slime color.  These pictures were taken indoors with flash and you can really see the blue flash.  This was my first mani after I had to chop off all my nails because of breaks/splits.  I know I can get away with quite a lot at work, as far as nail polish goes, but I had a feeling that this one might push the envelope just a bit, so I decided to tone it down a little with some stamping.

I grabbed my BundleMonster plates and the white Konad Specail Polish and went to work.  I had a hard time with the first attempt at a full-nail image, but this one was much easier.  I think I can chalk that up to having a bit more experience at the whole stamping thing and the shorter nails (less canvas to work with).

This picture was taken outdoors in direct early morning sunlight.  You can see a little of the blue flash on my middle finger, but you can't see how truly bright that green is.

And one more picture for good measure.  I don't mind my nails so short - less to worry about, really.  But, I think they just look better when they're a bit longer.  I got lots of compliments/comments on this mani.  Mostly it was people wondering how "they" got that design on my nail.  Oooh!  You should see their faces when they hear that I, in fact, did my own nails.  Why is that always such a shock?  Get it?  Shock?  LOL  I kill myself.

Well.  The boys are sleeping.  OK.  That's not entirely true.  Mason is sleeping and Nate is in his room for "quiet time" where, I'm sure, he's making a huge mess of his room.  Now...if I can just keep the dang dogs from barking at the neighborhood kids coming home from school...

Berry Nice

Good morning, Kitschies!!  It's Wednesday.  But it feels like Tuesday.  What's up with that?!  I really don't want to do yesterday over.  K?  Thanks.  I'm super tired today for some reason.  Good thing I'll be out and about at lunch - maybe the fresh air will do me good.

I told you that I'd post the recipe for the yummy French toast some time soon.  Is today soon enough for ya?  When we decided that the girls would make a meal and the guys make another meal, the bestie and I decided that we were going to make breakfast.  Good thing we settled on that because the guys didn't arrive at the cabin til almost midnight!!  There's no way we would've been able to wait that long to eat.  We talked about it and we decided that we wanted to make something with fruit.  Originally it was blueberries, but I found this recipe instead and all it took was one look and we were good to go!


Raspberry Cheesecake Stuffed French Toast
1 cup milk
2 Tbsp vanilla extract
1 cup white sugar
2 Tbsp cinnamon
4 eggs, beaten
1 cup raspberry puree
4 oz cream cheese, softened
1 loaf French bread, cut in to 1" slices
butter
confectioner's sugar for dusting
nutmeg for topping

In a bowl, whisk milk, vanilla, sugar, and cinnamon into the beaten eggs until well blended. Set aside. In a separate bowl, cream together raspberry puree and cream cheese until smooth. Make 'sandwiches' by cutting each slice of bread in half and spreading raspberry-cheese mixture in the center, then top with the other half. 

Melt butter over medium heat in a large skillet or griddle. Dip bread into egg mixture, coating thoroughly. Cook until well-browned on both sides, about 5 minutes. Dust with confectioners' sugar and nutmeg. Serve immediately. 

NOTES:  We didn't use the whole 2 Tbsp of vanilla extract because that sounded like an insane amount, but I think it could've used it.  It's just mixed in with the eggs, so it's not like it's actually IN the French toast.  Can't find raspberry puree.  Period.  So, we grabbed a couple bags of frozen raspberries because we weren't sure how much it would take to make a cup of puree.  Turns out that one bag made exactly 1 cup of puree.  If you don't like cream cheese or cheesecake, don't let the title fool you.  The filling was so creamy - it wasn't cheesecake-y or overly cream cheese-y.  I didn't slice the bread all the way through; I think it was much easier to deal with as a pocket instead of two separate pieces.

OMG YUM!!!  In all honesty, I was afraid of this recipe.  I was afraid this would be too much of a PIA to make, but it was super easy.  I was afraid that the stuffing wouldn't stay in, but that wasn't a problem.  I sliced the bread thicker than 1" and it turned out just fine.  I was afraid the bread would be too soggy (soggy bread = nastiness) but it was perfectly browned on the outside and soft on the inside - not soggy at all.  I was afraid that it wouldn't be sweet enough because we didn't bring syrup, but really, the powdered sugar and nutmeg were perfect.  I guess I need to just be "afraid" of a recipe every now and then.  If we don't try things outside our comfort zones, what's the point?

I'm going to Sam's Club to look for a cute costume for Mason today at lunch.  I breezed by them last week but didn't actually look.  I do, however, remember that they were around $10.  Can't beat that!!  Cross your fingers that I find one that's 1) super cute for my Mr Mason, 2) it fits and 3) is really $10.  I'll let you know what I find.

Listening to: Layla by Eric Clapton (the lame unplugged version)  

Mood: Zoooommmmbie

The Getaway

My second post of the day/night, as promised!  This post will be dedicated to sharing my adults-only getaway weekend with you.  It might end up being kinda long, so bear with me.  I'm going to start at the beginning.

Waaaaay back in April, the hubs and his bestie presented a work in progress to me and my bestie.  The guys (as we'll call them from here on out) are putting together a comic book graphic novel and they gave us this awesome binder of information about some of the characters.  It was awesome!  They put so much effort in to the binders and you can tell.  Some time after I get permission (or I talk the hubs in to guest posting), I'll give you more information.  For the time being, I'll just tell you that it's going to be a great book once they get it all together.  Anyway, after the guys' presentation, my bestie did a little presentation of her own.  She gave both me and her hubs an invitation.  My hubs and my bestie had reserved a cabin for us in Ruidoso for TWO WHOLE NIGHTS sans kids.  There was one catch.  We had to wait until October for the getaway.  So we waited.  And we waited.  And then finally, it was the day!

The bestie and I managed to get on the road around 3 that afternoon.  We stopped in San Antonio, NM at The Owl Cafe for a late lunch.  That place is a dive!  There were maybe 5 booths - there were more seats at the bar than there were booths!  There was a back room, but you couldn't see that from where we sat.  Anyway, I had some awesome pinto beans with green chile and a great greasy green chile cheeseburger.  Tummies full, we went on our way.  We arrived at Storybook Cabins around 6.  The cabin was perfect!  Two bedrooms, two baths and a loft.  It *almost* made me wish we only had 2 kids between us because there were two twin beds up in the loft.

The bestie and I headed out to a local bar to meet a friend of hers - who didn't show.  So, we headed back to the cabin where we had *plenty* of time to relax before the guys got there.  Speaking of which, they didn't get there til almost midnight!  But, once they got there, we were pretty "relaxed" and we got them settled in with some spirits, too.

 My bestie's hubs

 My hubs

That last one is a little blurry, but I think you can tell that the bestie and I were having fun.  And it looks like my hubs can't exactly tell what we were doing (or he was embarrassed by us - either way).  Anyway...A good time was had by all that night and then we went to bed.  The next morning, it was the girls' duty to make breakfast.  So, make breakfast we did!

We made Raspberry Cheesecake Stuffed French Toast (OMG YUM!), bacon and coffee.  It was SOOOO good!  I'll post the recipe for that tomorrow.  The weather was perfect - we were outside as much as possible.  There was a nice deck, so we ate breakfast and dinner out there.

After breakfast, the bestie gave us a guided tour of her hometown complete with the house she grew up in and the schools she attended.  Then we did the tourist thing and walked downtown.

 Me & the hubs

The bestie (aka: Makeup Zombie) & me

The gang - daytime

After the stroll around downtown and a trip in to Candle Power (the best place to find anything Yankee Candle), we headed back to the cabin where it was the guys turn to make us dinner!  Again, the weather was perfect, so we ate outdoors on the deck.

I don't exactly remember what they called this, but it was awesome!!  Chicken, beef and veggies on kabobs.  All marinated and super yum!  I'll have to get the recipes from bestie's hubs and post that for you.  SO good.  I ate waaaay too much of it.

After we got everything cleaned up, we moved inside where we played a fun game where we had to blow the cards off a bottle and whoever ended up blowing all the cards off the bottle had to take a drink.  Once we'd had enough of that, the bestie decided we should go for a walk.  I have no idea what time it was.

Click to make bigger.  I was the least tipsy of the group, so I have the most consistent expressions.  The other three, well, if you click the pic, you'll see what I mean.  LOL  The earlier group shot was better, by far, but this one was more fun.

The next morning, the guys took pity on us and made us breakfast.  Scrambled eggs, a ton of veggies, ham and cheese along with more bacon.  I didn't get a pic of the breakfast because we were all in a hurry to get everything packed up before we had to check out at 11.  I did, however, manage to get some good pics of the deers that were grazing just off the deck.

There were about 6 of them all meandering along until we spied them and then they moved up the road.  Other than the deer, we saw some woodpeckers and some gigantic ravens.  It's no wonder people find ravens creepy - you could hear their wing flaps; they sounded almost mechanical. 

We had a great time - I *almost* didn't want to come home!  But...I knew I'd have two happy little boys waiting to see me when I got home and that made the return a little easier.  There were a couple more pics, but I'm afraid the bestie would probably murderize me for posting them, so I won't.  And all I can say now that I'm back to the grind is...I WANNA GO BACK!  The next road trip for the Harmeyer Family will be to Bakersfield, CA to spend Christmas with my family.  Somehow, though, I have a feeling that trip won't be *quite* as relaxing.  But I mean that in a good way.