Apple Delicious

I know I only worked for 3 days this week but I'm really happy it's Friday! I am feeling great. I went for a walk after work and all of my favorite songs came up on the iPod. That means it's going to be a good weekend, right? Fantastic.

I made some Apple Crisp the other day and I had some at lunch today and it's so amazing. I got the recipe from Angie last year and I LOVE it! It's incredible and I think it's a weight watchers recipe so it's relatively guilt free. So if you are looking for something fun to make for the Halloween festivities you have going on...

4 cups apples cored and sliced (about 6)
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup oats
3/4 tsp. cinnamon
6 tbsp.. melted butter

Place apples in pie plate

Blend all other ingredients and sprinkle over apples.
Bake for 30-35 minutes at 350. Enjoy!

I'm getting ready to meet people for dinner and then the rest of the night is open for just about anything...we'll see how it goes. Did I mention that I'm in a really good mood?

So what are people going to be for Halloween? I'm going to be a cat for the trick-or-treaters tomorrow but I have another costume for a party next week. :)

Have a GREAT weekend!

Wear it Wednesday

Well, I'm back at work today. And I have to say it's actually been a pleasant day. I haven't had a lot of meetings and my desk remains relatively uncluttered. It was a crazy rainy morning here. It's cleared up a bit and I think I might be able to walk later. I am trying to walk outside instead of doing the elliptical right now because I will have to be inside exercising all winter. Although I like both, but the outside walking is way more interesting.

So obviously I don't have a lot of fun to talk about today. Except I wanted to show my new nail color. It's Material Girl by Essie. I like it. Maybe I should have a special nail polish edition once a week. ha ha. Manicure Monday or something like that. Someone probably already does that though. hmmm..... So I mentioned that my father brought some of my boxes from storage over last week and in it was my letter jacket. At the bottom of the box, was this sweatshirt:

I got it when I was in 11th grade in Paris (I went there to play softball) and I wore it for a long time and then eventually put it in a box with the other high school stuff because I couldn't part with it. I love Paris and I remember being determined to find the perfect sweatshirt while I was there. So it's lived in a box for years. Well, I decided that I would actually wear it again. To put this in perspective I NEVER keep clothes this long and actually wear them again. I don't think anything in my closet survives more than 2 or 3 years at the most. So this it kind of fun for me. Is that weird?

I swear there is more meaningful stuff happening in my life, but this is way more blog able today. It's fun to be a girl...

One to Spare

I've spent the last two days doing nothing really. I think I needed a break from my normal routine. I needed to just be. Not do anything social. Just be. I've done stuff around the house and watched a lot of Friends on DVD. I don't want to go to work tomorrow but I guess every break has to come to an end. But I resolve that I will take some more days off in the near future. All I know is that this has helped to clear my head and put some stuff in perspective.

But anyway...on Friday night I finally finished my spare room. It's a small bedroom so it's the guest room/craft room. I haven't had a guest room in a long time so I was excited to get it done. Especially because I had my first "guest" on Saturday night. (Thanks to Dad for bringing me the bed!) Here is the view from the doorway. There is a sewing machine table in there too. It was my Grandmother's and I love it. Now I just need to learn to sew.

Here is the craft closet in the room. I love that I finally have a place to store craft stuff. It has to be reorganized at some point but it's fine for now. I need winter projects anyway.

That means I have finally finished unpacking. There are NO boxes left in this place. From now on I'll be concentrating on improvement projects. It feels good to be settled.

Now I'm off to take a walk before it rains. Happy Tuesday!

Memory Lane

I've lived in this town for twelve years (wow!) and my world is pretty compartmentalized. I went to college here and then worked at the college I went to. Then I left to go to graduate school and then moved back and am now working at the other college in town. So I generally have very different memories of each part of my time here. On Saturday I spent some time visiting my post college life.

I actually got invited to attend a dedication for the building I was the Residence Hall Director in back in the late 90's/early 00's. They renovated it all last year and they did such a nice job. It was great to be able to walk around and see the building. I had a lot of great times in the building so I always think of it fondly.

The view of the building. It looks so good now.Tobey used to be a very traditional residence hall. The typical kitchen on the main floor. But now each floor has a kitchen. And there used to be only one laundry room. Now there is laundry on each floor. This would have been great while I was a student there. My favorite part is the fitness center on the top floor. I am so jealous. I would have used this all the time when I was the RD. My very first supervisor and I.

After that I met up with my friends Beth and Tricia. They were here meeting up with their friends from college (I hung with different people in college). We went to a bar that we used to frequent back in the day. Although I live here, I rarely step foot in there any more. It was exactly the same as it always was--just new, younger faces.

Here are Tricia, Beth and I. Ginger & Roxy shutting it down at the end of the night. It was a fun day!

On Sunday I returned to the present and spent the day cleaning, doing laundry and getting stuff done around here. This is fall break for the students so I'm taking today and tomorrow off. I'm so excited! The weather is going to be good so I plan on taking some good walks and doing whatever else I want. I love fall break!

Happy Monday!

View from the Top

I love Thursday nights! It's my only meeting free night at work. My favorite TV shows are on tonight (The Office, 30 Rock, and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia). I plan to relax and maybe make some apple crisp and maybe read some magazines during commercials.

Before that I wanted to show you all the reasons I absolutely love living here. This is where I talk my nightly walk. It's so beautiful but it was especially pretty on Monday night. I actually remembered my camera so I could share it. This is a trail that is above the campus I work on. It's a great work out and it's so good to clear your head.

Look at that sky!

A view from Table Rock.

This is my favorite view.
It's hard to be in a bad mood after I go on my walk. I feel really lucky to live in such a pretty place. Just remind me of this when it's all under snow in a few months. :)

Enjoy your Thursday!

I know I will.

Colors of the Fall

It's not a secret to anyone that knows me that the two beauty items that I love are mascara and nail polish. I swear I could buy a new color and paint my nails daily. I don't...but I want to. I do my nails a few times a week. I like to switch it up and since I hate chipped polish this works for me.

Lately there have been some really good colors that I've worn and I want to highlight them. Just in case you are in a nail polish funk...

Pamplona Purple

Great purple shade and this one looks nice on toes too. Manucurist of Seville
It's a great shade of berry.
Ginger Bells
This one is part of the holiday collection this year. I've never been a fan of orange nails but I LOVE this one!

Here is the way it looks on. It's a great fall color. Plus, it's a great name for a polish (says the red head)
Is it weird that I've already picked out my next color that I'll be wearing? (it's called Material Girl from Essie) hee hee. Maybe I'll take a picture of that too.

What is your favorite polish color?

Club Chestnut

On Saturday night I had a birthday party for two friends at my house. We had a great time and it was the first real "party" I've thrown there. It turns out the place is great for parties because people can be in a number of places mingling or dancing. Yep. It was THAT kind of party.

The birthday girls were Alisha and Gillian. They came wearing crowns. Yes, it was THAT kind of party.

The photo highlights:

Cristina & I. She looks super sly. I do not.

My Dad had dropped off some of my boxes from storage the night before and one contained my letter jacket from high school. I decided I would wear it for my guests.
Alisha & I showing off the letter jacket. My classiest moment.

Alisha & I again. We like to take pictures together.

Today is Alisha's actual birthday so I wanted to give her extra shout outs. She's a fantastic friend and I hope that she has a great day today.

And I hope she had fun at her party. Because we really did shut it down at Club Chestnut.

Call Me

Happy Monday!

I had a good weekend. I hosted a party for two of my friends with birthdays coming up this week. It was a great party--lots of funny things that happened. But more on that later.

First I need to tell you all about my new electronic love. As some of you remember I was so excited to get my blackberry this summer. It's worth every penny. Until I moved into my new place. That's right--this part of town is terrible for verizon customers. I was able to get texts and e-mails but I couldn't make a call. So annoying and I didn't realize until I moved in. I certainly didn't want to give up my phone and I definitely didn't want to pay for land line (so 1996). What's a girl on the go to do?

Well, it turns out that verizon makes a network extender. It's kind of like a mini cell tower thing. When I learned of this I knew this was the best option for me. Except that I wasn't crazy about the price tag ($250--yikes) so I spent a good about of time on the phone trying to explain to the verizon peeps that I might need to stop being a customer if I couldn't get the price reduced. Well, they came through for me and offered it to me for $100 if I signed a two year contract. Deal.

I finally got it hooked up this weekend and it's a dream. I went from 2 bars to full service within an hour. It's incredible and completely worth it. Now I don't have to get a land line and I can fully enjoy the blackberry at home. yay!I also wanted to say Happy Anniversary to my friends Courtney & Mark! I hope you had a great day! xoxo.

Snow Kidding.

Have you ever had a moment that you realized how happy you actually are? Like the kind of happy that makes you smile randomly when you are all alone? That's how I felt this afternoon as I took my walk. It's a nice feeling.

Not that the weather had anything to do with it this morning. There was a dusting of snow on the ground when I woke up. Not cool. It's October. Boo to that.

It turned out to be a chilly but beautiful day. Nothing really special happened today. It's just been a good day.

Maybe because I am now the owner of my car. I love the Civic. It's a great car and I love that it's mine. Officially.

Tonight I came home from work and have been completely relaxing. This is a rare occurrence these days. In fact I'm about to curl up on the couch with a blanket and watch Practical Magic. I'll probably fall asleep. It may sound lame for a Friday night but it's exactly what I need tonight. It makes me, well, happy.

Have a great weekend!

Is This Thing On?

I can't believe it's been so long since I have even opened my blog to look at it. I can only say that life has just kind of happened the last month. It's been great, busy, confusing, fun, busy, overwhelming, exciting...

But I've missed this. So I'm back. I can't promise I'll write every day but I will not neglect this for as long as I have this time.

Anyway, I know some of you have been asking about my new apartment. It's taken forever to get settled. I still have a lot of work to do but at least now I can feel more organized in general. I'll give you a little tour.

The back door (attached to the deck) The house is barn red.

I just painted this chair for the porch. I'm going to put a plant in the seat. Cute right?This is the divider between the living room and the kitchen. This is the "weird room area" It's now going to be the office/library. It needs new paint and some other things but it's going to be cute when it's done. And the guest bathroom is right next to it.
The Weird Room features a built in desk area. Right now it's holding my computer because I don't have the wireless hooked up yet. There is also a built in cabinet with drawers that I'm storing linens in.
This is the entry way to the living room. I love this with the built in cabinets.This is the foyer. I haven't decided on window treatments yet.

The front door that leads out to the porch area. The porch is enclosed but it's not so cute yet. I'm using it for storage for now.

The desk in the foyer. This is the view from outside my bedroom. The Paris picture is from when I went there in 11th grade. It's one of my favorite things.This is my bedroom. Again, needs curtains but haven't found the ones I want.

I really love the built in cabinets everywhere.

And finally, the doors to the guest room/craft room and the accessories closet. I haven't finished these rooms yet. I hope to soon. Stay tuned for that. So that's that on the home front. I'm glad to be back and don't worry--I won't stay away as long.

Happy Fall to you all--it's my favorite time of the year!

Oh, and Pumpkin coffee is back--spread the word.