Wednesday, September 28, 2011

A long time coming

Well folks, it's been a week and a half since I posted last. Last week, I worked my first overtime shift ever. It wasn't bad, but the difference between working 3 12-hour days and 4 is drastic. It only makes it worse that my 4th shift was on Saturday (the day of the Arkansas game!). I fortunately got off work early due to a low census and watched the 2nd half of the game at home (while Joseph was AT the game:) - I was jealous!). Needless to say, 4 days of work is exhausting! We shall see if it is worth it when I get paid on Friday. 

Now...on to other things. When I started this blog a few weeks ago, I wanted to let our friends and family know about our life together so far, so it is only appropriate to now show some pictures of our apartment! Be warned that not everything is clean, and I do not like cleaning...so if you ever come over it's probably going to be messy. Anyway, on to the pictures...



This is the couch (and loveseat  - below) that Joseph's great aunt and uncle graciously gave us. They needed a little bit of coordinating color to make them work with the room, but that's where the pillows and painting come in! I'm actually thinking about changing it up a little bit possibly in the spring with some blue pillows and a different wall hanging to make the orange less dominant in the room...but we'll see!



...and this is what the loveseat normally looks like. Pretty, huh? Haha. This is where I usually put clean laundry when I'm too lazy to put it up, then I have to work and it gets put off for a few days. That will all change later today, though! 


This is the wall across from our couches. You can't see it, but there's a wood-burning fireplace below the pictures!! We cannot wait to use it, and Joseph has already been chopping wood for it. The painting in the middle is a beautiful one that my mom's good friend from church did for us. She took our wedding invitation and put in on the canvas, then painted on and around it! What a great way to keepsake your invitation! I might try this as wedding gifts for friends. 


  
The perfect little corner that houses our tv and tv stand.
 

 The hallway before you get to the living room. Here hangs our beautiful sign that Liz Shults made. She also has a wonderful blog that you should check out here.

 

 Ahh...the bedroom. This has been a source of stress for me as far as decorating goes. I do not know what to put on the wall above our bed, and I'm just not the most creative person, so I've done other things to get my mind off these blank walls.


The bed frame, on the other hand, is my favorite part of the room. Why? you ask? because Joseph and his great uncle secretly made it as my wedding present. It's amazing! 



The bed itself, which is now covered with my quilt I used on my bed in college (bought at Dirt Cheap in Tuscaloosa, great find) will soon be covered with this beautiful duvet from Pottery Barn, thanks to a great wedding gift certificate! 

 

 Here is the wall across from the bed. It houses my vanity, and the dresser and TV. I plan to have this be the wall of pictures, I just haven't accumulated enough picture frames yet! 




 The wall leading to the bathroom is the only one that is finished. This initial was made by my good friend, Katherine for our engagement party! I got the frame from the Habitat for Humanity ReStore, which you should all check out. 

So that is all I will show you for now. The rest of the apartment is too dirty for anyone's eyes to see. I cannot wait to get our new duvet cover in the mail, which I just ordered today. I will update all of you once we finish decorating the bedroom! 

Enjoy your hump-day! 

Abby 




Sunday, September 18, 2011

The best chicken I have EVER tasted!

So I lied. Joseph just cooked dinner and I HAD to share it...


Yea. Doesn't it look delicious? Like something you would order from some hole-in-the-wall diner that just happened to serve the best chicken fingers you have EVER eaten? Well ladies and gents, you can make your VERY OWN best chicken fingers. It's easy. 

All you need is a hot pot with a good amount of vegetable oil. Get it hot enough to boil and continue...

1. Grab some chicken fingers out of the fridge

2. Put some all purpose flour in a bowl, and sprinkle with Tony's seasoning, hot sauce, garlic powder, and salt (just a little) 

3. Lightly dredge chicken in flour mixture 

4. Pop chicken fingers into hot oil (a few at a time) and watch them turn golden. 

5. Remove chicken from oil and place on plate covered with a paper towel. Make sure chicken is cooked to at least 155 degrees. 

6. Enjoy, preferably with some veggies to make yourself feel better. At least that's what we did! 


Happy Joseph enjoying his creation! 



Such a yummy dinner ...


Happy clean plate! 

Until next time, eat to your hearts content! 

Abby 


Meal planning, an art.

First of all, I would like to say I have decided to start a tradition. I will be posting twice a week in order to NOT overwhelm myself with blogging. 

That said, I have been trying to plan meals for Joseph and I while also saving money at the grocery store. I tried using coupons, but I was not dedicated enough to save much money. Since I do not have a whole lot of free time, I have decided to shop at Aldi and Publix (Aldi is great for produce and the essentials, while I shop the sales at Publix weekly.) If anyone else has ideas about how to shop smartly, let me know! 

So, as far as meals for the next few weeks, I have come up with a list of recipes I am using, and then we can choose what we want to eat each night. Previously, I made a weekly menu with a certain food for each night, but it got confusing and we ended up not following the meal plan. Since we have a handy chalkboard on our pantry door, I am using that to write all of the choices down and cross them off as we eat each meal. 


Here is a close up of our menu for the next two weeks...we will have leftovers some nights...


...and a view from our dining room. 

As for the recipes, Pinterest has been my best friend since we got married. It is great to find recipes from blogs and friends. I enjoy tweaking the ingredients to things that we have in the apartment already if we're running low on food. I would also like to share a few of my favorite recipes with y'all so far....

We tried this for a dinner party paired with asparagus and it was a hit! 

This is a healthier version of the chili we all love. AND it tastes GREAT! I made a whole crockpot full and put some in the freezer for a night when I don't want to cook. 

This was great to make ahead of time and get Joseph to pop it in the oven on my way home from work one night....and DELICIOUS! One of his friends came over for dinner and really enjoyed it! 

These are great! I am loving everything I make from dashingdish.com! This recipe was so easy and I already had everything to make it in my fridge. She also makes some Great Chicken Enchilada pockets that I have yet to try. 

That is all I have so far, but I would like to add that without the internet, I would probably be failing as a cook. I would also say that whenever I am too tired or can't think of anything to cook, my wonderful husband usually comes up with something AWESOME! 

Ta Ta for now! 

Abby



Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Going back in time...

So it was only three months ago that Joseph and I got married. Wow! What an awesome 3 months it has been! We've moved into our apartment, I started my job the day after we got back from the honeymoon, and Joseph finished his internship with the youth group. Now Joseph is into his first week at his NEW job (yay!), and I feel like reminiscing about our wedding day. 

Just so all of you know, the amazing Camille Beasley of SCB photography took all of our photos, from engagement pics, to the whole wedding day. Now that she is a travel nurse, we miss having her around, but we love looking at the pictures of our wonderful first day as a married couple together. 

Here are a few of our favorites....


getting ready!


seeing each other before the wedding....it was surreal


hugging my dad - this was when i teared up!


my girls! 


the whole wedding party...they do a pretty good job of acting goofy, don't they? 


the guys - of course they had to be cool.


Joseph's family 


My family 


THE KISS


The awesome venue for our reception - The Loft at Flower Stems


After cutting the cake and toasting...haha 


first dance to Coldplay's "Til Kingdom Come"


Dancing forever! So much fun! 


My lovely bridesmaid, Erin, who caught the bouquet


Groomsman, Will, who caught the garter


Leaving in our london taxi cab! 

So all in all, it was the best day of our lives so far. I'm sure there are many better days to come as our family learns and grows, but we will remember our wedding day FOREVER! O I almost forgot...


This is the night before the wedding, when Joseph's groomsmen put an actual ball and chain on his ankle. He had to go to Lowe's the morning of the wedding to get it cut off his leg....HILARIOUS! 




Sunday, September 11, 2011

Our Very FIRST blog post!

Well hello there! So I was sitting in our living room watching none other than Food Network (I know, the BEST channel EVER), and immediately needed something to do. This is the life of a type A personality. I can't even watch TV without doing something else too. I got bored with facebook, then looked to pinterest to find some new books to read or recipes to fit my fancy. Once my mind was bored, I looked to the blogs I normally read, and thought to myself, "I wonder if I could do this thing called blogging..." Of course I began to construct this blog, and hopefully friends and family will enjoy being updated with the exciting life of the Randalls.

For those of you that do not know, I (Abby) am a nurse at UAB Hospital. My husband (Joseph) just found out he got a job (YAY!) at a local law firm as an office assistant/runner. He starts his job tomorrow, and is very excited that he no longer has to be a house husband (his nickname for the past month). We have been married for 3 months today, and are more in love than ever. Being an adult is hard, and it is even harder being two stubborn people, but we become closer every day through all the decisions we have to make as a family.

So let this be the beginning of a long, happy blogging life!

Enjoy