Before February...

Before another month goes by I wanted to post a quick sneak peek of Christmas dinner.
I made sweet and spicy pecans. The recipe is from 1001 Ways to Cook Southern from Southern Living. My MIL gave it to me for Christmas, and I can tell it will be a great resource.
I set the table with my blue Spode. I love it.
And the cake was from a neighborhood bakery. I even stood in line with a famous actor when I picked it up!
We had a nice day at home and had friends over for dinner. It was a great day!
Now...we just have to make it through these next few winter months! Thankfully it's been pretty mild so far (except its in the teens this morning!). I already can't wait until Spring!!!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

From our family to yours! (A little late)

Christmas...

I'm finally going to blog our Christmas decor this year!  Better late than never, right?!  At least it's before Christmas!

 We have the largest tree we've ever had this year!

 I wanted to add a little something else, since I don't really have enough ornaments for such a large tree, so I went out in search of white branches and I found them for $2 a bunch!  I stuck them all throughout the tree, and I really love the look!

 Our stockings...Ryan, Susy, & Darby

 I used greenery from the tree to decorate the chandelier in the kitchen.

 The nativity from my parents.  It was made by a man that does pottery in Arkansas.

 I have garland over the doors in the kitchen.

 I got these great pinecone ornaments from our favorite store in Brooklyn for just $1 a piece!!  They were a great on sale find!  I bought a ton of them.

 I have my grandmother's old tree and my Christmas card wreath in the Butler's pantry.

 I even put decorations in the bedroom this year!  This is hanging from our mediocre light fixture (it's better than what was there!).

 And I added a little touch to the bedside lamps.

That's it for this year!  I hope you have a wonderful holiday season!  So far our's has been great!  I can't wait for Christmas this weekend!!!

Thanksgiving

Ok...so I'm a little late posting about Thanksgiving, but that's ok.

I went down to Arkansas for Thanksgiving this year.  This is the first time in 6 (or 7?) years that we haven't been in NYC for Thanksgiving.  We always have a great time spending it here, and since we usually go somewhere for Christmas, it just makes sense for us.  But this year, we decided since it had been such a long time since I had been home, we would go for Thanksgiving.  We plan on spending Christmas here, just the two of us, and I honestly can't wait.  Sometimes it's nice to have a quiet holiday with just us.  I think we have to remember sometimes that we are our own little family, and we can start establishing traditions and have just as much fun.

We left on Wednesday, landed in Little Rock, and immediately met my aunt and cousins at Big Orange (very yummy!) for lunch.  My mom, aunt, cousins, and I were going to watch Breaking Dawn together after lunch, so Ryan met up with our friend to catch up so he didn't have to suffer through it. :)  Also, during this time we were trying to locate our luggage.  They forced us to gate check our bags in Newark because they said they were out of overhead space, and when we got on the plane the overheads were empty.  We had a very short layover, and our flight was slightly delayed, so we knew our bags might not make it.  Anyway, long story short, my bag ended up in Virginia, Ryan's came to Little Rock, and I got my back the night before we left.  US Airways is not on my good side right now.

So....we saw the movie, picked up Ryan's bag, got dinner, then headed home, 2.5hrs south.  It was so great spending time with my aunts, uncles, and cousins that I don't see that often.  My cousins kids, who don't see me that often, thankfully warmed up to me, and I loved playing with them, driving the oldest to Sonic (per his request...but of course I was happy to oblige), and snuggling.  I'm pretty certain I got a bad cold from the youngest, who is 2.  He was being adorable and gave me a kiss, then when I stood up, he grabbed my legs and gave me the biggest squeeze.  I knew I probably just contracted the cold he had, but since my heart had just melted into a puddle on the floor I didn't really care!

We of course watched the big game on Friday (AR vs LSU).  It didn't go our way, but we knew it would be hard.  LSU is so good this year...I hope they win the National title.  I can't believe I'm saying that, but it would be nice to see.

We all spent time together, then we drove back to Little Rock to have another meal with some other extended family.  It was so great seeing all of them as well.  I can't believe it's been years since I've seen some of my family.  We enjoyed a very good meal there, then came home.

The next time I'm in Little Rock, I plan on meeting up with some of my friends and internet friends.  I feel like I have to switch off seeing friends and family, and this was a family trip...but I miss my friends too!

We got to enjoy our Sunday back in NY, then it was back to the grindstone.  Today I finished all of my Christmas decorations.  I'm sure I'll take pictures and post those soon.  We have the biggest tree we've ever had this year!

I hope your Christmas season is starting out great!

If I had a wedding...

When we were at the very cool cookbook shop in New Orleans last weekend, I was looking for any cookbooks that I had any sort of familiarity with.  They didn't have an Arkansas section, sadly, but I still looked around.  Then I saw this:

I immediately recognized the little church on the cover.  Why?  Because I have this at home:

Growing up we would go to Gulf Shores, AL every year for vacation.  Sometimes we took the scenic route and went through Fairhope and Point Clear.  We always drove by this pretty little church.  It's right along the bay, with beautiful, huge trees lining the road with Spanish moss hanging down.  I always said if I had a wedding, it would be there!  The summer that we were engaged, my mom stopped and took these pictures for me...probably trying to tempt me to get started on wedding plans (little did she know...it was already planned!).

I didn't buy the church cookbook, but I probably should have.  They are always the best...the classic church lady recipes are tried and true!

I thought it was so funny that I immediately recognized that little church on the cover.  Some things you just don't forget...now if I could only remember to pick up my dry cleaning or to buy milk at the grocery store!

Crazy Girl

This is Darby in the hallway outside of our apartment.  She gets like this after her walks, before she eats.  She gets pretty excited about eating!

Nope...she's not done yet...

Can you believe she is 7?!  We kept waiting for her to calm down...but obviously this is as calm as she is going to get!  Love this girl!

New Orleans!

Two years ago, our friends, Dino and Monica, went to New Orleans for Halloween.  They invited us, and we didn't go.  We have been regretting it ever since.  So this year, we mentioned it to them, they were on board, and we booked our trips!  Despite growing up just a few hours from NOLA, I had never been, so I was very excited about this trip!  I grew up eating a lot of cajun food and seafood from the gulf, so I knew I would be right at home with the food!
I don't have many pics of our first day because I didn't carry around the camera, but I got this on of our first night on my phone...

Ryan at The Sazerac Bar at the Roosevelt Hotel.  This is where they invented the Sazerac drink, apparently. He was a happy man.  It was a great bar.  Very fancy.

The next morning at the famous Cafe Du Monde.

Before

After.

My first experience with beignets.  Oh my word.  I made sure we went back the next day!

 I loved New Orleans.  We stayed in the French Quarter, and it's so beautiful.

 We ventured over to the Garden District and visited Lafayette Cemetery.  It was a little eerie, but I thought it was kind of beautiful.

This tomb, with the fancy ironwork is known as LeStat's tomb...the character in the Anne Rice novels.

We had a fabulous lunch at the Columns Hotel.

I had a shrimp po' boy.  Yum!

 I LOVED the homes in the Garden District.  Walking around here was really the only thing on my to do list....everything else was just extra!

This is the house from Benjamin Button.

Most visitors of this intersection are here to see this house (above).  This is Anne Rice's former home.  But...

I wanted to see THIS house right across the street!  This is Julia Reed's House on First Street.  I love Julia Reed, and I couldn't wait to see the house I had read a whole book about!  I'm pretty sure I saw John (her husband) getting out of his car as we approached the house, but I was trying to play it cool.  The New Yorker in me was calm...while the Southern girl in me wanted to jump up and down. :)

 These are my dream homes.  I love them.

 On Saturday, it was snowing in NY...the ground was white where we were from the all of the powdered sugar on the beignets.  And in October, that's how it should be!

We enjoyed our donuts and coffee on the river on Saturday.

We saw the Natchez river boat leave the dock.

 And Ryan got a $10 shoe shine from a hustler. :)

 The boys sitting on a fountain in the sun...looking at their phones, of course.

 We went into an AMAZING bookstore.  They had so many cookbooks.  I wanted this one signed by Julia and Paul Child...but it was a little over my allotted vacation budget.

 If you are ever in New Orleans...visit this shop.  You will love it.

After shopping for cookbooks, we stopped for a snack.  We LOVE raw oysters.  These were wonderful.  We made our own cocktail sauce, and the horseradish was SPICY!  Just looking at this picture makes me want more!  Sidenote:  We had our oysters at Felix's.  According to Julia Reed, you either eat your oysters at Felix's or Acme, but never both.  We chose Felix's because Acme, which is across the street, is very touristy and was crowded.

I just love the architecture.

This was my Halloween costume of choice.  Sookie from True Blood.  The author of the books happens to live in my hometown, and since I was in Louisiana, I thought it was appropriate.  It also required very few props and crazy attire.  Please note the bite mark and blood on the neck.  That was hard to accomplish with the very runny fake blood I got, but with a little help from the hair dryer, I got it to work.

We went on a vampire tour around the French Quarter, then we walked around a little.

Bourbon Street on Halloween was a little crazy.  As we were walking around, we walked by a bar with a really great band playing, and the hostess said we could go up to the balcony.  I thought you had to be someone special to be up on the balconies, but apparently not.  Or maybe she just thought we were special?

We enjoyed the view from up here much more than down on the street!  It was fun just people watching and seeing the sometimes very elaborate costumes.  We really didn't really participate in the shenanigans going on that night, but it was still lots of fun just to observe!

It was such a WONDERFUL trip!  It was just what we needed!  It was so relaxing...we ate, had a cocktail, walked around, and repeated that about 4-5 times a day!  We didn't really eat 3 meals a day...more like 4 or 5!  the food was spectacular and the atmosphere of New Orleans was so great!  I can't wait to go back!