Monday, December 13, 2010

Back in Action

I'm officially a slacker! UGH...I'm sorry. My college roommate called me yesterday and said, "Cait, you need to blog." She was so right. This past week and weekend were so busy that I put aside blogging for a while, but I am officially back in action. I promise.

This past weekend I traveled to PA to spend some time with my family, since Jeff has 5 finals this week and needed to study. I am a distraction. Despite the awful 4 hour drive by myself, I had a great time! And I finished ALL of my Christmas shopping.

Jeff and I are way ahead of the game this year. We mailed our Christmas cards out last week, finished shopping and even wrapped all of the gifts. I guess we just have a lot of Christmas spirit this year! I got home last night around 7:30 and spent the next few hours wrapping presents with Jeff. Actually, I confess that I only wrapped one. Jeff was much better, so I just decorated the gifts with pretty bows and ribbons after ward!

Here Jeff is, wrapping away!


I love the wrapping paper we got this year :) So bright and fun!



These are some of the gifts I put together for the kids I nanny for and the little boys that live next door to us. The Christmas Tree Shop has great (and cheap) gifts to make baggies for kids!


I was going to make a holiday treat today since I missed Friday (I was traveling), but I decided to take a more healthy route. I actually wasn't in the mood for cookies and of course if I make them, I have to eat and enjoy a few! So, tomorrow cookies will be made. And today? Today roasted brussel sprouts and sweet potatoes were made.

First, peel & cut the sweet potato.


Then, cut the brussel sprouts in half and season them and the potatoes with a little olive oil, salt and pepper. Place in the oven at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes.


After 45 minutes, they should look like this! Perfectly roasted brussel sprouts and soft sweet potatoes (oh so good and healthy on a cold day).


This is a great lunch option or side dish for a dinner. The prep is easy and although it does take a little while to cook, the end result is worth it!

I'm going to relax a bit before getting the kids off the bus, then off to the gym and home to make spaghetti and meat balls for my hubby since he hasn't had a home cooked meal all weekend! Hope you are having a great day.

Question of the day: What kind of holiday cookie is your favorite? Have any recipes that you have seen but haven't made yet that I should try for tomorrow? I have a few ideas but others are always welcome....

1 comments:

Katie @ Loves of Life said... Best Blogger Tips

hey! Your blog is really cute and I just saw you're on the food buzz (via your facebook)--so congrats ;)

Do you know about insidebrucrewlife.blogspot.com??

She is a friend of mine (via blog world) and she creates her own FANTASTIC treats and takes gorgeous pictures too (and runs a very successful headband etsy shop like moi)---you might like her! Her name is Jocelyn and she's a sweetie.

Secondly, I was looking around your blog and saw you often reply to people in the comments. Maybe you know this already but it's pretty unlikely that most people are seeing your responses to them if thats the only way you are replying to them. Just because most people follow multiple blogs (like, I read about 80-100) and don't even remember to go back and check to see if anyone replied to them on the comments section. If that makes sense?

Most people SHOULD have their email attached to their comment (when it hits your inbox) and typically you can just hit reply and write them back and it goes to their inbox. That is, of course it says "no reply @ blogger) which then means they didn't set up their email.

(and sorry this is so long)--

but to make sure your email is attached its under your dashboard, then edit profile, then add your email and click the button to enable or allow your email to be seen. Hope that makes sense :)

Now, once you start getting a huge following of people and your rankings are way up there, people will come back to comment sections to check if you replied, etc...thats how the big, BIG time bloggers do it (like the ones with millions of hits a day)--

I just thought that was a helpful tip (or freaking huge book i wrote you) so people know you are responding even if they don't come back and check the comments again.

Anyway--I hope that's somewhat helpful. And heck, maybe you're already doing that.

You've done a beautiful job :)

by the way, you know about google analytics right?? To track your hits and all? And you can also for a quick "idea" of your website ranking can use a website like alexa.com to see how your site is doing. Its fun to watch the number go down as your blog gets more traffic.

If you want anymore details on any of them, you can email me or write me on facebook ;)

 
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