ASHEVILLE!

So, today was the shopping trip to Asheville. I know I said this before, but I just love this place! it just has sooo much character, and is not a bad drive either (about 45 minutes), so i always try to go up just to walk around and spend the day whenever I get the chance. There are also some pretty cool restaurants down there too. Rachel Ray even went there on one of her shows! Of course, my mom is not so into trying new foods, so she opted for the food court. I got subway. Its always disappointing to eat at some crappy place when you know there are all these awesome restaurants just up the street! oh well, I like to come here with more adventerous people most of the time! haha.
The car ride was a blast though! I downloaded Kanye Wets's new CD, and I have been OBSSESSED! my favorite song on the whole CD is "paranoid"...its just soooo catchy! I think I listened to it about 10 times on the way up there, and insisted that everyone else agree on its awesomeness as well.
Role Call! Here are my sisters Kelli and Tatum holding it down in the backseat....
Here is my mom, EL CAPITAN...haha she cant even look at the camera she is soooo in the zone with her driving! Just look at that face! soo serious!
And me in the wing man's seat. Dont mind the HUGE sun glasses, my other ones where MIA.
ANNNDD Kelly again...not too amused by the 100th listen of Kanye!

And here is Kelly and I when we finally made it...we are ready to shop!
We Spent most of the day shopping around...i got two shirts, 2 pairs of earrings and 2 necklaces, and a pair of shoes! We got home about 5 and my mom dropped me off at my house. I hung around a little bit and then made dinner, shrimp stir-fry noodles and another one of my mean salads!

Wheew! it has been a looong day! shopping really wears you out, im tellin ya! Goodnight!

Shopping!

Looking forward to things is half the pleasure of them.

- Lucy Mand Montgomery

I have definately been looking forward to this shopping trip with my mom for a long time. First of all, I love asheville...its one of my very favorite places to shop, eat, hang out, etc. It just has such a laid back, cool vibe about it. It also has a HUGE music scene, and I saw my favorite band, Mates of State, there as well. Check them out, if you have never heard them. its worth it I promise!
Anyway, just to give you idea as to just how CUTE Asheville is, check out this picture...

It has a small town feel, but its a pretty big city! If you ever get the chance I would highly recommend a visit. Ok, this is going to have to be a quick-y post because my mom is due to pick me up any second! we like to get an early start to our shopping! Here is my breakfast (the usual) cottage cheese and toast with jelly. Ok nevermind, the picture is having trouble uploading...ill be back later with another post later on tonight!
See ya lata!

Movies, Lunch, Marathons!

Well, today ended up being a pretty busy day! I had errands that I needed to run before meeting my parents for movie number 3 this week! I swear, I never go to see movies, but with the break for the holidays and such, I have seen soooo many. We saw Valkyrie this time. It was pretty good, but my least favorite of the three that I have seen this week. I am just not a fan of Tom Cruise! Anyway, I didnt end up coming home to eat lunch until after three! I was starving, so i made up a quick sandwich. Now, i may not be much of a cook, but there are two things that i make pretty well and that is a sandwich and a salad! aha...maybe I need to work on my cooking skills a little more. So here is my lunch:
It consists of hummus, turkey, spinach, and tomatoes...grilled! its sooo yummy.
And for dinner I had the other thing that I can make up pretty mean like! haha. A salad!
I went to the grocery store and got all the veggies that i needed!...this one has five different lettuces, broccoli, cauliflower, cucumebers, and tomatoes. I think it pretty "veggie filled".
oh yeah, and one more thing that im pretty excited about, I went to the grocery store earlier, like i said...and i decided to spluge on some goooood peanut butter!
Peanut Butter and Co. Cinnamon Raisin Swirl! I cant wait to try it! I mean, $5 a pop is a little pricey for my budget, but I just couldnt resist this time. It better be worth it!
One more exciting thing that i did today was register for my first marathon...its a 10K in March, so I am going to start training for it ASAP! Im excited, its something that I have always wanted to do. Wish me luck...and give me tips!
Well, tomorrow is Asheville shoppin!!! I cant wait. My mom and I are leaving early, so im calling it a night. Goodnight everyone!

Cute Overload

Well, I finally got the internet back! It has been off for the whole weekend!!! whew, it was rough! so now im sitting here catching up on a whole weekends worth of blogs. SO, i suppose I will update everyone on MY weekend. I know your all just dying to hear about it! lol.
Of course I had to work at the mall A TON! the mall was INSANE i have never seen so many people (and so many rude people) at one time! I guess everyone wants to spend their Christmas money right away! I havent even had time to spend any of my money! Im pretty sure that my mom and i are taking a trip to asheville, nc tomorrow to do some shopping. I love asheville, its such a cute little town and has alot of little shops with unique things. Im gonna try to get some pictures tomorrow to put up so everyone can see the cuteness that is Asheville, NC.
I also saw two movies this weekend! I never really get to see movies, so its really strange that I saw two in a row...and then I might go see another one today! Anyway, I saw Yes Man with my sisters, it was pretty funny and then I saw Seven Lbs. with my friends. It was pretty good as well, I would recommend both.
Also, this weekend my friend Jenny had a birthday dinner at Olive Garden. Her and her boyfriend are having a baby, and i think they may be up there with Asheville on the cuteness scale. Here she is with her boyfriend Chris.
I just love her, she is one of my favorite people in the whole world! And she is soooo interesting! She is moving back to Korea, where her parents live, in a few months. : (. She can speak AND write Korean, and also cooks some AMAZING Korean food!
Another one of my cute friends is Tina, I went out with her this weekend too...she is always a blast to hang out with!

Night Number One:

Night Number Two:

Ok I will leave you with just ONE MORE CUTE THING...its my "teacher bag" that Mike gave me for my graduation. I kept saying that I wanted a bag to carry my books in that was really "teacher-y" and cheesy! haha...I think he nailed it, for sure! He even got my teacher name, Miss Emily, printed on it!!
pretty awesome huh?! Alright, off to run some errands and play a little catch up! Talk to you later!

Merry Christmas!!

well...Santa really made a mess of those cookies! How RUDE!...oh well, at least he left us some pretty nice gifts :).

As i mentioned before the stockings are my favorite part about Christmas morning...its just so fun seeing all the little practical trinkets! haha. Here are the stocking hanging on the mantel...and then the contents of my stocking!

See I told you it was all "practical" stuff!...My stocking contained lotion, gum and mints, a toothbrush, deodorant, a finger nail file, chap stick, and movie tickets (because my sisters and I always go see a movie on Christmas morning).

After we opened our stockings we moved on to the presents! We always pass them out and then go from youngest to oldest taking turns opening them one by one!...it lasts longer this way.
After we opened presents, my mom (of course) cooked a HUGE breakfast! My sisters and I always get mad at her because she never can just make one main thing...she has to cook EVERYTHING!! This morning she made hashbrown casserole, egg quiche, GIANT cinnamon rolls, bacon, and sausage!!! I think she is crazy...but its GOOD! Here she is cooking the cinnamon rolls...what'd I tell ya...crazy right?! haha j/k
And I of course had to start the morning off right with some coffee...in a festive mug!

I was trying to take it easy on the breakfast because my mom is cooking a big lunch/dinner as well...and I think I'm a little more excited about that then I was about the breakfast. Here is my plate of homemade breakfast goodness:
I skipped on the cinnamon rolls because, like I said I was trying to go easy!...I need get a pretty big portion of hashbrown casserole...and may or may not have gone back for seconds ;). A pieace of the egg quiche, and some sausage. Now whats for lunch?! haha. I'll be back with that one a little later! hope everyone is having a merry christmas!!

Secret Sisterly Santas

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVE!!

Hey everyone! I hope everyone is having a great Christmas eve! I know it looks like everyone is from all of the posts I have seen! Christmas eve was very different this year, because a lot of my family is gone now, so a lot of the old traditions have kind of left with them too. its sad, but we hope to start many new traditions of our own. One of the traditions that we recently started is the "Secret Sisterly Santas" (cute name huh?!)...anyways I have three sisters, so we each draw a name of one sister and get that sister a surprise gift. we always open the gifts of Christmas eve. this year I got my sister a necklace and i recieved a pretty awesome pair of boots from my sister, Allie. Here is a picture of all of us.

From left to right is Kelly, Allie, and Me and then in the middle is Tatum.

Here is a picture of my sister opening the gift that I got for her...i think she liked it! haha
And here is me opening my gift...

My sister, Allie and I...

Another tradition that we do is make cookies for santa...here is our plate of lovely cookies that santa will devour when he comes to leave us presents tonight!
Well, I think thats about it for the celebrations tonight...its sure to be an early morning. Im staying at my parents house with all of my family, and my little sister usually wakes up at 6 A.M.!! haha...I really think that my favorite part of christmas morning is looking in the stocking! its just always fun to get little trinkets that my mom stuffs in there! haha

What is your favorite part of Christmas morning?!

IM BACK!

Well, Im finally back from my trip to CALIFORNIA! Above is a picture of me doing cart wheels on the beach, you just cant go to the beach without doing cart wheels! haha. it was alot of fun and Mike was a great host! We went to L.A., Hollywood, and San Francisco, so I got to see ALOT!! No celebrities, though. :(
I also think that during the time that I was gone i forgot how to use a computer because I have tried several times to make a post about my trip and it just has not worked! Im getting very frustrated!! So, I did have a ton of pictures on here to show you, but now Im a little pressed for time, so here are just a few...ill probably post more later

The Golden Gate Bridge

A Robot Man at the Fisherman's Warf

Venice Beach

Mike and I in San Francisco...isnt he cute?!

Mike and I on the beach

Ok, thats it for now...I have a ton more, so I will definately post some later. Right now I am about to head out the door to finish up my christmas shopping in Asheville, sc.
Talk to you soon!

DOGS!

So i was sitting at my computer earlier and just realized that my dogs are pretty funny, if you are not used to them! first of all they both weigh about 200lbs. and are VERY lazy. so, of course I had to take a picture to share with everyone the humor.

Here they are laying by the door (their usual spot) Riley is a German Shepard and Rhett is a Great Pieranese.

And here is Riley laying by the other door now...OH WAIT!! I think he hears something!
haha. Ok moving on. I took a picture of my breakfast this morning, but I accidentally deleted it before I uploaded it to my computer. This is gonna take some getting used to! I just had the same breakfast anyways (Im trying to eat all my cottage cheese before I leave for California) Then for lunch my mom and I ate at Jason's Deli. I had the turkey slimwhich with a side of fruit.
I did manage to get a picture of my dinner...just look at this wonderful salad! YUM!
Its a spinach salad LOADED with veggies. It has broccoli, cauliflower, mushrooms, celery, and cherry tomatoes. I LOVE vegetables so with this salad I also had some broccoli, cauliflower, and carrots topped with low fat cheese. I felt like it needed to be rounded out a little bit more so I added some crackers and a tangerine as well.

I feel like I still have SO much work to do before I leave on Thursday. I really only have tomorrow to get everything packed and ready to go! On top of all that I still have a few finishing touches left to take of for school and then a closing celebration at my supervisors house to turn it all in. can we say stressed?! Im going to get started on what I can tonight so I wont have as much to do in the morning, but its already 1115, so i dont know how much I will really get done before Im ready to call it a night!
well, I better get started! wish me luck! I hope everyone has a wonderful night :)

I love sushi!

Tonight was so much fun! me and three other of the girls that I have gone all through college with went out for a celebratory dinner. we decided to get all dressed up and I convinced everyone to go to my favorite sushi place, stir-fry. None of them had ever been there! I just love it!
I was the only one that had sushi though (it is so hard to find people around here that are adventurous enough to try sushi) but it is my personal theory that someone who says they dont like sushi is someone who has never tried it! its just soooo good! I have lready been promised a nice sushi dinner one night while i am in California! I didnt get pictures of the food...I feel a little embarrassed about taking pictures of food in front of other people. Did anyone else feel this way when they started thier blog?! Anyways I ordered a plain tuna roll that looked a little like this:

http://img.timeinc.net/time/daily/2008/0801/tuna_sushi_0123.jpg

AND a Spider Roll that looked a little like this:

http://www.foodiebytes.com/img/iotd/spiderroll.jpg

And of course I HAD to get my favorite drink that they make there, I have never seen it anywhere else, so I always have to get it whenever I go, its called a FLIRTINI...yum yum yum!!
I talked it up so much that all the other girls HAD to try it too! Here is Crystal with her flirtini:
ANDDDD I think she liked it!
Here is Jessica, she has been the BIGGEST support throughout my entire student teaching, definitely a shoulder to cry on! and she is getting married after graduation! I just love this girl:
And here is jessica and I together, everyone always got us mixed up in class! I dont know if I really see it, maybe a small resemblance?! haha. Never mind the fact that we are wearing almost IDENTICAL outifts!!
It was a very nice dinner and I am sad that I will not have class with these girls anymore, but I know we will stay in touch.

Currently I am watching one of my FAVE channels, FOOD NETWORK! It may be kinda sad that I can name almost everyone of the "celebrities" on this channel. Diner, Drive-ins, and Dives just ended and now I am watching Good Eats! LOVE me some Alton Brown. I loved that other show that he did, dining on asphalt.
Anyway, I think im rambling, I have a BIG day tomorrow (getting all my school work wrapped up and getting things together for my trip) and I have to get up pretty early to get it all started, so I better hit the hay!
GOODNIGHT!

Student Teaching Celebration

OK i was going to say that i think this may be the last celebration for the end of student teaching, but my supervisor is having a get together on Wednesday to wrap everything up. Nothing big but she is calling it a "celebration". haha.
I woke up really late today (and by late I mean 9 a.m.) I just cant really sleep in too much since im so used to getting up at 530 every morning, and I really dont enjoy sleeping in, I always feel like there are things I need to be doing besides sleeping! I told the BF that im so A.D.D. i cant even sleep! anyways because i slept in a little i had a late breakfast (same as yesterdays) and then went shopping for a dress for tonight. The three other girls that were student teaching in my school are going out to a really nice dinner at my favorite sushi resturuant Stir-fry. By the time I got home from shopping it was already 4 oclock! i knew we were having dinner at 7, so i just made a small snack plate to hold me over...i didnt want to riun my appetite for SUSHI!!
I ate a little of it before i took the picture! haha...its just wheat bread with deli pepperjack cheese, celery sticks with salsa, some cherry tomatoes, and an apple.
im sure i will have plenty of pictures from tonight, so i will re-post later!
Hope everyone had a good Monday!

Celebrate good times...

This weekend has been full of celebrations, since I am graduating!!
It has been fun but I am definitely ready to get back into a normal routine, clean the house, and start planning out the things i need to do for my trip. i really need to start thinking about what i need to pack, because as of right now i have absolutely NO clue.
Here is a picture re-cap of the weekend:
I always get such a serious face when I take pictures. haha (im the one on the left, by the way). This is my best friend brittani in the picture with me, she has pretty much celebrated with me 24/7 this weekend, and she is the BESTEST!
And here we are on night #2 of graduation celebration:
And I just thought this picture was funny, its brittani telling me that if I talk to a certain guy tonight she will not be a happy person! haha

In other news, i did get a new camera and im so excited about it! its a cannon powershot and i really like it! i think it takes really good pictures, and now i will be able to post more pictures of food, fun, etc. Everyone whose blogs i have read have been such an inspiration and i think they are all so awesome! any tips or advice on getting my blog started please let me know! you guys are amazing!
here is a picture of my breakfast, i always eat this when i have alot of time in the morning because it takes so long to eat! haha. its kind of a weird combo, but its one of my faves. its just whole wheat toast with blackberry preserves and 1/2 cup of 1% cottage cheese (i added a dash of cinnamon after i took the picture) I also had my daily cup of coffee.
ok heres a question i dont know if im just weird or if other people feel this way too...but i have certain silverware for different meals and i HATE when i have to use other types of spoons, knifes, etc. than what i usually use. like i have a certain "breakfast" spoon and a "dinner" fork and so on. haha. is that weird?!