Handmade Holidays!

Hi friends!  Sorry the blog posting has been cut to a minimum.  My two jobs aren't leaving much extra time for blogging...booo.  BUT, things are good around here these days.

Right now Curt and I are...

- sitting on the couch, listening to an amazing fall mix (I'm tempted to share it here via spotify, but not sure if people would be interested in that....let me know!)
- doing work on our computers (well, Curt is doing work.  I am procrastinating...hence the blog post).
- drinking hot chocolate
- awaiting the 2nd (sort of) snowfall of the season.  We are supposed to get something like 6-8 inches....to give you an idea of how NOT ready I am for snow, I will be finally putting away my summer clothes and getting out my winter clothes as soon as I finish this blog post.  See ya later, flip flops!

Anyway, last year I posted about some homemade crafting I did for Christmas gifts.  You can find that post here.  This year, I wanted to share the awesome blog where I got most of my ideas.  They post 30 days of craft gifts (this year they are also including recipes, giveaways, etc.) and it's so fun to visit each day.  Just click the picture below.  I hope you enjoy it!

at home date night

Things have been pretty busy around here.  It's really nice to have a long weekend with no major plans.  It has also been unseasonably warm (yay!) and we actually got to go to the beach yesterday!

 yes, those are horses on the beach (only in New England!)

Since we've been so busy, Curt and I haven't spent a whole lot of one-on-one time together.  Sooooo we decided that tonight we would have an "at home" date night!  We do these often because, let's be honest...we're on a pretty tight budget.  I know that's probably hard to believe with me being a teacher and Curt being in school.  No worries though, he's sure to make plenty of money once he gets a job as a pastor.....bahahaha!

But seriously, we have kind of enjoyed living our simple life and coming up with new ways to have fun with very little money.  Hence, the "at home" date night.  Here are our rules:

1. Plan out the dinner ahead of time.  The dinner must have an appetizer, main course, and dessert.  It also must be very tasty....but with minimal "hands-on" time.

2. Set the table all fancy-like (cloth napkins, real silverware, and candles....shhhh don't tell b/c we're really not supposed to have candles in our apt).

3. Play some fancy music.  Usually we open up the old record player and put on some jazz or classical...yeahhh, settin' the mood!

4. Enjoy our meal together and pretend that we are at a really fancy restaurant.

5.  Don't do the dishes until tomorrow (gasp!  for those of you that know me this is a hard one, but it's part of the deal).

I think that's all the rules.  Obviously, they are not hard and fast, but we do try to stick to them.  The best part:  when you're super full and you just want to flop on your couch....you actually get to!  No paying the bill, no tipping, no driving home.  It's awesome.

 For tonight's at home date, I made chicken piccata/marsala.  I'm not really sure what the difference is between the two....I should probably look that up.  Anyway, I used a combination of this recipe and this recipe.  And let me tell you....it was delicious!!  Now, I'm not one to toot my own horn, but TOOT TOOT!!!  I have always struggled with cooking meat, especially chicken.  It's always either overcooked or undercooked.  Always.  But not tonight.  Somehow I managed to perfectly cook it so that it literally melted in your mouth.  And the sauce...ohhhh the sauce.  It was like the perfect marriage of butter and lemon and capers and brown bits from the bottom of the pan and white wine and heavy cream.  Heaven, I tell you.


Soooo what are your favorite date nights?