Congrats to dear brookie!

First of all, I love this picture.  It was taken a few months ago on a nice girl's night out.  Second of all, the lady on the left, my most favorite brooke, won a very cool blogging contest and I want every single person I know to hear about it!  brooke's blog is called grace and light, and she won Typepad's 10th Birthday Blogging Contest..  Do read about the contest, and then read every single one of brooke's blog posts, because they are all worth your time.  She is so very thoughtful with what she writes, and her words are so elegant.  I suppose you could read the other 2 winners' blogs as well, if you work night shifts like me and dink around on the internets for, like, hours.  Or, you could google yourself, then shop on Amazon for nut milk bags and donut pans, then pay a tiny portion of your taxes online, then look at tons of pictures of cute baby animals on the Huffington Post, then try to refocus yourself by looking at your own blog post about your goals, and then spend the rest of the night looking at lipstick shades.  Yeah.  Do that.

Because, wine.

I'm not exactly sure what the theme was for Summer, 2012 but I have decided that 2013 is all about the vineyards.  Wine is gluten free.  Vineyards are beautiful.  Yes, I realize we live in Nebraska but I'll take what I can get.  And the place we visited on Friday evening was the bee's knees.  Glacial Till is near Bennett, Ne which is a decent drive from our house, but totally worth it.  The Chambourcin was red and dry and I had the whole bottle to myself.  The music was fun.  I danced with Willa.  They had a visiting brewery, which made the gentleman happy.  You know where to find me every other Friday night from now until the end of summer.

And...if you don't get the title of this post then you have not been following my directions all along.  Shame on you.

Need a great ebook?

I recently purchased this e-cookbook, written by a girl that I follow on Instagram, and I am loving it!  I have already made the Pad Thai a few times, the chocolate chocolate chip muffins, chipotle tilapia, spicy tuna salad and the super seed loaf.  The recipes are all very clean, all gluten-free, and the author gives suggestions on how to make most of the recipes vegetarian/vegan as well.  I highly recommend it, if you are looking for some easy, healthy ways to perk up your food-life.  Her blog has a lot of really great recipes on it, as well.  Take a peek!

Day 'O Dads

What a great Father's Day we had this year!  Aside from the new tv, that was sort of Brad's gift (that he mostly gave to himself:), we also had lots of time to do some fun family stuff.  Like, the first swimming session of the summer!  I can't believe we didn't go swimming until nearly the end of June!  We are all such fans of the water.  We stinkin' love the Highlands pool, as they have the zero depth entry, so Willa can just run on in and play and we don't have to always be holding her or helping her.  We really need to get that kid some swimming lessons.  Then, we had Chinese food and ice cream cake and watched basketball at my parent's house. 

The day after Father's Day, we went to Omaha to the zoo.  I just love the Omaha Zoo.  I think our favorites this time were the hippos and the monkeys.  But that is only because I didn't find the armadillo.  He will forever be my favorite zoo animal.  We also rode the Skyfari thing for the first time and that was pretty fun.  

This peacock really liked our blueberries.  I am sure there is a rule about  not feeding the animals, and I'm not sure what blueberries do to the digestive system of a peacock, but he seemed very fond of them.  And us.

After the zoo, we made a quick stop at Whole Foods for a few things.  (I could make a whole day out of Whole Foods, but we only had a few minutes.)  Then we had dinner at a new seafood restaurant in the Old Market called Plank.  We were pretty sure we would love it, as we love Blue, seafood, Bloody Mary's, nautical tattoos, and Dave's design work.  We were right!

I love this picture of Willa, but has anyone else seen that episode of King of Queens where someone gives them a painting of themselves and Carrie's arm looks super huge?  That's what Willa's arm reminds me of.

What a nice weekend.  I love to watch Brad and Willa interact and have fun with each other.  They are such buddies.  He's a pretty good buddy to me, too.  And a million thanks to my own dad, for everything that he does for our family.  Not a lot of grandpa's are able to, or even maybe want to, spend as much time with their grandkids as my dad does with Willa.  He also has a friend for life:)

Berry Pickin' (#190)

Willa and I visited Martin's Apple Orchard this past week, to pick some strawberries!  We had gone in the fall for apples, and they were the best apples I had ever tasted, so I had high hopes for the berries.  We were not disappointed!  And, it was so much fun to look for them and pick them all by ourselves!  We filled one of those white buckets nearly full, for under $3.  Can't beat that.  That evening, we made strawberry shortcake for ourselves and for my mom.  Such a perfect summer food.

A night with friends

We've been having book club at some places other than our houses the last few months.  Two months ago we went to the Blue Orchid, which is one of my all-time favorite places to eat.  This month, we visited Deer Springs Winery.  This is now one of my all-time favorite places to be.  It was so pretty and peaceful there.  We went on a Friday evening, and they had some musicians and people making very tasty coal-fired pizzas.  There were small groups of people in lawn chairs, on blankets, having picnics, with their dogs.  It was great.  I am excited to go back.  If anyone needs a good place for a date night, or if anyone wants to date me for an evening, its the perfect place.

PS:  The book we read for the evening, Looking for Alaska, was very good.  I would recommend.  It reminded me of the Catcher in the Rye.

42 inches of heaven (#80. For now)

I really didn't know, until very recently, that I cared about tvs.  At all.  The tv that Brad and I had in our living room, as our main tv (really our only tv, aside from the one in the basement that I use if I'm going to be on the treadmill for more than half an hour), was purchased at the Conestoga Mall, at Sears, back when I worked at Vanity.  We're talkin, 1999.  I got a mall Friends and Family discount.  I think it still cost like $800 or something crazy like that, but when you are selling $39 jeans at 2% commission, you are living large.  It was a beast of a tv and nearly threw out the backs of anyone who ever helped me move.  But it was something of a family member by the time it gave out on us a few months ago.  I was sad.  I also didn't think I cared enough about tv watching to spend much money to replace it.  So, we brought up the treadmill tv, which is the one you see pictured above. It might by 13 inches.  Maybe 18.  I'm not sure because I was too embarrassed to measure it. Watching it sucked and strained our eyes.  As the days wore on, we all became more and more eager to get something new.  So, we made a plan to purchase a new tv sometime during the week before Father's Day, hoping maybe there would be some good sales.  As soon as Sunday rolled around and the sale fliers were distributed, we found ourselves back at Sears.  The circle of life.  This probably won't be the very nicest tv we ever own, but OH MY GOD, we are enjoying it.  And, 42 inches doesn't seem all that big in the store, when it is displayed next to the 70 inchers, but in our living room it seems gigantor.   Love it.

There she is, in all her Bob's Burgers glory.

And here is a chair that I found at Cool and Collected this weekend, that I think I would enjoy watching the new tv from.  Someone buy it for me?!?