Phone Dump!

                     

Aubrey's School Performance & Elfie on a date with Ken! He brought her flowers! 

Tacky Sweater!

! 

Penny at the Christmas Parade & 

Lights in the South!

 

Visiting Santa

Elfie enjoying some coffee in her hammock!

Christmas Eve & Penny & her huge bone!

Christmas Morning & 

Enjoying Christmas break!

Goal for 2013!

So 2012 has come and gone QUICKLY! I don't think a year has flown by quicker than 2012. It was definitely a year to remember for the Kirkendohl's. We became Mr. & Mrs. and have officially started our lives together. To kick off 2013, our goal is to save, save, save! We want to buy a house & start to plan for our future. I recently heard of this 52-Week Challenge to save money & thought what a perfect way to start 2013. So I did some researching, and found it on the Stuck At Home Mom Blog! You save one dollar for the first week, two dollars the second week, & continue from there until all 52 weeks of the year are done. After a year, you will have saved $1378. The most you will have to put aside is $52, which is great for us!

                                                        {Courtesy: Stuck At Home Mom}

Hopefully you will find this helpful & can start saving with us! Let me know if you have any saving plans or tips for 2013!

Elf's Welcome Dinner

Tonight was the arrival of our elf, Elfie. Aubrey was so excited! When she got home, Elfie had set the table in Christmas tableware and brought her a letter from Santa! It's a tradition that we have breakfast the evening that our elf arrives. So the menu included waffles, grits in the crockpot, eggs, bacon, & hot chocolate! Along with the letter, Elfie brought a letter for Aubrey to write back to Santa with special North Pole envelopes & stamps! We had a great dinner with Elfie & so excited to see what the rest of December holds for us!

Pantry Overhaul

I've been wanting to do some organizing to our pantry for some time now! Finally, the day has arrived! :) I wish I would have taken some pictures of the Before look, but I definitely got some After pictures! This project was so simple and inexpensive, everyone should give it a try. I've had the baskets and containers for awhile now which I purchased at Dollar Tree! I printed out these adorable labels from DomestiFluff, you can print them here.  They came out great, and have tons of color options to chose from.

I printed the labels, created my categories, wrote out the labels, used packaging tape to cover the labels, & attached to each container!

The basket categories are: Bread, Snacks, Breakfast, Potatoes & Onions, Snacks to Go, and Baking.

The closed containers are: Grits, Powered Sugar, Sugar, Brown Sugar, Gluten Free Flour, Beans, Rice, Flour,and Pasta.  

The shelves are categorized as: Condiments, Canned Goods, Packets, and Dog Food.

P.S. I'm sorry for the fuzziness on the photos?

Here are some of the AFTER pictures:

 

{The printable labels in red.}

 

{Categories for our pantry.}

  

{Our finished pantry}

 

{Some of the containers from Dollar Tree.}

 

{The shelves all organized.}

Weekly Menu

Monday: Chili & Sandwiches

2 cans of tomatoes

1 can of pinto beans

1 can of chili beans

1 medium onion diced

1 green pepper diced

chili seasoning packet

Combine all ingredients in slow cooker on low for 5 hours. 

Tuesday: Leftovers

 

Wednesday: Grilled Chicken, Stuffing, & Green Beans

 

Thursday: Taco Salad & Brown Rice

I use tortilla shells and place them in a upside down cupcake pan to create a taco bowl. Place them in the oven at 350 degrees until light brown.

Then place all ingredients in taco bowl. Ex. ground beef, refried beans, lettuce, onions, tomatoes, cheese!

Friday: Shrimp Creole

{recipe}

Who knew a blank field could be so gorgeous?

I have to give a big shout out to AW Photography, Le Belle Photography, & Roxanne Photography. I've been wanting some new head shots & fun pictures done for awhile now, and these ladies came to the rescue! They are all great friends that enjoy learning from each other in the photography field (& we were literally in a field.) :)

They created some great pictures! Everyone needs to go visit their pages & check out their pictures! Also, it's a great time to get family photos done for the holidays!

Thank you ladies! We had such a great time!!

Honeymooning!

I have officially been MIA for over a month, and I'm so sorry! Life has officially been crazy the past month, and we're so excited to finally be settled! In the past month, we have gotten married--traveled to Mexico & had two birthdays! I plan to catch everyone up on our life this week!

We left for our honeymoon Sunday morning immediately following our wedding. We adventured to Cancun, Mexico for four nights! We had an absolute blast! The experience to remember was definitely the catamaran trip we took to a smaller island and went snorkeling in the middle of the ocean! It was an experience. :) I'll share some pictures below!

 {The beach in front of our hotel.}

 {Leaving Cancun on the catamaran.}

 {Grant so excited to hold the shark.}

 {Gypsy Breeze our transportation for the day.}

 {Traveling by golf cart.}

{Where we spent most of our time. :)}