November 4, 2013 by Stephanie

Cara Box Reveal

cara (car-rah) noun : beloved friend

Thanks to Wifessionals for creating a pen-pal box swap that allows for friendships to grow.

I was paired with two lovely ladies the last couple months.

Stephanie is a fellow Army significant other. Her soldier is coming back soon from deployment, and I could not be more excited for them! Such a joyous time to be together again! She is also an avid runner, who is training for a marathon. Power to ya girl! It was really kind of ridiculous how much we had in common beyond just first names. It was great to be a support for each other this month.

Tiffany hails from South Carolina. (So obviously we chatted quite a bit about Clemson and the area around it.) She is expecting her first child to arrive in the next few moments. She is a beautiful momma, and I love seeing her updates! We also chatted a lot about photography, and she gave me some great tips and sights to look into. She was so sweet and encouraging to have this month!

I sent Stephanie a box, and you can check it out on her site. I did make an ear warmer for her so I will share that later on this week.

Tiffany did such a wonderful job with the box she sent me.

the goods

1. Ironically, I do not have a Clemson coozie. Love!

2. Baking decorations-so cute! I will have to save these for next year since I didn’t come up with a recipe fast enough last week!

3. Note book and pencils-to feed into my school supplies addiction.

4. Fall kitchen towels-I know you all know that I love fall!

5. Dog treats-They were very happy about these!

She also wrote a lovely note for me. Perfect!

The dogs pretty much devoured their gift in seconds.

It was so great to get to know these women and hear about their lives. (And to getting a goody box is an added bonus!)

I look forward to keeping in touch with them both! You should check them out too!

November 3, 2013 by Stephanie

Images of Fall

This weekend we had a very typical fall weekend.

We gave out Halloween candy Friday. By the way, I am not allowed to do this anymore because I wanted to take all of those kids inside and keep them. We also gave away all the candy except one of the six bags. It was even more fun when our friend’s five year old was over after his adventure in the neighborhood to help me pass out candy. He sat at the door enticing kids to come to the door as he ate candy from the bowl. It was adorable.

We had to barricade the dogs off, but they wanted to trick or treat too. If you didn’t notice, Grace is underneath Crosby as he tries to climb over the bench.

Friends of ours had a bonfire Friday night, which I am not sure can make you feel anymore like fall.

We played in the beauty of fall. Tom and I spent about an hour driving through the woods on base looking for that perfect fall picture. Hello leaves!

We cuddled on the couch watching Scandal last night (and probably today). I have gotten Tom addicted. Yes. While I realize Scandal may not scream fall to you, being lazy and cuddly on the couch is like that moment when you drink hot chocolate in front of the fire thing. So to me it just lounging inside was fallish.

Today was “fall forward” daylight savings.

Hello fall!

Since I wasn’t able to show you fall earlier this year, here are some shots from yesterday. The landscape has been beautiful with the change of fall this last week!

Today we are going to watch the Chiefs, hopefully go 9 and 0! Love KC Chiefs!

Happy Fall Y’all!

November 1, 2013 by Stephanie

Friday Filter-Movie “Hocus Pocus”

I have one Halloween tradition: watch either Harry Potter in its entirety or Hocus Pocus. Some years I have done both.

To be honest, I just haven’t had the time this year to invest all the time to Harry Potter. Plus Tom wasn’t really up for it. Maybe this will be November’s challenge with my upcoming free time.

So I just subjected Tom to about an hour and a half of a moviecation.

He had never seen Hocus Pocus!

Travesty.

So we watched it as we waited for trick or treaters this year.

This is my kind of scary movie. Totally predictable and cheesy.

When I was in middle school, I was obsessed with Bette Midler. I am not really sure where that started, but this movie probably helped with that matter. I did several book reports on her through middle school and high school. Not your typical 8th grade read, but I just thought she was the bomb.com.

This movie is about a kid who reawakened three witches from 300 years ago in Salem. They basically suck the life out of children to stay young. So the whole movie is about them chasing each other around to end the madness.

I love Dani. She is a no-nonsense kid who loves her older brother. She is adorably cute through the whole thing.

Her brother on the other hand; I wanted to punch him most of the movie. He was just a dumb love sick idiot. But you could tell he loved his sister as he valiantly sacrificed his life at the end, so I have to give him credit for that.

My favorite parts are seeing the Sanderson sisters react to the 90s culture and new age inventions like roads and candy bars.

Hocus Pocus

It is a silly film that is all about Halloween traditions and tales. It is very cheesy and for me a must every October. I was looking up critiques of it this year and found that when it first came out, the ratings were awful for it. It was doomed to vanish like the Sanderson sisters did in the movie. However, people like me watch it every year and it has become a mainstay on certain channels every fall. On several sites I read that this movie has reached “cult status.” It’s funny how the DVD and cable market can change what used to be controlled only in the theater.

Is there a movie or show you have to watch to get into the Halloween spirit?

Friday Filters offer a review that are my own opinions. I was not contacted by anyone associated with these works or compensated for my review. My review has not been influenced by anything other than my love for entertainment and art.

October 31, 2013 by Stephanie

Happy Halloween! (And Grace Adoption Day)

Happy Halloween everyone!

This is the most excited I have been about Halloween in years. It was never a big thing growing up, besides waiting for the candy weeks later that my dad would get on sale from the Russell Stover outlet store.

Why am I excited now?

One: we got to dress up at work, which is really just an excuse for me to wear jeans today…

People were pointing at me all day saying, “I found Waldo!”

Two: the daycare at APSU comes around to the offices and does trick or treating during the day. Adorable. Plus our office gets really into decorating the office (for really anything) so we spent an afternoon ~~not working~~ jazzing up the office with Halloween stuff. Crafting at work what!

Three: since I have lived on campus for the last 10 years, I have never had real trick or treaters at my home as a grown up. I have been talking about passing out candy for months! I told Tom that we could go to a party only after we passed out candy. Seriously so excited for this event. We are supposed to have a terrible storm today, so they actually post-poned trick or treating until tomorrow night. Did you know they did that? We have a bowl ready if there are any troopers who do decide to come tonight. We may have gone a little overboard on the candy. We bought 6 giant bags since we know there are so many neighborhood kids. We didn’t want to be the “only two pieces per kid” people. And of course we picked out candy that we like just in case they don’t come.

This is two bags….

Four, it’s Happy Grace Adoption day! We got Grace exactly two years ago! Look how little she was! (Seriously Grace, you need to get this whole anxiety thing under control. We aren’t abandoning you..)

This was at the shelter the day we picked her up and the hour drive home.

Five, it’s an excuse to humiliate our dogs with costumes. Need I say more?

Oh the shame!

Recently, they have started literally making out like people. It is really sweet and weird at the same time.

The only way to get them to sit still for pictures is to bribe them.

They look more like jet packs or wings than buns, but they were cheap. And with these two rascals, we didn’t want to spend a whole lot of money on something that they could potentially ruin in seconds. They are still cute and fun to watch them react to them and each other.

I am linking up for Howl-o-ween at A day in A Joyful Life!

Anyone have any fun Halloween traditions to share? Do you dress your pets up?