Year in Photos

Ringing in 2011

Mr Bubbles in February

Took Matthew to his first in theater movie...Gnomeo and Juliet

Visiting family in March

Learning some tunes in March

Spa Day in April for my birthday

 Scary surgery in May

 Feeling better in May

Carousel ride in May

Pool time in June

Feeding the ducks downtown in June

Celebrating July 4th with Uncle Jimmy

Welcoming Pop Pop in August

We said hello to a new friend in September

And goodbye to an old friend

Matthew started Happy Feet soccer league in October

Matthew and Grammy gearing up for Trick or Treating

And we gathered some ex-space workers to celebrate Halloween

In awe of the colors in SC in November

Took advantage of the beauty around us

Visited friends and saw the Rockefeller tree in December

My little man turned 4 and celebrated with a super hero birthday party

Had a house full of family and joy on Christmas morning

A busy Matthew checking out his take

Happy New Year everyone! Hope 2012 brings peace, health and happiness to you all.

Struggles

So since during the winter blast of 2011, which was last week mind you and lasted for oh 4 days, I have struggled to start my diet and other resolutions. In the last day I have conquered these struggles and started:

• To eat right and exercise a.k.a my resolution to Get Shake Weight Arms. I was a regular in the gym in Florida but my schedule was a wee bit different there  and I have gained a little extra jiggle since moving. I now have NO excuses to not workout since I made a brash purchase and bought an elliptical and I have the weights and knowledge to do the rest. I just pray for the willpower to stay away from the sweets. Which is extremely hard when your toddler son is sick and you bribe him with candy to get him to take his medicine and there are leftover Skittles, Peanut butter bars and Teddy Grahams.

Why do they taste so damn good

• Yesterday I also started another term to obtain my MBA. To be honest I have zero desire to go back to school but since my company is paying for it and it can't hurt me - I decided to hit the books. Its taking me a long time to graduate since I refuse to pay any money out of pocket but when I do graduate I can say I'm smarter than my husband! We all know this NOT to be true as he knows just enough about everything to argue any point and will at any given point in time.
• I also started this blog which is something I have been wanting to do for a long time now but just never got around to it. I have to say reading Natalie's blog (which is deeper than this one and helping a lot of people out there) made me push myself to get on the ball. Speaking of balls,  Cakeballer Emmie turning out the cake balls like nobodies business also made me want to jump into this world of blogging.
• Another resolution of mine is to Enjoy Cooking more. I love to bake but that is because I love to eat sweets. I want to enjoy making meals, that my husband will eat and not scoff at. He is particularly picky about his meals, although last night I came home from work and he was eating an english muffin with melted peanut butter on it and washed it down with a glass of wine with ice in it. Perhaps I am rubbing off on him more than I thought. 

To that end here is the recipe for the Browned Butter Frosting noted in my first post:
1 Cup Butter
1 (16 oz) package powdered sugar
1/4 Cup milk
1 Tsp. Vanilla
Cook butter in a small heavy saucepan over medium head, stirring constantly, about 6-8 minutes or until butter is golden brown. Remove from heat immediately and pour butter into a small bowl, cover and chill one hour and begins to solidify.
Beat butter at medium speed with an electric mixer until fluffy; gradually add powdered sugar alternately with milk, beginning and ending with the powdered sugar. Beat at low speed until well blended after each addition. Stir in vanilla. I chilled my frosting, taking it out when the cupcakes were out of the oven. Giving the cupcakes time to cool was just enough time for the icing to be spreadable.