Nadine

We are heading straight into mid-August without even pumping on the breaks it seems. Fine by me, I am ready for some cooler weather. Damn, it is hot. Even at like 9:00 pm at night, I break out in a sweat taking the trash from the kitchen out across our driveway and back to the house. Ridiculous.

Anyways, we had some fun this weekend and tried two new to us places. We wanted to explore some areas of town that we don’t spend a whole lot of time in. We first hit up LEON La Taberna, just outside Liberty Park heading into Vestavia. It is a Mexican restaurant, so you can’t really go wrong. It had excellent reviews online, but for us, it was just ok. I mean, it wasn’t bad at all, it’s just….I can think of about eight others I would rather go to just off the top of my head. You know what I mean? I ordered the chicken flautas. I would have rather it came with one or two less flautas and some rice instead of a bed of lettuce.

Afterwards we did some exploring, and then stumbled across a Shipley Do-Nuts!!! We made an impromptu stop and grabbed a dozen. Zoe wanted one immediately once we got to the car. Actually, she wanted to eat it right there outside the store on the bench, but I told her it was way tooooooooo hot to be sitting out there. She thoroughly enjoyed it, and so did we!!!!

Their apple fritters are amazing too!

We hit up a Bargain Hunt while we were out. They had so many toys and clothes on clearance! Zoe found a really cute Beauty & the Beast bracelet that she wanted, and I managed to sneak something past her to put away for Christmas. I actually bought three Christmas presents this week!!! It isn’t that far away people. I am not going to be the person out shopping the weekend before this year. Nope nope nope nope nope.

We knocked out our grocery shopping Sunday morning and came back for Zoe’s nap. Chris and I started watching Grand Hotel, and we are hooked!!! Have you seen it??? For dinner we made carne asada street tacos and I made my second batch of macarons. This time we chose coffee with a vanilla buttercream filling. They taste delicious, but because it is so damn hot and humid here…the texture isn’t quite right. I just couldn’t get the dang things to set. Oh well, we will still eat them because yum!

Zoe loves her babies. She carries one around everywhere, even when she is at school I can see her carrying one around her classroom on camera. She got a new one this weekend, along with a playpen, and has been such a good little mommy to it. Chris even buckled her in the car on our way to the grocery store, gotta stay safe.

I hope you had a wonderful weekend! It’s Monday, let’s do this!

It was brought to my attention last night that my birthday is next weekend. Obviously, I knew that it was coming up, but didn’t realize just how soon! I love to do a birthday wish list, it is just fun. I usually end up picking some of these items up as a treat yo’self. So here it is!!! What do you have your eye on lately? I am so ready to be able to wear fall fashion again! I cant wait to sport my new booties and some sweaters with leggings. But until then…..

Smart Watch – I say smart watch, because I am still on the fence. I love my Apple watch. I have had it for three years and it has been wonderful. I wear it every single day. Chris recently got a Galaxy watch, and well, it is just so pretty!!!! That is the one thing I think the Apple watch is lacking, it just looks like a mini iPhone attached to your wrist. I love the spin bevel of the Galaxy! But, I will say….I am still leaning Apple because I have an iPhone and don’t plan on changing that anytime soon. Decisions decisions. Do you have a Galaxy watch??? If so, please tell me your experience!!!!

Football season kicks off in just a few short weeks!!!! I need a good game day shirt, and how cute it this??? I recently stumbled across Scarlet & Gold and am now obsessed and want everything.

I am jumping on the barrette train. I don’t like the big head band trend for myself, but this I certainly can get behind. I would love something to hold back the same strands of hair that fall in my face alllllll day long! How cute are these?!?!

Nordstrom sold out of the black and white striped Caslon tshirt before I could hit purchase on my shopping cart. One second it was there, then it was gone. RUDE! I see they waited to after the sale to restock it. Whatever. I still want it.

Love this scent!!!!

This pillow case is supposed to not absorb moisture from your skin, prevent wrinkles, decrease split ends, keep the bedhead away, etc. Sign me up! It is waaaay less than the Silk ones I see.

Gotta support the local places! Love the color of the letters on this shirt. And this cute necklace made in Homewood.

This cute leopard dress is the perfect transition to fall, from a local Alabama boutique!

Love my Kut from the Kloth jeans I got!!!! Now I want the black pants!

Be prepared for some back to school pictures today! It is move up day, and Zoe has graduated to the “big girl” side of the hallway at her school. There are going to be 16 kiddos in her class. Can you all imagine 16 kids aged 2.5 to 3 all at one time?!?! Bless those teachers and their amazing hearts. I do not have the patience for such things!

Friday I worked from home, since Zoe’s school was closed. I took her to the local Mexican restaurant for lunch to get her out of the house. She loves going out to eat. She wanted to wear her Vampirina dress, and I figured why not…so off we went. Zoe cracks me up, face planting in her taco the second they put them on the table.

This weekend we didn’t really have anything planned, but turned out being on the go most of Saturday. We started out by looking at a house Saturday morning. Then we went for breakfast at Metro Diner. Zoe was excited about her chocolate chip waffle, but ended up eating like half of my food. I need to remember to order more next time, that always happens!

A new unclaimed freight place opened up in Springville this weekend, so we decided to head up that way and check it out. Annnnnd since Springville is half way to Gadsden, we headed up there after to hit up a Bargain Hunt, Ollie’s and a few other places. We ordered Papa Sal’s on the way back in to town and picked it up on the way home. Their food is so delicious!

Sunday morning, Zoe and I knocked out the grocery shopping. During naps, we started watching Mindhunter after a few failed attempts at starting other shows. This one had us hooked pretty fast, and we are already half way through the first season. COME ON SEASON 2!!!

After some cussing, a seriously messed up ingredient batch that I improvised to fix, and some more cussing……the perfect rose water macarons were born in my kitchen!!!!! The vanilla buttercream frosting I made for the center was amazing too!!!! I cant wait to try some flavors!

And just like that, the weekend is over! Back to the grind! Have a great week!

What up, August?! Can you believe it?! I was scrolling through Facebook yesterday morning, and all my Georgia friends were posting back to school pictures. A bit early, yeah??? School doesn’t start here until August 14th. Zoe’s school has move up day Monday!!! We had open house last night and got to meet her new teachers. There are going to be sixteen kiddos in her class. SIXTEEN. That just sounds like a lot of toddlers at one time. Lord help those teachers! She is excited about moving up, and some of her besties that have been with her the whole time are in there, but I also noticed several new names I didn’t recognize, so maybe it will be a good change.

August also means birthday month! The fact that I will officially be closer to 40 than 30 is a little unsettling, but I am thankful that I am celebrating another year. Life is damn short. Anyways, I am linking up with Kristen for What’s New With You in the form of a currently post, as always. A day late and a dollar short, but I do what I want.

Reading: Girl, Stop Apologizing by Rachel Hollis

I read Girl, Wash Your Face awhile ago, and enjoyed it alright. I am a little less than half way through this one, and honestly, I think I am liking it more. She is talking about achieving your goals and letting go of all the excuses you make and lies you tell yourself on why you aren’t following your dreams. There were several things that she said where I was like, damn….girlfriend has a solid point there.

Watching: We finished Billions last weekend, and started Big Little Lies. Chris wasn’t a huge fan of this season after about three episodes, so we are looking for a new show to binge! (I need to go back and watch the rest of it myself, because I love Big Little Lies!) Give me some of your favorites! We tend to watched darker, crime related things. We loved Blacklist, Blue Bloods, House of Cards, Scandal, the Chicago Trilogy (Chicago PD, Fire and Med), Lucifer, Law and Order SVU, Ozark. Give us something awesome!!!

Listening: I think I discovered this song on an episode of Greys. But it is one of those songs that is hauntingly beautiful.

Cooking: I continue to meal plan on Sundays for the week, and we do great with weeknight meals. This week I made Kung Pao chicken, Caesar salad and tomato soup, bbq chicken stuffed baked potatoes and chicken sausage with veggies. My struggle is going to be lunches. We don’t really have a break room to go and sit at my new office. I need ideas of things to make that don’t require any heating. Other than sandwiches and salads. Because I will get sick of both really fast.

Working: This is my second week at my new job, and I am working from home today. Zoe’s daycare is always closed the last Friday before move up day for a teacher work day, so I needed to stay home with her. My boss was like yeah, no problem, have a great weekend! SO refreshing to be back in this type of environment. Also, I have worn my jean jacket twice and damn I missed that thing!

Planning: The whole house needs a deep clean, and I feel a purge coming on. I really need to get down in the garage and go through all the boxes we have down there. Obviously, a lot of that stuff we haven’t touched in years. Clearly, we don’t need it! It’s just so hot, that I don’t want to be down in the garage right now! Which is also why I haven’t jumped on the treadmill in the last month. Need to get back to that too.

Excited: Since it is August, football season is about to start!!!! We are less than a month out now! I am looking forward to hopefully, some cooler days soon. And by cooler, I mean upper 80’s, instead of 90’s. We wont see actual cooler days until like November. A girl can dream though, right? I want to take Zoe to do something fun like the zoo or science center, so hopefully that will happen soon. She has been asking to get our pool back out, so maybe I can make that a thing this weekend. What do you guys do with your blowup pools when they aren’t in use? We are trying to figure out the best way to store it.

Laughing: It isn’t Friday without some funnies!

I started this post Monday morning, and here we are Wednesday and it is just going up. Life…am I right? We had a really good weekend, and it went by way too fast.

On Saturday morning, my sister came over to get Zoe for awhile so that Chris and I could have a date day! We started our day at Holler & Dash with some spicy chicken biscuits and amazing beignets.

After breakfast, we were to Sur La Table and bought all the supplies and some new baking pans so that we can attempt macarons at home. The chef even came out and shown us her favorite items to use and gave us some recipes to try. The customer service in that store blows me away every time we are there. Hopefully we can attempt them next weekend!

We then headed over to Bargain Hunt and scored an amazing deal on some outdoor furniture. Then we went to Woolworth’s. It was my first time there, and man was it awesome!!! It is like an adult Chuck E Cheese. We had frozen mules to drink, played bowling, the world’s largest Pacman game, checked out the roof top and just hung out and chatted for awhile. We had so much fun!!! I am so glad we were able to get a date day in.

Zoe had a lot of fun with my sister and her family. They even played under the sprinkler.

Saturday evening we watched the second weekend of Tomorrowland and ordered Landmark BBQ. Zoe was down there dancing and twirling around her ribbon and having a blast.

Sunday we went grocery shopping, got in nap time (while we finished the last episode of Billions and now don’t know what to do with ourselves?!?!) and headed to check out the summer clearance at another Bargain Hunt. Zoe scored some fall boots on mega sale, and we picked up a few other little things. If you have one in your area, definitely check them out this week. I went back Monday to pick up our chairs that we bought Saturday that didn’t fit in Chris’s car and came home with a shirt for 15 cents for Zoe and an outdoor game for 15 cents. They yellow tag summer was an additional 90% off. Such good deals!

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! And now that it is Wednesday, we are halfway through the week!