St. Patrick's Day Fun

St. Patrick's Day is one of the best days in Dallas! The weather is usually nice and the whole city it seems like comes out to celebrate on Greenville Avenue. Greenville is a street in Dallas that has a lot of restaurants and bars on it. They block a part of it off and make a big "block party".  It is great people watching and gets crazy! People that live in the surrounding area, the "M" streets also have big house parties. This is also one day that Eric actually likes to go out! He and his buddies have always done the Greenville Avenue thing since college, so it is a tradition for them to all get together. The past couple of years since moving into our house, we have hosted a brunch for everyone before going out. It is important to eat a good breakfast if you are going to be doing a lot of day drinking! We kept the brunch pretty simple with a breakfast casserole, waffles, bacon, and fruit. Oh and of course mimosas! Usually we have two parties to go, but Eric's coworker was not having his this year, so we headed to what is usually Party #2 for us, one of Eric's friends from college.

The girls - Karla, Me, Alba, and Connie

I love all of our different shades of green!

This is the first of the newly engaged couples! We have so many friends who are getting married this year! Connie and Ben are getting married in May in Lake Tahoe. I know it is going to be a beautiful wedding! We couldn't be happier for them!

This is my friend Karla and her fiance Steve! They recently got engaged as well and are planning a Spring 2013 wedding! Knowing Karla, this wedding is sure to be a good time!

Alba and Pete - Alba is from Madrid! They are not engaged, but I would LOVE to go to a wedding in Spain! Hint hint! :)

The newest engaged couple, Jason and Alli! They weren't engaged in this picture, but Jason popped the question that next week. They live in Houston and will have an October wedding. Eric will the best man! (Jason was his best man also!) So excited for them!

Our turn!

I am wearing my green Pippa necklace from Stella & Dot! It went perfectly!

Fun day!

Usually we go to the block party, but when we walked down to try to get in, the lines were ridiculously long, plus it just looked like a mess! We went back to the party and then decided to go grill hamburgers at Brian and Kim's (I just realized I have no picture of them!). We all headed up to their house, grilled, sat around the pool, and had a good time! It was a long day though, let me tell you!

End of the night!

Christmas at the Bases

Happy New Year! I have kinda of slacked on blogging since my birthday post! We spent four days at the ranch in Oklahoma for New Years so I was without a computer! I am going to do my Christmas/Birthday/New Year posts broken up over the next couple of days! Or if I get ambitious I might just knock them all out and be up to date!

Today's blog is Christmas with Eric's family. I still need to get the pictures from my parents that I took on their nice camera. I highjack it when I am there! Christmas Eve started with dinner at Eric's parents house with his sister's family.

 Sweet Blair in her Christmas dress.

 Dinner was homemade canneloni and bolognese. SO GOOD!

 Blair having fun at the dinner table.

 We went to my parents after dinner and then back to the Bases the next morning. Here is their tree with all the gifts!

 Eric's dad's white elephant gift from his office. He thought is was funny because it said HO.... 

No correlation with Blair here!

 Blair in a basket - lol I dont know....

 Eric's mom and her two favorites - Blair and Lucky. (with Eric's grandmother City Mama in the background)

Eric and his doggie.

We had a great time opening presents with Eric's family. They really get into it! After presents, we had seafood gumbo for lunch. Eric's mom wanted to change it up and not do the traditional Christmas lunch. The gumbo was really good! After lunch, we headed over to my parents to celebrate with the Drakes. More on that to come!

Celebrating Christmas a little early!

My brother and his family have been in town for the past couple of days. They live in Greenville, SC now, so they come back to Texas for Christmas and have to split their time between Dallas and Houston, where my sister in law's family lives. This year we got the first half of the trip so we celebrated Christmas and opened presents on Sunday night. This trip was extra special because I got to finally meet my new niece, Merritt, who was born on October 21st. She is absolutely perfect and so cute! Here are some pictures from our Christmas, but the truth is they are mostly of Merritt!

 My grandmother holding Merritt for the first time

 My aunt Ginger trying to soothe Merritt. 

 Mason, my nephew, who is 4, opening his presents!

 Dad and Grandmother

 Aunt Ginger and my brother, Matthew

 Someone is excited for their presents!

 Mason watching his special video from Santa

 Oliver and me! I actually took advantage of my parents awesome DSLR camera and took lots of pictures of the dogs. A puppy post to come soon!

My dad made his infamous Chile Rellenos. He has made these for years and my mom and aunt love them. They request them for their birthdays. I used to turn my nose to them (no clue why?!) but this year I ate them and loved them! So good!

 Homemade Mexican Rice

 Mason and my aunt Ginger 

 

The iPad dorks club. All three of them are on their iPads playing a racing game. This is Eric's new obsession to get more points, to get better cars, so he can beat Mason, who has the best cars!

It was so nice having Matthew, Megan, Mason, and Merritt (yes the four Ms) here for so long! This week has been full of fun and as soon as I get the pictures from their fancy camera I will be posting about our adventures to the Trains at NorthPark, Legoland, and more!

Fabulous Holiday Blog Challenge - Day 7!

Wow, I am just a blogaholic these days! I am posting all the time I feel like! I think I have made it my goal to reach 100 posts in 2011 by the end of the year. Pretty sure I can do that since after this post, I will only have 11 more to do!

First, off I want to say thanks to everyone who congratulated me on the White Rock Half Marathon and hi to those people who have found themselves here from SkinnyRunner! For those of you who do not know who SR is, I have been following her blog for well over a year now and she is one of my daily (sometimes multiple) reads. She is a super funny, crazy runner (she runs like back to back marathons in one weekend) who blogs about running, her life, celebrities, just about anything! Her blog is definitely worth checking out! She likes to feature her "reader runners", so I emailed her and told her about my race and she posted about it on her last blog post. Pretty cool!

Today's topic is "How do you celebrate the holidays?" Well, this topic could be interpreted a lot of ways, so I will just stick with Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Since getting married and blending two families celebrations, Eric and I have had to do some rearranging of our traditions.

As I posted on the Holiday Traditions challenge, my family always gets together with my Dad's side of the family, Aunt Ginger, my three cousins, Jenna, Avery, and Drake, Grandmother, and my Uncle Ben. We go to my parents house and have chili and tamales. Depending on what time church is, we eat before or after. After dinner and church, we open our "family presents". We go around and someone plays "Santa" and passes the gifts out individually. My nephew, Mason, is now the Santa usually. My brother and his family get to be with us every other Christmas since they alternate between Dallas and Houston for Christmas.

 All the cousins

We also usually have a very special visitor. Santa actually comes to visit our house! :)

Eric's family Christmas Eve is usually a nice dinner, like cannelloni. We go to his parents house, with his sister and her family, and Eric's grandmother, City Mama. Somehow it all works out that we are able to make it to all these festivities! After all the eating and presents, Eric and I come home and sit in front of our tree and do presents for each other and for Ollie.

The next morning we head first to Eric's family's house and do presents with all of his family and then enjoy a traditional Christmas lunch. They eat earlier than my family so it works out.

 Eric's Mom with Blair, who was only 4 months old last Christmas

In my new Carhart jacket. Perfect for the ranch!

We then head over to my house, where we do "Santa" presents and then the extended family comes back over and we have another big lunch!

In years past, we all go see a movie, but lately with two Christmases under our belts in one day, Eric and I like to go home and just relax! I know it is going to get even crazier when we have kids, so if this is it for now, I will enjoy it! I can't wait for this Christmas! I will finally get to meet my new baby neice Merrit! My brother and his family come in on the 18th so we are doing Christmas early with them since it is their year to be in Houston on actual Christmas. So this year I guess I have three Christmases! 

How do you celebrate?!

Thanksgiving & Yummy Brown Stew Recipe

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Our holiday plans unfortunately got derailed last week and we had to cancel a trip to Greenville, SC to spend Thanksgiving with my brother's family and my parents. Eric and I both have had a nasty cold for over a week now and since there is a new baby in the family, we didn't want to risk getting the baby sick, plus it is just no fun traveling and being away from home when you are sick. We were really disappointed to not get to make the trip and meet Merritt, but they are coming here at Christmas, so we will meet her soon! Luckily, Eric's parents were doing Thanksgiving at their house, so we joined them for a yummy Thanksgiving meal and then ended up back on the couch to rest. We are feeling better, but Eric is still suffering from a nasty cough. I am suffering from having to listen to it! (Kidding, love you!)

Friday, the plan was to go to Fort Worth to see Eric's parents horse Fritz compete in a cattle herding competition.  They bought Fritz a few years ago and he has been getting trained by a professional and this was his first competition. Although he didn't win, Blair had a great time!

Just Eric ended up going because early Friday morning, I got a text from Brittany asking if I was in town and wanted to go look at bridesmaid dresses, so of course, I had to go do that! We had a fun girls day out trying on tons of dresses. I think we found the winner! We will see which the bride picks! Can't wait to wear it! :) I wish I had some fun pics of all the dresses, but Brittany took them all!

The White Rock Marathon is this weekend and I am running the half! I have been worried about my training since I was sick all last week, I was not able to run and started getting anxious. I tried to run on Wednesday and made it about two miles and couldn't breathe well so I didn't push it. I knew I needed to get one more long run in before this weekend, so yesterday, I set out for an 11 mile run. I ran the first 5 miles by myself and then picked up Ollie to finish the remaining 6. I knew I would need him at the end! It was a cold and windy day and I was still weak and out of shape from not running all week, but I managed to finish all 11 miles. I can't say I am impressed by my time, but I am not going to give up my goal of under two hours next weekend.  I actually had a scary moment during mile 6 of my run. My legs were tired, Ollie was pulling me, and somehow I lost my footing and totally ate it. I fell right on the sidewalk. Luckily, I had a water bottle in my left hand and honestly, I think it broke my fall. It is all scraped up along with my right knee. I am just glad I didn't land on my hand and break my wrist!  Ollie just stood there and was no help and it took me a few minutes to kind of come out of the shock of falling. I was bleeding pretty badly, but decided to keep going and not go home to clean it up. I am sure anyone who saw me running thought I was crazy because I had blood all down my leg. My knee is pretty scraped up and it hurts, but I am okay. My knees are super sore today from the 11 miles and I am hobbling around. Hopefully it will go away and I can train the rest of the week to finish strong on Sunday!

Last night was my friend Tracy's "non-bachelorette" party! We had a blast celebrating her last night of singleness before she gets married on December 10th. Post with some fun pics coming soon on that! After being out super late last night and being sore today, I have been quite unproductive today. I enjoyed a lot of couch time, a nap, and a bowl of homemade beef stew! Eric got tired of seeing me acting so miserable so he went to the grocery store and came home and made this awesome Brown Stew from the Better Homes & Garden cook book. It was so good, so I thought I would share the recipe with you guys!

Brown Stew

2 lbs of beef stew meat cut in 1 1/2 inch chunks
2 tablespoons fat (didn't have, so he used 2 tablespoons of Crisco)
4 cups boiling water
1 tablespoon lemon juice (fresh)
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 clove garlic
1 medium onion, sliced
1 to 2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon pepper
dash of allspice
3 cloves
6 carrots, quartered
4-5 big red potatoes, cubed (bite size pieces)
1 lb (18-24) small white pearl onions (you have to peel before using. To peel, boil in water for three minutes and then rinse in cold water and peel.)

Thoroughly brown meat on all sides in far; add water, lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, garlic, sliced onion, bay leaves, and seasonings. Cover, simmer 2 hours; stir occasionally to keep from sticking. Remove bay leaves, garlic.

Add carrots, onions, potatoes. Cover; continue cooking 30 minutes or till vegetables are done.

Remove meat and vegetables; thicken liquid for gravy. Makes 6 to 8 servings.

It was so good and perfect for this cold night on the couch! I really am lucky to have a husband that enjoys cooking so much! He was actually really proud of this meal! The meat was so tender and it really hit the spot! Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving holiday! I can't believe it is almost December!!!

9 miles... done!!

White Rock half marathon training is getting serious now! We are just less then one month away and I ran 9 miles yesterday! Ollie ran over 7 with me. He probably could have kept going but 9 seemed like a lot! The weather was getting a little warm (we went around noon), but it was a beautiful day to run. When I dropped him off at the house, I grabbed water and a package of Swedish Fish (Halloween Candy) for fuel, which I definitely think helped. Usually towards the end of my long runs, my pace just goes out the window and I slow majorly down, but I took some inspiration from my daily running read SkinnyRunner and pushed through even when I did not want to do. I finished my 9 miles in 1 hour 22 minutes and 19 seconds at a pace of 9:09 miles per minute. Not bad. I finished White Rock last year at a 9:26 pace I think, so this is an improvement! I thought it would be interesting to see where I was in my training last year, so I looked it up on Map My Run, the app I use to log my runs on my iphone, to see my run this time last year.

Well, last year at this time, we were in Greenville, SC visiting my brother's family for his birthday and Halloween. It was very hilly there and it was a hard run. I am not used to hills at all here in Texas and I remember almost not being able to finish. I ran 9 miles in 1 hour 44 minutes and 18 seconds at a 11:32 pace. Granted that was with hills but that is a big difference! Over 2 minutes per mile! The next weekend, I ran back in Texas on flat land 10 miles in 1 hour, 40 minutes and 15 seconds or a 10:01 pace. Still a minute improvement almost!

It is encouraging to see the improvement in my times. These long runs are not nearly as taxing on my body as they were last year. I remember finishing and coming home and just wanting to do nothing and of course whining to Eric about how sore my legs were! My goal is finish White Rock in less than two hours this year. I almost don't want to say that in case I don't, but seeing these times gives me some confidence that I will be able to do that. I am excited to try!!

Hope everyone had a happy Halloween!! Eric and I had like no trick-or-treaters. I think our bell rang 5 times. I am throwing the candy away today because Eric (not me!) will just eat it. I don't know what the deal was! We have lots of kids in the neighborhood! Here are some stolen pics of our nieces and nephew of their Halloween costumes, since no post is complete without pictures!

St. Patty's 2011 on Greenville

One of the highlights of living in Dallas is being able to partake in the St. Patrick's Day festivities on Greenville Avenue. Eric and I both enjoy going with our friends to check out the crowd and enjoy a few beers. We started the day with brunch and mimosas at our house.We managed to get a pic with Ollie before we headed out.

Our first stop was one of Eric's coworkes who lives just yards from the entrance of the block party.


At Eric's coworker's house



                                       
Then we headed over to the block party where we saw some interesting people....

Erica and her sister Amanda

Hook em!

As you can see, the crowd is quite electic.

Pat, Eric, and Justin

Girls having fun at the Block Party

We then headed over to one of Eric's college buddies houses and met up with the rest of the group.

Ended  with dinner at Franki's

St. Patrick's Day 2011 was a blast!  We can always count on having a good time. We look forward to next year!