as sweet and clear as moonlight through the pines.

I hate not being content with where I am but it's just that Idaho will never compare to Georgia for me.

I miss my in-laws, the warmth, the southern drawls, the humidity, the trees, the seafood, the hospitality, the sounds, the food, and sometimes I even miss the sound of gunshots in the distance, lulling me to sleep. (But maybe I'm just acting desperate.)

I really hope that one day life will take us back to Georgia (OR EVEN TENNESSEE). I want my babies to be little peaches that talk real slow and charm the pants off everyone, but not literally off, just metaphorically, unless they're married. Then it's ok.

just an old sweet song, keeps Georgia on my mind.

Happy THANKSGIVING Pilgrims!

Phew! What a fun crazy week we had.

We've been in Georgia all week for Thanksgiving/one of our best friend Kyle's wedding (congrats ya'll!). It's been nice and warm and relaxing. I'm not quite ready to get back to the Idaho winter that awaits me.

If I had to pick one picture to sum up our week here it would be this one:

That's Paisley. (and my Kristen Stewart buck teeth. I own them) She's our niece and the daughter of my sis-in-lawbff, Jamie. and I'm just kind of obsessed with her. Like, if you saw my cell camera pictures (my instagram photos are just the tip of the iceberg) right now you would think that she was MY child because I have so many pictures of that girl. but I can't help it, she is just too beautiful and sweet. and also really advanced for a four month old, she can already do math, probably.

I could tell you about every single detail of our vacation, but I'm not gonna. I just really wanted to brag about how precious Paisley is. Just know that we've been talking real southern up in here (can't help it) and that we ate waaaaaay too much (all week, not just on Thanksgiving) and lost all our eating inhibitions. back to dieting on Monday... until Christmas of course.

Also, I just realized that all my best friends have beautiful babies, see evidence here. 

I guess I just know how to pick em. 

GET IN MY MOUTH: Low Country Boil

So lately, I've been missing Georgia. Sometimes it literally makes my heart hurt because I miss it so bad. Which luckily, is not because I am totally miserable in Idaho, because I'm surprisingly not (yet). But, ANYWAY, I decided that there was one thing that could help curb my Georgia yearning; some good old southern food.

So, I pulled out Aunt Martha's cookbook (which if you are ever going to buy a cookbook, let that be your next one because Martha is amahzing. She's used to help write Paula Deen's cookbooks. She basically a Savannah celebrity!) and after looking through it, decided to invite some of our peeps over for :

LOW COUNTRY BOIL
Adapted from "Savannah Celebrations" by Martha Nesbit

Thanks to Sassy YGBG for the photo

Here's what you need:

Serves 8

2 pounds kielbasa Polish sausage, sliced into 1 inch pieces.

20 red potatoes, halved or quartered, depending on size.

4 to 6 ears of corn broken into halves or thirds

3 pounds large shrimp 

1/4 cup Old Bay seasoning (this is optional but I HIGHLY recommend using it, and being generous with it!)

Allow 1 hour to heat water in a 20 gallon pot*, filled about one-third full. Add the Old Bay seasoning if using (which you better be). 45 minutes before serving, add sausage. 20 minutes before serving, add red potatoes. 15 minutes before serving, add corn. 5 minutes before serving, add shrimp. When shrimp are pink and cooked through (about 5 minutes or less - you can tell because they curl up like they're prepping for an earthquake drill.). Drain and serve hot.

*Alright so, if you're anything like me, you don't have a 20 gallon pot and when you saw that you were like, Whaaaaaaaaaaat? But don't worry, it's a little bit of work but it's still possible. What I have is just two 5.5 quart pots. So, to make the full recipe (which you can half it, or even quarter it if you're cooking for less people) I had to split it up into 4 different rounds (so two for each pot for me). So I did MATH (which I suck at, but I did it) and split the ingredients up into fours. And then you follow the recipe the same (except that you don't have to wait an hour for the water to heat up). 

The best way to serve this is to just lay out some news paper (or craft paper or a plastic table cloth) on your table and dump it right on to the paper (but if you wanna be civilized you can leave it in a bowl, sometimes that's a good idea too) and serve with: Soft Butter, Sour Cream, Cocktail Sauce, Slices of lemons, and Ice Cold Coca-Cola. 

you can just see the humidity in the air from all that boilin! felt just like the south!

HOW TO COPE WITH UNEMPLOYMENT.

look, I already look kind of homeless and it's not so bad.

sometimes your husband gets laid off, and sometimes you need to do things that keep you from being depressed while taking a break from near constant job hunting.

 here are things we've been doing instead of crying:

well for starters, I've been cooking/baking a lot. Like almost every night. And I'm sure better housewives (and mothers) than me would scoff at that, but I mean I've been going HARD in the kitchen. Like I am getting in trouble because we have too much leftovers.

For example, I've made this (as pictured above). and this. and this to go with these. and this. and these.

And most of it was with the help of my lovely new kitchenaid!

Which I'd like to point out was pretty much free.

We spent almost 5 days straight in the house in attempt to find a job for Taylor and also save money, obviously. BUT yesterday we caved and decided to go see The Dark Knight Rises. DON'T WORRY, it was the super matinee so it was only 5.50 a ticket. And Batman is my favorite so I had to go, finally.

It was sooo grood.


To supplement our income and also to be nice we have been dog sitting for the family that I "nanny" for while they are out of town for the week. It sure is different having  TWO regular sized shedding dogs in our house on top of my sassy little virtually shed free cotton ball. But they are really sweet and Lux likes to boss them around and make sure they don't get on the couch and they think she is an idiot, but strangely, they are also scared of her. Also they are basically in love with Taylor.

the boss

lily and ella

And then today we decided to plant some flowers in our ugly back yard.

IT'S SO BEAUTIFUL I MIGHT NEED TO HAVE A GARDEN PARTY!! and get some G.D. garden lanterns.

If you're wondering how the job search is going, it's going well. I mean not well in the sense that we have any specific leads but there are plenty of jobs for Taylor to apply for. In fact, so far I've compiled a list of about 80. And that was a list I made while being picky about locations. Currently Tayl is thinking about switching to teaching so we're trying to get more information about doing that. So if anyone knows anything about becoming a teacher in the state of Georgia (for someone with a Masters Degree), holla at us.

All of your kind words and prayers and helpfulness and well wishes are GREATLY appreciated. We love you all! We're gonna be okay. Probably. But if not, I think I could find a way to make a cardboard box a home. I'm resourceful.

oh! Christmas tree.

OK, so here is our standard run of the mill newlywed first Christmas tree post.

So I don't know what it is about being married that has me all stoked for Christmas stuff, but it does. It's probably the same thing that makes me blog all the time. Marriage is magical.

Get this, I am actually listening to Christmas music, RIGHT NOW. I mean, really. Me. The person who has cursed Christmas music for her entire life. However, it is the Indie Christmas Pandora station, so it's like Sufjan Stevens, a little more my taste. But, STILL Christmas songs guys!!
[Don't worry, I am never going to be able to listen to it on my own before Dec. 1st though.]

Clear back in August while I was homesick in England I was daydreaming about our life when we get home and what I was going to do with our Christmas tree, and I decided that I was going to make miniature tissue pom pom's for our ornaments. I KNOW, it's kind of lame, and uncreative, but it was cheap, easy, and cute.

I also bought the cheap snowflake ornaments at Target.

We tried to make decorating the tree together an ordeal, but it took about 5 minutes. It was still fun though.

Behold, the tree.

We just used Lux's Santa hat for a topper cause I'm cheap.

ALSO we bought LED lights. Which are AWESOME!

P.S. if you want to know how to make the tissue pom poms..

 click HERE! and just follow the directions, but use small pieces of tissue paper. Also I just bought the cheap little ornament hooks from target (300 for a buck!) to hang them on. I'm too lazy and not pretentious enough to do my own tutorial, even though a lot of people ask me how I made those, since I also made 2000 of them for our wedding.

Landlubbers.

This last weekend, our dear friend Kyle came to visit us. Just for fun!

Kyle.

AND BOY DID WE HAVE FUN. 

Kyle was able to spend our 2 year anniversary with us and accompany us to The Pirates House for dinner. 

The Pirates house is supposedly haunted. Nothing scary happened while we were there, until we got the check (ZING!). Anyway, Pirates used to eat food there. and die there.

Earlier that day we drove over to the beach to take some photos for our Christmas Card (no one get your hopes up, it probably won't top my other Christmas cards but, when you get married you get boring, it's the rules.) 

I thought it would be a fun concept to wear sweaters at the beach, Lux included. It wasn't actually as cool as I had anticipated, BUT we got some good ones (yes, I'll give you a preview, for those of you haven't seen them on facebook already.)

It was crazy windy, which I somehow always forget about that aspect of the beach, but since I am a [plus-size] model, I handled it, and so did my model dog. And my model husband. and our model friend Kyle. 

Also while we were there we saw dolphins all up in the ocean! While I was watching the dolphins I was just thinking, man! it is so cool that we LIVE here. It's really great to live somewhere you love, and to live somewhere that people will enjoy visiting. It makes all the instability up until this point totally worth it.

After we went to dinner that night we walked over and explored River Street and bought bubblegum cigarettes and took pictures of us that looked like we were smoking cause we thought it was funny.

It was.

Since we are all old people and boring Mormons, we went home pretty early and played like a buttload of Halo. Which is just how we roll.

Monday, before Taylor went to work and Kyle went home we went to see Breaking Dawn. I forgot how stupid that storyline was. Wow, really stupid. But I liked the movie, I thought they did an ok job at not making it horribly long and boring like the book. I mean, I think it's really lame that Stephanie Meyer makes a cameos in these movies. It's not necessary. Anyway, as per usual when I see these Twilight movies, I always laugh at inappropriate times. Like when Bella is dying, or when Edward isn't putting out. I think I have offended many a twihards in my day. Also what's this new craze with acting like Harry Potter is cooler than Twilight? Both are for losers. That's an exact case of the pot calling the kettle black. Which in lieu of that saying I'm going to start saying, "The Harry Potter fan calling the Twilight fan gay." Pass it on.

the massacre of 11-11-11

I've debated sharing this. But I decided, it was kind of funny, although REALLY gross. And PETA really irritated me with this little STUNT they pulled. And I was like, you know what PETA? Go stuff yourselves.

Anyway.

So the other day, while we were moving the couch into the house I noticed that there was something inside the door that wasn't there before. Upon looking closer, I realized that it was a frog/toad that must have been smashed when Taylor was on his way to work that morning.

It must of hopped in as the door was open but was not quick enough to get out of the way and was CRUSHED as the door slammed shut. Was it planned? Was it suicide? Accident? Who's to say?

At any rate, as much as I don't really care that much about toads (except the baby ones I found last spring in South Carolina), it was still kinda sad. I mean not as sad as the time I saw a baby bunny with it's legs ran over dying in the road in England (yep, I cried. And Tay wouldn't let me save it.)

THEN, I realized,  Friday was 11-11-11! what a bad omen.

OR maybe this amphibian's 11-11-11 wish was to be smashed in the door of the house of two really ridiculously good looking people in love.

WISH GRANTED!!

Now how to get Taylor to clean it off...... yuck.

The Couch Story aka My 1st REAL Redneck Experience

Just to clear the air before we get started, this is NOT the couch that we are picking up today.

This is a story all about how our life got flipped, turned up side down.......... For a couple of hours.

So as I said, I was in --what felt like, a never-ending search for a grey couch.  So you can imagine my delight and excitement when I saw a grey sectional posted on Craigslist on Sunday night. Normally I skip over the listings without pictures, but I had to see it. So Taylor called and the guy emailed the pictures to me.

Sometimes I have to consciously make an effort not to be a photo snob, because I've been spoiled by Tay's DSLR. But these pictures were taken on a cell phone and they were pretty bad. Anyway, no matter, I was still all amped up about it being grey. So Taylor asked the guy where he lived, "near Hinesville" he said. Which is about, 45 min -1 hr away. Which is where they have a lot of trailer parks. And I said to Taylor, "Oh, he probably lives in a trailer park." To which Taylor replied "No, he said he has the couch in his shed. People who live in trailers don't have sheds." And he is more of the trailer park expert so I listened. Anyway, we made plans to go see the couch Monday evening after Taylor got off of work.

[The guy posted the couch, again (for about the 4th time) and this time with the *high quality* pictures along with it. So this isn't the listing that I initially saw, but I thought I would screen shot it for visual aid purposes.]

Okay, let us pause and analyze for just a moment, so the couch here is listed as a REMBRANDT sofa. Go Google Rembrandt couch and see what comes up. Go ahead. I'll wait. Okay, see how there is nothing?? So I knew from the start that couldn't be right, I knew that Rembrandt makes teeth whitening products, and I was pretty sure they hadn't ventured into the furniture business. But anyway, more on that in a minute...

So the guy gave us his address and we put it in the GPS to see how long it would really take us to get there. Remember that he said he lived near Hinesville. Let me show you where Hinesville is in comparison to Savannah (where we are):

So, it is quite a drive, but worth it for a grey couch for me. So we go ahead and put the address his gave us in the GPS, and this is where he actually lived:

As you can see, the B marker is where Hinesville is, and the C marker is where he lived, outside of a [horrendous smelling] town called Jesup.  Just so we're clear, that is almost TWICE as long of a drive as the drive to Hinesville. So I was starting to feel like maybe the couch wasn't really worth it.

When I woke up on Monday I kept feeling like I should just forget about the couch. It was too far, and we don't have a truck to get it here so it would probably cost us a buttload and a half just to get it home. And it would have to make a SECOND trip there and it didn't look THAT great. So I had decided we were not going. And then I got a call from Taylor at work, who was trying to figure out a plan to go look at the couch that night after her got off work. "I don't want to go. I don't think it's worth it." Then Tay was like, "Come on, we have to try. You might love it!! and it's a lot cheaper than a brand new one. and if we get this cheaper couch we can get a new mattress."  I told him I didn't care. But after we got off the phone I started to feel guilty, I thought about how I had been acting like a brat all week and maybe it would be the best couch ever. So against my better judgement.... we went.

So we're driving along and Taylor is tired so he's boring and Lux isn't doing anything particularly exciting so I just started yelling things and laughing about how stupid we were for driving almost two hours to go look at some redneck's old couch, that he bought used from Craigslist.

FINALLY, we get there. And it's dark and as we pull up we can see that they do in fact, live in a trailer. There's a very butchy woman in the kitchen window, and at first I'm not sure if it's a man or a woman. Taylor gives the guy a call to make sure we're at the right place and the guy is at Wal-Mart [of course, a town with only 700 people, still has a Wal-Mart...... ugh.] and says he'll be there in 5 minutes. So we wait in the car.

About 2 minutes later, a truck pulls up. So we get out, and go introduce ourselves to the man who gets out of the truck, who looks like he's 65. As soon as he opened his mouth I could hardly stand myself. I've heard all sorts of southern accents, but his sounded exactly like the way me and Tay talk to eachother in jokey southern accents. I mean EXACTLY. Well it turns out this guy isn't the guy with the couch, but his BFF. So the butchy woman then emerges from the trailer saying "Ya'll come on in here!!!" and we obeyed. We go inside and meet the butchy woman, who is couch guy's mom.There is a toddler sleeping in a car seat by the TV. Upon entering the light I can see that couch guy's BFF is not 65, he is young, in his early twenties. So we sit on the couch (not the couch on craigslist) and wait. Normally, in awkward situations Taylor is very good at chatting with people and diffusing the situation. In this particular instance, Tay was extremely tired and not up for chatting. So I am forced to make conversation WITHOUT laughing in this guys face. I ask him about the town and if he's lived there his whole life, he has, of course. He tells me there is about 700 people in the town. I tell him I grew up in a town with about 2000 to make him feel like I'm on his level, but he is more impressed than anything.

FINALLY, couch guy pulls up and we go out to meet him so we can go look at the couch.....in the shed. Behind his trailer. Couch guy is also, young, and is with his anorexic scraggly smoking girlfriend, who walks by, ignoring us, heading for the house. Which is totally fine by me, I don't think I can handle anymore stereotypes coming to life in front of my eyes at this point. Couch guy is a real nice guy, he is explaining to us how he lives with his mom and his girlfriend just moved in with them so they have a couple of couches to get rid of. He pulls the car up so that we have some light shining on the shed. I think that was when the reality of everything really hit me. It literally took everything out of me to not start LAUGHING. and I MEAN REALLY LAUGHING. There's what looks like 80 couches piled on top of each other in the shed and I see a roach scurry off. They pull out one section and the cushions and we sit on it. It's kind of romantic, sitting outside on part of a sectional, in the light of car headlights, just the two of us, and couch guy and his BFF.

So I know what you're really wondering, how was the COUCH? Well, it wasn't that bad actually. I'm not really sure what fabric it was but I know it wasn't microfiber, or anything that would ever be stain resistant. And the cushions were very obviously sat in and used. But it wasn't the worst couch ever, and I don't think it smelled like pee, sex, or cigarette smoke. Which is always nice.

While they were putting the cushions back I saw the tag with the brand name on the couch which was BERNHARDT. not Rembrandt. But I didn't say anything because I didn't want him to feel like I was patronizing him. If he even knew what that meant. And when Taylor asked him the brand while we were there he seemed so confident. He said "It's Rembrandt. Yep. Rembrandt."  HE SAID IT TWICE.

We tell couch guy we appreciate him showing us the couch and inside I'm thinking, "These guys probably think we are the dumbest idiots, driving 2 hours to LOOK at a couch for 3 minutes." Then I think, "I can't believe I've gotten to this point in my life where I am worried about what people, let alone rednecks are thinking about me." He tells us he's no rush and he'd deliver for us if we pay for gas. He tells us he's not busy but he's in school all day. Then Taylor asks where, and he says the technical college down the road. Couch guy then proceeds to tell us he is graduating in May and can't wait to be done cause he's been there for a year and a half. And if I were Taylor, at that moment I would have been like TRY GOING FOR 6 YEARS!! But he ain't even like that. Anyway, it's not like I can talk, I'm a college drop out.

So then we part ways and spend the entire drive home laughing and I keep yelling,

"THAT JUST HAPPENED!!!"

I like to yell in the car.