5 on Friday

{one}
Chili
As Autumn turns into Fall, I couldn't be more excited that it is Chili season!  This past Sunday I made my first batch of Chili in the Crock pot and it was great.  My recipe is a mash up of various chili recipes but the key is it is super easy!

Mandy's Chili
1 jar of Salsa
2 cans of diced tomatoes
2 cans black beans
2 cans kidney beans
1 chili seasoning packet
1 lb of ground meat - beef, turkey, chicken, or our favorite - Venison!

Brown the meat.  Stir in seasoning.  Dump meat & everything else in the crock pot for 4 hours. Enjoy!
Favorite toppings: Fritos, Doritos, Shredded cheese/Avocado/Tortilla Strips, or Oyster Crackers

{two}
Family Dinner Recipes
I don't know what has gotten into me but I'm a recipe printing freak lately!  My email is continuously getting flooded with links to Pillsbury, Kraft, and Betty Crocker.  I've always been obsessed with collecting recipes so I'm loving that there are so many yummy new dishes out there.

{three}
Fall TV premiers!
Last Fall, we were in a newborn baby haze and watching our favorite shows was the furthest things from our minds.  Now that our little baby is 1 and goes to bed like a champ, we can enjoy our shows again.  Here's to watching Modern Family, Big Bang Theory, Glee, Dancing with the Stars, Survivor, Bones, and whatever Bravo has to offer!

{four}
Gallery Wall is a go!
My personal handyman Brad is on board with my latest project!  As part of our date night last Saturday, we went to IKEA before dinner and our movie to get all the frames.  We decided to go with a combination of black and white frames with white mats in various sizes.  We even mapped out the layout the frames.  Some may think the hard part will be hanging all of these frames but I think it is going to be picking out the photos.  Thankfully we just had a photo shoot for Eloise's birthday with the amazing Chantel Ferraro so we have some great photos to pick from!

{five}
Eloise's 1 year Photo Shoot.
"The best that a photographer can do is have someone else take their family photos" - Chantel Ferraro.  We got to see some sneak peaks this week from Eloise's 1 year photo shoot and they were amazing.  We can't wait to see the rest!

5 on Friday

{one}
Market Salad
Right now I'm obsessed with this salad.  Easy pantry ingredients and so simple to throw together.  Mixed Greens, Dried Cranberries, Bleu Cheese crumbles, Walnuts & Balsamic Dressing.
Balsamic Dressing suggestion:

{two}
Gallery Wall

With the new interior paint, I find myself bored with most of my decor.  I've been sniffing around Pinterest for ideas and keep coming back to the concept of a Gallery wall.  I have the perfect place for it and everything.  Now to get Brad on board.  He loves a good project!

{three}
5 things you could live on
One of my favorite authors Shauna Niequist posed a random questions on Facebook - What are your 5 things that you could or do live on?  She said peanut butter, cheese, bread, wine, and coffee.  Me? Peanut Butter, Hummus, Red Bell Peppers, Cheese & Bread.  Runners up would be Diet Pepsi, Cold Milk, and Chips & Salsa.  How about you? 

{four}
Fall Decor
I've said a ton of times on this blog that Fall is my favorite season.  I love the food, colors, weather, holidays/celebrations, clothes, and decor.  Fall/Halloween is probably my favorite holiday/season to decorate for - more so than Christmas.  I love seeing pumpkins in the obvious and not so obvious areas of the house.  With a curious toddler on my hands now, I will have to do some serious thinking when it comes what I can do for Fall Decor this year.  I see a Hobby Lobby trip in my future...

{five}
And just like that...I'm done nursing.

I stopped pumping a few weeks ago and was just nursing in the morning and night. This past weekend, I dropped the morning feeding with no problem.  I figured that I would keep the evening feeding for another week or so.  Wrong.  Come Tuesday, I could tell that she was done.  If I would have known that Tuesday night was going to be the last night, I would have cherished it more.  Instead of playing on my phone or looking at the clock, I would have just stared at her.  Eloise & I have come so far in this Breastfeeding journey and I'm so glad that I was able to do this for her.  Here's to putting away the nursing bras, tanks, pads and all other nursing gear! 

Would you like a cocktail with dinner, you ask.  Why, yes.  Yes, I will.

5 on Friday

{one}
Pink & Yellow.
1st Birthday Party preparation is in full swing.  As pink & yellow is my color scheme, I feel like I'm seeing the two colors together everywhere.  I find myself hearing this song in my head while strolling the isles of Target, Home Goods or Party City as I look for items for the party.  Humor me and listen to the chorus and say Pink & Yellow instead of Black & Yellow.

{two}
Basil Plants 2.0
Since I killed off my first basil plant, I sent out an SOS to my parents on what to do.  They went a hunt for a sturdier basil plant and found 2 viable options.  This past Sunday, my Dad came over and replanted them for me as well.  Thank God my parents have a green thumb! Here's hoping I do better with my Basil Plant 2.0

{three}
Oh Kale Yeah
One of my besties Anita is a Vegan and champion for the plant-based diet.  Over the past few months, I think I have seen her eat every type of vegetable the Whole Foods has to offer.  Most days at lunch, she entertains the questions of "what are you eating?" "did you make that?" and "that's kale, right?"  With Brad out of town this week, I decide to get some kale and give it a whirl.  Of course, Anita was thrilled and was armed with lots of tips.  Homemade kale chips here we come!

{four}
Kitchen Revamp.
As mentioned earlier this week, we had the interior of our house painted. With new paint, comes new decor!  In preparation for the new paint, I had picked up some new accessories for the foryer area and living room but completely forgot about the kitchen.  For some reason, I guess I thought that what I had decorated the tops of kitchen cabinets with back in 2007 was going to work with this new color.  Wrong!  As soon as I took these decorations down, I started to hate them.  That's how it is when you are redecorating - you instantly start to hate what you've had for years simply because you are so excited about the change.  Thanks to a few Visa gift cards I got for my birthday from my girlfriends & Home Goods, I was able to start revamping the Kitchen accessories immediately.  Lovin' the new look so far!

{five}
Last Day of Pumping!
I know, TMI.  Deal with it.  So, where's my medal?  We get a medal for doing this whole nursing & pumping for a year, right?  No medal? Oh, ok.  A prize?  We get a prize, right?  No prize?  What?  No medal, no prize, no nothing?  So, remind why I did this again?  Oh yeah, because I wanted to.

One thing that I have learned since the moment that I was pregnant is that motherhood is all about doing what works for you and sometimes simply just survival.  No matter what you do - natural childbirth vs epidural, breastfeeding vs formula or cosleeping vs sleep training etc - no one is going to give you "something" as a reward - no medal, no prize, no award.  All you get is the satisfaction knowing that you did the BEST THAT YOU COULD for you and your baby.  Seriously.  Think on it.  It's so easy to sit judgement of other mothers and what they are doing when you are having one of those supermom days yourself.  Believe me, I've done it more times than I would like to admit.  When fellow new moms or other pregnant women ask for advice, I've found myself telling them this: Do you what you can and what works for you and your family.  I made the decision to nurse Eloise as long as I could from the beginning.  I would take it day by day, week by week, and month by month.  Now that we are staring at the finishing line, I feel great that I made it this far and I'm ready to be done with whole nursing lifestyle completely in the coming weeks.  Real talk?  I may run my car over the pump just to show it who's boss for once.      

Paint Before & After

Brad & I painted the inside of our house a fairly neutral yet warm color in April 2007 after moving in November 2006.  After almost 6 years, we have seen enough of this color and wanted a change!  We both loved the various grays Brad had decorated his Naperville townhome with and decided to go that route again.  With some design consultation, we picked 2 colors - SherwinWilliams Mesa Verde Tan for an accent wall behind the fireplace and Sherwin Willliams Pismo Dunes for the rest of the house.  Check out the Before & After photos of our house now that the painting is complete!  Thanks to Brian Sanderson at Aisling Decorating for the amazing job that he and his team did.  Check him out!

Before

After