"Wake Up!"

This is a totally crazy, but also a totally TRUE, story. 

Yesterday, I was vegging on the couch (does anyone else say "vegging"?  It's weird to spell...) and noticed that the Georgia Tech / Virginia basketball game was being televised.  Very exciting news for this Atlanta-native-turned-Coloradan, since our games are only televised if we're ranked, and even then it's rare. 

for the purposes of this story, I will tell you that our basketball team is definitely NOT ranked this year...we're tied for last in the ACC, which is another reason it was exciting we were on tv!  It's okay, though...it's a rebuilding year =)

Well, since the beginning of the game was only marginally interesting, and I was super tired from the weekend, I fell asleep with the game on after a few minutes.  Oopsie.  But then the crazy part happened!

I was in that weird "in-between awake and asleep" place, where you have trippy dreams.  In this particular dream, one of my girlfriends was there and said "Nicole - you should wake up right now - Georgia Tech might win the game."  Seriously, that's what she said!

So, in my weird, kind of asleep, kind of not, state, I slowly open my eyes and saw that we were tied at 57 with 3 minutes left in the game.  Then, I hear the announcer say "And for those of you just tuning in, Georgia Tech has just had a 6 minute, 9-0 run to tie the game with 3 minutes left."  Whoa!!!

Since we have DVR, I was able to rewind and see this crazy comeback, and then we ended up winning the game!  Very exciting, considering we are a very young team it's only our second in-conference win.

And to think, I almost missed it because I was asleep.  Thank you, to my dream-friend, for waking me up to watch it =)

Isn't that totally crazy?  I think so.

Go Jackets!

Recipe Success - Warm Wilted Winter Greens

Heyo!  I wanted to share a recent recipe experiment that went very well and pulled me slightly out of my comfort zone.  I am kind of weird about my salads - for the most part, I prefer "savory" salads as opposed to "fruity" salads.

As an example, when picking between a spinach salad with roasted beets or a spinach salad with strawberries, I would always go for the beets.  And I have historically detested Waldorf salad, or any salad with mandarin oranges or candied walnuts or anything sweet in them.

Anyone else that way?  No?  Just me?  I'm weird...I get it.

Unfortunately for Marc, he looooves fruity salads, and I am usually in charge of the salad-making at our house.  He's never complained, but deep down, I know he's itching for me to throw some grapes into my leafy meals.

So, for our New Year's dinner, I decided to give a new recipe a try, and I am very excited to say that not only did Marc love it, but so did I!  This might actually make a reappearance for Thanksgiving or Christmas next year =)

Warm Wilted Winter Greens

Recipe courtesy of Tyler Florence (we love him)

Ingredients: 

• 1/4 cup honey
• 1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
• 1/2 pint walnuts, for garnish 
• *we used sliced almonds, since Marc doesn't like walnuts...weirdo
• 3 bunches assorted winter greens (such as Swiss chard, radicchio, or escarole), washed, stemmed, and torn into pieces 
• *we used escarole
• 1 tablespoon grainy mustard 
• *I was scared of this ingredient, for some reason, but it is key!
• Extra-virgin olive oil
• 1/2 cup pomegranate seeds, for garnish
• Parmesan shavings, for garnish
• 1 shallot, chopped, for garnish

Directions: 
Cook honey and balsamic together over medium-high heat in a large saute pan, about 5 minutes. Toast walnuts in a small skillet; set aside to cool.

Pile greens on a platter. Stir mustard into balsamic-honey dressing, then whisk in about 1 cup extra-virgin olive oil; pour over greens. Season greens with salt and pepper and garnish with walnuts, pomegranate seeds, shavings of Parmesan, and shallot.

It sounds a little tricky, but it was fantastic.  Look at me, expanding my salad repertoire =)

Enjoy!

Time for a new camera - help!!

Okay, I am still working on cleaning up our Fiji vacation pictures and I will be back in blog-world soon!  I have just been seriously enjoying the time off of work and spending the days lounging with friends and hubby...so sue me =)

For my first post, I would like to request the assistance of my photographer friends.  While we were in Fiji, our "fancy" camera broke.  And by "fancy" camera, I mean our point-and-snap, not really that fancy camera.

So now it's time to purchase a new one and I'm not so keen on just getting another point-and-shoot.  My opinion is that if we're going to spend money on an actual camera, we should get something that's better quality than my camera phone.  I have the new Samsung Galaxy S3 (love it!) and the camera on this thing is amazing...so if we get a new camera, it needs to be worth the money and worth hauling it around. 

Our previous camera spent most trips tucked into it's travel case, because the quality of photograph wasn't really better than my cell phone...so why even bother with the extra electronic device?

This is where I need your help!  What should we get?  Please please help.

The camera we recently had was the Nikon Coolpix S220.  I think I bought it because of the Ashton Kutcher commercials...oops.  I ended up HATING it and I vow to never purchase another camera like this again.  Here are a few of my "must haves / complaints" from my recent camera experience...

• - The Nikon took amazing landscape photos, but the indoor pictures were awful.  Indoor photos always ALWAYS came out with a yellow tint.  Always.  We messed with settings, adjusted the flash, and the best we could come up with on indoor photos were over-or-under-exposed, still slightly yellow images.  I want this camera to take beautiful indoor photos with "as true to life" colors as possible, as well as amazing landscape/outdoor pictures.

•  
• - I'd love an auto-focus but would like the option to switch to manual focus (I know nothing about photography...I assume those are different things!).
•  
• - Marc says we don't want a digital zoom but an optical zoom.  Again...I'm ignorant about cameras/photography...
•  
• - We want this to be affordable.  I'm not interested in becoming a professional photographer, but I want to be able to go on trips and take decent pictures of us, family, friends, babies, mountains, dogs, birds...you get the idea.

 So...camera savvy friends...can you help?  Essentially, we need a step up from a point-and-shoot, but not quite as fancy as something you professionals use.  Does a camera like this exist?  What are your suggestions?

Your assistance and advice is much appreciated =)

I'm alive...

Big shock, but yes, I am alive =)  Since August, we have been traveling (both together and individually) every single week until today.  And just for the record, I hate traveling...I am just not a "jet-setter" - although I feel like I do a good job of faking it.  I have slept about 10 nights per month in my own bed since August and that makes me very very sad.

So, even though I know a ton of exciting things have happened to our little family of three (don't get ahead of yourselves...the three is myself, Marc and the dog), I haven't been able to share them with you.  Over the next few weeks/months, I hope to get caught up.  Here's a summary of some of the stuff we've been up to:

• - We bought and moved in to our new home!
• - Decorating our new home...this will take forever
• - Heading home to see family and friends over Halloween
• - Our amazing Thanksgiving in Fiji
• - Vegas and seeing "O" for the first time
• - Our first Christmas at the Treehouse

Bear with me.  My first task is going to be trying to capture what I can of some form of Christmas spirit...I'm going to start with trying to put up some Christmas decorations in our house (they are still in the basement today...and Christmas is less than 2 weeks away).

At least I take some comfort in knowing I'm not alone...it seems like a lot of people have a case of of the "bah humbugs" this year...although I don't know if that should be comforting or make me more sad.  C'mon, people...it's the most wonderful time of the year!

Are you buying it?  I'm faking...bah humbug =(

The Magic of Paint - Bathroom.

Alrighty, this is my last update.  After today, I'm crawling into the hole of chaos that is our new house and I will not emerge until we have gotten rid of all the boxes.

Scratch that.

I will not emerge until we have gotten rid of most of the boxes...upstairs...okay in at least ONE room upstairs.

Here was our upstairs bathroom before:

Purple window.  Purple mirror shelf...oh and if you opened the mirror, the whole inside was painted purple.  Eggplant purple.  And the walls were STARK white.  Like...hospital white.

And again...with that half painted door.  And purple trim.

The previous owners had recently redone the tile and  it's  not awful, but the colors they painted were not helping the cause.  I was intrigued by the archway, but it was difficult to get excited when the eggplant purple trim kept distracting me.

One more before:

And after:

Now I am so excited to get decorating!  I've ordered a white ruffled shower curtain to soften the space a little and provide some contrast against the manly tile work, and working on getting some bathroom furniture in here for storage. 

We went with Burnished Clay for the walls, and Heavy Cream for the trim.  What a difference!

And with that, I will disappear until my home is slightly more put together =) 

The Magic of Paint - Bedrooms

Continuing to share the glories and magic of paint =)

The upstairs bedroom...before:

And after:

Whoa!!

Another angle...before:

Previous owners...what's up with the half painted doors?  They're weird...

After:

This is much much better =)

We're going to be using this room for Marc's office.  Originally, this room was going to stay empty for a while, but now it's so awesome, that we had to use it!

The color we chose is called Classic Silver by Behr.   Very classic, indeed!

And now...we venture to the downstairs guest bedroom.  Before:

After:

Um...we were very torn about whether we should get rid of the polka dots or just embrace them.

...joking.  We were SO happy to tear those suckers off the wall.  Every polka dot that was removed felt like we were taking a breath of fresh air =)

One more...before:

After:

So much more soothing and calming for guests =)  The color is Sliced Cucumber by Behr from Home Depot.

I might have one more of these up my sleeve, and then I will be silent for a while.  We had the movers come this weekend, so we are living in a minor state of chaos right now.  Excited chaos, but chaos none the less!

Hope everyone has had a great weekend!  If you hate a room in your house, I strongly encourage you give it a face lift with a fresh coat of paint =)

The Magic of Paint - Living/Dining Room

Holy cow.  Paint is an amazing thing.  I never realized how much paint can truly transform a space!

I wanted to document the facelift that our living and dining room underwent this week...just with a little paint!

Here is the before:

Yucky, putrid green on the walls and brown trim...

And after:

Light, airy and refreshing!

Wow!  Need to see more?  I don't get tired of sharing =)

Before: 

 After:

Let me just tell you - I am THRILLED with how this has turned out so far!  There is still only primer on the moulding, but the walls are totally done.

I'm mostly excited about how amazing the fireplace turned out.

Before:

After:

People gave us a lot of grief about painting over the wood, but I'm basically obsessed with it now =)

I have to say, these were the rooms I was most nervous about, as mentioned in a previous post, but I am just so so excited with the end result.  We had lots of options to pick from....

In case you can't count them all...there are 7 paint options on that back wall =)

...seriously...we bought, like, $40 worth of those tiny paint samples, but it was totally worth it.  The color that I was passionate about ended up looking terrible on the walls.  Marc actually picked out all of the colors we ended up using!

We ultimately landed on Charismatic for the living room:

 Caribbean Sunrise for the dining room:

And Heavy Cream for the trim and fireplace:

All colors by Behr, purchased at Home Depot.  Now I can't wait for the furniture to arrive!