Rhythm Of My Heart...

Because I'm so hilarious and love any excuse to post about Rod Stewart. Today my dad is going in for another cardioversion in hopes that his heart rhythm will finally return to normal! Keep your fingers crossed!! Luckily this time it will be an outpatient surgery! Then if things go well he will be going to the Cleveland Clinic next week for surgery. Anyway I know that this Rod Stewart will definitely cheer him up since it has been his theme song since September. Keep him in your thoughts and prayers!!! And no Lucy will probably not be able to go back to the hospital much to her dismay....

Ellie Is Ready For Halloween....

So Kelley decided to dress Ellie up as a bumble bee for Halloween...here are the pictures she just sent me! SO cute! Apparently she is rolling around in circles on the floor trying to get it off...

Sophia Grace and Rosie Go Shopping!

I could watch this over and over! Look at all that Barbie stuff!!!!

Nicki Minaj Sings 'Super Bass' with Sophia Grace

By now most of you have probably seen this...SO cute! I love these little girls. But what I really loved was their shopping spree at Toys R' Us....

Paula Deen's Crunch Top Apple Pie...

A couple of weeks ago our sweet neighbor Virginia brought us some apples. They looked delicious! She is seriously so sweet, she always brings us vegetables from her garden. Anyway we had a box full of apples and I decided to make an apple pie! I have never made an apple pie before and was hesitant about making a pie crust from scratch, but it was well worth it! It turned out delicious!! I definitely will be making one for Thanksgiving!! You need some time to make it but it's worth it!

It's a long recipe so I just copied and pasted the recipe from www.foodnetwork.com.

Ingredients

• Paula's Perfect Pie Crust, recipe follows
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• Dash salt
• 3 1/2 cups peeled, chopped cooking apples
• 1 (16-ounce) jar applesauce
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 2 tablespoons butter, chopped into small pieces

Crunch Topping:

• 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• Dash salt
• 1 tablespoon butter, at room temperature

Directions

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

Line a 9-inch pie pan with half of dough. Combine the sugar, flour, cinnamon, and salt in a bowl. Stir in the apples, applesauce, and lemon juice. Spoon the apple mixture into pie pan and dot with butter. Cut remaining crust into strips; arrange in a lattice design over top of pie.

For crunch topping:

Combine the flour, sugar and salt in a bowl. Using a fork, cut in butter until mixture is crumbly. Sprinkle over top of crust. Bake for 10 minutes, then reduce heat to 350 degrees F and continue to bake for about 45 minutes, or until crust and topping are golden brown.

Paula's Perfect Pie Crust:

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon fine salt

3 tablespoons granulated white sugar

1/4 cup vegetable shortening, cold

12 tablespoons butter, (1 1/2 sticks) cold and cubed

1/4 cup to 1⁄2 cup ice water

In a large mixing bowl, sift together the flour, salt and sugar. Add the shortening and break it up with your hands as you start to coat it all up with the flour. Add the cold butter cubes and work it into the flour with your hands or a pastry cutter. Work it quickly, so the butter doesn't get too soft, until the mixture is crumbly, like very coarse cornmeal. Add the ice water, a little at a time, until the mixture comes together forming a dough. Bring the dough together into a ball. When it comes together stop working it otherwise the dough will get over-worked and tough. Divide the dough in half and flatten it slightly to form a disk shape. Wrap each disk in plastic and chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours. On a floured surface roll each disk out into a 10 to 11-inch circle to make a 9-inch pie.

**It was very helpful to me to watch the video of her doing it first...plus she cracks me up**

                                     

                                                                           Making the Pie Crust:

Flour, Salt and Sugar sifted together.

Cold Butter cubes.

Added to the flour mixture.

Mixed together to resemble "coarse cornmeal"

After the ice water has been added...

Rolled into a disc shape and wrapped in saran wrap.

After being in the refrigerator for over 2 hours.

Rolled out on a flour surface...I think it's important to put flour on the roller as well otherwise the dough will stick.

Not so beautiful in the pie pan...

The Filling: 

I forgot to take a lot of pictures while baking...

Apples were sliced and some were chopped. I didn't use as much apple sauce as called for and I used a little more cinnamon than it called for.

Attempting to make a lattice top...

It got a little confusing..

The crumb topping... the reviews recommended doubling it, but I can't remember if I did or not.

On the video she puts an egg wash (2 egg yolks, 1 tbsp milk) over the crust

I would maybe put the crumbly topping on before the top next time, but maybe not. Then just lightly put the egg wash over the crust.

It came out golden brown... I stuck in the freezer for a couple of minutes because I wanted to firm up the juices a bit.

After Bec, Rob, Jay, Frank and I had started eating it. It was really good and I would definitely recommend making it!

Farro & Wheatberry Salad...

I have had a couple requests to post this recipe. I got it from my aunt Cheryl and it's awesome!!! It's really healthy and a great thing to make at the beginning of the week and take to lunch. It's also a great side at dinner!

Ingredients:


Farro Grain, about a cup
Wheatberries, I just mix in a few with the farro, a little over a cup
Good Seasons Balsamic Vinaigrette, (the packaged kind that you make)
Lots of fresh Italian Parsley
Lots of fresh Basil (sometimes I use dried basil)
1 Cucumber, chopped
Tomatoes, chopped (I usually use about 4-5 roma tomatoes)
1 Yellow Pepper, chopped
1 Container Sliced Mushrooms, chopped
Green Onions, chopped
1 Can of Whole Kernel Corn, drained
1 Avocado, cut up (optional)
Kalamata Olives (optional)
Chicken, cut in bite size pieces (optional)
1 Package of Crumbled Feta Cheese
Salt and Pepper

1) Cook farro and wheatberries according to directions on package. You have to rinse these first, they cook for about 15 minutes.

2) Drain farro and wheatberries and chill in refrigerator.

3) Chop ingredients above.

4) Once the farro and wheatberries are chilled, add all of the ingredients above- Parsley, Basil, Cucumber, Tomatoes, Yellow Pepper, Mushrooms, Green Onions, Corn, Olives (I don't like olives so I don't use these), Chicken, Avocado (if you have a ripe one!). Mix all of these ingredients with the farro and wheatberries. Then season generously with salt and pepper.

5) Then prepare the Good Seasonings dressing. Cheryl told me she usually just mixes olive oil and balsamic vinegar with the seasoning package...I usually follow the directions but add extra balsamic vinegar!

6) Pour dressing over salad mixture, and stir to coat.

7) Lastly top salad with feta cheese. This stays good for a few days at least!!

Mayer Hawthorne...

I love love love Mayer Hawthorne. I recommend that everyone download some of his music! It's awesome... My favorite songs are The Walk and Hooked. The music video for The Walk is kind of weird but here it is below... It just makes me want to dance!



Look how cute he is!!!!!! There is just something about a guy with glasses...

Weekend Playlist...

1) Young, Wild & Free by Snoop Dogg & Wiz Khalifa
2) We Found Love (feat. Calvin Harris) by Rihanna
3) Without You (feat. Usher) by David Guetta & Usher
4) Home by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros
5) Hooked by Mayer Hawthorne
6) You Make Me Feel... (feat. Sabi) by Cobra Starship
7) Super Bass by Nicki Minaj
8) Heart Vacancy (DJ's from Mars remix) by The Wanted
9) Give Me Everything (feat. Ne-Yo, Afrojack & Nayer) by Pitbull
10) Lights (Bassnectar Remix) by Ellie Goulding
11) The Walk by Mayer Hawthorne
12) Dedication to My Ex (Miss That) (feat. Andre 3000 and Lil Wayne) by Lloyd (clean version is the one I like)
13) Marvin & Chardonnay (feat. Kanye West & Roscoe Dash) by Big Sean
14) My Body by Young the Giants
15) #1 by Madison
16) Play My Way by Maya Von Doll
17) Ready 2 Go by Martin Solveig & Kele
18) Go Outside by The Cults
19) Where Them Girls At (feat. Nicki Minaj & Flo Rida) by David Guetta
20) I'll Be Around (Prod. by Jonathan Marquez) by Azad Right
21) Helena Beat by Foster the People
22) Weatherman by Tarik

United Way...

This year I was put in charge of the United Way Campaign for Snider Tire. We kicked it off on Wednesday and I think it was pretty successful. I know that the employees at least enjoyed all of the snacks!! (12 dozen doughnuts later...) Anyway we had some great speakers come from The American Red Cross, The Salvation Army, Communities in Schools, Reading Connections, etc. At the beginning of this campaign I didn't know a whole lot about United Way. Basically United Way is an organization that is located in many different communities and provides support to the community through various charities and non-profits. They focus on improvements in education, income and health. Last year I did a little volunteer work with Communities in Schools in Charlotte, but this campaign just reminded me that I need to really focus on getting involved within the communities and helping others. Anyway I just wanted to encourage everyone to volunteer, every little bit helps. Even though I feel like most of our friends are very into volunteering so just keep up the good work! 

Here is a link to an article that I thought was really inspiring that was shared with us on Wednesday:  

http://www.news-record.com/content/2010/06/03/article/he_took_care_of_business

United Way website: www.liveunited.org 

Motivation....

If any girls need motivation to work out just check out this blog... (excuse the language!)

http://fuckyeahfitspo.tumblr.com/

Yep I headed to pure barre at 8:30 after looking at this blog last night.

Style Icon: Olivia Palermo

Olivia Palermo is right up there with Rachel Bilson when it comes to my style icons! I love everything she wears. Here are some of my favorites! Make sure to visit her blog: http://www.oliviapalermo.com/.

*pictures from http://oliviastyle.tumblr.com/* 

The Vampire Diaries...obsessed.

My favorite scene from last night...I'm officially obsessed with this show.

Hurricane Irene and I go to NYC...

 This post is obviously long overdue but since I haven't been very good about keeping up with my blogging recently I'm having to catch up. This would probably be better suited to facebook, but as y'all know I don't really put up albums so here ya go... Basically I had this awesome trip to NYC planned from Thursday-Monday because I was supposed to go to the Hamptons with Molly, Merrill, Ellen and Caroline, but Irene pretty much ruined our plans. Instead NYC shut down and we had to get creative. If nothing else we were stocked up on food and alcohol. Pretty sure we each purchased around 5-6 bottles of wine for what was supposed to be a week long lock down. Delta went ahead and cancelled my flight for Monday morning on Saturday and I had the pleasure of being up there for 5 nights....I couldn't have found a better group to spend it with though!

Day/Night 1: Magnus's Birthday Party
I must say that every time I get to hang out with Lib in NYC I'm always finding myself in really cool settings. On Thursday night Lib threw Magnus a birthday party in a penthouse suite at the Tribecca Grand Hotel. I was lucky enough to tag along with everyone and we had a blast.

Lib and Magnus...

We had so much fun in fact that some wine ended up in a bowl on the coffee table...

After the party Merrill, Molly and I decided to go have a few more drinks. Well those last couple of drinks led to Molly and I having quite an adventure on the way home...

Day 3: Day Drinking and A Dance Party

I didn't take any pictures on Friday (Day 2) but we did eat at a great restaurant named Peasant. Also on Friday Molly and I took a pedicab down 6th avenue (I think) to Central Park...by far one of the best times in NYC. We wanted to make sure we got some extra park time in just in case Irene destroyed everything. Anyway on Saturday, much to our dismay most things closed down around 12. So the few places that were open were packed. We had an awesome lunch at BarBossa where we immediately decided to start drinking. After lunch we made our way to Spring St. Lounge which was packed. After Spring St. Lounge we went to Gatsby's. At Gatsby's I took more shots during the day then I ever have. Things started to get crazy after that... After Gatsby's a large group headed to CP, Molly, Ellen and Laura's apartment for a hurricane party and spaghetti. While the party was fun, the real fun didn't start until everyone left and we had a late night dance party...

The sign outside of Joseph Leonard, it was too crowded for us to eat there.

Day drinking at Gatsby's...

Hurricane Irene apartment party.... Liz brought clothing to dress up in and fake tattoos...one of which I still have "hidden" in my purse. At some point during our party we had complaints from the neighbors, if only they had known what was in store for them late night.

Once everyone left, we had a huge dance party for a solid 3 hours singing along to Shania Twain, Tim McGraw, Eve 6, basically anything from high school.

We just got more and more into it as the night progressed...

Here's a sampling of what our dance party was like....I had to cut out some inappropriate stuff but you will get the idea...

After the dance party we decided to play in Irene. It was POURING down rain and there were absolutely no cars on the road. It was ideal...we even made some friends in the rain.

This is probably my favorite picture of the weekend...Molly and Charlotte in the street. Not sure how my camera survived this rain.

Back inside and in new clothes. This is right before we decided we needed to change out of our wet clothes so we could go back outside.

The girls that were smart and stayed inside took these pictures of us. At this point we took a bottle of wine down into the rain and shared it with some nice strangers we met.

Here we are just laying in the streets.

Day 4/5: The aftermath of Hurricane Irene

Luckily there wasn't too much damage in NYC. We were able to go to a great brunch on Sunday but I can't remember the name of the place. We spent most of the day drinking and watching movies. On Monday Caroline had the day off, so we were all about town. It was so pretty outside...perfect weather. Charlotte, Molly, Caroline and I had a great lunch at Pastis and did a little shopping. Caroline was so excited to be out on the town that she even curled her hair. She looked stunning.

Merrill came back in town and we went to an awesome dinner at Cornelia Street Cafe. I highly recommend this restaurant it was amazing! (Maybe I just needed some vegetables?) 

While at dinner Caroline shared this amazing picture with us. It's from this summer at Schwab's wedding when she went horseback riding. I can hardly believe that I'm friends with such a beauty. The picture below actually doesn't do it any justice because she refused to send me a copy, instead I had to take a picture of the picture. So if you want to really see the picture in all it's glory ask CP to email it to you, her email address is caroline.p.parker@gmail.com. 

Overall it was a great weekend! I just hope next time I go back the bars are open and the cabs are running!