What Will Save My Back

About a month ago, a friend at work was talking to me about a device she ordered called the Backjoy.  I thought she might have lost her mind, but when she got and brought it to work she said it really helped her back.  Here are a couple of pictures for you to check out so you know what I am talking about.

Looks a little weird, right?  Last Friday my friend was gone for the day at work so I swiped her Backjoy and took it for a test run.  My back was hurting, so I thought what do I have to lose?  As soon as I sat down on this bad boy I could tell a difference in how my back felt.  Going into this experiment my back and my hip were really hurting.  The last time I had a massage, my massage therapist told me that my hip was slightly elevated.  After a full day of using the Backjoy, my back felt AMAZING. 

The Backjoy claims to relieve neck pain, low back pain and tail bone pain.  It also says it will increase blood flow and circulation, engage your core muscles and help you breathe better.  At this point, I can only attest to the decreased back pain and hip pain, but I will keep you posted if I notice other differences. 

This bad boy runs $40 on Amazon.  If you are an Amazon Prime member, you also get free shipping.  I was able to score it online this past weekend for 20% off!  Today I ran into another coworker who said she also purchased a Backjoy.  I really think they should purchase these for all of us at work because the chairs at work kind of stink.  When you sit on your butt most of the day, wouldn't it make sense to have a chair that doesn't kill your back?  Would this not eliminate some issues with medical claims and lost time at work for back pain?  Admittedly, I have terrible posture both at work and at home.  I doubt I am alone in that, and I'm sure that doesn't help my back pain.  But, I hope my Backjoy can correct all that.  I will keep you posted.  

I’m off to watch the presidential debates.  Lets see how this goes.  Does anyone get the sense that this could get ugly?  

Favorite Fall Foods

As I mentioned before in my post about all the things I love about fall, tonight I get to post about a couple of those.  Last weekend Andrew and I took a trip down to the farmers market and picked up a couple of things.  I bought some zucchini to make another round of chocolate zucchini bread.  I also enjoyed my first honeycrisp apple of the season, which I discovered Buddy enjoyed as well.

Tonight, I made myself some butternut squash.  The first of many more to come this season.  It is so easy to make and I love sitting down with half of it for dinner.  Andrew hates almost all squash, but his loss in my gain!  Buddy and I enjoyed our first taste of squash. 

Here is how I fix my squash:

Cut the squash in half, in the cavity put a dollop of butter and a hand full of marshmallows.  Place both halves in a 9x13 pan, place an inch or two of water in the bottom of the pan, cover with foil and bake at 350 for an hour.  Remove and enjoy!

Tomorrow night I am headed out to a craft show, so I will have to share my purchases with you later.  I am pretty excited to pick up some new decorations for the house and possibly some other fun things!  

Recipe Wednesday

Today I'm going to post another recipe from our family recipe book.  I grew up on this recipe, it is my favorite.  Come to find out when searching online tonight, my mom isn't the only one that makes it.  That was kind of a bummer, but I will go on thinking it was my mom's exclusive recipe!

Cheesy Hashbrown Casserole

Click on the title and it will take you to another blog I found this recipe on, but I will post it here too for ease. 

2 lb bag of hashbrown potatoes, thawed

2 Cups of Sour Cream (large container)

1 stick of Butter, melted

1 can Cream of Chicken soup

2 Cups shredded Cheddar Cheese

1/4 tsp. Pepper

2 T. minced Onion

1 tsp. salt

For the topping

1 stick Butter, melted

2 Cups crushed cornflakes

Mix all ingredients for the casserole except for ingredients listed for the topping in a large mixing bowl.  Place in a greased 9x13 pan

Mix crushed cornflakes and butter in a small bowl and spread across the top of the casserole.

Bake at 350 for 1 hour.

ENJOY!!!

Happy First Anniversary

I can't believe our first anniversary is already here.  Where has the time gone. To be honest, I look back on the last year and feel like it has been a lifetime (not in a bad way) and then there are days I look back on it and it seems to have flown by.  We have done so much in a year. 

Our first major event in our married life was the adoption of Buddy in February of this year. He has brought so much joy and love to our lives.  We can't imagine our lives or home without him!

Following the adoption of Buddy in February was our decision to purchase our home in March.  Our house feels more like a home every day, and it certainly keeps us busy.  We love having a place to call our own. 

Within days of closing on our home, we took our honeymoon tip to Boston.  We had a blast!

When we got back from Boston, we kicked into wedding mode and worked some amazing weddings this summer!

Toward the end of the summer, I bought my  new set of wheels which I am totally in love with!

We rounded out our year with an amazing trip up to Green Bay, Wisconsin

What an amazing ride this first year has been with my husband and best friend.  Here's to many more happy years together.  Let's see what the next year can bring us!

 

Another Successful Weekend

We had another successful fall weekend.  The World Food Festival was going on downtown this weekend, so we partook in some delicious foods.  As always, we headed straight for the pupusas, they are always delicious.  I'm semi adventurous with my food tasting and will generally taste everything once, but Andrew is a little more daring than I am especially when it comes to the Middle Eastern foods. 

Also this weekend we were celebrating our one year anniversary since it is technically tomorrow and we won't really see each other.  We got a cake from Indulgent Moments who baked the cake for our wedding last year.  My mouth was watering all week just thinking about the deliciousness.  We didn't do anything too crazy for our anniversary since we just got back from Green Bay. 

We also traveled down to the farmers market on Saturday morning.  It was a bit chilly, but I wanted to go down and check out what was on sale for the end of the season.  I bought some zucchini so I can make another batch of chocolate zucchini bread this week!  I'm also pretty excited about the butternut squash I bought.  There were so many things I wanted to buy: pumpkins, cinnamon rolls, pie, honeycrisp apples, more squash....

Today we did a little cleaning around the house.  With the temps dropping, I decided it was time to open up the windows and air the place out.  We also did massive amounts of laundry.  Have I mentioned lately how much I love our washer and dryer?  I was able to wash and dry our blankets to put on the bed for fall and winter and some of our throws for the couch.  Everything smells so clean, I love it!  We also put up the new microwave that has been sitting on our front porch for a couple of months.  Some family members were swapping out their kitchen appliances for stainless steel, so they gave us their white microwave.  Now everything is matching in our kitchen.  Thank you guys! 

Before 

                                                                              After

Hope everyone else had a great weekend.  Back to the grind tomorrow.  But, tomorrow has to be an amazing day because it is our 1 year anniversary AND the Packers are playing! 

Fall Fun

I know I am a few days behind on the promised photos from outside, and I don't really have a good excuse.  X Factor and The Voice have been on, so I have been a little distracted by those.  I'm not really a fan of the fact they are on at the same time.  Last year, I was hooked on X Factor and when it ended, The Voice was on.  Now I must make a decision.... it is tough! 

I took a commercial break to run outside and snap some shots.  While I was out there I was reminded of all the things I love about fall.  I was a little bummed last week when we were in Wisconsin because there wasn't a ton of color yet on the trees.  I think it has been too warm still to really get the good fall color.  Our tree has started to change and I notice on my nightly walk with Buddy that the trees in the park are also starting to change!  I LOVE the fall weather, but more on that later. 

Here are some shots from the deck

The lower deck

 Upper deck

 The whole view of our summer yard work

While I was outside, I notice that my hydrangea's continue to bloom and they are looking amazing!  I got a variety that was supposed to be strawberry something or the other and were supposed to be white and pink blooms.  I was was pumped when I noticed they started to bloom, but a little let down when they only bloomed white.  Tonight, I noticed they weren't all white! 

Gorgeous!!!!  I can't wait to see them next summer.  They should be in bloom now until the first freeze. 

While I was taking pictures of these beauties, I noticed the tree was changing

It is time for fall inside too!  I have slowly been putting up our fall decorations.  I'm pretty sure Andrew thought I was pushing the seasons when I had fall decorations up before Labor Day, but I was ready and now, fall it almost here.  The first official day of fall is Saturday!  Here are a couple of our fall decorations

I took some branches from our yard, painted them black and made some ghosts to hang on them! 

This particular decoration has been around for as long as I can remember.  My mom had a decoration for every holiday I loved and reminds me of my childhood.  This is my favorite Halloween decoration, for Christmas I have several decorations I love, Easter is the bunny cottage (stick around until then and I will be sure to post a picture). 

The wedding wreath lives on! 

 I bought this urn on clearance and I love changing it around for every season.  I can't wait to put some greenery in it for Christmas!

My new purchase this year! 

Here are a few other things I am looking forward to this fall:

The pumpkin patch

Apple cider

Pumpkin pie 

Sunday and Monday and Sometimes Thursday Football 

Scarves

Sweaters

The release of the new Taylor Swift Cd--- ok, this is isolated to this fall 

The end of allergy season

The end of this campaign season!

What do you guys love about fall?  

Deck Update

 

As promised, here is another update.  I know, two days in a row. As I mentioned yesterday, we finished up the deck staining project before we left on vacation.  It only took all summer, but we got it done and it looks much better.  By the end, we might have gotten a little sloppy, but we were both just ready to be done.  We love the two tier deck, but it is a pain in the butt to stain.  While we were staining, we were already discussing how we would love to replace the deck with the decking that you don’t have to do anything to.  No staining, no intense cleaning, nothing but awesomeness.  Awesomeness until we saw the price tag… gross.  We have 50 deck boards and when the decking we are looking at is $30ish/per piece, that adds up.  We also want to re-do the railings on the deck.  This was the first and I hope the only time I have to stain deck spindles.  What a pain in the butt, scuse me, what a MAJOR pain in the butt that was.  I didn’t count the spindles on our deck, I didn’t want to know.  But, now it is all done and it looks much better and is protected from the elements. 

 

When we were done staining the deck, we put together the grill that my parents bought us as a housewarming gift shortly after we moved in.  We were cutting it pretty close on our promise that we would have it up and use it before the end of the season.  We didn’t want to put it together until the deck was done being stained because it is rather heavy and we didn’t want to move it a million times.  So, it is together and had its initial use for BBQ ribs, which were quite yummy.  I know Andrew will continue to wow me with his grill skills.  He is a little bit of a pyro, so the fire thing doesn’t scare him.  Me, that is another story.  I am a little leery about anything with fire.  Although, I did get use to cooking on a gas stove and now love it, so perhaps there is hope for me.

 

As I also mentioned in my post yesterday, we were at Target (one of my favorite places in the world) before we left and got an amazing score on some outdoor furniture.  I think they were pretty stoked to see it leaving the store.  Once again, my new set of wheels came in handy for hauling these bad boys home.  We scored two loveseats for a total of a little under $200.  Plus, we found an end table to match for $20.  The loveseats were originally $199 each and then we got them for ½ off, plus another 5% off with our Target debit card.  Let me stop here and put a plug in for the Target debit card and for those of you that I have already converted, you can skip this.  The Target debit card is amazing.  If you shop at Target EVER, it will be the best decision you make.  The card is just like a bank debit card, it is linked right up to your checking account, every time you shop you get 5% off your purchase, you get free shipping on Target.com, through your card, your purchases are tracked and they give you customized coupons for the things you buy and we all know how much I love coupons, 1% of your purchase price goes to the school of your choice, and from time to time they also send you amazing coupons in the mail.  What isn’t to love about this? I wish they had this back in the days when I was working at Target because I would have had a much easier time pushing the debit card over the credit card. 

 

Alright, so back to the finished deck.  Here are some pictures of everything.  I am excited for my mums to take off too!  I realized as I was typing this that it is now dark outside and the picture thing isn't going to happen, so here are a couple of photos that I have taken.  In the first one, you can kind of see the new seating and in the second one you can check out the new grill... under the cover.  I will try to remember to take some photos tomorrow when I get home from work and it is still light out.  Tonight it was so nice I had to take Buddy on a walk, so it was getting dark by the time we got back.