2015 in Review, part 2

Tim and I went on many bike trips this summer. It was fun, besides my butt killing me!!! Being on an enduro for 5 hours is no fun in that department.

Checked one more place off my bucket list, this covered bridge near Sleeping Bear Dunes :)

Tim got part of his sleeve done over the course of about six months

I made my first lemon tart! Besides having a slight metallic taste to it (darn metal pan!), it was really good! I will definitely try this again, just in a different pan.

Harvested banana peppers and cucumbers :)

Homemade croissants filled with chocolate or fruit

Went on a camping trip with my entire family! I realized 80% of my photos taken were of Micah :)

Found a place in Traverse City that sells macarons and cupcakes :)

Tried truffle fries for the first time and fell in love <3. With the fries. And my husband :)

Made Giada De Laurentiis' Marinated Salumi Sandwich-so yummy! I even got Tim to eat fennel and arugula!

I got a Dutch oven and made Irish beef stew with mashed potatoes, very yummy!

Spent lots of time on the couch with my family.

Harvesting grapes from my neighbor's yard-I ate bowls full of these, so good!

Celebrated my 27th birthday along with Micah, Rebecca, and Chloe. Rebecca bought me some delicious tea and a sloth tea infuser!

Tim and I (me especially!) wanted to go away for our 1st anniversary. Since we didn't have a ton of money, we decided checking off a bucket list item still in Michigan, aka da U.P.  I'll do a post on this :)

Tim was voted employee of the semester!

2015 was the year of organization! This is an upstairs closet that just houses all the crap we rarely use. My whole thought is that if Tim and I were to die, we don't want people to have to take forever going through our stuff to keep/sell. I want things to be organized. We're slowly getting there.

Kitty and I spent a lot of time on the couch this year. I wonder how many movies I've watched?

Halloween

I've tried making time for myself on weekend mornings. This book helped. It's amazing how much our body craves alone time.

Tim and I tried making meals ahead of time: breakfast sandwiches and cookies, lasagna, and marinara. We did it for one week and stopped. I just think frozen food doesn't taste as good. We'll definitely try it again, but not these recipes. Besides the cookies. Those are awesome. I'll post the recipe sometime.

We hosted Thanksgiving at our home this year, and everything went well :) Minus the mashed potatoes not being cooked all the way. Oh well.

I took Benjamin's senior photos :)

We found our Christmas tree, thanks to a goat :)

I, again, took a lot of cute pictures of Micah :)

I bought this book for Micah that talked all about a brave, courageous little boy named Micah!

Tim turned 28 :)

We celebrated by going to see Star Wars :)

Made our Christmas cookies for the season!

Tim saw some posters on etsy that he wanted for his Christmas present, so I bought three of them; and I saw a couple of rings I wanted on etsy, so he bought me them :). Limit of $50 gifts sort of kept...

Went to my parents for our annual Christmas breakfast :)

New Year's Eve I actually dressed up...for the morning haha. Sweatpants were found later, I just love comfort. My hair actually looked cute though :)

I purchased my first Try the World box and think I love it-I'm going to give them a couple more months to see if I really want to keep subscribing. Good food, just kind of expensive.

This was the last photo taken of 2015!

Overall, I believe 2015 was a year of finding myself through baking, spending time with family, and traveling. Exactly what I'd love to do EVERY year <3.

2015 in Review, part 1

We started out the year using my resolution of making new recipes and found favorites:

Painted our bedroom so it doesn't look like Barney anymore :)

My niece, Chloe, was born :)

Made these delicious cupcakes for Tim's coworker's birthday and confirmed my love for baking.

 In February I lost my job due to Tim and I standing up for myself (long story about my boss lowering me to part time but telling me I was not allowed to tell Tim about it as well as him never taking out taxes in my checks. Tim called him out on it because that's serious and very illegal. And I was fired.). I am so relieved that I don't work there anymore. Everything seriously happens for a reason.

Losing my job meant God gave me a month to find the perfect job. I was also able to focus on hosting my sister's baby shower and spend a lot of time finding myself again. You don't realize how much a horrible job is sucking the life out of you until you don't work it anymore. I was able to go to the library and read, bake, hang out with my sister/niece/nephew, and really focus on happiness. It was exactly what I needed.

 I finished Gilmore Girls during this time also and ate a lot of healthy ice cream made from frozen bananas, peanut butter, and chocolate :)

I got my most likes on an Instagram picture of a pizza that looked amazing but really didn't taste that great. No one needs to know...

Made apple crostata for the first time with Marshalls Abroad's recipe

After a month, I found the perfect job for me right now. I'm a receptionist at a dentist in town, where each day is started out with a smile and a "good morning" from everyone. I love working with optimistic people and people who really care about you. Also, it's only three minutes from my house and I get Fridays off :)

Celebrated mother's day with a homemade fruit bouquet :)

 Tim and I went to our first wedding as a married couple. We actually had a ton of fun, but Tim hates hates hates getting his photo taken. We really are happy! Tim was just ready to be home and in sweat pants. In this picture, we still had the reception to go to haha

 We remodeled our entryway-I'll post on this soon!

I planted our garden :) Chock full of peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes, brussel sprouts, and herbs! 1/2 of which didn't harvest in time before the snow :( Next year I'll figure it out!

 Tim and I had a date day and found an arcade we'd never been to :)

I got new glasses :)

 Made my mom's recipe for strawberry shortcake but added orange zest whipped cream on top.

 Put together a shed in our backyard to house Tim's new....

 enduro!!! We had a lot of fun taking trips on it this summer :)

 I got my first tattoo (see previous blog post in case you're wondering why the heck I'd get a tattoo of my cat-this photo is also just of the stencil)

 I also checked off a box on my bucket list when Tim and I saw Dave Matthews Band!!!

We found a cute little cupcake shop (my numero uno place to find when traveling to new cities!)

 Made homemade raspberry syrup for our pancakes!

 We also had my niece and nephew visit for a few weeks this summer, it was so much fun!

I helped out on my friend's food truck a few times!

Part 2 coming soon!!! I have WAY too many pictures and things I want to remember!