Guest Post! Cream Cheese Filled Pumpkin Bread...

Aileen's been blogging like a mad-lady, so I am going to take off some of the pressure and cover for her today! It's been turning colder and crisper, and we now have to wade through the leaves to get into our apartment: I love the fall! After working outside this morning (getting some overtime baby!), I had the urge to bake. Also, we had a pumpkin that was beginning to mold, so it needed to be used up. Those two things definitely equal pumpkin bread. I decided to try a new recipe with a layer of cream cheese in the middle, because that is a thing that needed to happen. I found a recipe on Averie Cooks and tried it out, but instead of using canned pumpkin I used the real deal. I hope it tastes as good as it looks! I'll let Aileen report on that tomorrow...

TGIF!

It's Friday! I love Fridays for two reasons. First of all, my work schedule is more flexible and I get off earlier on Fridays. I work in an after school learning center and we have classes on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday, so on Fridays I get the center to myself to organize for Saturday/recover from the first three days of classes. I listen to WFPL and WFPK (the public radio stations here in Louisville) as I work. For an introvert like me, that one day of working alone is awesome (after three days of constantly talking to students and parents)!

Second, even though it's not my real weekend yet, it's Sean's and it still feels like one for me too! We usually get "dressed up" (not really... just a little more fun than the normal work week) and go out to eat, where there's more than likely some beer involved as well.  Today we're headed to the St. Matthew's Holiday Walk. Hopefully I can get started on that November Christmas shopping goal.

Cheers to Friday everyone!

Favorite Twitter Accounts

I have a Twitter account, but honestly, I'm not very active on there. I rarely tweet anything, but I have a few favorite accounts that I follow:

For laughs
The Onion
Team Coco
The Daily Show
Stephen Colbert
Jimmy Fallon

For news
The Diane Rehm Show
Candace Clifft WDRB
89.3 WFPL News

For fashion
louwhatwear
E!'s Fashion Police RIP Joan :(
George Katsiopolis

For cute (!)
Emergency Cute Stuff

I follow all of these accounts, but I'm not really into Twitter. I guess I don't really "get it". I think it's kinda boring, honestly. So tell me, which accounts do you follow? Am I missing out on some great ones?!? Tell me so I can get in the loop!

Oh yeah, you can follow me too! :)

Three Recipes I want to Make Right Now

Sean does most (read: all) of the cooking at our house, but I like to experiment every once in a while. I mostly stick to baking and love trying new things for special occasions and parties. Here are three recipes I want to make right now:

Spiced Apple Cider from Dishing up the Dirt. I'm always up for trying out a new cocktail, and this sounds perfect for this time of year. We already have a bottle of Applejack (apple brandy) on our bar for the season! (Also, champagne!)

Blueberry Crumb Cake from Smitten Kitchen that I pinned way back in July when we were buying up all the blueberries from the farmer's market... Luckily, we froze a bunch of them!

Baked Macaroni and Cheese with Spinach and Red Peppers over at The Kitchn. Actually, I already made this one a few weeks ago for a party, and it was delicious. It's a good version of what Sean likes to call, "mac 'n' cheese plus."

Favorite Novel

It's hard for me to choose a favorite novel, really. I've always loved reading and I love so many books that it's just too much pressure to choose just one that is my favorite. I guess you could say I've had favorites at different phases of my life. Here are a few that have stood out to me over the years, and that I would gladly read over and over again.

Probably my first favorite novel was Number the Stars by Lois Lowry. I read it in fourth grade for Mrs. Shields' class. Then in high school a few of my favorites were The Catcher in the Rye  and Fahrenheit 451 in Mrs. Kidd's class and The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien with Mr. Hittle. I think I started reading the Harry Potter series sometime in middle school and remember feeling so much joy at being completely immersed in the world of Hogwarts for the 2-3 days after each book was released. (My favorites are Prisoner of Azkaban and Order of the Phoenix.)

Lately, I've really enjoyed the A Song of Ice and Fire series. I love all of the characters and the way that George R.R. Martin has created such an elaborate world and history for them. Finally, to circle back a bit, my book club group just recently read Fahrenheit 451 and it's one of the few books we've all truly enjoyed so far. I was one of the few to have already read it, but I was happy to read it again after so many years. It's eerie how relevant it remains in our society today, and we had our most lively and satisfying conversation around it.

These are just a few of my favorites. I'd love to hear what some of your favorite books are! I have to re-boot my book club after all!

Mondays...

What are the little ways I cope with Mondays? Actually, my Mondays aren't so bad with my work schedule being Tuesday through Saturday, I'm off on Mondays. So for today's 30 for 30 blog post here's my list of ways that I "cope" with Mondays:

-Do Nothing :) Mondays are my day for relaxing in preparation for the work week. I have the house to myself so I usually have a lazy day at home sleeping in a bit, catching up blog reading, binge watching a series on Netflix, or making to do lists for the rest of the week.

-Laundry: This might be contradicting my top item on the list, but at the very least while I'm sitting around the house, I try to get all the laundry finished so we can dress ourselves for the rest of the week!

-Running errands: One of the perks of having Mondays off is that I can do all of my errands like appointments and phone calls that you can only make during business hours without having to take time off from work. Oh, and I also do a lot of my shopping on Mondays... without all of the crowds out on the weekends.

-Blogging/organizing posts for the week: I'm starting this new Monday ritual for the November 30 for 30 challenge and hope to make it a habit for the future. I have time to brainstorm what I'm going to post for the week, organize photos, and general housekeeping with the blog.

And just to give you a laugh on this Monday: Sean found this video over the weekend, and I'm filing it away for whenever I'm having a bad day. I don't know why I find it so funny, but it cracks me up every time!

Post by Ryder.

1 Photo

Photo of my parents' house circa 1924

Today's post is coming in just under the wire. I thought this photo would be appropriate since we spent the day in Northern Kentucky with my family. Another reason this post is so late: we really know how to squeeze in every second of that extra hour we got with the time change last night! 

I'm adding a second picture of what the house looks like today, even though the assignment is one photo. I thought it would be torturous to you readers not to include it. :)

My parents' house on November 2, 2014