Labor Day Weekend

Hope you are all recovered from your Labor Day weekend. Maybe you actually took the day off (as you should). We did not. It is Wednesday, and I am still recovering. Good thing I'm not working yet! ;)
I finally got the energy to start some craft projects (what took me so long-I know!) I have been wanting to decorate all our cheap bookshelves and finally found the inspiration I needed. Stenciling seems to be totally in right now so I found a stencil I liked and got to work. I saw another blogger used a gold sharpie to accent her bookshelf, and I LOVED IT!!

I got the top half stenciled in one afternoon. Now I am working on filling in the lines and will do the bottom half. I can't wait to show you the finished product!

Before we took off for the weekend, these two things came in the mail. I have an OT license, yipee!!!! And do I have the sweetest friend or what?! A cute congratulatory card AND Vera Bradley hairties. All on the same day! I have no idea how she planned that so perfectly!!

Saturday morning we "splurged" on some BoSa donuts. Matt had some at work and told me how good they were. He was right! I think we will be getting these again soon! 

While waiting for the Huskers to start, Matt even helped me with a bookshelf a little. Probably mostly because he wants it to be done. Currently, there are books covering most of the walking spaces in our apartment.

After a great Husker win we got ready for our trip. Sunday morning we headed up to Flagstaff. A lady at church had told me about these lava tubes that are really fun to hike in. So as usual, we took someone's advice didn't really look into it much and went for it. WE HAD A BLAST!!!! It was so cool! Our pictures do not do this thing justice, but take my word-it was amazing.

Here is the entrance to the cave. Lucky for us, everyone and their dog also decided to hike in the cave. Normally, I don't enjoy seeing a ton of other hikers, but when were are in an unfamiliar place that is pitch dark with a flashlight from 1992 we gladly welcomed other hikers!

This was hiking down in the cave. Some areas were not very tall! My legs got a nice little workout.



So I do not do so well with a flash in a dark place, but this gives you a pretty good idea of what the cave looked like.





Kinda creepy right?

Click HERE if you want to experience part of our walk through the cave.

We were in awe of how symmetrical the cave was since it was all natural. We got a little cold in our shorts, but we enjoyed the cooler weather for a change.
We headed back up, ate some lunch at a cute little Mexican place and headed north for some more sightseeing. Our first stop was at Wupatki National Monument. We took a look at all the pueblos from the Native Americans that used to live there.

It was kind of fun seeing the ruins of the past. Then we drove over to Sunset Crater. It is a volcano that erupted a little over 900 years ago. 

It was crazy to see all the lava rock and ash.

Do you see that huge crack?!?

That night we headed into downtown Flagstaff to grab some dinner. It was such a cute downtown area. We even saw a Rolls-Royce! I wasn't expecting it  to be so much like a ski-town. I would describe it as a mix between Breckenridge, CO and Lawrence, KS.

We ate at the Hotel Weatherford which ended up being this old hotel they had restored to its original glory. The first floor held the main part of the restaurant. The second and third floors had rooms you could actually stay in as well as more restaurant seating. The second floor was filled with a group playing Irish music. We headed up to the top floor where they had the original bar and a fun outdoor patio. We chose to eat inside since we did not pack for the weather. It was so cute!! We had a blast, plus they had free popcorn!

The next day was our big hike-the main reason for our trip. Matt's friend, Eric, who we would be hiking with us called and said he talked to a group that had just finish hiking and said it was really cold. So after dinner we went to go buy some warmer clothes. I am so thankful we did-I was cold! 

We met Eric, his uncle and nephew early Monday morning to start our hike up Humphrey's peak. It is the highest point in all of Arizona. 

Can you see that beast way up there!?

After an hour or so I was getting really tired. Check us out.

Do you like my Walmart special sweatshirt? I was still really cold at this point. And did you notice I wore my headband backwards-don't judge. I had to keep my ears warm somehow. They aren't selling headband ear warmers in stores yet.

We had to hike a while to get above the tree line for any good views.

But when we did, it was pretty spectacular.

I had heard a lot of people get altitude sickness because it gets pretty high. I was definitely feeling it!

Isn't my husband so nice to document this for me???

Altitude sickness or not, we made it!!!!

Check out these views!

We weren't too far below the clouds!

Kind of looks like we are in an airplane. But we weren't.

We enjoyed lunch at the top and headed back down.

We had such a good time. Apparently so did everyone else from Phoenix because we all decided to come home at the same time. Meaning we got to enjoy a nice little hour delay on the drive home. 

We decided if we could do it all over again we would have done undergrad at Northern Arizona University. How cool would it have been to go to college here? Hiking, skiing, 75 miles from the Grand Canyon, adorable little downtown? Oh well, Kearney was nice, too! Enjoy the rest of your week. I will be sure to update you all on my craft projects as I get them finished! :)

Philly Burgers

Hello everyone! Hope you all had a relaxing Labor Day. I will put up our weekend adventures tomorrow! Before we took off for our weekend, we made these-Philly Burgers. We kind of stumbled into making them and may be tweaking them in the future. They were good so I thought I would share them with you now!

Here's what you need:

1 pound ground beef (or turkey or chicken)

Burger seasonings: we used seasoned salt, a little chili powder and a touch of cayenne pepper

~1/2 cup chopped green peppers

~1/3 cup chopped onions

4 slices of Swiss cheese

4 buns

Additional burger toppings of your choice

Here's what you do:

We tried this two different ways. I will give you both and you can decide how you want to make them. 

Method 1: 

Prepare ground beef by mixing in seasonings, peppers and onions. Form into four patties. Cook burgers with your preferred method. Just before removing from grill, top with Swiss cheese. Remove once melted.

Method 2: 

Mix seasonings into ground beef. Form into four patties. Cook as normal. Add Swiss cheese just before removing from grill.

Toast buns (if desired). Top burgers with additional toppings. (For Method 2 add peppers and green onion at this step). Serve and enjoy! Matt used Method 1 for his burger, and I used Method 2. We both enjoyed them the way they were. Although, I wouldn't mind giving Method 1 a try next time! Let me know which one you choose!

 For your BONUS recipe this week I thought I would highlight another great weekend food, my salsa recipe. It's so easy! And so delicious!! You can use it for just about anything-even topping your burgers!!

Enjoy friends! Talk to you all tomorrow :)

Bundt Pan Pizza

Holy moly was this good!!! But then again who doesn't want monkey bread for dinner? Following Matt's first bite he said, "we are having this again!"
I found two similar recipes to this. I mostly followed this ONE from The Craftinomicon. I also found another that wrapped the pepperoni and cheese into the dough. So cool, but too much work for me! If you are feeling ambitious, you can find that recipe HERE. Here is my recipe for bundt pan pizza.

Here's what you need:
1 can of biscuit dough that makes 8 biscuits (I think I used Grands flaky layers)
1/4 c. butter (1/2 stick)
1 T. garlic salt (if desired)
your favorite pizza toppings (we used pepperoni and bell peppers)
~1/2 c. shredded cheese
pizza sauce (I recommend this one or something similar that is easy to reuse)

Here's what you do:
Open biscuit dough and cut into pieces. I usually quarter my dough when making monkey bread but actually cut into 6-8 pieces for this since I was only using one can. It worked well this way.



Melt butter and stir in garlic. Now is a good time to start preheating your oven to 350°. Grease your bundt pan. I then placed a few pepperonis into the pan.

Next, dredge biscuits through butter mixture. 

Begin assembling pizza toppings into bundt pan. Like I said, I put a few pieces of pepperoni down first. Then I did a layer of biscuits. Mine did not fill up the pan like they normally do when making monkey bread since I cut them smaller. Then I added a layer of toppings-pepperoni, peppers, and cheese. I did not measure my cheese, I just grabbed a couple handfuls. 

I did another layer of biscuits followed by another layer of pizza toppings and was out of dough at this point. If you have more, keep going!

Bake in oven for 30-35 minutes or until dough is golden brown. Let sit in pan for a few minutes then flip onto plate. 

Serve with pizza sauce. As I mentioned earlier, we use the pizza squeeze. It is easier to reuse when we are making our individual pizzas, and it worked perfect for this! You could definitely layer the sauce into the pizza (use about 5 T.), but make sure you increase your cooking time to avoid soggy biscuits. I wasn't sure how long it would take so I used it as a dipping sauce instead. Plus, it was way more fun!

We both ate more than our share and it lasted us two meals. I would say you can serve 4-5 adults with this recipe. You could very easily double it because you will probably have the pizza toppings for it. Ours did not expand to fill the pan completely but another can of biscuits may have overflowed it since you are adding pizza toppings in the middle. I would recommend two bundt pans if you are doubling the recipe. Let me know what happens if you double it!

Your bonus recipe this week again comes from Mix and Match Mama. Are you beginning to sense a trend here? She is our new go-to for desserts. These were again very simple and so yummy. They only require a few ingredients. Here you have, Marshmallow Cream Crunch Bars. 

Enjoy! :)

Enjoying the Wait

Where is the time going? I looked back on my blog to see I haven't posted ANYTHING since Tuesday? What have I been doing.!?!?!?!...A whole lot of nothing is what...Maybe that's why I don't have anything to post. Let me fill you in. 

A little over a week ago I took my boards (I passed, yay!) so now I am waiting for my state license to be processed. Until then, I can't really do anything...I have been enjoying some much needed down time! The temperature hasn't been too hot here (upper 90s) so I have enjoyed some pool time and other unimportant internet searching. I am so excited to start working in a career soon. This is my first fall I am not heading back to school for a LONG, LONG time. Nolan informed me I went to school longer than he has been alive...Thank you for bringing that up. I am very ready to move on to non-school things.

Saturday we hung out with a family Matt met at work. We had a great time enjoying some burgers with them at their place. Sunday we went to church and Matt headed back home to do his fantasy football draft with my church back home. I stuck around to volunteer in the nursery. I think it will be a good way to meet some younger people. We headed over to Glendale for a little preseason NFL watching last night. 

How great are these seats?! The Super Bowl will be played here this year. If only we could get these seats....Unfortunately they probably won't qualify for our under $10 ticket price. So we will probably just check out the week festivities instead.

My week will be spent the same way I spent last week. I may have to start some new craft projects. Let's hope my license gets processed soon!! I promise to be back tomorrow with another recipe for you. And maybe something else exciting will happen this week so I have something else to blog about....no promises there.

Nearly twice baked potatoes

Matt has discovered his love of crockpots. He can put our food in it before he leaves for work, and I usually get home in time to turn it off. It doesn't get much easier! This recipe involved more work on the back end than the front end, but either way it is still pretty simple! So if you need to get out the door quickly in the morning, this recipe is for you!

Here's what you need:

4 medium russet potatoes

Optional: 10 oz. cremini mushrooms

1 c. broccoli

1/3 c. vegetable or chicken broth

2/3 c. low-fat plain yogurt

Here's what you do:

Wash and clean each potato. Wrap each potato in tin foil and place into crockpot on low setting for 6-8 hours.

Once the potatoes are soft scoop everything out of the skins.

Mix scooped out potatoes with chicken broth and yogurt (and mushrooms if you are adding those). Fill skins with new potato mixture. Cook broccoli how you wish and add to top.

Garnish with your favorite toppings-cheese, bacon bits, etc. And done! You could also very easily add meat to your potato mixture if you choose. Another Tasty Tuesday for you to try.

For your bonus recipe this week I must share these with you. 

S'mores cookies!!!! They are SSSOOOOO good! And super simple! And the best part, you can make as many or as few as you want! They area great afternoon snack! Again these come from my favorite blogger, mix and match mama. You can find the recipe here. I also have it saved under Great Recipes on my Pinterest page. Enjoy!!!