.nothing like the smell of wood stain on a sunday.

Truth.

Just wanted to share a cute little home project I did a couple weeks ago.

Like many others I have fallen in love with instagram style photos. The filters, the ease, the cute little 4x4 print outs! I have been searching for a way to showcase these quick, candid shots of my little family without breaking the bank. I found a great picture frame last year, on Amazon, that could fit 12 square pictures and bought two. One, however, quickly broke and I realized at $30 each I didn't want to spend the money replacing it.


A picture frame also makes it less convenient to switch the pictures out frequently, which with this style of photography I wanted to be able to easily remove old ones and add new ones as the kids grow.

Then about two months ago I stumbled upon Command spring clips. I am a command strip junkie, I use them for everything! As soon as I saw these clips I knew what I wanted to do. All you need is a piece of wood, wood stain, a brush, and you're ready to go!

A quick and inexpensive trip to Home Depot had me coming home with an 8 foot 1x4 board (that Home Depot can cut into quarters for you!) and an 8-ounce can of Polyshades Bombay Mahogany gloss stain and polyurethane. I already had a small paint brush.


I did one coat of stain on each board, let dry overnight, then attached the Command clips on the front, Command strips on the back, and they were ready to go! I'm not kidding when I say this is an easy project! I decided to add some art boards to my photo boards, so I also have a great place to showcase the adorable artwork my daughters make as well!

XO

.everybody loves cheese.

Over the past 3 years I have done one full Whole30 and multiple W14s and every single time all I can think is how I could never eat paleo 100% of the time because, cheese. I might be a little obsessed but, cheese is delicious and I don't want to live without it. Everybody loves cheese. You know, except for the few people who don't. This is not a post for those people.



A few weeks ago I had an awesome little gathering for some ladies I have met recently. There was cheese, there was wine, there were fruits and veggies and it was just a grand time. One of the things I made, that I was probably most excited about, was baked brie, topped with cherry preserves and wrapped in pastry dough. I've wanted to try it forever and the fact the it was so amazingly easy just made it even better. Plus it was insanely delicious. After the party there was about a quarter of the wheel left and my husband tried a small bite.... then took the whole serving bowl and finished it off!




After that successful recipe attempt I was curious as to what else I could do with baked brie. I didn't have any more crescent rolls but one night the husband was working overnight. It was just the little ladies, me and Frozen for the billionth time. I had brie, half the jar of leftover cherry preserves and a can of biscuit dough in the fridge.

So.... I stuck it all together and bada bing, bada boom. Delicious, gooey, tart, carb-filled amazingness was born. And again, it was so easy it's almost ridiculous. I feel like this dish would be awesome at a party as well. Truthfully, there's not even really a recipe. It's as easy as putting the brie in the middle of a baking dish or sheet, pour the preserves on top of it, arrange the biscuit dough around the sides of the brie and bake as directed by the biscuit brand. Let it sit for about 10 minutes and serve.

I feel like this would be amazing as some sort of savory brunch option as well. Perhaps some bacon on top of the brie, with the biscuits. Scramble up some eggs to go with. I'd love to hear more ideas!

XO

.oh hi.

Well hello friends.

What's been happening? Over here it's been, well, mostly just life. Moving, and babies, and surviving. All that fun stuff.

For awhile now, however, I have felt that something has been a bit lacking. Me. I have been a bit lacking. So, I'm not saying I'm back, I'm not saying I'm not back, but I am saying I know I need to kind of kick start myself back into..... Sara.

Not wife Sara. Not mama Sara. Not friend Sara. Just Sara.

Now, that being said, we have been in a new state, Georgia, for a little over 6 months now. We're still figuring things out. Still finding good people. Still looking for a niche. But in the meantime, a girl has gotta eat lunch. As do her babies, who are 2 and 4 now, so not so much babies!

I asked the Peanut to help me meal prep for this week. I let her pick lunches. On the list are green smoothies, crackers and cheese, sandwich kabobs, tuna salad and......

Grilled cheese with tomato soup!

Now, I won't lie. I definitely considered just buying a canned tomato soup and calling it a day. But then I remembered how much I have been missing the creativity and pride of cooking something amazing and sharing it with y'all. I thought, was a great, simple recipe to whip up and blog about. So, a plan started forming.

One thing to note at this point: I hate tomato soup. There I said it! I hate it! I always have, ever since childhood. But once upon a time I had an amazing bowl of tomato soup. It was in South Dakota, in 2008, at the Prairie Berry Winery (which also has frickin' amazing wines, if you're ever in the Black Hills, find a way to stop in!). And no, I can't tell you why I ordered tomato soup, when I know I hate tomato soup, but I just did. And it was worth it. Maybe God spoke to me and told me to order the soup. Je ne sais quoi. So, when I was trying to decide how to make my soup, the Prairie Berry concoction is immediately what came to mind.

I mean, come on y'all. Come on! Tell me you don't want to lick your screen right now. It was an amazing bowl of soup.

Creamy, tomato-ey, with a nice hint of basil. The soup was better than the grilled cheese. Which is bread and cheese, and therefore pretty hard to beat. I set to recreating something similar.

And failed. Miserably. My soup tasted nothing like the soup I remembered. And in fact I absolutely hated it. I'm sure that's a big surprise. My girls loved it, so I'm guessing it just tasted like typical tomato soup. Since I hated it so much though, I'm not going to post the recipe. It's basically just a giant pot of tomatoes with some spices anyway. Nothing too ground breaking.

I will say though, I did add a secret ingredient. I thought this was going to really change the taste of the soup to something I would prefer. My super top secret ingredient? Canned coconut milk. I put that shit on everything.

And by everything I mean, you know, stuff that needs cream.... like soup. And.... yeah, pretty much just soup. Nah, I use it in my coffee, in curries and even with berries for desert. I absolutely love adding a little coconut milk when applicable. And even some times when not applicable. No shame. Coconut milk is the new put a bird on it. Just do it.

Sadly for my taste buds, however, even my secret ingredient didn't really make this soup shine for me. So I'm basically just saying hello and I will have to work on something that's actually recipe worthy this week. I'll see what I can do!

XO

.my baby is not my baby anymore.

Sigh. That's right. My baby turns 2 today. I'm happy and sad at the same time. She's growing into such an amazing little person. She's so kind hearted. She can be mischievous and ornery at times. She loves to have fun. She's silly all day long. She's getting to be such a big helper and such a smarty pants.

But she's 2. She has spent 2 entire years being our incredible daughter. Our little lady. Our baby. But I'm painfully aware of the fact that she is rapidly growing up. She has opinions now. About everything. What she wears. What she eats. What movie we watch. She slings her little play purses on her arm and sashays around the room. She learns new complete sentences everyday. New independent skills to help her do things on her own, which she is very adamant about doing.

A daily conversation in the house goes like this:

Me: Tyler, can I help you with that?

Her: No, no. I do it.

Me: *heart breaks*

So, because I'm a glutton for punishment, I decided to go through all of our pictures from the past 2 years. We've had some amazing times with the Peanut. I'm excited to let her explore even more of the world, even if it does mean one day she'll be out in it on her own. It was also insane seeing her transform over the last 2 years.

The day she was born. An amazing day. We had A LOT of learning to do, but she was as patient as she could be with us. :)

Three months. This was her first time in a bumbo. She wasn't completely sure what to think about it. 

Six months. She loved rolling around on our "photo backdrop," also known as a super soft blanket.

Nine months. We were visiting Nana and Papa and about to take her very first "swim" in a kiddie pool. She loved it, and still loves water.

Twelve months. Simply amazing. We had just moved to Washington and were exploring our neighborhood. 

Fifteen months. Visiting family in Texas for Thanksgiving. She had lots of fun with so many people around to dote on her!

Eighteen months. Ready for bed but had to take some pictures for Daddy.

Twenty-one months. I still can't believe this is the same baby. We are just getting used to the house being just us girls for the time being. 

Twenty-two months. It was right around June when I started thinking, "Holy crap, where is my baby? She's looking so grown up!"

Twenty-three months. But she still knows how to make some hilarious faces. 

That brings us to August. The month has flown by. This has been good in some aspects. She's been very patient waiting for Daddy to get home. And I've been very patient, being 28 weeks pregnant now. But it's been tough watching how quickly she's growing up in such a short amount of time. 

If she finds a stick, she picks it up. Always. Rocks also have a good possibility of coming home with us.

At her second drive in. Running off some energy and watching the big kids play. She wanted so badly to be playing with them. 

Those eyes. I die.

She has loved the weather this summer. On this day, however, she was content to just sit in the chair and listen to the rain on the patio.

She has learned to take selfies. Which make me feel like she's actually turning 13.

But still makes her hilarious smile face whenever I request it.

Again, a stick. And a purse. A girl needs her accessories. 

She gets such joy in the simplest of things, like finding Nemo stickers that Nana and Papa sent her. 

She has started waking up in a generally good mood this past month. As opposed to the scream fests of the last 23 months. I am kind of enjoying that progression.

All I have to do is say "smile for daddy," and this is the face I get. Every time. 

Again, those eyes! 

Our beautiful little lady.

She somehow manages to make friends wherever we go. "Puppies" are her favorite BFFs though.

So, as a very proud Mama, with only a slightly broken heart, I have to say Happy Birthday to my amazing little Peanut! 

XO