thanksgiving prep

oh man! i love love LOVE thanksgiving. i love the fact that i'm off work. i love that i get to eat crazy amounts of comfort food. i love spending time with my family. and i love that i get to decorate for christmas the next day! this year i'm super excited for a couple of reasons.

1- our family is going to gatlinburg! my mom rented a beautiful cabin in the smokey mountains and we get to spend 4 wonderful nights enjoying the mountain air, relaxing in a hot tub on the wrap-around porch, hiking, eating, playing games and just being with my family!

2- going to g-burg means 4 straight days with these wonderful people


this is my little brother and his fiance. johnathan and darcy (or as i call them, jo & darc) are getting married next may. they are both really busy, so even though we all live in lexington, we hardly get to see each other. jo is an amazing chef at a local restaurant. darc serves there a few nights a week, but also has a 9-5 job. it's always so great to hang out with them. jo and i are 6 years apart and have always gotten along great. we "get" each other.

3- speaking of jo - he always makes our thanksgiving meals. and they are always A-MAZ-ING! i can't wait to eat his food all weekend long!

4- i get to make the desserts! i love to bake. love to make pretty sweet treats, and (not to brag) i'm kind of good at it. i've been making things lately, trying to test out what i want for thanksgiving day. lately i've made:

paula dean's gingerbread pumpkin triffle

this was SUPER easy and looked beautiful just like the picture. click {here} for recipe

joy of baking's pumpkin cookies with cream cheese frosting

i'm not a huge pumpkin fan, so i decided to add chocolate chips. they were yummy! and the cookies were nice and soft. i'd call them a muffin-cookie. click {here} for this recipe.

tasty kitchen's oreo cheescake cookies

i have to be honest - these did not turn out as good as i thought they were going to be. still very yummy. i was just expecting more... recipe {here}

and better homes and garden's maple pumpkin cheesecake. this one came out of my better homes cook-book, but i found a scanned version of the recipe here. this cheesecake is amazing and one pumpkin dessert i really, really love. i've made it the past 3 thanksgivings.

shaun of course loves them all. and darc and my mom are big pumpkin fans too. but jo and i really aren't. so, next i'm going to try a pecan pie. pioneer woman has an amazing recipe that i want to try. i love how she titles it "pie that will make you cry". she definitely has me convinced to try it!

she also has me excited to make these - bacon onion cheddar biscuits


i know, not a dessert. but can you imagine waking up and having these for breakfast?? or even with our thanksgiving meal??

man! i'm getting hungry!

so - what are you making this thanksgiving? any amazing recipes i should try?

i'll be back soon to show you some ideas i have for the table setting. another thing i'm excited about this year!!

fun find on etsy

i just found the cutest thing for C's room!

as you may remember from the post about C's room, i have a little bird theme going. well, just recently we moved her furniture. her crib was in a corner and both walls were exterior walls. with the temperatures dropping and only 1 vent in her room, i am trying to figure out how to keep her warmer at night without sweating shaun and i out! so, i rearranged her furniture.

to make stuff on the walls make sense, i had to move things around. now, i have one wall that is pretty bare. it's the wall her crib used to be on. but - i think i've come up with a solution and should have it resolved after i visit IKEA this weekend. i'm going to purchase a few of these shelves.

they are picture ledges. we got some for our master bedroom a couple of months ago and i really love the concept. very easy to install and fairly inexpensive. (duh - it's IKEA)

ok - but back to the title. since i have a little bird theme going on in her room, i could NOT pass up these little cuties -

aren't they precious? they are easy-to-apply vinyl stickers that come in a variety of colors. and only $5!! honestly, i'm not big on decals, but in a little girls room, i think they could be really cute and fun. i can't wait to get them and add them to her room. i plan on having a couple sitting on her new shelves! they come from an esty shop called elaphannie and they are the small ella vinyl decal.

i'll be sure the post more pictures once i have the shelf and birdies up!

and check out this shop. there are TONS of cute decals!