I love food magazines with their perfectly photographed meals on the covers. I ended up getting a Bon Appetit, a Summer Grilling magazine and a 30 Minute Suppers from America’s Test Kitchen. Bon Appetit, while definitely enjoyable to look at has a little more fluff than I’d like (Cool Copenhagen: Hot Restaurants….is not really applicable to what I make for dinner tonight). But the 30 Minute Suppers? Best $7.95 I’ve spent in awhile. Everything I have made out of there has been either ‘very good’ or downright ‘keeper’ material. And when they say 30 minutes? They mean 30 minutes. As you know Im not one for using prepackaged ingredients and all these meals are from scratch- unless you count the rotisserie chicken as ‘prepackaged’.

I usually turn to epicurious.com or foodnetwork.com or recipezaar.com when Im doing my meal planning. I think americastestkitchen.com is going to be my new go-to. Go pick up a copy for yourself– you wont be disappointed. And if you’d like to get me a subscription, that’d be fine too.

Behold:

Not only does it work (frizzy flyaways? tamed), it smells good. Your entire head will smell like a summer night in Morocco. Not that I have any idea what a summer night in Morocco smells like, but I’d like to think it would smell as good as my head does right now…..kind of uh…..frankincense and mirr-ish er something like that. Just trust me, you’ll like it. Its like a vacation in a bottle. And don’t let that price tag deter you, girls. A little goes a long way, and I don’t want to catch you lookin greasy.

I don’t care what your hair problems are- I bet Moroccanoil can fix them. Remember in the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding how the dad would spray windex on everything? No matter what the ailment, Windex would fix it? Moroccanoil is kind of like that, except it smells better than Windex.

As you know I went to visit my brother and his fiancee two weeks ago. My brother Scott (or you can call him Scott-a-lot or scotty potty or Scottaretta. I think he’ll answer to any of those) is in the Navy. He’s a nuclear engineer in the Navy which is pretty much like the most brainy, smarty pants, difficult thing you can be in the military. Because he’s in the military, and we’re in the military (stationed on the other side of the planet no less) it means I haven’t seen him in THREE years.

There are 7 years that separate Scott and I so we haven’t always been close. I left for college when he was….uh, I don’t know, 18-7….11? Yeah. 11. And when I would come home from college he was just the dorky little brother and my mom would always get mad at Stephen and I because we’d be all ‘we’re cool, lets go to do stuff’ and my mom would (literally) come running down the driveway as we’re backing out, waving her arms yelling (hissing?) at us to “take your brother with you…..he wants to go too.” And that was decidedly uncool. Like we were the freaking Partridge family heading to the mall or something. Two’s company, three’s a crowd mom.

But eventually Scotty grew up and turned into the handsome nuclear engineer he is today. And I no longer think he’s the dorky baby brother; I adore him and am just so proud of the person he’s turned into. In the three years its been since I’ve seen him he managed to snag a girl, ask her to marry him and have her say yes. And I missed all of it. Damn. After numerous failed attempts I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that I wasn’t going to meet Ashley until their wedding day. PC knew I needed to get off this rock and so a plan was hatched.

Now, this meeting wasn’t quite as awkward as say, when I met PC for the first time, because we’ve Skyped and FB’d and talked on the phone and exchanged beautifully wrapped Christmas presents (hers, not mine). Its like I told Scott, she’s the kind of person I’d love to have as a friend and now I get her as a sister. We had a lot of laughs, a particularly funny “you had to be there moment” inside a Macy’s bathroom, got cat called in Scott’s ghetto neighborhood in Ct., had to retrieve her towed car, a little food poisoning, some military adventures of trying to get on base, a girls spa day, good food, a late night trip to Rite Aid for an air mattress pump and an extension cord, and a particularly difficult time ordering a pizza one night. I had such a great time. Well done Scott. Love you both.

Pictures courtesy of April K. Photography, not only is she Ashley’s friend, shes super nice. And takes amazing pictures. And she’s cute. And fun.  And were friends on FB. And she wants to move to Colorado. And I heart Colorado. So…..I like her. Thanks April! (Of course, April is in most of these pictures, so maybe I should thank little Yenny. And I pretty much think that makes me part of the cool crowd if I can call her little Yenny.)

Today, we got a brief reprieve from the rain. And I do mean brief because the 5 day forecast is more clouds, rain, thunderstorms, and rain and more rain. So, we took full advantage of our one sunny day.

Also, completely unrelated, I saw someone refered to as “Becky-home-ecky” and that is funny. Better than Susie homemaker.

Mackenzie’s awake. I think we’re done here.

So, I thought this would be a good time to tell you about my mom tool belt. Ok, its not really a tool belt, but I thought the image of that would be pretty BA.

Nathan is a chronic complainer of his ear hurting for no apparent reason. He’s had a few ear infections but he’s not like one of those chronic cases. I vacillate on what to do when he wakes up at 3am complaining of his ear hurting…..ER? Vitamin M? Thats what led me to the purchase of one of these. A quick peek and I can diagnose….well, I think I could, so far I haven’t diagnosed an ear infection because he hasn’t had one.

Ok, Im not *technically* a medical professional, though I pass for one in this house. You gotta be careful and practice with this before you go poking it into your kids’ ears. Also, I don’t recommend this for the 2 and under crowd, they are much too wiggly.

And then for Christmas I got this thermometer.

This is the most accurate thermometer I’ve ever owned. Seriously. No sticking things in butts, no pleading with a little person about keeping it in their armpit. No 91.6degree temperature readings from the worthless ear thermometer. This thing is awesome.

If I did actually have a tool belt I’d make sure it had two notches for these two indispensable tools and also some sort of apparatus for dispensing out glugs of “FOR GOVERNMENT USE ONLY” Motrin (wait- is that not the kind you get?) in 1 and 2 tsp doses.

What would you put in your tool belt?

**sidenote– I just noticed the “germ busting” tagline on the thermometer picture. I had no idea! Am I radiating and eradicating germ at the same time Im taking their temperature? That is AMAZING. Its like a magic wand isn’t it? I wish.

When I ordered my dress from Nordstrom’s a while back I decided to treat myself to some new makeup. Let me first start off by saying, Im not a huge/faithful makeup wearer. I used to be…its like the older I get the less I do, which, is the opposite of what I should be doing you know, as youth is fleeing from me. I think its mostly because in the mornings I spend time clothing, feeding and ushering children out the door and not much time applying makeup. Trust me- its gotta be simple and quick or I won’t wear it.

I really like makeup that has some sunscreen in it. Clinique used to make a great one that had a hint of shimmer and bronze to it, but they stopped making it. So- when I found this illuminating moisturizer I thought I’d give it a go. Its pretty great. Its not too shimmery or shiny (and I worry about that because its humid here- it doesn’t take much to break a sweat so I don’t want my face to look like an oil slick) but it gives you a nice glow….you know, like when I wear it I pretty much look just like a supermodel. Pretty much.

I also bought this ‘base layer’ eye makeup stuff. Its ok….I think Too Faced (at Sephora) makes a better one.

Now- my very favorites. Im so easily presuaded, Im a bit of a product sucker, but I saw this on the bestseller page and I thought “ooooh, preeeetty.” And Guess what? It IS preeeetty.

Im no makeup expert, so I can’t tell you if it would look good on you, but I promise it looks nice with brown eyes. I especially like the dark brown which makes great eyeliner. So much better than the clinique pencil I’ve been using. Its really nice makeup- its definitely worth the money. Second item- lip gloss. My mom is a faithful lipstick wearer. There were times that she drove us to school in her green velour bathrobe and she’d always put lipstick on. Because, that made the difference. I however, hate the feel of lipstick. I feel like no matter how neutral the shade I look like I have clown makeup on. I just do not care for lipstick. Lipgloss, well its better, but I still only put it on for special occassions. I do however love lip balm/chapstick and have lots. Since the Marine Corps Ball fell into the Special Occassion category I figured I’d find something. I threw a tube of this lip gloss in my cart in naked. The big selling point was that it claimed it had the “luxurious feel of a balm.” I don’t know if I’d go quite that far– its still a little sticky but its SO much better than most. And the color- the color is just perfect. It is decidedly UN-clown like. You might want to give it a whirl.

There. How helpful was that? You can thank me later….after Santa brings you some and you’re looking all hot and sassy.

My awesome husband, my kids, both our families, fantastic friends, and our health/mostly health (ear goo Im looking at you)- these are the things Im most thankful for. In addition I’d also like to give a shout out to coffee, internet, Christmas lights, two free-pieces-of-laundry/day at the hotel, the mango cake I had for dessert and especially to my wonderful husband who told me to ‘just go shop for yourself this afternoon…..go as long as you want….get whatever you want.’ And I spent an hour in what must be the Worlds Largest Sephora and treated myself to some overpriced skin care products and it was wonderful. Almost as wonderful as my fruity drink yesterday. Oh yeah- I almost forgot. Im thankful for Singapore Slings at the Long Bar and getting to do things I never would have guessed I would get to do.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone.

PC and I decided on that flight that if we ever made it to Singapore, having a Singapore Sling at the Long Bar was going to be at the top of the list. I don’t think at the time we thought we’d be going there with our kids….or that we’d be drinking at 10:30 in the morning….or that we’d pay $100 for four drinks, but- it was so totally worth it.

The hotel itself…its one classy joint. So classy that only “residents” (yes- you are a resident, not a ‘guest’ at the hotel) are allowed free reign-all the rest of us had to use the side door. Its very British colonial (?) style meets the tropics– its beautiful….large verandas, wicker furniture, the old school fans. I loved it.

My drink was all that I’d hoped it would be- maybe more. If you are ever here- you must do this. I realize for me there is some ‘history’ which made the anticipation of actually doing it that much greater but really– this is one of those things you just have to do in life, if for no other reason than to say you’ve done it. And they taste good.

The approach

The 'resident' entrance

I love magnolias....

Nathan loved the peanut cracking part, though he refused to eat them

Oh geez...his didn't have alcohol.

So. Good.

In case you couldn’t tell- this has been the highlight of the trip. More to come….