My Lazy Friday Evening

Me...

plus 

plus

plus 

equals a GREAT evening. 

William & Kate - the world wishes you well. May you have a blessed marriage with many years of health and happiness!

One year down...a whole lot to go

March 25th, 2010 - I got a call that changed everything. It was my first job offer. A real big girl job! I was about to give a tour of the SMU to a bunch of prospective students, when my phone rang and the voice on the other end said "We'd like to offer you the position". It was just a thrill to be able to share the good news with my tour group as parents constantly ask what your post-grad plans are when they find out that their tour guide is a graduating senior. What a joy it was to be able to tell them that I had a job!

NOOKbook Reading List

I love reading on my NOOK which is a big surprise because I normally love paperback books. I also love that I can store a wishlist on my NOOK so I always have a new book pending. Here is my list at this point:

Any other suggestions? Have you read any of these? Reviews?

A House To Call Home

We just may solved the housing issue but I don't want to jinx it. For those of you who were worried about me being homeless, thank you and you can no longer panic. I'll be sure to post a full update on this situation on Monday.

This Changes Everything...

My church has been doing a sermon series with the following theme:
Ever had something happen in your life that completely changed everything about your life?  Maybe a phone call, an accident, a chance meeting, a discovery? Whatever it was, after "it" happened, nothing in your life was ever the same. Jesus was the catalyst for that type of change for the people he encountered. Sometimes it was a chance encounter with him on the street. And sometimes it was something he did for all the public to see. Regardless, those who encountered Christ usually walked away saying, "This Changes Everything".

There have been a few times in my life when I thought "wow, this changes everything..." - graduating high school, moving away to college, graduating college, etc. Lately, there hasn't been any huge, life changing events happen until this weekend. The management company of the lovely, over-sized townhouse we live in just raised the rent...$500 so it would now cost us over $1000 each. INSANE and totally unacceptable. Long story short, we're all moving and not together. This is where the "this changes everything" part comes in. One of my roommates is taking a huge leap of faith and possibly moving in with her boyfriend and my other roommate is branching out on her own to live by herself for the first time ever! Now you're thinking "And where the heck do you think you're going to live, missy?"

Busy Little Bee

Back in December I know this post outlining events that were coming up and things I wanted to do. I thought it might be good to revisit this list and see what I have accomplished and what events I need to add to the list....

Books I want(ed) to read: (instead I've been reading Businessweek and finance books...)

• Shantaram - started it!
• The Devil In the White City
• Water for Elephants (before the movie comes out!) - read it, can't wait for the movie staring my FAVORITE, Reese Witherspoon
• The Help - bought it, didn't read it, then gave it to Becca (must purchase the digital copy for my Nook)

You throw like a girl!

Well it should probably read - You Swing Like A Girl... but here's the catch, I don't! I found out last night that my clubhead speed is 90mph! That is within the range of the swing speed of the average male golfer (read: NOT Tiger Woods). I'm not going to lie...I was pretty impressed if you don't mind me tooting my own horn.

And now I've been bit by the bug again...the golf bug to be exact. Always strikes right around this time of year - possibly because the Masters is on and I get to watch dreamy Adam Scott  make birdies left and right and yet he comes in tied for second, sad day....  Back in high school, golf season would just be starting. We probably would have had a couple of matches already and taken our annual yearbook picture. The JV team would have 75 girls in the picture who came out to practice the first day and never came back again. Figures, they just wanted to try to meet the cute golf boys.

Margaux Webster Sarin

My sister, wow, is honestly one of the coolest people I know. Mom, if you're reading this, I really mean it!! I know it's pretty hard to believe but my sister and I used to fight...bad. We are only 2 years apart so there was a lot of hair pulling, face scratching and chaos in our household. As kids, we both rode horses which caused a lot of competition between us. However, we soon branched out on our own paths and have gotten closer every year. Now, we talk almost every other day and we actually like to hang out with each other, not to mention miss each other.

The basics:
She's 20 years old (but she'll want me to tell you that she'll be 21 on June 29th, let the countdown begin!)
She has light brown hair and brown eyes and she's taller...taller than me.
She's a junior at UMASS Amherst.
She's an Alpha Chi Omega.
She had her appendix out in Ecuador.
She speaks pretty good Spanish.
She used to call me Ya-Ya when she couldn't say my name. Now she calls me San-San. Somethings never change.
She loves animals especially our cats (Mikey-RIP, Maddie-RIP and Millie).

Fool-proof healthy muffins

I promise you, these are the easiest and most delicious muffins I've every had/made. You will love them too mainly because they are so easy and bonus HEALTHY! Thank Picky-Palate for the great recipe!

“Healthier” Banana Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffins

4 Tablespoons softened butter
2 eggs
2 ripe bananas, mashed
1 Cup plain low-fat vanilla yogurt (I happened to have Yoplait Banana Cream Pie yogurt on hand so I just used that)
2/3 Cup sugar
heaping 1/4 Cup creamy peanut butter

1 1/2 Cups all purpose flour
1/2 Cup whole wheat flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 Cup semi sweet chocolate chips

1/4 Cup coarse sugar (I used Turbinado sugar)
1/2 Cup shredded sweetened coconut (I didn't add this)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Place butter, eggs, bananas, yogurt, sugar and peanut butter into a large mixing bowl. Mix to combine. Place all dry ingredients into a separate large bowl and stir to combine. Slowly add to wet ingredients along with the chocolate chips until just combined. Scoop into muffin tins lined with paper cups 2/3 way full. Sprinkle with coarse sugar and shredded coconut. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean from center.

12 muffins

This recipe can be found here.