Thanksgiving & eShakti

I received this product complimentary for review purposes. All opinions are entirely my own.

Happy December dear readers! As much as I want to spew all kinds of stuff about Christmas and December, I have to backtrack a bit and cover my Thanksgiving!

So first, just in time for the wonderful holiday of Thanksgiving, I received an email from eShakti asking if I would review a product from them! Naturally, as a fan of free stuff, I went ahead and ordered my complimentary dress.

The process was something I had never experienced yet, and it was great. I normally hate ordering clothes online because you get it and it's just all kinds of not fitting. This time, though, I was able to customize everything! I had the option to put sleeves on the dress - and not just any sleeves, I could do a cap sleeve, a full sleeve, a half sleeve, etc. I could customize the length, short or long. I could put in my measurements or just pick one general size and hope for the best. 

I had a lot of fun customizing it! After I ordered it took a couple of days for it to ship, but once it did it came really fast. I got it the day before Thanksgiving, actually. The fabric felt a little like scrubs, but it was still super duper comfortable. 

For Thanksgiving, we went by my grandparents on my mom's side and everyone kept commenting how cute the dress was. My mom kept telling me to bring extra clothes, but I didn't need to. I wore the dress all day! 

I highly recommend this company, it was a lot of fun picking out something I liked and customizing it to exactly what I needed. If you guys want to take a peek at the awesome selection they have, check them out at eShakti! 

Franklin Cider Mill

So I know it's been over a month since I last updated you all on my glamorous life, so it's time to fill you guys in! I don't know what it's been like across the rest of the country, but here in Wisconsin, winter kinda snuck up on us and smacked us in the face. One day I was wearing just a sweatshirt to work, and the next day I'm scraping snow off of my car. So in honor of poor autumn, I'm going to talk about my fall adventures with Dan!

I left Wisconsin on October 28th, and went on my first train ride! It was a little intimidating at first, but I got the hang of it pretty quick. And I have to say, sooo much easier than driving myself! Amtrak is totally the way to go, folks.

We did a whole bunch of stuff, but what I really wanted to talk about was our trip to Franklin Cider Mill. It's this adorable place located in beautiful Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. Everything about it screamed fall!

I thought it was more of a pumpkin patch, but it's actually quite the opposite. This place leans more toward apples and cider and donuts. They have honey and preserves and jam and all types of yummy stuff!

The apple cider that they sell was probably the best apple cider I've ever had. Not to mention all of the other neat things to just look at there. 

After we made our purchases, I wanted to play with my camera a bit, so we set up my new little tripod and took a couple of pictures of just the two of us :) 

I'm only putting one up because since it was just the two of us, I had to set the timer and run into place. And you can't tell, but this picture is actually zoomed in quite a lot, since the only thing to place the tripod on was a million miles away from where we were standing. Needless to say, running back and forth made for some silly pictures. 

If you guys haven't yet, feel free to check out Franklin Cider Mill! It's a really neat place to visit, and I'm glad I got to go! 

Graze

This adventure started when I signed up for the Disney Movie Club. I got my first bunch of movies, and they sent me all of these coupons and codes for some free stuff. Graze was one of them. I had no idea what this was, so I checked it out. 

Basically, you can pick how often this company sends you a little graze box. There's a million different options, and each time you get something new to try. 

I've had some good things, and some not so good things. And the beauty of this is that you can go to their website and customize what they send you. You can pick the option to have a particular item not sent anymore, or sent all the time. 

It's all healthy snacks, too. All of the snacks that Graze offers are packed with a bunch of good stuff for you. Protein, whole oats, fiber, vitamins and minerals, the whole deal. If anything, it's a fun little thing to get in the mail, and you get to eat it! I mean, how much better can it get? 

And now I have a little treat for you! Because everybody loves treats :) If you want to check out all of the great stuff Graze has to offer, but don't know if you want to start paying for these boxes, I can get you one box for absolutely free! Honest to goodness free. How do you do that, do you ask? It's simple: Just click right here! Go ahead, click it. You know you want to! :)

The Bristol Renaissance Faire

This was probably one of the most amazing and awesome places I have ever been to. I know it doesn't look like much from the picture, but once you get past the gate, a whole world of awesome was waiting. 

As you guys know, Dan came to surprise me last weekend, like the best boyfriend that he is. On Sunday, my mom decided that she was going to take all of us (me, Dan, and my sisters) down to the Renaissance Faire, because we had never been there before and it's something I always wanted to experience. 

It was so much cooler than I had ever imagined it to be! It really was like walking into a new world. If it weren't for the people in regular modern day clothes, I would have thought that it was really the 1500's. 

There were tons of little shops selling all different kinds of Medieval things. Jewelry, swords and other weapons, clothing, the whole deal. My inner fangirl was going crazy. They were selling food that was popular back then, like huge turkey legs. Dan and I shared one, and holy cow! It was huge! 

I feel like the worst blogger in the world because I was so busy taking in all of the wonderful things that I kept forgetting to take pictures. 

They had different kinds of shows going on, too. For example, we watched two guys, Dirk and Guido, do a sword fight. They threw in comedy and had every body laughing. If you want to check them out, head over here. 

Dan also bought me this beautiful chain maille bracelet from one of the shops.

We found a pattern we really liked and then they handmade me a bracelet using the colors I picked out. I used sapphire and silver, and it turned out gorgeous. To check out more of their work, you can check them out right over here. 

I hope I get to go back next year, I just read on the website that costume rentals are available and I would absolutely love to dress up! 

For more information, and more pictures, of the Renaissance Faire, you can check out there website by clicking right here!

Mexi-Mac

One of these days I'll catch you guys up on all that's been going on but for now I'm going to share one of my favorite recipes with you!
Now this is a very complex and confusing recipe so I want you to pay close attention, 'kay?


So here's what's going on. That bowl of delicious up there is probably known to just about everyone but just in case we're going to give you, the lucky reader, directions on how to indulge yourself.


First, make a box (or however many boxes you need) of macaroni and cheese like normal. With the milk and butter and cheese powder and all that jazz.

I usually brown the hamburger as I'm going that but you can do it whenever your little heart desires. But make it all nice and taco-y. As for a measurement, use as much hamburger as you want. I just used a pound with 2 boxes.


After both of those things are done, mix them together. Yup, just throw the meat right into the pot of mac-n-cheese.


Finally, to give it that mexi-mac name, add some taco seasoning. And I don't have a measurement for you, I just go by taste. So put as much in as you want, stir it all together and enjoy!


Fine dining on a budget is what this is. But really, it's one of my favorite things to eat because, hey, I'm a cheap date.

The Best Banana Bread

Happy Saturday my lovlies! I have a recipe for you today.

Okay, so those bananas don't look very appetizing, but work with me. Here's what you have to do.

You'll Need:

1/2 cup of butter
1 cup of sugar
2 eggs
4 bananas (I like to use overly ripe ones, it makes it taste awesome and they're easier to mash up)
1 1/2 cups of flour
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

And start mixing it all together. I do a couple ingredients at a time, so I started with the butter and sugar and eggs.

 

Looks kinda soupy and gross. But don't worry, not for long! Keep on mixing in the flour and the rest of the ingredients.

 

After you're all mixed up there and it's a nice consistency, pour it into a greased and floured loaf pan. It might seem like a lot of batter for a little pan, but it fits perfectly. Now, make sure your oven is preset to 350 degrees and then slide it on into the oven and bake it for an hour. And then once it finishes, it should look like this pan of deliciousness. Let me know how it works out for you!!