wee weekend!

I'm so glad its the weekend and I am staying home! I love to travel, but these past few months have worn me out completely! School is really starting to pick up lately and I have to study all the time also, which makes me a boring blogger. Im taking two online classes and I HATE it. I thought we paid teachers to teach us, not sit at home and upload tests onto a website. Call me weird, but I would much rather actually go to class than have to read the entire chapter, cause lets face it, all those books I spend sooo much money on every semester never actually get used. I should get to sell mine back for full price.

Yesterday I had some free time and decided to cook. I realize I said this blog would involve cooking in the beginning, and then it was like i forgot how to use a kitchen, making only sandwiches and cereal for two months straight. But a few hours after running, hunger hit me harder than one of Ronnies fist pumps

so I went to my lonely little kitchen and had NO FOOD. With no other option, I began hybrid cooking. I really think I should copyright that phrase.. maybe they'd give me my own show on The Food Network

Hybrid Cooking with Hillary

"Making a halfway decent tasting meal out of absolutely nothing"

...nevermind.. i don't think i would even watch that show, and I watch Jersey Shore if that tells you anything about my tv viewing standards.

Armed with my cookie monster deflector and silly string shooting bazooka, I traveled to the depths of my cabinets and found enough essentials to make quiche

and

Are you ready?

...i dont think you're ready..

prepare yourself...

The worlds largest PIZAA ROLL

...ok that picture looks kinda gross..

but I PROMISE it was good.

If I would've had any fillers like cheese or pepperoni it might've been my new favorite

"Jiffy Pizza Crust Mix" recipe.. but so far Madaline's stromboli still holds the record. I'm very upset because no matter how many times I try I just cant replicate hers. Mine is still good, but its just not the same. I don't understand. But anyways, since I have spent all of my recent income on heartworm pills, school books, gas money and other boring but necessary expenses, I will be living on these two things and special K until thursday.

yay.

Speaking of expenses, my dogs have a new hobby I like to call synchronized sleeping. They started doing this when I picked them up from boarding when I went to Colorado.

(look at all those toys in the floor, its like having toddlers living with me...at least they didnt one of my bras this time..)

and again.. in case you weren't impressed with the first one, they did a formation change for you.

why do they do this? so peculiar...

Ok, its time to talk about the thing I've been putting off. You're going to be so disappointed in me. I am sooo behind on my new years resolution. I mean soo ooo oo behind. Once I got my Garmin I became a snotty little running brat. I decided i was too good to run on a treadmill, but it was WAY to cold to run outside.. well maybe not WAY to cold, but I dont really have the right clothes to run in sub freezing weather. So I chose the WORST option ever and just didn't run at all.

I know.

I'm so ashamed.

So at this point I'm at 15.02/1000.

And seven of that was done on thursday. That puts me 48.23 miles behind schedule. OMG. I'm so not happy about this. But I still have 11 more months so I have plenty of time to catch up. And the past three days I have been doing really well, so i just need to keep it up. Im trying to get motivation from anywhere I can. Today I was supposed to go "ruck?" with a couple of my guy friends. I think we were going to do six miles, but decided not to because its going to rain. But i looked at the weather and we're under a wind advisory with 21-26 mph gusts of wind. JEEZ! I would rather run under just about any condition except wind. For me, it makes it soo much harder. I ran at the park here the other day and it was pretty windy and I remembered how much i hated it. I should've sold tickets for that run. I bet it wouldve been very entertaining to watch because it had rained the night before and the trail is a gravel/dirt/concrete mix. I ended up skipping around like the dang Nike fairy jumping over streams and mud puddles. Im still bleaching out the mud spots up the back of my shirt. Lesson learned.

But I'm planning on getting in at least 5 miles today and catching up as soon as I can. Wish me luck!

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Breck, in pictures!

We flew out of the Memphis Airport into Denver and from there drove the two hours to Breckenridge. I had just driven this in March, but its still so exciting when you're first entering all the mountains. It was pretty sunny the whole time we were there, so I got some decent pics of the scenery.

Mom and Sara at Coppetop, a resturaunt/bar, where we spent the majority of our time when not on the mountain.

Waiting in line for the lift. This was the first year we've ever gone the week after christmas, and it will probably be the last. I had never seen lines this long in my life! And Sara's hat. It was too adorable and if I could get away with wearing bunny ears on any day aside from halloween, i'd wear them every single day of my life.

This was the view from our room. We were on the inside, facing town instead of the mountain, but it wasnt too bad, because there was always something going on pretty much anywhere you looked.

They had this in the cafe one morning and I HAD to get a picture. Now thats my kinda coffee pot. This poor man didnt speak english and thought we wanted to take his picture and smiled so big.

Mom and I on New Years Eve. I hung out with the oldies for a bit, and then went upstairs to the more "dancy" party and made some friends a little closer to my age.

But met these guys on my way up:

My new years shirt adds about 70 pounds in every picture, so naturally, i burned it when i got home. But this picture was just way too good to delete. The dj at the downstairs party set off the fire alarms with his fog machine (um yeah, he was that cool..not), so the fire department came. And by fire department, i mean every greek adonis known to man kind. The girls in the bar were actually screaming "take it off!" .. which the fire marshall didnt find very funny. And i don't know why i wore that hat in the picture. Poor assessment on my part.

Anyways, this was a really awesome trip. I was so excited because I snowboarded my first black. I had skiied one before (ski: slide down the mountain on your butt with entirely too many accessories awkwardly hanging from your body, causing you to jam, twist or sprain something every 10 feet), but I enjoy snowboarding alot more, so I'll more than likely never touch a ski again.

Headed to the gym. Next blog:

-new years resolution

-school

-possible surprise trip this weekend?

I'm Back!

Oh my goodness. Did you think I forgot you? I most certainly did not! Everytime I check my email I look at that little shortcut up at the top that says "blog" and think "Oh, I'll do it later"... not anymore! It has snowed here for the past two days and I have done... you guessed it.. absolutely nothing. So now I'm in the "antiprocastination/don't waste time/get stuff done kinda mood".
I've decided, instead of writing a novel, I will share the past three weeks with you in pictures. Beginning with...
Christmas! We went to my cousin's house a few days early because her parents were going to florida. Me & my sister:

I'm very proud that I got her to actually smile in some pictures because she usually makes all of these ridiculous "scene kid" faces and I tell her to visit

antiduckface.com

haha but i love her anyways.

Before opening presents:

After opening presents:

Yes, it really was exhausting work, but someone's got to do it. I'm just glad we could help.

I really racked up in the present department this year. I don't know why, but I guess everyone thought I was extra good! My grandmother got me a crockpot (yay!), a cast iron skillet (im afraid of it, but that will be a blog all on its own) , new dish towels, and a red sweatsuit that I picked out when I went shopping with her ( I mean that IS the best way to get presents. No surprise there!) My aunt bought me a new coffee pot with a clock on it. I wanted this to help me get out of bed in the morning, I assumed it would be easier if there was already a pot of coffee calling my name. The first day I set it, I got a steaming hot pot of coffee at 7 p.m. sharp. Lovely. And the second day, I got none at all. But the battle rages on and I will continue trying. I shall keep my faith in the epic morning I wake up to my coffeepot servant, waiting on me, hand-in-hand with the sugar free vanilla caramel creamer. I shall keep the faith.

For christmas eve I went to my parents house. That night we each got to open one present.

Guess what mine was?!

I finally got my Garmin! Soooo excited! And so I spent the entirety of christmas eve staring at my wrist. I even got up and ran on christmas morning just so I could use it! And returned home with windburnt fingers. But it was totally worth it!

Every year my mom makes my sister and I get together to take a picture before we open our presents. These pictures are ALWAYS horrible. There is no reason anyone should have a camera within a 50 mile radius of me before a shower and a cup of coffee. But in light of the Christmas spirit, I begrudgingly let her take this one picture ever year.

This year's tops the chart, by far.

There ya go mom. There's your christmas pic. Cell phones in hand. Not even looking at the camera. Practically a Normal Rockwell moment, if i do say so myself. After we opened presents, we went back to Jonesboro and visited the grandparents. By this point I was pretty pictured out. Next blog: snowboarding trip and new years resolution. But school starts monday and I've got lots to do today!

Counting Down!

3 Days until family Christmas at my cousins house!

4 Days until I get to see my best friend Laura who is coming back to Arkansas to visit!

8 Days until Christmas!

10 DAYS UNTIL I LEAVE FOR BRECKENRIDGE!

(can you tell which one im the most excited about? No offense Laura, haha)

Here i am in Aspen last year in my "murdered out" ski outfit. White Girl Thug Life 4eva!.. ok sorry..

i wont do that anymore..

I am beyond ready to hit the slopes again. I have been working out so hard this year and I am anxious to see how much easier snowboarding will be with these buns of steel (and by steel, i mean sugar encrusted marshmallows). So my goals until then are :

1. run as much as possible and pray this helps acclimate me to the altitude change
2. not ruin my diet by eating everything in the 50 mile radius on christmas day
3. come up with the most awesome snowboarding playlist EVER 
4. go on a quest to find my ski clothes that are more than likely being inhabited by hobbits in the underworld of my closet
5. begin anabolic steroids in order to be able to pick up my suitcase while en route
6. acquire the perfect airline outfit (i think its very important to be that highly fashionable, mysterious girl on the plane that everyone secretly hopes to sit by. i know i put entirely too much thought into this, and I'm okay with that. )

But in the meantime, I'm attempting to get my entire house completely organized and clean, so that when i return home on the 1st I can start the year off right. The only problem with this is I've had this entire week by myself while my roommate was on her honeymoon and so far all i've done is put up a shelf. What happened to the time?! So now I have tomorrow afternoon to do the entire thing. Typical me. At least I'll get some good cardio out of the whole ordeal! But while I spent an entire week doing nothing, I ordered these prints to put on the shelf above my bed (so HA! there's one project finished):

My New Years Resolution:

I don't usually do the whole "resolution thing", but this year I have a real concrete goal that I am going to complete. I've talked to several runners lately and tried to come up with a good distance to run in one year. It seems the most popular is 1000 miles. When i first heard this I was absolutely ready to run.. in the opposite direction. But I started doing the math, and its just over two miles a day. Considering I usually do at least 3 during each run, I really think I can do this. I had my evaluation with my boss this morning and he was an excellent motivator. He's part of the Ridge Rider Athletic Club and has lots of experience. He also works over cardiac rehab, so I will have someone to crawl to when I am at my wits end. I'm going to tell all of my students, friends, and family in an effort to gain motivation from anywhere possible. And of course my biggest motivators are my dogs, because they will more than likely tear my house apart without their daily exercise! And of course once I get my garmin watch I will want to put it to good use, so I'm really excited about that!

But right now i'm really excited about going to sleep!

Goodnight!

pics and plans!

What a terrible blogger! Its been 8 days! But so much has gone on in the past week, so I'm just going to show you through pictures! This is my sister and I on the way to the lake for Thanksgiving.

I'm kind of deer in headlights in this picture which I've decided is not a good look for me:

And here are the dogs in the car. They are cuddling for pretty much the first time ever. In reality they are probably holding on to each other and praying for dear life due to my driving skills:

Between Thanksgiving and now I somehow managed to make it through finals without having a meltdown. And then we started hardcore planning for my roommates wedding, which was last weekend.  I was super busy the whole time and didn't take many pics, but here are madaline (bride, on the right) and dani (bridesmaid) at the rehersal dinner:

I also put up my christmas decorations while I was procrastinating during finals week.

Here is my Christmas tree! It has raffia, gold and turquiose balls, gold stars, brown and blue wicker balls,  gold reindeer,  brown jingle bells hung on twine, gold spiral stick things and a big gold shiny star topper!

I made my tree skirt out of some lazy boy fabric furniture that I have no idea where came from. Its been behind the door in my guest bedroom for a looong time and i keep trying to come up with projects to use it all. The other day i discovered that its machine washable, so I might make a dog bed cover out of it!

I put a little garland and christmas lights across the fireplace mantle and put up my stockings. I suppose this year they will be dedicated to each dog. Otherwise they would just be for decorative purposes. (how ugly are those tv cords running down the wall?! its my pet peeve that i dont know how to fix! drives me insane.)

And i also set out the decorations that my dad gave me for as a christmas present last year. I absolutely love them. They are "Jim Shore" and they are so colorful and have so much personality!

Santa and reindeer:

Snowman and snowman snow globe (i award this one the repetitive redundant name award):

Now that I'm on christmas break and my roommate is moving out (on Saturday) I'm living by myself again, so I'm planning lots of projects. I started cleaning out the guest bedroom this week, and I'm going to redo the office and my bedroom. I'm also thinking of painting my bathroom, but I've been too afraid to do that for the entire two years I've lived here, so we'll see what happens!

The weather here has gotten drastically colder, so I haven't been running outside and I can REALLY tell.  I have been cross training on the elliptical (only two hours a week tho!), but I've just got to go buy some outdoor running clothes so i can get back out there. For my new years resolution next year I'm trying to come up with a mileage goal for the whole year, but I'll talk more about that next time!!!

Finally finals are over!

Finished my last final exam today! Will blog again soon, have lots of updates to share! Until then, I'll leave you with a quote:

“Success isn't how far you got, but the distance you traveled from where you started.”

za's and goodies!

So its been a really long time since I've had time to cook anything, and I really didn't have time tonight,  but I've been craving pizza so bad. With the wedding coming up and my workout kicked into high gear, my conscience just wouldn't be able to make it so I decided to make a veggie pizza:

Usually I make it on a big flat pizza pan but this time I did it in a small round pan and made a deep dish. It was sooo good. One of my favorite things to do when I make pizza is to put cornmeal on the bottom of the crust. I don't know why you do this, but I think its fantastic. I put so many veggies (mushrooms, black olives, onions, green red and yellow bell peppers) on it that just one slice filled me up. But i also had some roasted garlic hummus on wasa crackers while i was making it.

I also received the most thoughtful gift yesterday for absolutely no reason from the sweetest boy! He got me a new coffee cup and a HUGE candy bar!

Yes, its a little contradictory because I drink the coffee to help me work out and the chocolate will completely undo my workout.. but thats kind of how I do things anyways. I love getting presents for no reason! I think they're better than getting them on your birthday or Christmas.

Awww... look at how sweet my boys we're being while they were waiting on their dinner tonight:

Duke was using Apollo's rear as a pillow. This is so amazing because this is the first time they've ever looked like they purposely wanted to be close to each other. Please pay no attention to the upside down light plugged into the wall behind them. I'm sure it got turned around during a game of "Duck Duck jump on the couch, run in circles, lets Goose Hillary in the butt while shes not looking".

I have to take a moment to do a bit of advertising. I've been giving Duke antibiotics for the past few weeks in an attempt to clear up a skin condition he came home from the the kennel with. I started out giving him half a piece of cheese, with the pills rolled up inside, but he kept picking the pills out and just eating the cheese. When I went to an equine/pet supply store in Mountain Home over the thanksgiving holiday I found these:

They're moldable dog treats with a hole in the center to put the pills in. I think this is just too cool. And a lot nicer than prying open their mouth and shoving the pill down the hatch and praying it makes it. I think the bag was about $7 dollars and comes with 30.

Ok I'm going to study for my next to last final.

(which probably means watching the shows I missed last week on Hulu until I fall asleep).