Tourist in my own city

This past weekend my good friend Lisa came into town. We had so much fun staying up til 2am her first night, catching up. Friday we went to the Grizzlies game and Saturday we went to Graceland. Saturday night we went down to Hernando and cooked out and played games at Brett and EmilyBlair's house. Lots of fun! Graceland was awesome. I felt like Chandler on Friends when complains about going to the Statue of Liberty and all the touristy stuff in NYC and then comes back decked out in all the NYC merchandise and says "New York City is awesome!" I always say that native Memphians don't do Graceland, yada yada yada... But I forgot how good of a tour it is! They have put a lot of effort into it. Lisa and I found ourselves wanting to buy everything in the giftshop. We refrained and only left with Elvis 75th birthday koozies, magnets and matches. A good time had by all!

Grizzlies game

Graceland!

Lisa Marie Delozier with the "Lisa Marie"

Peacock living room

Stairway up to the secret upstairs they won't take you to.

Dining room.

Pool room. Note how the fabric on the walls and ceiling is the same as the furniture.

The infamous Jungle Room.

Me and Lisa with our 75th Birthday koozies on our Woodchucks.

I don't know why Bryan looks so unhappy, the boys won Trivial Pursuit.

Resolution vs. Goal

I've decided not to make New Year's Resolutions this year, but goals for 2010 instead. You can break a resolution, but a goal is just something you strive for. That being said, one major goal for 2010 is to read all the books I have (that I haven't read yet) before I buy any books or check any out from the library. This is somewhat of a challenge for two reasons: 1, I have A LOT of books and 2, I LOVE getting new books. But, I am determined to stick with this. So far, I have read 2 books this year out of a 3 book series called The Heritage of Lancaster County, by Beverly Lewis. The first 2 books, The Shunning and The Confession, were wonderful, and the third one, The Reckoning, so far is equally as good. It's about an Amish girl, and well I don't want to say much more because I don't want to give it away. They're really well-written and you can tell Ms. Lewis did lots of research on the Amish culture.

Next up: The Anne of Green Gables series. Surprisingly, I've never read them even though I've owned the series since childhood. I love the mini-series that Kevin Sullivan did for Disney and had so much fun watching it with Lisa this weekend.

Grillin'

My new grill was delievered last week and christened this past Sunday:

Ribeye

Lemon Pepper tilapia + cedar plank = DELICIOUS!

The Weber-Q 320. So far, I am impressed.

It's Christmas... all over... again!

The downside to spending Christmas in a location where you have to fly to get there is you can't get any big presents in your luggage. The upside is my mom ships them to me and I get to open packages with Christmas presents all over! Here's the piece de resistance:

I asked for a wooden recipe box that I'd seen on Etsy.com My mother gave me this one, it was my grandmother's. I absolutely LOVE it! So much more meaningful, knowing that it help all my grandmother's recipes.


My mom also made me these cute cards to put in it.

Bryan's mom got me this adorable phone for my kitchen (notice it matches my mixer perfectly)

Can't wait for my new grill to come in, so I can start having grilled fish and veggies for dinner. However, I found a great alternative until then. Humdinger's. It's DELICIOUS! It's fast (similar to Jason's) but it's all healthy food. They have grilled fish, chicken, grilled veggies, etc. It is so good that I had it yesterday for lunch and then took Bryan back there for dinner. For lunch I had grilled tilapia, grilled zuchini and rice. For dinner, I had the shrimp tacos and fries (I'd been good all day I deserved the fries!) It's absolutely scrumptious, so go check it out!