A change will do you good!

All it takes is a $0.14 (I used a $2 off coupon when I bought this) box of hair dye and I feel like a new woman!    

I hadn't colored my hair in months!  I was getting bored with my lack luster hair and needed a change. Yes, my hair was red the last time too, but since it had been so long, it was now back to brown! So yes, it is a change!

As you can see, my roots were about 3-4 inches long. 

I don't have any greys yet and just color my hair for the fun of it, but my natural color was pretty dull!

With Eric's help, I got my whole head covered.

I highly recommend using foam hair dye, because it has the easiest coverage when you are trying to apply it!  

We even put some on Eric's goatee!

Presto chango, light intense auburn!!!!! ;)

 

Once again, I am loving it! Once again, I am a sassy ginger!

That's all for now, folks! Till next time!

21 years old with 15 years experience

July 8th was my birthday... I turned 36 and am officially in my late 30s! LOL!  Or as my adorable husband would say, I am 21 years old with 15 years experience!   

My age has never mattered to me...but for a little over two months, I will be two years older than Eric.  I truly am his old lady! ;)

As an adult, birthdays are not as a big to-do as they are when you are kids!  I wasn't expecting much this year... a card or two and that's all.  

I woke up and my mother-in-law and my daughter had made me cards and they were waiting for me on the computer desk.

Well, my husband truly surprised me!  He bought me a dozen gorgeous red roses and gave me a very sweet birthday card that made me bawl my eyes out!  I love that man so much!  He never ceases to amaze me! 

my pretty roses

Eric and I

Birthday date!

Kisses for the birthday girl!

My mother-in-law, who had been staying with us since May, was going to be headed home to Arizona this week. She stayed one more day, for my birthday, so my hubby could take me out!!!   Plus, we weren't ready for her to leave yet either! We miss you, GrandMama!

 

I picked Red Lobster for lunch! Eric has been wanting to go since they opened, but we haven't had a chance yet. I took advantage of that! ;)

We both ordered a 4 course meal special that they had. It came with never ending cheddar bay biscuits (and they are just as good as people rave), soup, salad, entree and dessert for $14.99 or upgrade for $4 more (which is what we did)!   Pretty good deal!  I had ceasar salad and clam chowder.  Eric opted for creamy potato bacon soup.  I took one bite of his and wished I had ordered that one instead. It was so creamy and yummy! I love clam chowder, but this totally topped it! 

I was teasing Eric, because he was eating a salad! He is not a big veggie person!

For my entree, I ordered Maui Luau Shrimp & Salmon.  It came with wild rice pilaf, steamed broccoli and pineapple pico de gallo! It was so good that I forgot to take a picture of it when it first came out!

Here it is, after I had already dug into it! So so good! I ate every last bite!

Eric ordered Honey BBQ Shrimp & Chicken, that came with steamed broccoli and garlic mashed potatoes. His was pretty tasty too! 

 

Overall, we were pretty impressed with Red Lobster. Our server was super nice.  He brought my brownie dessert and said that his birthday present to me was for him not to sing! LOL!  We must have gone at a great time of the day, because we were only like one of seven or so tables!   It's not an everyday restaurant, but I highly recommend it for special occasions!

 

           

Then, we came home and I got tons of birthday hugs from these two munchkins! I love my kids!

 

I had a super blessed birthday!

Beef and vegetables

Here is another Fresh & Easy score that I found on 4th of July!  I have been waiting to try this beef and vegetable slow cooker kit. It comes with a huge slab of beef, seasoning packet and all the veggies: onion, carrots, celery and red potatoes.  It normally cost $14.99, but because they were dated that day, they had them marked down to $1.50!!!!!!! SCORE!!!  They had two of them, so I bought them both.

I put one of the roasts in the freezer.  I put the other roast in the crockpot, with the seasoning, a little more water then it called for and both sets of veggies. I love me some stew type veggies! 

I set the timer for 6 hours on high. After about 4 or so, it was done!  The house smelled so good.

The meat was so tender, it just melted in your mouth!  It fed 3 adults and 2 children. So delicious!

I ended up taking all the veggies out and leaving the broth in. I pulled the other roast out of the freezer and ended up cooking that one too.   We are still eating left overs!  I totally recommend this one!

Beef, it's what's for dinner!

Our family is not a huge beef eating family.  Chicken and turkey, and some pork, is what we usually eat. Well, knowing that 4th of July is a huge grilling day, I figured that steak would be on sale. For the holiday, Fresh & Easy had their New York Steak on sale for 50% off.  I got two packs for around $12. I have no idea if this was a great price, but I figured, what the heck! ;)

My sister's husband is a steak lover, so I asked Laura for an easy recipe to cook it on the stove, since I didn't have a nice BBQ to BBQ it on!   

My mother-in-law took the steak out of the fridge, for me, an hour before I was going to cook it.  Laura had told me that it would cook better if it was almost room temperature and not as cold.  I turned my burner on and got the pan super hot.... 

I put onion powder, garlic powder and some Lawry's Seasoning salt on both sides.

I took a stick of butter and threw some pats in the pan and tossed in the steaks. Man, it smelled good!

I cooked it, until it looked done-ish, and then flipped them (adding some more butter)!

Now my sister had also told me, that once you pull them from the pan, they will continue to cook, so you want to take them out when they are sorta rare-ish.  The first two came out better than the last two. LOL! But since it was my first time attempting to cook steak, I thought I had done good! ;)

I also had grabbed these veggies to cook as a side.

They sauteed in the mix that had come in the package. I love squash, but the seasoning on them was horrible. I won't buy this again.

Sweet corn was also on sale for 6/$1, so of course I grabbed those! I did my handy dandy microwave trick and steamed up! So so yummy! I love fresh corn!

Other than the squash, the dinner was pretty yummy! I was super hungry and ended up eating the entire piece of steak! So good!  I thought that it turned out pretty good! 

So, now I can officially say that I have made steak and it turned out great!