Jan 22 2013

It’s A New Year

Happy 2013, everyone! For my (two) followers (because I’m sure most people have given up on me, ha!), I know you have been wondering where I have been. Let’s just say the last half of 2012 was … busy. And that’s putting it mildly. It got so busy that the Hubs and I let our diet spin out of control, eating out a lot, resorting to fast food, and just generally eating crappy. We both gained some weight. Ick.

But it’s 2013 now, and the bad diet is behind us. In fact, we’ve got a new outlook on how we eat that I will explain later. For now, here’s a quick recap of what’s been going on in our lives since I posted in August.

The last time I posted, I told you all about Mandy, my dog who was very sick. Mandy had a lot of ups and downs over the next few months and I spent a lot of time taking care of her. We ultimately had to say goodbye to her on Christmas Eve, just a few weeks shy of her 15th birthday. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, and it still feels strange knowing that she’s gone forever. I picked her out as an eight week old little ball of fur when I was nine years old, and since then, she and I had been through a lot together. This put a damper on our Christmas, as you can imagine. Still, we made the best of it. I miss my baby girl very, very much and I have a lot of sweet memories of her life.

In October, we finally closed on a house. FINALLY! We searched for six months and had offers on multiple homes that we did not get for different reasons. Six months of tirelessly, hopelessly searching for a place that Marcos and I could call our own. Where we could nest and be husband and wife like we dreamed of. But all of the searching was worth it because we found the perfect house, and I cannot wait to show it to you guys! Oh, and on that note, this blog is going to expand a little bit to include my DIY projects around the home! I’m so excited!

A lot of firsts happened in October. On the 12th, we closed on our home. On the 28th, we celebrated our first wedding anniversary! And on the 29th, we set sail on our first cruise. We left out of New Orleans, LA and sailed to Progreso, Mexico and Cozumel, Mexico. This picture was taken at the cruise port in Cozumel.

Other than that, I’ve been sick a few times (more than usual for me in a season – and I contribute that to a high stress level for watching Mandy’s cancer take her from her as well as a very poor diet), and I worked a seasonal job from September-December. And in between all of that, we had a lot of family come to visit to check out our new house, as well as Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years celebrations. Oh, and my birthday was last week (and the Hubs’ birthday is coming up in less than two weeks!). So all of these things kept me very busy and neglecting this blog hobby of mine. And of course, my number one priority was my sick baby girl.

It’s only been a few weeks since Mandy has been gone, but our diet is revamped already and I have a lot more time on my hands. I am ready and itching to get going on this blog again. I can’t promise that I will post every day, or even every week, but I can promise that I will share every new creation I come up with. Here’s a sneak peak of a goodie I created a few days ago:

And of course, it is a healthy treat! The recipe will be posted soon… promise

xoxo,
Sarah

Aug 17 2012

Where have I been?

It’s been quite a while since I’ve been able to update the blog and I thought it was important that I explain why.

This is me and my doggie Mandy. For those of you who follow me on facebook, you may remember that I mentioned several weeks ago that Mandy is very sick. The past month and a half has been full of ups and downs with her. She has stopped eating, started eating again, and stopped eating again many times. I can’t keep up with what she wants to eat or when. Throughout the day I am constantly trying to get her to eat, and if she doesn’t, I resort to force feeding her. She is still happy and in good spirits, but noticeably more frail and weak. Nearly two years ago she was diagnosed with cancer and was given a very bleak outlook. She wasn’t supposed to make it to the following week. 21 months later, she is still hanging in there, but the end is obviously near now. I love this girl more than I can describe. I picked her out from the shelter when I was nine years old and she was 8 weeks old. She’s 14.5 now and I’m 23. To say that I can’t imagine life without her is an understatement. She has been my shadow for over 14 years.

I have dropped almost everything, it feels like, to make sure that I take good care of her. Marcos and I have been eating a lot of quickly thrown together meals. I’ve nearly quit baking. And the time that I do have available to work, I find it hard to focus because I know that in 30 minutes or so I will need to get back up to feed her or take her out. It is totally worth it, but also completely exhausting. The other night, I got up with her three times because she had to go to the bathroom. She is having to use the bathroom a lot because she is on a medication called Lasix that makes her urinate a lot. She was put on this about a month ago when I noticed that her belly and back legs were swelling up. It turns out that the swelling was actually fluid building up and this was being caused by the cancer. The vet told me that she is essentially in Hospice now and it is only a matter of time. Pretty much the crappiest news I could have gotten.

It’s very sad and draining watching your best friend die. I am just thankful for the time that I’ve had with her and the time that I have left. Mandy loves it when we get to go out in the boat. The picture above is of us just a few weeks ago when we took her out and I just sat in the water with her and let her relax. The water, I believe, helped her feel so much better. She always perks up after a boat ride or a dip in the salt water.

When I first neglected the blog last month I felt that Mandy was almost gone and I completely dropped everything to take care of her. But she has held on longer than I expected. I know she doesn’t have long left, but I have no way of knowing when the end will be and although I still plan on spoiling her to death, I’ve also realized that I need to get back to doing the things that I love to do also, for myself. I can’t wait to get back in the kitchen and create some more recipes to share with you all. I’ve got to find ways to fill my life with happiness right now, and cooking and baking will definitely make me happy.

Thank you guys for your continued support and stay tuned for a new post here very soon!

Jun 11 2012

The Best Day of My Life

Summer Blog Challenge, Day 11: Best Day of Your Life

Photo by Jenn Hopkins Photography

I spent my whole life dreaming, wondering, waiting to see what my wedding day would turn out to be like. Seven and a half months later, the hubs and I are still wishing that day hadn’t gone by so fast. I can’t count how many times we’ve said “I wish we could get married every year! Every month! Every day!” By far, without a doubt, not even close, is there another day. Best day of our lives.

We got engaged last May, and were married in October. We originally planned for February, but after much talking, we decided to move it up. For reasons that even I didn’t know, I had been wanting to get married in October for a long time, but we didn’t want to wait until the following October. So the date was set, and it was perfect. I couldn’t stop thinking “How perfect of a wedding date is October 28? No day is better!” It was going to cut out 4 months of planning, but I knew I could do it.

I did all of the planning myself, with the help of awesome friends and family, and we pulled together an amazing day. I didn’t have a wedding planner and people called me crazy more than once, but I rarely found myself stressed due to the wedding and truly enjoyed every moment of it. The only thing I would go back and change is how fast the day went by. It came and went and before we knew it, it was over. I still cry when I think about the fact that we can never do it again. Not because I want to change anything, but because the emotions I experienced that day – the love from all of our family, and getting to marry the love of my life – it all added up to a day that I never wanted to end. It was just incredible.

Photo by Jenn Hopkins Photography

We got married at an old historic hotel on Jacksonville Beach in Florida. The courtyard outside hosted our ceremony, then we moved inside to the dining room for dinner, and back outside for dancing. The morning of the wedding, I woke up early without my alarm clock (this definitely does not come natural to me!). We had been up late the night before, trying to get the dinner area put together for our guests. There was an event earlier that night and we had to wait for them to clear and clean the area. Due to the event, which was Halloween-themed, our rehearsal was quite … eventful. Hanging ghosts and goblins were outside where our ceremony would be the next day and inside where our guests would eat dinner. Not exactly wedding-friendly. But we all had fun with it. They cleaned everything up before our big day, although they missed a couple things that my dad had to grab. No, I did not want the ghosts and goblins to make a flying entrance at our wedding!

The morning of, I did not talk to Marcos at all. We did not want to see or talk to each other until we walked down the aisle. Two of my bridesmaids stayed in my suite with me, and that morning we worked on a few last-minute decorations before we went to get breakfast. I couldn’t eat, hard as I tried. I think I had a spoonful of yogurt and a mimosa (thanks to the awesome guys upstairs who took care of us ). But I felt fine. I wasn’t tired and I just wasn’t hungry. Throughout the entire process of getting ready, I was cool as a cucumber. I was happy and excited, and I just couldn’t wait to walk down the aisle.

Then it hit me. Once my day-of coordinator came to tell me to “stand by and be ready,” I got really nervous. My bridesmaids and I started playing games to get my mind off of things. But my heart was racing. I went from calm, cool, collected excitement to a basket of nerves in .05 seconds flat. I have no idea why I was nervous. I wanted to marry him so bad. But the thought of walking down the aisle and looking the most amazing man in the eyes and telling him I wanted him forever was so overwhelming that I couldn’t even bear the thought. I was so lucky.

Photos by Jenn Hopkins Photography

After saying “I can’t do this!” over and over again, and my friends encouraging me “Yes, you can. You’ll be fine!”, I finally was walked down the aisle with my dad by my side. The whole way down, I stared at my soon-to-be-husband and cried. He was so handsome. He was just smiling at me, but I could see how nervous he was too. I blubbered through my vows and Marcos stumbled through his. But I wouldn’t change a thing. It was heartfelt and it was real. People told us that it was one of the most emotional weddings they had ever been to. You can hear our vows and watch a trailer video of our wedding at this link: Marcos and Sarah’s Preview Video.

There are too many amazing things for me to recount to really put my wedding day into words, so I won’t even try. All I know is, I am so incredibly grateful for the amazing video and photos I have of the day, and the unforgettable memories. I still can’t believe it really happened. Someone pinch me.

Photo by Jenn Hopkins Photography

Jun 9 2012

Summer Blog Challenge, Day 9

We’ve had a lot of flooding and bad storms here today, so we were without power for a while. And now, the hubs is dying to go watch the Heat-Celtics game with some friends, so instead of me getting to work on the blog, I am just going to post the Summer Blog Challenge post today. I’m already late on the post for the day, so I just decided that I would at least post this (thank goodness for the Blog Challenge!). Promise to have a recipe up for you guys tomorrow!

June 9– Your worst cooking disaster.
This one came recently. I was making this really extravagant dinner (or at least I’d like to think so): coconut crusted snapper with mango salsa. I even made a special trip to the store for the ingredients (I usually just use what we have on hand). While I was getting everything ready, I was writing down measurements of what I was putting into it so that I could later post it on the blog. I turned the oven on to bake the snapper. Therein lies my mistake…

What, you didn’t catch it? Oh yeah, note to the wise: ALWAYS check to see what’s in your oven before you turn it on! Because you never know, you just may have a paper bag in there!!!

Yeah, a paper bag! When my parents were in town the day before, my dad cooked fresh mullet. He always drains it on a paper bag-lined baking sheet (because it is fried in oil). To keep the fish away from the dogs, we put the fish, on the paper bag-lined baking sheet, into the oven (which was off). This was fine, except at the end of the meal, we should have removed the paper bag from the oven.

Or I should have checked the oven before I turned it on the next day!

Before I knew it – within a matter of seconds – the oven was on fire. BIG TIME. I started freaking out, and for whatever reason, I opened the oven to see how bad it was. Not smart!! The flames were only inches away from my face when I opened the oven. I started screaming “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my GOSH”. After a few moments of this, I grabbed my cell phone and the dogs and ran outside. I immediately called 911. The operator asked if everyone was out of the house (hubs was at work) and told me to absolutely not go back in for any reason and that the fire department was on the way. During the 10 minutes it took for them to get there, I was hysterical. I could not imagine what would happen if it spread to the rest of the kitchen and throughout the house.

I was so lucky that I had shut the oven door back. The guys from the fire department told me if it had been open, the cabinets and microwave would have been toast. This is probably the only time I’ve been thankful for that clunky oven door that always slams shut on us when we’re trying to shut it quietly. I’m not sure if I would have closed it back otherwise, but thanks to that feature it wasn’t going to stay open, and that’s what saved our kitchen!

I thank God that he was watching over me, and the awesome fire department men! They were so nice and calmed me down a lot. The thing that really got me feeling better was when they grabbed the slip of paper that had my ingredients on it and came outside where I was to ask if they could stay for dinner … hahaha! So glad to have such an awesome volunteer fire department up the street. They are life savers (literally)!

No meal is worth the kitchen being on fire … but at least it turned out pretty?

So that’s most definitely my worst cooking disaster. What’s yours? Please tell me I’m not the only one who has nearly lit their kitchen on fire!

Jun 8 2012

Summer Blog Challenge Days 1-8

I’ve decided to participate in the Summer Blog Challenge. You’ll notice I’ve added the button to my sidebar, so if you’re interested in reading posts from any one of the participants, this would be the place to find the links for everyone’s individual blogs. Basically, it’s a challenge to post a blog post every day and there’s a prompt for what to post. From this point on, I’ll probably include my blog challenge post inside of another recipe post. I’ve missed the first week, so here are my answers for those days, including today

June 1– Why are you doing this challenge.
I wanted to participate to encourage myself to post every day. I don’t want to forget about this blog at all and I know it will encourage my readers to come back if I have new content every day

June 2– Post a picture of you smiling.

Me and the hubs on our honeymoon in Jamaica

June 3– 15 interesting facts about yourself.
1. I love music! Especially country music. Music keeps me motivated while I’m cooking and baking. Currently I’m listening to “Drunk on You” by Luke Bryan. <3 this song!

2. I have a huuuuuge sweet tooth. No meal is complete without dessert at mi casa. This blog will eventually be covered with a lot of desserts, I'm sure.

3. I love dogs. Especially mine We have two, and you can see their pictures on my about me page!

4. My first job was at a veterinarian office. I worked in the kennel and took care of the cats and dogs by feeding and medicating them, cleaning up after them, bathing them, taking the dogs out to potty, etc. To date, this is still my favorite job I’ve ever had. Animals are just great

5. The hubs and I are moving our way towards no processed foods, but it’s not as easy as it seemed like it would be. I’m letting it be a slow process so that I don’t get overwhelmed. It’s something I’ve been learning a lot about lately and want very much for my husband and I and our future children. So far, it’s actually been really fun because I’ve had to become more creative in the kitchen with substitutions, making my own recipes, etc.

6. Along the same line, the dogs have been eating better than us for years. I’ve been feeding Mandy and Nova an exclusively raw diet for over six years now. The improvements in their health is really wonderful. They are always mistaken for being younger than they are (Nova is 7.5, Mandy is 14.5). For those who don’t know, a raw diet for dogs is exclusively raw meat, raw bones, and raw organs such as liver, kidney, heart, etc.

7. I have a hard time picking a favorite food, but I’ve always had a thing for mashed potatoes and yeast rolls. And brownies. Definitely brownies. And anything else chocolate. It’s a problem, really.

8. Our honeymoon in Jamaica was the first time I’ve ever been out of the USA. I miss Jamaica on a pretty frequent basis. One of the best experiences of my life … aside from our wedding day and the day of the proposal.

9. Speaking of the proposal, wedding, and honeymoon: I still cry when I think about any one of those days. To be fair, we’ve only been married since October, but I have to wonder if I’ll ever be able to talk about those days without crying and getting overly giggly and happy. Not that I’m complaining, because it’s really a wonderful thing! I’m so in love <3

10. The hubs and I are trying to get into running. We ran our first 5k last month, without any training. We really just wanted to jump start into it. How are we doing since then? Ummm...we haven't run very much ... at all. But we have a 5K next month we plan on entering, and we're determined to start training for it this upcoming week!

11. The hubs is much more social than I am. He makes friends wherever he goes. I wish I could do that. I'm the shy, quiet type. Until I get to know you, then you can't get me to shut up. You have been warned (har, har).

12. I've always been a computer geek. I once had an Aaron Carter fan site that made an appearance in J-14 magazine and was dubbed as "the grandaddy of all Aaron Carter fan sites!" My mom and I went out and bought all the J-14 magazines we could when that issue came out. Can I just make a note that I was, like, 11 at the time? So, no, I'm not embarrassed. haha!

13. I want to travel the world. But then, who doesn't? But the hubs and I have big plans to travel a lot before we have kids.

14. I miss my friends since moving to this city. But then, I love this city. The hubs and I plan to live here forever. I just wish my friends would all move over here too!

15. I love, love, love to garden and grow my own vegetables. It's so satisfying for me. I am currently growing jalapenos, red bell peppers, sweet heat peppers, fresno peppers, habanero peppers, oregano, basil, cilantro, rosemary, eggplant, japanese eggplant, three different types of tomatoes, sweet mint (because we love mojitos!), and some others that I'm sure I'm forgetting.

June 4– Meaning behind your blog name.
I spent way too long trying to come up with the name and I hope it sticks with people. One Sweet Heat has multiple meanings. One, the hubs is from Mexico, and he’s really sweet…and hot. So, yeah, that’s that.

Oh, and our love is a sweet heat. I’ll stop there.

Aaannnnddd… I like to cook with a lot of spices, and bake with a lot of sweets So, sweet heat!

This is less having to do with the blog, but it still fit: we just moved near a beach (by near, I mean 30 minutes away), so finally, I can say the Florida heat is pretty sweet. It was not sweet when I was living 2 hours from the beach, it just sucked! Now I enjoy bike rides at the most beautiful beach, concerts on the beach, fishing on the beach, etc. Life is pretty great over here.

June 5– Short term goals for this month and why those goals.
1. To work on this blog a lot and really get it going. I have big plans for this baby

2. To focus on getting the word out about my photography business that I’ve just started. Trying to start a new business is not easy, especially when you’ve just moved to a new area. I want to get out and about this month and see if I can find some businesses that will let me drop off some business cards.

3. To make my own yogurt. This is step 1 for us to save money on our grocery bill. We use a lot of greek yogurt, so I’ve decided to start making my own. But we’ve gotta use up what’s in the fridge, first

4. To focus more on God and the bible. When we make God the center of our lives, we are happier together and individually. Unfortunately, without our small group and our church that we loved so much, it’s been harder for us to keep Him the center of our lives over here in our new home, and though we still pray often, we study the bible less and talk about Him less. We desperately want to change that. This is really the biggest goal, and more of a long-term goal, but it’s a goal for this month nonetheless because we are longing to be close to Him again.

June 6– Nicknames you have & why you have them.
Oh gosh, the hubs has a million nicknames for me. Which is funny, because I really grew up with next to none. Everyone always just called me Sarah.

Some of his nicknames for me are Chumper Love, Chumpers (which came from the first one), Baby Boo, Honey Bun..and tons more. And I have no idea where any of them came from! But they sure are fun and I love it when he calls me any of them He has plenty too. In fact, we never call each other Sarah or Marcos except when we are referring to each other in conversations with other people. Towards each other, it sounds so weird to call each other by our first names!

June 7– Picture of something that makes you happy.

The hubs. Duh! Yeah, he’s pretty much the greatest. Even better is this picture: The hubs in Jamaica. Can we go back?!

June 8– Not including blogging your favorite guilty pleasure.
Brownies. But I think I mentioned that up there ^^. Sooo…hmmm…cleaning. Yes, I love to clean, and yes, it gives me pleasure. I love to clean during the day while hubs is at work. I turn up the music, then start cleaning the house. I dance to music while I’m vacuuming, doing dishes, etc. It’s fun, I swear!

Alright, I told y’all that it’s hard to get me to shut up, so I’m sorry for being so wordy! But like I said, from here on out I’ll post the blog challenge prompt in that day’s individual post.