Kitty Deschanel | Food, Wine, and Travel Adventures Across the USA

It's time for another Not "Baaad" Sundays linky party! Discover some nifty new sites and share all your week's adventures. After that, be sure to check out Pica and Biscuit's cute Halloween costume idea. Dressing up for Halloween works better when your dog isn't afraid of their costume. And, of course, if you could share my blog hop button, I would be much obliged!

I don't normally dedicate entire posts to deals I find online, but this one is too nifty not to share. In addition to the $15 credit you get for signing up with One Kings Lane through this link, you save $15 by using coupon code get-inspired - a total savings of $30! Already have an account? Use a different email address and open another one! There are plenty of pretty things to buy for $30 and less. I just purchased a 12 inch Le Souk Ceramique Tagine. The retail price is listed at $70 and it has wonderful reviews on Amazon. My cost? $11.95, including shipping! One Kings Lane is a little bogged down at the moment (for obvious reasons) but keep trying if you can't connect. It's worth it! What awesome deals have you found on One Kings Lane?

I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone has been up to this week! Sexy Nerd and I will be spending our weekend visiting houses on the Albuquerque Parade of Homes tour. I forgot to bring my camera when we went out today, but I'll try to take photos to share tomorrow and Sunday. First visit to my blog? Well, my new bloggy friend, you might want to visit Linky Party Rules for LambAround Newbies .

Behold, Pottery Barn's Sand Vase Filler . Only $8.50! I suppose the price may seem a bit much, but it's not like you can get 4 pounds of sand anywhere else, right? Besides, it's from Pottery Barn! Really, Pottery Barn? Has anyone out there purchased this fancy pants sand? Is it actually made up of finely ground diamonds and unicorn tears?

Sexy Nerd is spending the weekend with his super cute, paper towel-eating baby niece (and developing an extreme case of Baby Madness!) and I'm crunching the numbers to take the two of us on a little Hawaiian vacation. What is everyone else up to?

Let's rewind to high school, when my stubborn teenage self insisted (demanded!) at the orthodontist's office on the very last appointment before getting braces that there was no way I was ever, EVER going to put those sharp, ugly things in my mouth. My mom told me that I'd regret it and would have to pay the thousands of dollars for braces myself in another 10 years or so. I knew she was wrong. I just knew it. Now, I'm at an age where my smile just doesn't send the professional image I would like. Between you (the entire internet world!) and me, I don't have the most attractive front teeth. I had my teeth fixed in the 3rd grade after a little accident, (Face, meet Road) and now, 20-something years later, the composite build ups are chipped and showing their age, with a noticeable horizontal line separating real tooth from fake. Oh, and as if this weren't all bad enough, the 2 teeth are different sizes with a gap between them! When I told my boss, a ...

Woot! Woot! It's time to mix it up with another Not "Baaad" Sundays linky at LambAround. Be sure to mingle with your fellow blog partiers. There's no room for shyness at a blog hop! And, since you're all such wonderful party guests, I just know you'll post my pretty link up button. You're cool like that. "Baaaaa!"

Now that Sexy Nerd and I are invested in property to build a home on, I can while away hours looking at photos online. My home building strategy is to take my most admired photos and design them into our house. Here are some of my favorites* so far: *These were all saved in a design folder on my computer without link information. If you know where a photo should be linked to, please let me know and I'll be happy to add a link!  Kids Room (Sexy Nerd insists the kid is going to break every bone in their little body when they plummet down those steps. I think they'll learn to be careful after their first tumble, which *probably* won't be that bad.) Prettiest Wall Ever Itty Bitty Room, just because Candles recessed into the wall  Guest Bedroom Living Room...for the Guest Bedroom Sexy Nerd (who, by the way, insists on a 6 car garage minimum ) says I'm not being practical. Phooey. Ideally, I'd like to limit our home to aroun...

Here in Albuquerque, Sexy Nerd and I are all about brewing beer and frying potstickers today. I hope everyone is having a fun weekend!

Meet Stretch. "Love my rolls." Stretch lives on the wall in our kitchen. See the smug look in his eyes? There's really no stopping him. Now, using the authority of his mighty rump, Stretch has expanded his occupancy of our home to include the laundry room door. Pica thinks this is a bunch of nonsense.

Happy Weekend, everyone! For all you curious types, things seem to be right on track with our property purchase. We're planning to drive up to our lot tomorrow and I'm hoping to have some photos up soon. (I love the lot, but I'm also suffering from an extreme case of Weekend Lazies.) Oh, I suppose there must be a photo of the lot online that I can show you now... 13.1 acres, baby! And, actually, it turns out that there is not a photo of our lot online (the bank is really trying hard to sell it, right?) so this is a nearby lot for sale. Some dirt, some trees, some more dirt - you get the idea. (and BEARS! and MOUNTAIN LIONS! I've opted not to think about that part though.) BTW, my mom told us an interesting tidbit about the previous owners of our foreclosed on piece of land. It's a post for another day though (hint: it involves mass nakedness!)

For those of you who doubt the durability of laminate floors, I present: Pica! A hyper Jack Russell is no match for this floor. Even her claws sliding across it do not do any harm. (Dropping an attachment from your stand mixer will leave a dent though, as I learned the hard way.)(Roomba also cannot be trusted after leaving swirls on the floor. Punk robot!) As an added bonus, since Pica cannot get much traction on this floor, she slides excitedly into the wall, the door, the fridge, (etc, etc!) whenever we come home. MUST.KILL.ROPE! MUST.FLIP.UPSIDE.DOWN! Aaaaaaaaugh!

I needed to access an old Qwest bill, but was having trouble setting up an online account. I selected the Online Chat option. The representative and I got off to a good start. Providing verification that I was indeed the account owner would be simple enough, right? I told the representative my name, account number, and billing zip code, as requested. A few minutes passed before receiving any reply. "To verify your identity, what is the answer to your secret account question?" Ummm...my what? It's a bit stupid tricky to answer a question that hasn't been asked. I inquired specifically what the secret account question was. Another pause. "If you cannot answer your secret account question, instructions for resetting your online password can be mailed to you." I asked again WHAT IS THE QUESTION?! I wrote that I was sure I could answer the question, if only I knew what it was. No response. I wrote a few common question/answer combinations that I thought it...

Happy Saturday, everyone! Wondering where the heck Lamb and her Sexy Nerd have been this week? Well, you know how we have been house hunting, hopeful of taking advantage of the super-low interest rates and buyer's market? We've been busy putting in an offer on... a 13.1 acre lot in the mountains ! Nothing is ever as clear cut and simple as it seems, is it? And now, my bloggy friends, let's link up with another Not "Baaad" Sundays blog hop. I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone else has been doing this week!

Before (okay, technically after would be just fine as well) linking up this weekend, I'd love, love, LOVE for you to take a second to vote for my latest Kenmore Genius Tips tip, which can be found at http://apps.facebook.com/kenmoregeniustips/?contentPath=/detail/732 via @KenmoreConnect . It's a pretty snazzy tip, if I do say so myself. It's all about getting your picky kids to eat (wonderful because parents just loooove getting child care advice from childless twenty-somethings, right?) You can actually vote once a day, but even just one time would be so super appreciated! And no new house yet, but we're going to spend the weekend looking and will be fixing up our home to sell. There's a house that looks promising (it has a cocktail pool!) online but was too expensive. They dropped their price this afternoon, which sounds like a sign to me. Alrighty, let's share some linky goodness with another Not "Baaad" Sundays blog hop!

Or is it a super-stealth pantry of looove? Sexy Nerd recently had a birthday and graduated from a fancy pants program at work, all on the same day. Clearly, this called for something special. See that pretty white door? It's just your typical, everyday pantry. Go ahead and open the door. Grab yourself a box of Multigrain Cheerios. ***SURPRISE!!!*** (Ahem. The banner is the surprise , not the mess.) I may not have thought this through. How do I top this next year? And Sexy Nerd's next birthday is a pretty big deal - 30! Geez, perhaps I should've stashed my banner away for another 12 months. Who am I kidding? Sexy Nerd is such an old man now, he'll have forgotten all about this banner by next year.

Happy weekend, everyone! Please be sure to visit your fellow Not "Baaad" Sundays blog hop party goers. Wish us luck with our house hunting endeavors :)

At the ripe ol' age of 27, I figure it's time to place higher emphasis on staying in shape. I've been very good about getting up early the last few weeks and going for a walk before work. Yesterday, I walked further than I ever have on my own and, of course, was feeling quite impressive later when I told my coworker how far I'd gone. She immediately stopped what she was doing. Her eyes grew enormous and she asked, "You walked there this morning ?!" I bragged about how the walk really wasn't very challenging and how you just have to make the time, even if it means setting your alarm for 5am. That wasn't why she was alarmed. "Didn't you watch the news this morning? Did you hear all the sirens?" Honestly, I had heard *something* when I started out on my walk, like the sound of a police officer talking on a megaphone the next street over, but I didn't give it much thought. My coworker asked my route again, then pointed out: ...

Nope! We're still here, albeit semi-absent from the blogging world. Geez, I didn't even post the Not "Baaad" Sundays linky this weekend (tsk, tsk!). Sexy Nerd and I have been 100% distracted by something since last weekend. We are thinking... ...of buying a house! And not just any old dumpy house either. Well, okay, the house at the top of our list right now is about as dumpy as they come (it's a foreclosure that would need everything redone, including repairing the damage from this winter when all the pipes burst). But it has potential! Over 5,000 square feet of potential, actually, which is a bit nuts because we were originally hoping to downsize from our current 2,700 sq ft house. We also have a few more reasonably sized homes to visit today and tomorrow. We're dreading selling our first home, partly because it seems like such an overwhelming process. What if our buyer wants to purchase with a contingency, but then their buyer needs a contingency, and...

Inspired by Passionate Penny Pincher, I decided to maximize my Walgreens deals this week, sans the diapers she had purchased. They are a great price and I'm sure one day I'll wish I'd bought them, but for now, baby-free, it just seemed too weird to buy a package of Huggies! Several drafts and alternate spending scenarios were required for this. You can't just walk into Walgreens willy nilly - that's how they get you! Here was my plan of attack, factoring in the annoying Walgreens rule that requires an equal or greater amount of items purchased to number of coupons: To Buy Omega Smart (cost: $10; Get a $10 register reward) (2 bottles) Speed Stick 24/7 (cost: 2/$5; Get a $3 register reward) Revlon Nail Polish (cost: $3.99; Get a $3 register reward) Pert Shampoo & Conditioner (cost: $3.99; Get a $3 register reward) Twizzlers (cost: 3/$4) Existing Register Rewards from Last Week 1 for $1 1 for $2 Transaction #1 Buy 2 Speed Sticks Use both existing c...