A great weekend!

So we had a great weekend here in the Wilson/Travis home. Friday I didn't have to go to class thanks to my sweet teacher. I cleaned this apartment all day though! I even cleaned the baseboards and dusted the ceiling fans! It was so nice. I also jammed out in the living room. Justin got this super nice surround sound for Christmas and I was blaring my music. It's the best way to clean! Anyway, I finally got all of that done. Justin was so excited he took me to dinner! We went to Santa Fe and it was amazing as always! I had the steak with a baked potato and a salad with ranch. The same ole same ole but it is always so good and so perfect!

Yesterday was a fun day too. We went to lunch at Arby's then we went to Target to look around. I found this really cute shirt that I wanted but I'm waiting for it to go on sale. I just don't want to spend $25 on this shirt when I know that in a few weeks it will be 12.99 So, I will wait it out! After that, we came back and got Trixie and went to the pet store. Now, just like any other visit to the pet store, I always look at the pets but never think of getting one. Well yesterday was not our usual trip. There was a precious little hound dog there and he was only $10. No one wanted him and he had been there a long time. Bless his little heart, he kept biting the cage just begging to get out. He really needed just a big ole back yard to run around in and have a fun time. So Justin called his dad to see if he wanted him, and he did! So we adopted the dog and his name was Dega like Talladega. He is so sweet. We took him up to Jasper to Justin's parents' house. Gah he is so sweet. I love him so much. I can't wait to go visit him. So, we went to Chick-Fil-A on our way home. They have a chick-fil-a sauce that I had no idea about! Why didn't anyone tell me about this? I asked for it because I heard another girl ask for it. When I looked at it I thought it was going to taste like Guthrie's sauce or Zaxby's sauce. Well it didn't. It was like a bbq sauce mixed with some other stuff. I LOVED it! It is now my 2nd favorite sauce next to polynesian sauce at Chick-Fil-A. So, we got home and there was some more exciting news. We get here and pull in and see police cars all at the apartment. They don't have their blue lights flashing, they are just in the parking lot, so we figured it was nothing too bad. Well, as we are walking up the stairs I hear a woman screaming "get down, get down on the ground! I need back up! Forest Trail apartments highway 69" So Justin and I are freaking out and we run up the stairs trying to get in the apartment. She then pulls out her gun so I'm like omg omg! I run over to the window and she has a man down on the ground handcuffing him. It was crazy! I first thought it was a mexican man which had me worried. I was worried because I saw the security officer for the apartment standing with a girl my age watching the guy get arrested. There have been a few cases down here within the past month as a mexican man walking around apartments claiming to be maintenance and girls are letting him in his apartment and he rapes them. So, I thought something had happened to that poor girl. Well, after everything calmed down Justin, Trixie and I walked down to the security officer to see what was going on. Turns out the guy was an Asian guy and he has been beating the crap out of his girlfriend and she called the cops on him and when they showed up he ran and the female cop spotted him and arrested him. I couldn't believe it. But, I'm glad that it wasn't just some random guy and that she knew him because then I would begin to worry.

Today was a great beautiful day. We slept really late so that was amazing! We then went to Swen for lunch and after that we went to the airport and the basketball coach was flying in at that same time. We had completely forgot about that. After that we went to WalMart to do our grocery shopping. I got some stuff to make my Butterfinger cake. It is Justin's absolute favorite thing and his birthday is coming up so I told him I figured we should make one for "practice." He couldn't agree more. So I made this. I am also about to make a recipe blog. I love cooking and I want to share with people some excellent recipes. So I will start one of those. But for now, I will post my Butterfinger cake recipe and I hope you all enjoy! I also hope all of you have a great week! I know I will thanks to a lot of canceled classes!!
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Butterfinger Cake:

1 box butter cake mix
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1 jar caramel ice cream topping
1 container of cool whip
4 Butterfinger candy bars (these are the large ones, I just buy 2 packages of the fun size)





Mix cake batter and cook according to box directions.
*Note: the box will say 35 minutes but I only cook 30. You do not want to over cook
because it will become dry much quicker.



Mix the caramel and the condensed milk together in a bowl.
As soon as the cake comes out of the oven, poke holes in it while it is still hot
and pour the caramel mixture on top so it will seep into the holes.

Let the cake stand and cool for about an hour and a half to two hours. I know, it's hard
to wait. Once it is cooled begin chopping your butterfingers. I crush mine in a tiny little
food chopper. You can chop them in a food processor, hand chopper, or put them in a
ziploc bag and pound them with a hammer! It doesnt' reallly matter. After you have about
2 large bars or 8 small bars crushed fine, sprinkle them over the cake. After you have sprinkled a layer of Butterfinger over the cake, you can then top with your Cool Whip. You will probably get little bits of Butterfinger in your cool whip, but that's okay. In fact, it makes it look even cuter. Once you have done this, do a rough chop of a few more butterfingers to garnish the top. It should look like this.



After this step, regrigerate. You can refrigerate as long as you like. Sometimes it only makes an
hour in our house, but some people may want to refrigerate overnight. Either way it is delicious!
I hope you try it and enjoy it!!!

Busiest not so busy week!

This has been the busiest not so busy week for me. I don't have a lot of assignments due, in fact I only have one assignment due. BUT, what makes it bad, is that this is the biggest waste of time and completely pointless. I have to create an author study on a children's book author. I chose Jan and Stan Berenstain because I knew they would be super easy. They are, it's just the assignment itself is a pain in the butt! But, I will get through it just like I get through everything these days!



Yes, this is indeed a Gideons Bible. I show this picture to show all of you that this is how I make it through my days. No, I do not open it up and sit around read it. I wish I had time, but unfortunately I do not make the time. But the story behind this thing is I was walking to class last Fall. It was actually September 2007. I was walking to class and running late so I was in a big hurry. This man, which happened to be the man passing out the Gideons Bible, said to me "Here you go young lady, you look like you could use one of these." I smiled and said thank you and took it and dropped it in my bag. At first I felt offended in a way. Did I really look that bad or worn out or did I look like I had that much of a lack of faith? Whatever the case may be, I thank that man because since the day I put that Bible in my bag, everything has turned out great for me. My grades went up drastically. I made the Dean's List last semester while taking 19 hours, and this semester I have all A's and I do not see them dropping! This thing has really helped me and I refuse to take it out. It has helped me get through lots of things like financial issues, relationship issues, grades, school, etc., it helped me get through every bit of it. So, I just wanted to throw that in there. Even though I complain a lot about assignments and stuff and since I was just complaining about that assignment, I know that it will be okay and that I will make full credit on it and things will be fine because I have my little Bible with me. God is there for me every day and I wish I could be there for Him more often. But, back to everything else.

I dont' know if I ever told any of you about the 5th grade girl I have that stole her grandma's car, drove to town to beat a girl up, then wrecked the car on her way back. Well, if I didn't there's the brief story. Well, I found out today that last week she got kicked out of school and is now living in a group home in Montgomery. She took a girl in the girls bathroom and pulled her jacket around her so she couldn't move her arms and started beating the crap out of her in the bathroom. That girl really enjoyed me being around her though. I could make her behave and focus on everything. Every day she would come to check and make sure I was at school that day and come give me a hug. But, I think this is what's best for her. No one can excuse that kind of behavior not matter how bad you have it at home or how good you may be when you are around one person.

Well, I taught my math lesson. It was alright to be that nightmare of a group of kids. They are seriously the worse kids I have ever experienced. They are a bunch of the West End bussed in kids and it's just a nightmare!!!! But, I got through it somehow, I guess it was my Bible! But it went fine and now it's over. Today I got go over a cute reading lesson with my class and it was a lot of fun. They enjoyed me getting to get up there and teach to them for a change. I'm very excited about next week because I get to go to Kindergarten since my kids will be taking the SAT. So exciting. I went and introduced myself to them today and they are just precious. They are seriously some of the cutest little kids EVER! But anyway, I'm done talking and blabbing. I need to get started on that assignment I've been griping about. I hope all of you have had a good Monday and Tuesday and have a great remainder of the week!

Back to school

Well, Spring Break is officially over... :( I hate when that happens, but I only have 6 more weeks of school left so that gives me something to look forward to. I went to Gatlinburg for Spring Break this year because a. it was so cheap, and b. because I wanted to relax away from Spring Breakers. It was a lot of fun. Let me update on this!

Monday 3/16: We left today to go to Gatlinburg. This morning started off crazy wild. Number one, Justin's phone completely died on him. It was ridiculous. So, we had to stop by WalMart to buy a car charger for my cell phone because I had forgot my car charger and forgot to charge my phone the night before so it was going dead. Well, once we got that under control, we got on the road. Everything was all great until we got to Knoxville. Let me tell you, this is one more reason I hate the University of Tennessee. Their highways are the biggest mess! We had to take like 5 exits because they were working on the interstate and then we just made one gigantic circle, got downtown Knoxville and our GPS had no idea what to do so we were driving in circles. We eventually found the interstate and got back on it. That was stressful enough in itself. So, we make it to Gatlinburg. We get to our hotel and things are great. It's so nice and big and cozy, but it was very.....Christmasey. There were Christmas lights, Christmas trees, and yes...Santa Claus! Santa's were everywhere because apparently there was a Santa Claus convention. It was really weird to see that much Christmas when you are escaping for Spring Break. But anyway, we checked in, laid around for a little bit and went to dinner. We ate at a BBQ place called Corky's. It was so good and very cheap! After that we went back to the hotel to get ready for bed because we were so extremely tired and we lost an hour by going to Gatlinburg so we were ready for bed.

Tuesday 3/17: This day was much better. We woke up early and went to Log Cabin Pancakes. Ahh they are so good. Justin said that they had the best bacon he has ever eaten. It was good. I had 3 HUGE pancakes, eggs, and bacon. It was enough for 2 people. I came nowhere near to finishing it. Justin had biscuits and gravy as always and bacon. After breakfast, we went to the Motor Nature Trail. This is where you can drive through the mountains and look at all kinds of cool things. We ran into tons of old houses, pretty rivers, and lots of animals. I took tons of pictures and maybe I will upload them soon. After that we went straight to Cade's Cove. that was a really long drive but it was awesome. We saw tons of old houses, churches, and deer and wild horses. It was really beautiful. We were like up in the mountains. It was a lot of fun. For lunch we pulled over at this cute little place that sold food. I had a hotdog and Justin had nachos. After that, we continued on our trip through Cade's Cove. After we were through with that we went back to the hotel for a short nap. We then got ready and went to dinner at Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. It was a lot of fun. We got to sit outside. I answered all of the questions from the Forrest Gump movie. Everyone was shocked that I knew that many facts from the movie. I can't help it, I have seen it a hundred times and just love it! After that, we walked around for a while and went to this little stand called Mama Bear's snack shop. We shared a funnel cake and it was so good. We then went back to our hotel to call it a night!

Wednesday 3/18: This was our last day in Gatlinburg. We decided to get up and go to breakfast at another pancake place called Flapjacks. I had the Caribbean pancakes which were pancakes filled with bananas, topped with bananas, pineapples, pecans, coconut, and whipped cream and honey. It was really really sweet. I couldn't eat much of it. Justin had Reese cup pancakes. His had pancakes filled with Reese cups and topped with chocolate syrup and melted peanut butter. After that we decided to go to a place called Newfoundland Gap. It was really cool. When you were here you were on the Tennessee/North Caroline state line, you were also over 5000 feet above sea level. That was almost a mile above sea level. There are all kinds of cool things here. Once we were here we decided to go to Cherokee, North Carolina. This place is where all of the Indians reside and it was cool too. We got there and went inside an Indian casino just for the heck of it. Once we left there we just drove around and I noticed that all of the street signs had the english name of the street and then under it there were Indian symbols. It was really neat. After this we drove back to Gatlinburg because it was almost a 2 hour drive. Once we got in, we took a quick nap and then got ready to go out. We went to TGI Fridays. After there, we walked down to the Ripley's Guiness Book of Records Museum. There were so many cool things in there. After that, we went to the Mayfield store and shared another funnel cake. We were both extremely exhausted after all of the hiking we had done on Tuesday and Wednesday so we decided to go back and pack up our things and get ready for bed.

Thursday 3/19: We left Gatlinburg at 8 their time which was 7 our time. I was glad to get out of there and get home. Knoxville once again was a gigantic mess. In fact, it was worse this time. But we finally got out of there and got back on the interstate. We finally made our way back to Jasper, Alabama so I could get my doggy out of the vet and get back to Tuscaloosa. We made it back to Tuscaloosa just fine. I was so sleepy, I took a really long nap. I had a bag of popcorn for supper tonight because we were tired of eating out and bascially just tired. Needless to say, I went to bed super early.

Friday 3/20: Woke up really early because I wanted to clean. I cleaned my room and even steam cleaned my carpet. It's awesome. After that, Justin and I went to lunch at Popeye's then I had to go to the library to meet Melanie so we could work on some assignments. I then came home and hung out with Justin and Trixie for a while. We watched Criminal Minds since we missed it on Wednesday. After that, I went to bed early again.

Saturday 3/21: Today was a good day. I tried to sleep late and didn't really succeed too well. Got up, got ready and we went out. We went to Arby's for lunch then we decided to go look at these apartments that we were interested in living in. Yea, great deal. 500 a month, 2 bedroom and 2 bath. Brand new, great location. We get there and it's nothing but a bunch of ghettos. Apparently these were like projects or something. We got out of there really quick and scratched that one off the list. Oh well. Went home for a little bit. Took a small nap to catch up on some lost sleep. We then got up and went to Iguana Grill for dinner. It was really good as always. Then we went home. I was out like a light and Justin was up til 2.

Sunday 3/22: Today was the grocery day. We got up and went to lunch at Zaxby's. It was really good today. Maybe it was because we were really wanting it. After that, we went to WalMart to do the grocery ritual. We bought lots of groceries because we had absolutely none at home. Thank goodness we did that. After that we came home and washed our cars. I started washing a spot on my car and then rinsed it off. Wow. It looked like a completely different car. I'm telling you, this thing looked like a gray car when it's supposed to be bright white. After that, we came in and just hung out. I did some homework and helped Justin look for some more internships. I had a cheeseburger for dinner and Justin had a deer cheeseburger. I dont' like deer meat so I didn't eat it. Well, now I am just blogging and I have just realized I am supposed to teach math tomorrow. Whoops. I better go study up on that. I still have to get a shower. I will post pics later for those who read this and may be interested in my trip. Otherwise, I will be posting them for myself! I hope everyone else had a fantastic Spring Break if you had one, otherwise I hope you all had a great week and I hope you all have a great week coming up!

Slacker!

Alright, so I have not posted in 11 days. I think that's a record for me. School has taken over my life and whenever I have time to even think about sleep I do that. I have had no time for anything, not even my boyfriend and my dog. But luckily, I am getting to go on a Spring Break Vacay next week and I am so very much looking forward to that. Let me kinda brief myself without being too long.

March 4: This was a typical Wednesday. Well, not so typical. I didn't have to meet for my afternoon class until 2:30 rather than 1:30 so that was nice. I met with my professor so she could grade one of my assignments and I got a 30/30 and a "Great Job!" so that was nice! After that I had to go to Vicki's class (this is what we call it now) It's ridiculous, and as always, she did not let us down in her uselessness this week. I was really happy to get home this night.

March 5: Thursdays...yuck! I hate Thursdays. I have to be in class at 8:00 and I am there until 8 at night. Ughh. Anyway, I went to my morning class. Thank goodness we had a speaker who is not very good with time management because she took up all of our class time which was excellent. She also gave us some really cool children's books so that was nice. After that I went to work. I caught up on some homework and worked on my "Book in a Bag" for my math class. We have to read a children's picture book and try to relate it to math some way and make a math assignment out of it. Mine was pretty lame so I won't share. After work I went to class and did my Book in a Bag. It went well. This night went by pretty fast. After that I went home and was glad to get to go to bed.

March 6: Friday mornings, not so bad. Just better when we don't have class, but this day we did so oh well. It wasn't long though thank goodness. I have been so worried about this stupid thing called Action Research. It's where you basically evaluate your belief on teaching and you have to come up with a question to research to see if your belief is accurate. I decided to ask "Is my belief that incorporating more literature into the math classroom will be a more effective learning tool rather than traditional lecture, accurate?" My teacher said that was a great question and that I could get tons of research on it so plus for me!! She let us out super early this day, which made me very happy because it was really warm and sunny and I just didn't want to be in class. I then went home and then Justin and I went to lunch. We went to Swen and it was good as usual. After that I went to work to sub for this girl who had a doctor's appointment. It was fine, I only had to be there from 1-3. I also had to train though, but she is a sweet girl. It was good to sit there with someone else and not by myself. After that I went home and took a nap. Justin and I ordered pizza and we watched Role Models. It was hilarious!!! I really suggest you watch it. Of course it has some language, but it was funny.

March 7: This was the craziest Saturday I have ever experienced in my life. The day was fine, Justin and I went to his parents house because they wanted to give him some money which was fine with us. After we left from up there, we came back to Tuscaloosa and made a call ahead seating arrangement at Outback and Santa Fe. We make call ahead at both because you never know which one is the most crowded. So, we decide to go to Santa Fe because there was no wait and Outback still had an hour wait. Well, we get to Santa Fe and get seated immediately. Everything was great, until we realized we had been there for 20 minutes and no one came by to ask us what we wanted to drink or anything. No one even acknowledged that we were there. So, we decided to just go on to Outback since there wouldn't be a wait since we had call ahead already. Well, we get there and I found an iPhone. Well, of course the human in me was like "Omg an iPhone, I want it." So I was looking at it and I put it in my purse while we were sitting there. I had no intentions of stealing it by the way. I was going to take it to the ATT store the next day because there was no home number and I didn't want the Outback people to get it and just keep it for theirself. So, Justin was like, you know you're on camera and if someone asks the manager and they find you, you could get arrested. Well I wasn't going to give it to the random worker there because they may take it for theirself so we decided to leave. Remember, this was our 2nd restaurant for the night. We then decide to go to Logan's. I don't like Logan's but I was going to go there for whatever. I was pouty, and Justin could tell I didn't want to eat there so before we ordered anything I said, "Yea I really don't want this." He was upset because he didn't want to spend a lot of money on something I didn't even want, so we left there too. So, this was restaurant 3 for the night. I know. It was crazy. So, after Logan's we decided to just go back to Outback and the hostess was sweet and remembered us. I just told her that something had come up and we had to leave and she said it was fine then she seated us immediately. We had our dinner and everything was wonderful. I then just decided I didn't want any part of that iPhone anymore because it was giving me an upset stomach so Justin just gave it to the hostess and I have no idea what happened to it from there. I don't really care either, it obviously belonged to some Frat guy by looking at pics in it and everything so whatever. He deserved it whoever it is. We then went home and I went to bed because this was a crazy day.

March 7: Sunday was a good day. We went to Moe's for the first time and let me tell you we loved it! It was super good. After that we just did our Sunday shopping and went home and did some homework.

March 8-11: Just another school week. Nothing special.

March 13: Friday. No class today which means SPRING BREAK! yay! We had pizza from Hungry Howie's and watched a James Bond movie. It was pretty good.

March 14: Saturday. This day was definitely not as eventful as last week. We went to the library to get some things. I got "Multiple Blessings" by Kate Gosselin which is Jon and Kate Plus 8. It is amazing. I love them. It's a great book. Read it. Anyway, after that we went to Target, Woods and Water, then Wal Mart. Then we came home, cleaned up a bit and decided to go to dinner. We went to Milo's. It was good. After that we came back here and I cut Justin's hair. He needed a hair cut and thank goodness he just likes it shaved because I can do that! Now I am washing clothes and such and getting ready to pack because we are going to Jasper tomorrow to stay with Justin's parents tomorrow night to get Trixie accustomed to staying there because she is staying with Justin's mom while we are in Gatlinburg. So, that should be an event. I am just ready to get away from school and lesson plans for a few days. I will post when I return from my Spring Break Vacation. I hope everyone else has a great Spring Break or week.

Quick post!

So, not a lot going on in Amberland. Yesterday was Monday and that was just a typical Monday. My supervisor came to watch me teach a lesson. She told me I did a great job so that was good. She gave me a 7/8 so I was happy with that. After that, I came home and cooked dinner. I made homemade pizza and it was delicious. Today was Tuesday. It was a long day too. I'm really just extremely tired and worn out. Thank goodness tomorrow is a day I get to sleep in for a little while! I have to get up at 9 though to work on my rough draft that is due tomorrow afternoon. Also, I have to go get registered for classes for the fall! Ahh! This is so exciting because it's my last semester that I will have to register for "classes." Next time I will only have to register for my internship!!!! Gah I cannot wait to graduate! Anyway, time to go to bed so I can enjoy as much sleep as possible! Goodnight!

Snow Day!

Here are some pictures from our first "real" snow in a long time!!



This was at 6 this morning. Justin woke me up
like we were little kids! It was so much fun!



This was also at 6 this morning. It got even
heavier throughout the day!


Here is a view from my balcony.


This is a bush on the side of the apartment building.


Pretty pictures from land behind our apartment.


More forest pictures. I guess this is why they
call this place Forest Trail.


A snow angel.


More pictures of the woods.


I brought my ruler just to see how much we got.
According to this, we got nearly 4 inches!


I thought the bench covered in snow looked pretty.


Yea don't laugh at me. I had been up since 6.
This was after we played in the snow!


Trixie actually had fun in the snow.


Another pretty picture from our balcony.
It was really coming down hard.


Again, don't laugh at me. It was too early.


This is the pool area.


This was the highway on our way back from
Cracker Barrel. It was coming down really hard.


Of course we went to Cracker Barrel. It only
seemed right!


My sad 7 am snowman on top of Justin's truck!

Justin standing outside of our apartment ready
to go exploring and playing!


This was my car at 7. It got much more covered
than that by they time it was over.


Here is a video from when it was snowing pretty hard.