This is my favorite time of year…The wonderful holiday season filled with lots of love, family, friends and great food! As you all know I love to cook and especially during this time of year.  As the years go by the food tends to get a bit traditional and boring so I thought what I could do differently this year to still provide that comfort food that everyone loves, but come up with some new dishes.

During Thanksgiving in our home while growing up we would always have the same traditional dishes every year. And while these dishes were absolutely delicious and I will always eat them. They do get a little boring. We would have both turkey and ham because my dad was a meet man. Always need to have protein so we could grow up big and strong. Then we would have the traditional sides like mashed potatoes, stuffing, corn and my favorite green bean casserole.  Oh and of course we would have yummy homemade gravy to serve over top.  They would also have cranberry sauce, but I was never a fan of that and nothing has changed. I am sure there are other dishes served during these times…I would love for you to share some of your family traditional dishes to help give me some new ideas.   

Last year I attended a holiday dinner party and tasted an amazing dish that I have craved all year long. It was a Cauliflower and Gruyere cheese. Oh my goodness; this dish was amazing. The wonderful lady who made it started off by making creamy rue and then mixed in the cheese and cauliflower, followed by baking it and it was the hit of the dinner that night. I also had a dish that a girlfriend made for me about 4 or 5 years ago that I cannot forget about.  Apple sage stuffing and boy is it yummy! Now prior to having this I was not a big stuffing fan because it was boring. Cooked bread with chicken flavors…yuck! Today you can actually buy breakfast sausage that already has sage in it and then diced apples for a sweet flavor along with your traditional stuffing mix, onions and celery. It over flowed with sweet and savory flavors that melted in your mouth.  While these are previous year recipes they are on my list of favorites that I do not get to have that often.  

This year I have been watching my traditional Food Network channel and trying to come up with some new ideas for this year’s Thanksgiving dinner and I have found a few tasty recipes thus far. The vegetable of the season seems to be Brussels sprouts. And while this was not my favorite veggie as a kid I am curious to try cooking it a few different ways that might peek my liking. My dad would just steam or boil them and my mom would put the cheese sauce on them to help cover up the bitter taste of them. I have found two different recipes that might be really good. One was a Brussels Sprout and cheese casserole. It reminded me of the cauliflower dish I mentioned earlier.  Another one was Brussels sautéed with nutmeg, salt, pepper and think pieces of pancetta bacon. Looked very tasty too! I do not have many green bean fans in my family now so the traditional green bean casserole is out of the question. I also saw a recipe for Leek bread pudding made with cream and cheese. Hmmm cheese seems to be the theme. I promise I can eat vegetables without cheese it just so happens to be the trend in the recipes that I have found this year. Any other ideas are welcome for sure. I am responsible for a few side dishes this year so I am collecting ideas.

If any of these dishes sound good to you let me know and I will pass the recipe along. If I happen to try any of them I will let you know how they come out too. In the meantime please send me some of your favorite dishes for the holidays! And I wish the best to you and your family during your Thanksgiving Day of Grace!!

Here we are starting week six and we are half way through the semester already. Man where does time go? I could say that about the whole year; well I could say that about the last five years, but we are going to talk about this semester. I have enjoyed this semester as I am taking a very interest class called Communications. I wanted to update everyone as to what I have learned this far and how it truly is important in day to day life situations.

Thus far we have touch based on several topics including culture and communications, perception and the self, listening, verbal messages and nonverbal communication. Not only have I learned a lot about myself during the last few weeks of class, but I have learned a lot about others around me. We need to understand communication to help us understand our selves, but also to help us in personal relationships and employer relationships to help understand others.

Now for most of us we live in a melting pot which means we are surrounded by people from all over the world. Therefore it is important to know other cultures and how they communicate. For example we shake hands to introduce ourselves, but in China they do not shake hands. So when you shake their hand it is not natural to them and they do not have a firm handshake. We think of it as being weird; until you understand their culture and then it is no longer weird.  Also understanding how we perceive something may not be the same way you perceive something. It is also important to understand how to say things. When telling someone that they make you mad when they do something; you should change the verbiage to “I feel angry when you interrupt me.” It comes across better and allows the person to understand where you are coming from. This is very useful during work hours as we need to be careful when saying things.

So I highly recommend the Communications class to everyone as it is important to know how to communication with your loved ones, friends and co-workers. By understanding people, knowing how to communicate your thoughts and feelings, and interrupting others will add value to your life. So as I communicate with all of you on how I am doing throughout the semester; I hope all of you will reach back out to me about your accomplishments – share your stories – and communicate.      

It’s always a fun time of year for most as we get to dress up in costumes and parade around town without a care in the world. The question I have is do we really know how Halloween got started or where it originated? I am sure many people do not and there are many others who do not even celebrate the holiday as they feel it is celebrating evil.  So I thought I would share a little history with my fellow trick- or-treaters.

According to Wikipedia the roots of Halloween came from the Celtic Festival of Samhain and the Christian Holy day of all Saints. It originated in Europe and then came to America by immigrant settlers. The word Samhain means the summer end. The Celts believed the border between this world and the other world became thin during this time allowing evil spirits to enter into this world so they wore evil customs’ to trick the evil spirits into thinking they were evil too so they did not harm them (Wikipedia.com). They use the colors orange and black to represent Halloween because orange represents the harvest and black represents the evil spirits. It gives you a better understanding of the holiday and the history behind it.

I personally love this holiday because I enjoy dressing up. I have never been much of a creative person so I enjoy watching the creative minds of others. Over the years I have seen some really neat costumes. One year I saw a guy who dressed up as a night stand. He wore a lamp shade and then made a table around him and dressed it up with an alarm clock, reading glasses and a book. It was pretty neat!

 For Halloween I normally just go out and buy something to wear verses trying to come up with something on my own. However this year I could not afford to go out and buy anything so I needed to come up with something using whatever I had from past years and clothes in my closets. So I decided to be a Greek Goddess because I already had gold rope, gold jewelry and a white dress…put it all together, do my hair and you have a Greek Goddess costume. It was very easy and I got a lot of compliments on it. My boyfriend was a pimp using parts of a Halloween costume from a few years ago. His brother and sister-n-law dressed up as gothic punk rockers using old costume parts and his cousin was a 70’s guy using some of his parent’s old clothing. No one spent any money and we put together some great outfits.

It’s a fun time of year and I can’t wait until I have children to celebrate with and carry on the traditions. I see Halloween as a time to go trick-or-treating, have fun dressing up in costume, telling ghost stories and carving pumpkins. For those who celebrated, I hope you had a great time dressing up and carving pumpkins.               

Rasmussen unfortunately does not have a football team so I support our local University called UCF.  Also many of my friends and my boyfriend attend school there so I go to the games with them to show my support.  Not to mention I have a love for the game and watch a lot of football; both college and NFL.   Well I went to a game this past Saturday and I just had some fans really bother me so I thought I would share my experiences with all of you.

So we all know that football is a sport and sports are mostly competitive, right? And usually at a football game fans of one team with taunt fans of the playing team, right? Yes and while all of this is normal boys and girls it is just a football game. We can be completive without being rude or nasty. And that is what I experienced this weekend. And the sad part is these guys probably never even went to college or at least this college. I was watching UCF vs. Miami and some of the Miami fans were out of control. They were telling the girls how stupid they were and starting fights with the guys. These girls and guys were students of UCF trying to support their team and school.

Now this is something I might expect at a pro game, because there are a lot of rude pro football fans, but this should not be happening at a college game.  So there really needs to be game day etiquette and the visiting teams and home teams need to be aware of this proper etiquette. The visitors need to respect the home team fans and prevent from saying insulting outburst and if you act like a goof then expect to be treated the same in return. There should be no acting out against young girls and most certainly don’t get mad when one home team fan is sticking up for another fan. If you had too much to drink before the game, eat something and drink a coke cola.

 And for the home team fans… Make sure you keep your team spirits contained. It is not necessary to shout profound language to the visiting team, even if you think their team cannot play. And if your team isn’t playing well you have no room to talk about the other team. Keep the mouth closed…

 I enjoy going to football games and will continue on going and hopes that one day I can take my children to games too. I do not have a problem with being competitive, but there needs to be a fine line to draw at any game college or professional. Make sure you are aware of your surroundings and do unto others as you would want them to do unto you. What are your thoughts on game etiquette? Do you feel this way too or am I out of control? I would love to hear others and their experiences at football games.

 May your favorite team win the National Championship!!    

Yes, it’s the National Breast Cancer Awareness Month http://www.nbcam.org.  And I am amazed at the number of supporters that I have seen locally and nationally.  As you all may have read in my blogs earlier this year; I had a scare with breast cancer and many of my family members have too. It is a very scary thing to go through and many women face it throughout the year.  They say 1 in every 8 women is diagnosed with breast cancer.

The problem with breast cancer is that there are no symptoms so many women go without knowing and by the time they get diagnosed it is too late. That is why it is very important to educate the women around the world; young and old and encourage them on education so they are aware. It is all about prevention so the more people know the better off they are.

The other day I was listening to a local radio station XL 106.7 who happen to be big supporters of NBCAM and one of their callers was telling a story about a friend who she encouraged last year to go and have a lump in her chest checked. The friend did as told and got results back saying that something in the test was abnormal and they needed her to come in for further review. Well she got too busy with life, work or whatever and never went back. Finally 8 months later she found time to go and at that point it was too late and she was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. What a horrible story… if only she had been educated on the seriousness and how it was important to act quickly she could have prevented this and saved her life. And then you have another story where a lady goes to get checked and they tell her it is nothing so the next time something appears she thinks it is nothing so doesn’t get checked and it happens to be cancer.

So I am proud to see we are starting to take these things seriously and more people are promoting awareness. I was watching a NFL football game on TV this past Sunday and the players were wearing pink on different parts of their body/uniform. Some players had pink on their shoes, hats, pants, shirts and around their arm…It was all over. Also last Friday it was the day for everyone to wear pink- I would imagine people did this nationwide, but I am not sure. I know everyone in Orlando did and it was pretty cool. On Friday everywhere I went I saw men and women wearing pick to show their support.   

We are heading in the right direction with Awareness and I hope we continue on this path. Someone said to me last week that they love how we are doing this for Breast Cancer, but there should be similar things for other cancers and illness too. I do agree with them, but we have to take one step at a time.  This has been going on for years, but only recently people have been opening their eyes. Thank you to all the supports and much love to all the survivors! May we continue to fight!!!

Ah… yes it is that time once again. We are starting school this week and as always I am looking forward to another semester. Yes, you may laugh; however I do enjoy learning. Now if you asked, do I enjoy the massive work load I carry every day, week, month or year absolutely not, but there is a light at the other end of the tunnel.

I am only taking one class this semester because I have some other things I am studying and doing that will take some more of my time. So my class this semester is Communications and we are going to be studying on how we can use communications with our careers, families and all other aspects of life. Understanding how to communication amongst each other will really help through life situations because you will have a better understanding of different people and how each person communicates.

I know already that communication is very important when it comes to relationships, family, friends and work. So I am curious to see what I will learn throughout this semester. I am sure it will expand the knowledge I already have and make certain situations that much more clear. My friends and boyfriend make fun of me, but they thank me too because I make them express themselves more than they normally would have.

If you really think about how we communicate with one another everyday and how some people communicate a little more or better than others you will start to learn or see how important it really is to be able to talk with and understand different people.

The year is flying by and the holidays are almost here. I am sure this course will fly by too, but I am going to keep everyone posted as to what I am learning and how we can use this important information in our everyday lives.  I would like to hear from others and their thoughts on communications and what their knowledge of it or experiences has been regarding it. So until next time…Enjoy your classes and let’s keep the communications open.

A few weeks ago I took part in my best friend of eighteen years wedding. She found the love of her life and they have now entered into the next phase of living. Now I wanted share the moments I experienced in this amazing wedding because it was not your typical wedding as they are not your typical couple.

Just to give a little insight on the couple…Jaime who is my best friend of many years is a wonderful individual with a great big heart who is always there when you need her.  She is an identical twin, but nothing like her sister. Jaime is very free spirited and cares more about life, earth and people than anything else.  She is extremely intelligent and is a science research specialist by trade.

The new addition to the family…her new husband Ronnie whom I have known since I was in high school too is probably the most laid back individual I have ever met. In high school he was the guy that always sat around playing acoustic guitar in the park while everyone else was running around and being crazy. Sweet, sweet guy also with a great big heart and the two of them together are a perfect match.

Jaime wanted to do something different for their wedding. They live in the Beautiful Blue Grass state…Kentucky and had their wedding in a local horse park. The grass and trees during this time are amazing. This time of year the beautiful colors of the grass, trees and cool weather were perfect for an outside wedding. She wanted to incorporate some history of their ancestors into their wedding and this is where it became interesting.  In doing so she decided to let loose a little and make this special day costume oriented. Yes…costumes and she did an amazing job at organizing the wedding.

They both have Apache Indian in the ancestry background and wanted to bring some of the wedding rituals into her ceremony.  In doing so she needed to represent The Universe, Life, Time, Water, Air, Earth and Fire.  The wedding party became each element and had a reading within the ceremony to talk about how they were going to incorporate their new lives together. For example I represented time so I actually read an Apache Wedding Blessing called Blessing of Time. I was fortunate as my dress was black, but everyone else had to dress according to what element they were representing…like fire wore a dress with orange in it. We each had wings to wear which matched our dresses and we represented fairies….very different!

They also did things like washing their hands and getting rid of past sins. They each combine sand together to illustrate how they will become one. They also had fire dancers and little kids running around with streamers. The guests were allowed to come dressed in medieval times like clothing. We also released butterflies representing new life…and everyone sat in a big circle as the couple sat in the middle. It was really amazing…we were not sure how it was going to turn out, but she did a great job of organizing it, researching and implementing. There was not a dull moment that day and there were a total of 150 guests so it was fairly decent in size too.

It was a wonderful wedding and as odd as it might sound everything turned out really well. We all enjoyed being a part of this wonderful day and will remember it for many years to come. I wish them both all the love and happiness possible and may they have a loving, prosperous life filled with lots of family and friends.

Summer Semester is finally over, and I do not have any plans for fun…Wow! Normally around this time I am packing my bags to take a little trip. It is nice to have a two week break every eleven weeks. However this break I am broke and staying home. Not to mention I went on a little break already before school ended. It wasn’t a vacation, but a best friend got married and I was in the wedding. There is more to come on that later.

So I ask myself…what I am going to do during my break. I will be relaxing as I always seem to be on the go and on the computer so I am going to take a step back and breathe a little fresh air. This week I have been a little under the weather so a little R&R is good for me. I am also going to take this time to study for my Real Estate exam.  I finally got approved to take the state exam… Whew, what a relief!

I am also going to take time to do some little things around the house that I have had on my list for way too long. You know…like spring cleaning except it is fall time. Spring came and went way too quickly I did not have time to do any cleaning.  It is amazing how quickly the year has passed us by. Not to scare anyone, but the Holiday season is right around the corner.    

No the less, I am going to sit back and relax. I really value the next two weeks and do not know what I would do without it. These days it seems like I have so much I want to do and just not enough time in the day. Not to mention I do not have as much energy as I use to so I can only go full throttle for so long.    

 I hope all of you have better plans for your break….Be safe and don’t forget to stop by and share your stories.

There are many football fans out there that all wait for this time of year to come. In fact many of us are lost once the season is over.  I am a huge football fan and love this time of year just for this simple reason.  Pre-season actually started a few weeks ago, but I do not really get into that as much. Mainly because there is a lot of warming up to do, getting use to playing with new players and they do not even play the good players as much; other than during the first quarter or two.

Now when it comes to Football there are college fans and there are NFL fans. I like to watch both and I have a love for both while many people only prefer one or the other. Some of my friends refuse to watch NFL because they say the heart and love is not in the game because it’s all about money.  I do agree to a point because these players are paid way too much to play a sport they love. And this is in all sports not just football. However the college players are playing to be noticed so they can make it to an NFL team so it’s kind of a double standard.

My team for NFL is Tampa Bay Buccaneers who is based out of Tampa Florida. They are the closest NFL team to me in Orlando so I have just always followed them. Now the Tampa Bay Bucs have had some good years and they have had some horrible years.  We have had some great coaches and some okay coaches. Overall I feel the team has struggled from lack of something. I do not know this for sure and this is just my speculation, but both of our last 2 coaches Dungy and Gruden were pretty amazing coaches and have led many teams to championships, but for some reason did not do well with our team. My question is…Are they given full authority to lead the team? Is there someone holding them back or restricting them? Who knows….we may never know. Now we have a new coach Raheem Morris. Raheem has been with Tampa since 2004 so he knows the team very well and hopefully will make great strides.  The only problem I see thus far is the fact we have so many new players on the team it may take a year to get use to playing together.  Oh and not to mention we have a very difficult schedule this year. We shall see….

As for College I watch two teams. Orlando’s home town team UCF and of course the Florida Gators. I have a love for both and watch all of their games. Well if they are aired on TV. The UCF games we try to attend a few here and there, but tickets can be pricey so we cannot go to all. Florida is hard to get tickets too. You literally have to know someone to get tickets, but I have been to a few and I love going to their games. The energy and love you feel throughout the whole stadium is amazing. UCF last year just built their own stadium on campus so that was very exciting for all the fans. Hopefully now we can start playing like a real football team.

Well here is to a good season. I will keep you updated with home team games as we attend for UCF and Tampa. As well as my thoughts on how we are playing. I would also like to here if any of you have a favorite team. And how do you expect your season to make out this year.

I need a little friendly advice from my fellow bloggers out there. It pertains to my work and referring someone into the company. In the past I was not a fan or referring friends or acquaintances to my employer for the fear of them not working out and perhaps making me look bad at the end of the day. I mean face it you cannot expect people to be perfect or be as dependable as you, right. I mean I do not miss work unless I am deathly ill or there is a death in the family or I requested time off, also I work very hard making sure I am doing the best job possible; not just for the company but for my own benefit.  However I have worked with many, many people who do not practice the same motto.

However despite my fear of referring people I know – I took the plunge to help out an old colleague that had been laid off from work and was not having the best of luck finding anything. It is a very challenging job market and it is hard to get into a company today unless you know someone.  I referred my friend over to HR and of course she still had to go through the interviewing process as everyone does, but she did very well and was presented an offer. After she was hired one of the other employees mentioned to me that we are paid a referral bonus – great free money!  After 90 days you are paid $250 and then additional $250 at six months and a hundred at the one year mark.

Well I called HR upon it coming close to my friends 90 day mark and asked how they go about paying the referral bonus. She mentioned that she was not aware that I referred her, but she will go ahead and set me up to receive it in the next pay period which would have put her there for 120 days. That’s cool – I am ok with that.  Well here is the part I need your advice on….The same day as pay day my friend was let go for lack of performance.  She started at a difficult time and was just not producing deals – well many were not, but they let her go for some reason. They didn’t even try to help her – that irritates me. Anyhow needless to say when I got my check that day there was no referral fee.  She was there longer than 90 days and at 90 days I am suppose to receive $250. Obviously at 6 months she won’t be there so I understand I will not get that, but shouldn’t I receive payment for the time she was there working for the company?

I put an email into the HR lady and now she is ignoring me. It’s a great professional company right? Well I want to collect this money if it is owed to me so I could use a little advice – what is your take on the situation? I feel bad for my friend and I know she put up her best try to make things work there. Something’s are just not for everyone…I wish her the best in her future endeavors and I will always be there if she needs a referral. What is your thought on this….? Any help would be great!