Cheers To Hyvee

If you don't know, May is my favorite month.

First and foremost, it's my birthday month.

It's also my family's month (get it, May?).

And now, it's my 6-month-wedding-anniversary month.

And maybe a little less know, it's also National Beef Month. :)

Kidding. It's a national holiday, I hope you all knew about it first.

Anyways, I don't have to continue to profess my love for beef on this blog. I think you get from the title, cattle are important part of my life and in turn, so is everything about the beef industry.


So in honor of beef month, I am giving a shout-out to my friends behind the meat counter at Hyvee.

Like most girls who grew up on a farm, I have never bought meat from the grocery store, except hot dogs and chicken breast. Why buy beef when I can get it from my parent's freezer? I think have cooked with store-bought hamburger maybe once in my life.

You don't tell me how blessed I am. I love eating our farm-raised beef...and our pork and usually, even our chicken.

This week, I made my first trip to the Hyvee grocery store in Faribault and was completely impressed with their meat counter. I honestly couldn't walk away without buying something. And I have a freezer full of meat...imagine how a normal consumer would be? I came home with twice-baked potatoes, cheddar & bacon brats and some barbeque pork chops – my husband is going to be a happy camper when I make all that for supper!

I loved that the guy behind the counter was super friendly, their prices were reasonable and they literally had endless options. Plus, everything was presented so well. I give them an A+. We need more meat counters like that in our grocery stores.

And another plus, Hyvee was one of the reasonable retailers out there during the unwarranted media attack on BPI's lean, finely textured beef. Instead of pulling all #LFTB from their shelves, they decided to label it and give their consumers a choice, and in turn, they provided a leaner, cheaper safe meat choice for consumers on a budget.

So cheers to Hyvee. Thanks for making my first meat counter experience a good one. You can bet I will be back!

What about you? Do you have a good local grocery store that you love to buy your meat from? Or are you a Hyvee fan? And what makes one better than the other? I think as producers we need to continue to make the meat counter experience better for consumers, because face it, we need to continue to improve beef demand for so many reasons.


And by the way, if you are a food blogger -- or just a really good cook -- I know of certain magazine hosting an awesome recipe contest this month with a new contest each week. (Find all the info here.) The prize? Some cash money for a new pair of boots from Stetson. Here's their site -- I'm sure you will be drooling shortly.

Happy Beef Month!

High Five For Friday!

It's Friday, Friday, Friday!

(imagine me being Rebecca Black belting that out right now.)

I don't know about you, but my week flew by, which I love.

Once again, I am linking up with Lauren at From My Grey Desk for her High-Five For Friday! Hopefully, you're celebrating your week today, too!

High-Five Numero Uno goes to the sunlight that is now streaming into my office every morning! Yep, I upgraded and got a cubicle with a window! It has its downfalls – like the that printer brings people and unwanted noise constantly into my little space; but I will take the sunlight everyday of the week. I might even get a plant now!? How exciting. :)

My second High Five goes to finally getting our bank accounts figured out and finalized...it only took 6 months. So nice to have loans paid off and have goals nearly set for our future.

And this leads nicely into my third High Five -- Marko & I are celebrating 6 months of marriage bliss tomorrow! It's amazing how much things have changed in that time and I love the people we have become.  Don't get me wrong, I still want to punch him some days, but he's also my best friend. We're celebrating tomorrow with garage sales, some wine and a fabulous little girl's birthday party!

{my favorite picture from thousands of wedding photos!}

We also got a nice surprise this week and got our wedding book in the mail! Perfect timing, right? I have raved about our photographers before, but really, I can't say it enough. They. are. fabulous. And Jessica (half of the great duo) is the cutest darn thing – it was better than Christmas morning and her wrapping was perfect!

{watch for a post to come on this!}

And finally, High Five #5 goes to all the free goodies I got this week. I don't know about you, but I love freebies. Honestly, I could hate the darn thing, but if it's free -- I want it. It might be a problem

My grab of the week? All these magazines....

{I have lots of reading ahead!}

 And that's all folks. Have an excellent weekend! Soak up the sun & enjoy every second of it!

Goodbye Friend

On Monday, I said goodbye to a good friend.

My husband is ridiculously happy. He says the departure of this so called "friend" will save us hundreds of dollars.

I, however, am realistic and I know that I lost the best thing that happened to our bank account.

Curious yet what this crazy girl is rambling about?

Well, I don't know how I managed to go a year without blogging about this, but let's backtrack a year or so to explain.

Remember last April when the whole world was obsessed with the upcoming royal nuptials of William & Kate? We all were gossiping about what her dress would look like, I was secretly wondering if Henry would call me up and ask me to be his date and, of course, every woman in the world got up at 4 in the morning to watch the live broadcast of the once-in-a-lifetime event.

Well, at the same time my favorite store was offering what I would call a once-in-a-lifetime prize -- 50% off of all Gap clothes for a whole year, appropriately named the "Royal Giveaway."

Of course, I entered. And then I made my mom, my dad, my little brother and my fiance enter to improve my odds. Think of all the things I could buy!?

Well the Saturday after Will & Kate tied the knot, my mom checked her email to find out that she had won the Mall of America Royal Giveaway. Cue the singing angels!

Long story short, my mom goes shopping once a year, so she of course passed the prize along to her daughter. And, I took well advantage of it.

Fast forward a year and on any given day, you can now find me at least wearing something Gap. I wear their underwear, bras, pants, tanks, t-shirts, skirts, jackets, sweaters -- basically anything that I can convince myself I need to have. Often, my whole outfit will be Gap. And don't forget my family, they proudly sport their half-off Gap clothing, too!

Here's some ridiculous good deals I recently picked up:

{no joke, I get this for $28. You can find it here.
sorry, it's not that great of deal online.}

{this is the softest sweater ever. And for ten bucks? How could I not?}

 {at half-off, this fun skirt came to $25. I think it will go great with the blazer and a striped shirt. find it here}

I almost feel mean posting the links when the prices aren't even close to what I paid, but they really are cute basics you might like? That's what I love about GAP. They might not be the most fashion-forward store out there, but they have high-quality basics that you can easily base a closet on. And trust me, my closet is stock full.

But as you can probably guess from how I started this post, my reign as a fake Gap employee (they get 50% off, too. And you won't believe how many times I got asked what store I worked at!) is over. On Monday, I made my ceremonious last trip to my neighborhood Gap store with my 50% pass off in my purse.

Good news though! Thankfully, it's my birthday month, so Gap is letting me transition slowly into the full-price world. :)

To please my husband and because my mom taught me to never buy yourself stuff during Christmas or your birthday month, I am making a silent vow to avoid the MOA for the next month unless necessary. It just won't be as fun going every week when I have to pay full-price for clothes.

So, I say it again. Goodbye Gap card, thanks for filling my closet and making me smile in delight because I just saved more money then a spent. You were a good friend, no matter how much my husband despised you.

Until next time,

Corn Report: It's Up!

We have some happy farmers in Southern Minnesota today.

I am hoping to do Corn Reports this year on the CCC blog and I have been trying to convince my hubby to be my contributing author (he's not digging it, no pun intended). After all, if corn was important enough to make the title of this blog then I ought to write about it now again, right? And really, it's an awesome process -- I think everyone should understand the brainpower and manpower behind our food supply.

So the first Corn Report is an exciting one! IT'S UP!

It's was an absolutely gorgeous early spring in Southern MN and most farmers jumped at their chance to get in the field to plant corn. And then, unfortunately, it got a bit cold....which isn't always good for new seeds in the ground. Mark kept assuring me that if it wasn't out of the ground and if it only got cold for a few days, we should be okay, but I still think everyone was waiting impatiently to see the first signs of life.

There is a long way to go before this little guy makes us a crop and we need some sunshine and rain for the next few weeks to keep it growing. But before we can pray for rain and sunshine, we needed to get it out of the ground.

And now that all the corn is in, we get to start on soybeans! The fun never ends for a farmer. :)

By the way, Happy May Day! As I told Mark this morning, this used to be my official holiday, but since there is no Purfeerst Day -- I am still celebrating!

Crossing The 5K Off The Bucket List

I am officially a 5Ker.

Gosh it feels good to type that!

{this definitely deserves a spot on the fridge!}

I was pretty nervous going into the run on Sunday and felt really unprepared. However, I was determined to check this off of my list (and it helped that my best friend had came 8 hours to run this with me, I knew I recruited her for a reason!), so bright and early Sunday morning we packed up our stuff and headed south to join hundreds of other beautiful ladies in a run around Rochester. 

Now, I didn't set any records, but I also didn't get last. I ended up 174/358, so you could even say I was in the top half! :) I did just over 11 minute miles, which I had been averaging, even though my phone said I ran 10:28 miles. Something wasn't matching up between their timing and my GPS, but I am not official enough to care.

{My partner in crime & I after running. don't mind the squinting, it was a beautiful day!}

{the trio. Angie rocked the 10K while Lindsay and I did the 5K}

{my fabulous hubby who came and cheered us on}

I am determined that this will not be my last 5K, so I am already on the search for another one this summer and I am debating about a 10K in September that Kati suggested. I think I could do it!? Either way, I am a lot better off than I was 2 months ago, when the farthest I could run was to the mailbox. :)

What Kind Of Person Are You?

My husband might think I am crazy, but I will readily admit that I read about 5-10 blogs a day.

Some of them make me laugh, some of them I wish I wouldn't waste my time reading, a lot of them make me wish I had a perfect house and owned a Silhouette Cameo so I could craft away my life and most of them feel like they were written by my friends.

And, every once in a while there is an inspirational blog though that makes me stop and think. A post that makes me want to become a better person.

Those are the posts that make my time spent mulling over blogs completely worth it.

Yesterday's post by Emily Jones on Jones Design Company was one of those.

I don't know how or when I first stumbled upon Emily's posts, but I ended up following because of her gorgeous design work. We have the same classic style and I would love to one day create something as simple and beautiful as she has. I don't read every email that comes in my inbox from her, but something about yesterday's caught my eye.

Her question was valid and I had a hard time finding a really good answer. Probably, because I found it challenging to limit my answer to just a few things. I want to be so many things, but when that happens I often have trouble succeeding at just one. And unfortunately, my list is full of too many nouns, and not enough adjectives.

I am going to spend the next few days mulling this over. What is mine & Mark's motto? What do we want to be remembered as? What do we want people to say about us over the dinner table? When we have kids, what values are we going to make the most important in our family? What two or three words describe us?

And then, when I find an answer I am printing it out and hanging it on my bulletin board. Life is too short to not start becoming the person you want to be now.

I am also a realist and I know that I will not and can not succeed at making every person love me. It's simply not possible. But I can convince those people to respect me for the life I lead, even thought they don't agree with me. And, more importantly, I can succeed at creating lasting relationships with the people who are important to me.

Hopefully, the answer to this question slips off the tip of your tongue!

Have a great weekend!

High Five For Friday

Finally, Friday, you are here!

I don't know about you but 70 degree weather and sunshine makes weeks in the office seem terrible. I don't know how I am going to handle the summer. Luckily though, I have a new office starting tomorrow with lots of light and sun. Maybe I can get a tan through the window!?

I decided I am going to try to make "High Five For Friday" with Lauren at From My Grey Desk a regular addition to Cows, Corn & Country. Hopefully, as you're reading you find some reasons to celebrate too!

High Five #1 goes out to the new Essie nail polish I splurged on this week. I picked up the nail polish addition from my BFF last fall, but this was my first Essie purchase. I am loving the spring Tart Deco color and day 2 without any chips. I am thinking it's going to much more durable than my $2.00 bottles.

High Five #2 goes to the finally getting out to Target Field for a Twins game. We got lucky and got some last minute tickets to Tuesday night's game. We went with Mark's co-worker and wife and their adorable 3-month-old son. Seriously, you should see the hair on this kid's head! He's a cutie. When they slipped out because of rain we met up with Misty & her boyfriend Matt, who just happened to be at the game too! The Twins ended up losing terribly to the Red Sox, but nothing beats outdoor baseball.

{we had killer seats right behind home plate.}

High Five #3 is for a spotless house. Mark spent Wednesday night in the tractor and I wasn't feeling so hot, so I stayed home and went super domestic on our house. The bathrooms are cleaned, the floors are swept, laundry done and everything dusted. Best feeling in the world. Unfortunately, the house being clean didn't make me feel any better and I spent most of Thursday sick. 

High Five #4 goes out to it being 5K week. I am ashamed to admit that I am terribly unprepared and my run Wednesday night went awful. However, I am blaming the bad run on my cold and I am excited to just get it over with. Even if I walk half of it, it's still an accomplishment in my mind...and door prizes and massages at the end! And I also decided that I am signing up for at least one more this summer yet. Any ideas on where or when?

And my last High Five For Friday is for hitting the big 5-0 in followers! Thanks everyone! If you want to follow my blog, you just have to click on "Join This Site" in the upper right hand corner or subscribe via email. To celebrate, I think I am might have my first giveaway next week!

Have a good weekend! The 5K is Sunday morning so while you are at church on Sunday, send a prayer my way! :)