This weeks 5FF is Halloween candy.  Yum!  I love LOVE candy of all kinds.  I also tend to like the candy most people think are gross [like Circus Peanuts] aha.  I obviously don't trick or treat anymore, and my son is too old.  So this list is the candy I always HOPED for when trick or treating.

||1} Peanut Butter Kisses: I could end this post right here.  These are hands down my favorite thing to receive trick or treating.  Yes I know... most kids always hated to receive these, but I LOVE them.  I still buy a bag every year at Halloween time.  I bonded with an associate at Walgreens a few weeks ago because he said he loved them too.  We had a moment.  AHaha!  Seriously though, you don't see many people that actually do like these.

||2} Flavored Tootsie Rolls:  I love regular tootsie rolls, but reeeally like the flavored tootsie rolls.  Especially the orange && vanilla.  The flavored midgees are just a nice fruity treat.  I prefer chewy candy you will learn that from this post.

||3} DOTS:  Ahhhh DOTS!  These are seriously my favorite overall candy of all time.  I can't explain it, they just are.  I love them to pieces.  Hands down all time fave.  I always loved getting the tiny little boxes with like only 4 in my Halloween bucket.

||4} Caramel Apple Pops: I was 13 when these lovely suckers made their debut.  They were a HUGE hit.  Everyone always had them in their backpacks.  We always loved getting these when trick or treating.  Yum!

||5} Hershey's Miniatures: When it comes to chocolate I preferred these little nuggets of joy.  My favorite was always Mr Goodbar && Special Dark.  I loooove dark chocolate.

I think I'll go buy some Halloween candy now.... <3333

October  3rd:  Gateway Fandoms That Made Me Who I Am Today

October 10th:  Geeky Clothing Items I Need In My Closet Immediately

October 17th:  Characters I'd Love To Dress Up As For Halloween

October 24th:  My Must See List of Halloween Movies

October 31st:  The Halloween Candy I Always Hope For When Trick-Or-Treating

November  7th:  Comfort Foods That Always Make Me Feel Better

November 14th:  Smart Phone Apps I Cannot Live Without

November 21st:  Characters I Would Invite To My Thanksgiving Feast

November 28th:  Black Friday Purchases I Would Sacrifice A Night Of Sleep For

week 43 [planner love]

This weeks planner decor features items from the Dollar Tree && washi I purchased from the office supply on clearance.  The pen I used is the same as always: Pilot Frixion erasable.  On the washi tape && labels I used a fine point sharpie.

Myyy poor little bookmark is unraveling.  Not sure if I want to just let it do it's thing && have a worn distressed look, or if I want to fix it.  I love the look of a very used planner, so I might just let it unravel all it wants.  This week you can see that I used the labels from my Dollar Tree Planner Haul.  The small blue strip on thursday is washi.  The blue/white polka dot strip is also washi.  The heart sticker && rainbows are from the Dollar Tree as well.

teefury halloween promo [coupon]

|May Contain Affiliate Links|

Tee Fury Website

TeeFury has amazing shirts.  I've purchased several nerdy shirts from them.  This is a good deal!  You don't want to miss your chance to get a discount on ANY t-shirt in their gallery!  Awesome price!  I love the mash up designs that bring two different pop culture images in one.

Here's a few of my favorite designs:

[Nightmare Before Christmas/Abbey Road]

[Labyrinth/Celestial Seasonings Tea]

[Doctor Who/Infamous Academy Awards 2014 Selfie]

You've got now until the end of Halloween night to take advantage of this coupon code.  Hurry HURRY!  

I think I'm going to have to get one of these 3, but which one.... Leave a comment below && tell me your favorite!

gluten free pumpkin muffins [recipe]

What if I told you these delicious treats are under 200 calories?  Has zero fat && zero trans fat?  Free of gluten, lactose, and soy?  Awesome, right!?  Now what if I told you that it takes less than 30mins to make them and you only need 2 ingredients?  Sold!

These are my favorite go-to quick breakfast or snack during the fall/winter season.  Not only do you feel like you're eating something very naughty, you're getting lots of dietary benefits!  Win!

Let's talk about canned pumpkin for a minute.  When I say canned pumpkin, I mean PURE pumpkin.  NOT canned pumpkin pie filling.  Yes there's a difference.  We're wanting the pure canned pumpkin here.  Canned pumpkin has lots of health benefits.  Read about them here [livestrong article].

You guys know that I love my Aldi.  I've especially been loving my Aldi lately.  They've added in a HUGE selection of healthy food alternatives.  Including adding in their Live G Free brand [no they aren't sponsoring me aha].  For the pumpkin muffins I used the Live G Free yellow cake mix && a can of pumpkin.

Basically you're just going to mix the 2 ingredients together until they form a batter.  This batter will be a little thick, so don't think there's something wrong when you mix it.  It's going to be thick because we're NOT making the cake mix.  DO NOT add oil or eggs or milk or anything.  Scoop into a muffin cup lined muffin tin.  Bake for whatever the box says.  Mine was 350 degrees for 20mins.  You can make this a 3 ingredient recipe if you wanted to add in pumpkin pie spice seasoning to the batter.  I don't because I find it's perfect on it's own.

These are amazing right out of the oven.  However, I prefer them cold.  After the muffins cool completely, I toss them all into a gallon sized Ziploc bag && into the fridge they go.  We've also made these for Thanksgiving and topped them with cream cheese icing [like cuppycakes].  Beware: that WILL obviously change the calorie and fat content lol.  They are totally delish with icing though for a special occasion treat...  

That's all there is to it!  Delish, gluten free, supah quick, && healthy!

dollar tree [planner haul]

I keep my eyes open for things I can use in my planner everywhere I go.  I'm always thinking of ways to utilize any kind of stationery item in my planner.  I see everyone online always talking about finding washi tape at their Dollar Tree, I have yet to find it in mine.  Boo.  I check about every 2 weeks, scouring the store for washi tape.  Well this week I found some really great items to use in my planner [still no washi]...

These are labels [that are super cute] I found in the office supply section.  I immediately grabbed 2 of each giving me 100 of the kraft paper labels && 120 of the multi-colored bright labels.

More labels!  I absolutely love these.  Especially the ones that look like picture frames.  I haven't used either yet, but I think I'll use the lined circle labels for VIP tasks/events && the frames for inspirational quotes.

View them in action here

When I saw this, I was veryyy tempted to buy every single one they had.  I mean seriously.  It's only a dollar!  I restrained myself though.  I think the Paris theme on these stickies is adorb.  You can also see them in action on my week 41&42 planner post.

I'll admit that I'm usually not a fan of the sticker selection at the Dollar Tree.  Usually it's non-kawaii cartoon characters, usually Disney.  Disney is fine, but it's just not my first choice for planner decor.  I saw these Eiffel Tower stickers & had to get them to go with my Paris stickies.  The rainbows just kind of made me happy.  I thought they'd go well with a washi I have that reminds me of clouds [you'll see them together wednesday].  The owls were just too cute to not buy, I loved the colors of them too.

If you love planner stuff, be sure to check out my Etsy shop!  I hand sculpt polymer clay planner clips!

Thanks for stopping by!

5 Fandom Friday: My Must See List of Halloween Movies

Today's 5FF is our favorite Halloween movies.  I don't think my list is going to be as traditional as everyone else... but we'll see!  My favorite Halloween movies tend to not be of the horror nature.  Don't get me wrong, we usually have one night around Halloween where we veg out as a family and watch scary movies.  However, they aren't set in stone movie traditions like this list.

Thanks again to Super Space Chick and The Nerdy Girlie for hosting the 5 Fandom Friday linkups.  You can find all of them on social media using the hashtag #5fandomfriday or #fandom5.

||1}Hocus Pocus: I love this movie.  Hands down my favorite Halloween movie to watch every year.  It's so funny && cheesy.  I just adore it.  Jess and I make a point to find time every Halloween to watch this movie together.  



||2}The Nightmare Before Christmas: I'm sorry if my Nightmare mentions are getting repetitive, buuuut I told you how much I love this movie lol.  Obviously you know if you've read any posts lately, I watch this every year at Halloween THROUGH Christmas.  It's a must.  



||3}The Worst Witch: This movie is terrible.  Just terrible.  But oh my GOD so amazing! <333 Seriously.  I couldn't find a trailer for it, buuut here's the whole movie! Ahah.  It's definitely just sentimental from my childhood.



||4}Garfield Halloween Adventure: I warned you this wasn't a traditional list!  I have loved this movie since I was a small child.  I love when Garfield says "Candy candy candy candy candy".  I don't know anyone else that was obsessed with this special as a child, and I sure don't know anyone that STILL loves it.  I also found the full movie on youtube for you, yay!



||5}It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown: I love the Peanuts gang.  What's not to love?  This movie is cute, sweet, && is a prime example of why I love the Peanuts.

There's my Must See Halloween Movies.  They're not full of blood && gore [not that there's anything wrong with that], but they're myyy favorite Halloween movies.  Like I said before, we usually have one night where we do binge watch some of our favorite horror movies.  That's more of a Halloween activity for us since we don't have little ones to take trick or treating, && don't get trick or treater's where we live.  Those movies vary from year to year, but this list is set in stone.  Every. Single. Year. 

October  3rd:  Gateway Fandoms That Made Me Who I Am Today

October 10th:  Geeky Clothing Items I Need In My Closet Immediately

October 17th:  Characters I'd Love To Dress Up As For Halloween

October 24th:  My Must See List of Halloween Movies

October 31st:  The Halloween Candy I Always Hope For When Trick-Or-Treating

November  7th:  Comfort Foods That Always Make Me Feel Better

November 14th:  Smart Phone Apps I Cannot Live Without

November 21st:  Characters I Would Invite To My Thanksgiving Feast

November 28th:  Black Friday Purchases I Would Sacrifice A Night Of Sleep For

2 year blogiversary

Today is my 2 year blogiversary.  I've come a really long way with this little space on the internet.  What started as a little hobby has turned into a full time job for me.  I feel like I've grown [seriously] and my hard work is paying off.

Over the last year I've worked very hard to increase my photo quality && have frequent posts.  I think that's the best advice I could give anyone because once I took care of those 2 things, my viewership has skyrocketed.  

I'm most excited about the friends I've made along the way in the blogosphere.  It's a wonderful community [especially the Female Geek Bloggers community, holla!] && I feel so lucky to have made it this far.

I've had A LOT of self reflection going on this month, and I am super excited to extend it to my blog.  New post topics && new life experiences to share.

I appreciate every single one you.  Thank you so much sharing my "life" with me.  Thank you so much for sticking with me for 2 years and I promise there's lots to look forward in the future here at EmileeSpeaks <3333

week 41 & 42 [planner love]

Today's planner post contains the spread from the last 2 weeks.  The pictures are also a little different.  I took the pictures at my office [non blog job] because I had some down time && wanted to get these pictures taken ahah.

I got the decorating bug... You'll probably see more of that lol.  I thought I was enjoying my pages bare and to the point, buuuut I really missed decorating my pages.  It's still pretty minimal IMO.  Ill be doing a planner haul soon that will include the stuff used on these pages.

I just loved how this one turned out.  I love yellow && purple together.  I used washi tape along the bottom and stuck on a yellow owl sticker.  The smaller "yellow stickers" are actually washi tape as well.  The other labels are awesome labels I found at the dollar tree.  I'll tell you more about those soon.

Week 42 was a little bare, but that's the week I took off for some me time.  Hope you enjoyed my pages! <333

my quarter-life crisis

Okay so here's the deal...  I've spent the last week taking a break from blogging to regroup && reorganize.  Not only did this apply to my house but it applied to my life.  I've needed some "me" time to reflect && make some important decisions for myself.  I'm feeling much better now that I have some of this worked out.  Let's talk about it...

||1} POHS: My eye health is a constant stress to me.  Having Presumed Ocular Histoplasmosis is not only frightening [due to the loss of vision], it puts a major strain on me financially for treatments.  I have lots of doctor appointments && due to the nature of the syndrome and treatment, I have to have someone drive me to and from the appointments.  I HATE having to rely on people.  I'm an independent person, and it really bothers me to have to ask people for help.  I've completely lost central vision in my right eye, and my left eye is getting blind spots && acting up.  I have to really focus and work hard to protect my eyes.  

||2} Home: You guys since I've started dedicating so much time and effort into my blog, my household duties have been ignored.  I LOVE getting on the computer first thing in morning, reading other blogs, promoting my post for the day, work on more posts, etc etc etc... I've been working SO hard on this blog, that some days I sit in front of the computer for 12hrs.  I've let it completely consume me.  I love my blog, I love writing, and I love being a part of the blogging community.  I will never ever let that go.  I've just had to rework and prioritize a schedule for myself.  This way I don't let myself totally lose an entire day staring at a computer screen [which probably isn't good for my eye health either].

||3} Weight: I'm overweight.  The end.  I'm not going to make excuses for myself or tell you my life story.  I'm just going to tell you that when my mom died, I started packing on the pounds.  I turn 32 [omg thirty two...] next month && my weight and overall health has been weighing heavily my mind.  So far, for being overweight I've been lucky.  No diabetes, no high blood pressure, no high cholesterol... everything is good.  Which is also hella impressive since I was a smoker.  I think it's high time that I get healthy and in shape BEFORE something does end up going south.  I've got enough problems with my eyes, I don't need to add any other health issues to it.  It's time to make some changes && get myself into the gym that I already pay for every month, ahah.

||4} Health: Several years ago I saw a doctor about some stomach issues I was having.  We did some dietary testing and I found that I'm intolerant to red meat, gluten, and dairy.  I was seriously deficient in B12 and malnourished.  I was tested for Celiac Disease but in the end ruled it out.  I was PISSED that the doctor decided I had a gluten intolerance.  Seriously.  There is soooo much bandwagon Gluten-Free people that it feels like a "fad" instead of an actual issue.  Sometimes it's hard to remember that people have an actual problem with gluten, unlike the people that just say they do cause they think it's the cool thing right now.  I don't get it.  I LOVE bread.  Whyyy would you choose to be gluten free if you don't have to be?  That's insane.  
I rigorously watched what I ate for about 6 months.  Paying attention to keeping my gluten intake low to non-existent, not eating red meat, and pretending to keep dairy to a minimum [I love cheese].  Then one day I just kinda stopped.  Got lazy && quit caring.  Well last week I grabbed Subway on my way to work.  I ate it that evening at work, and felt absolutely miserable.  Mind you, I always feel miserable after I eat but something about this particular night was worse.  I decided right then and there, that it's time to cut out the foods that I'm intolerant to because I'm tired of feeling like this.

So as you can see, I did a lot of reflecting on my vacay from blogging.  It was incredibly necessary, and I'm ready to implement changes.  I'm quite sure that you will see these topics arise throughout my journey.  

5 Fandom Friday: Characters I'd Love To Dress Up As For Halloween

I'm a day late, but here's my 5 Fandom Friday post!  For those of you just checking in, Super Space Chick && The Nerdy Girlie have been hosting a weekly community linkup.  This week's topic is: Characters I'd Love To Dress Up As For Halloween.  This has once again been a super fun post to write.  I'm really enjoying the 5 Fandom Friday's.  If you have enjoyed them too, check out what other bloggers have done for theirs by searching #Fandom5 on Twitter.  Instead of just posting a picture of the character, I found costumes other's have put together for visual ideas.

||1} Lumpy Space Princess: I'm starting off with my top choice, LSP.  She's by far my favorite Adventure Time character, && I'm lumpy too so I think it'd be an easy costume to pull off! Ahah!  

||2} Dalek: Yes this is a little girl's costume, but come on... it's amazing!  You get the awesomeness of a Dalek mixed with super girly fun.  I want this in a grown up version! <333

||3} Luna Lovegood: This was too cute.  I always enjoyed Luna in both the Harry Potter books && movies.  She's quirky and bizarre, and I love her to death.

||4} Sim: Okay... so maybe after I lose some of those lumps I was telling you about above haha!  I couldn't go out in public like this, but I've always loved these costume ideas.  The pixelated Sims costumes are just too funny.

||5} Rose Tyler: She's not exactly my favorite companion, but she did throw together some pretty fun outfits.  This to be honest, is about as "costume" as I go in real life.  Halloween night I'm usually found either at work, or at home in my pj's vegging out watching horror movies.  I rarely go to Halloween parties or have much of a need for costumes.  So out of all 5, even though LSP is my favorite... Rose is more realistic for my endeavors aha.

October  3rd:  Gateway Fandoms That Made Me Who I Am Today

October 10th:  Geeky Clothing Items I Need In My Closet Immediately

October 17th:  Characters I'd Love To Dress Up As For Halloween

October 24th:  My Must See List of Halloween Movies

October 31st:  The Halloween Candy I Always Hope For When Trick-Or-Treating

November  7th:  Comfort Foods That Always Make Me Feel Better

November 14th:  Smart Phone Apps I Cannot Live Without

November 21st:  Characters I Would Invite To My Thanksgiving Feast

November 28th:  Black Friday Purchases I Would Sacrifice A Night Of Sleep For

5 Fandom Friday: Geeky Clothing Items I Need In My Closet Immediately

Welcome back to week 2 of 5 Fandom Friday hosted by The Nerdy Girlie && Super Space Chick!  I absolutely loved doing last weeks installment, and this week was just as fun!  Today we're doing geeky clothing we want.  Like right now.  This was hard to narrow down to only 5! Aha!

||1} Pony Chops Adventure Time Shoes: I need these chucks in my life so badly.  I really wish I was talented enough to paint my own... These are so beautiful!  The only downfall is that I'm really short and I always wear pants.  My pants would cover the best part of the shoes, LUMPY SPACE PRINCESS!

||2} Doomsdaydoctor on Polyvore: I don't wear skirts that short because I'm pretty self conscious about my legs.  However, I think I could make an exception for this outfit.  How AMAZING is this entire outfit!?  I adore this shirt with the big bow on it.  Those boots are to die for.  The accessories are adorb.  Love. It.

||3} Whorecrux: I have loved this shirt since I pinned it on Pinterest over a year ago.  This one would be hella simple to make... I just haven't tried it yet.  I did however make a sharpie mug in this design.  I love that it randomly mashes Mean Girls & Harry Potter together.  Perfection.

||4} Nightmare Custom Painted Shoes: I know I already have a pair of shoes on here, but these custom painted vans are to die for.  I love LOVE the "kidnap the sandy claws" kids!

||5} Yoga Pants: Hell yes, batman yoga pants.  Like I said yesterday, I pretty much live in casual clothing.  Yoga pants, hoodies, && tshirts.  These pants are amazing.  Get in my closet.

October  3rd:  Gateway Fandoms That Made Me Who I Am Today

October 10th:  Geeky Clothing Items I Need In My Closet Immediately

October 17th:  Characters I'd Love To Dress Up As For Halloween

October 24th:  My Must See List of Halloween Movies

October 31st:  The Halloween Candy I Always Hope For When Trick-Or-Treating

November  7th:  Comfort Foods That Always Make Me Feel Better

November 14th:  Smart Phone Apps I Cannot Live Without

November 21st:  Characters I Would Invite To My Thanksgiving Feast

November 28th:  Black Friday Purchases I Would Sacrifice A Night Of Sleep For