Weekend Fun

Hi peeps! We had a great relaxing weekend with amazing family and friends. On Friday night we went to ...

...to celebrate Allie's college graduation and my birthday!  

Saturday we went to the We Love Homewood Day Parade so I could walk with my cheerleaders... all 29 of their beautiful faces (we were missing 4 though)  :)

Saturday night we went to see ..'Something Borrowed' with Tanner, Mason, and Christy ~ SO GOOD! It was a great girl/guy romantic comedy.         

 And then enjoyed...

Sunday we spent time with both of our wonderful mothers :) I am so blessed to have such an amazing mom and mother in law! We went to Brio (YUM!) with Daniel's family for lunch and spent some time with my mom that afternoon. Then we went to Home Depot to buy flowers for my two big pots that are by our back door...pics will come soon if they look good (that's questionable though)!?! 

Chocolate chip cream cheese ball

How could you NOT be interested in eating this after hearing whats in it?? Chocolate chips and cream cheese...sounds perfect :)  I had to make something for school last week and this is one of my favorite recipes. ENJOY!

Ingredients

Mix together the cream cheese, butter, vanilla, brown sugar, and powdered sugar ~ Then add in chocolate chips

Roll the cream cheese mixture into a ball

Roll the ball in pecans right before serving



Chocolate Chip Cream Cheese Ball Recipe

• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 3/4 cup confectioners' sugar
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips
• 3/4 cup finely chopped pecans

Directions

1. In a medium bowl, beat together cream cheese and butter until smooth. Mix in confectioners' sugar, brown sugar and vanilla. Stir in chocolate chips. Cover, and chill in the refrigerator for 2 hours.
2. Shape chilled cream cheese mixture into a ball. Wrap with plastic, and chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
3. Roll the cheese ball in finely chopped pecans before serving.

Power of Prayer...

On April 27th 2011, tornadoes tore through the state of Alabama causing an incredible amount of damage. Please keep your thoughts and prayers with all of the families and communities affected by this awful event.

There are no words or pictures to even describe how terrible this was and what the state of Alabama is going through, but here are a few pictures to give you an idea...

Tuscaloosa Tornado

This was a restaurant in Tuscaloosa, Hokkaido - my cousin's boyfriend Freiley was actually working in there when the tornado came... we are very blessed and thankful that he is okay. 

"For the LORD your God is living among you. He is a mighty savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs." 

Zephaniah 3:17

Easter 2011

HE HAS RISEN!

Here are a few pictures from our wonderful Easter day spent with amazing family and friends. 

This was the BEAUTIFUL flower arrangement at Trinity on Easter morning.

My family

 

 

 Daniel's family

 That's my gorgeous sister in law, Allie

 Evan putting flowers on the cross :)

Evan and Pops

my handsome husband...

My mother in law knows how to set a table... 

              
                                                             Evan loving his bubble machine...

                                    

                                                       

It was a LONG but great day!!

Pesto Feta Chicken

My neighbor told me about this chicken that is delicious!! She actually found it in a weight watcher cookbook, but you would never really know it (*hint - your husbands/boyfriends won't notice) 

Ingredients

Mix the feta and pesto together

Slit the chicken down the middle and stuff it with the pesto mix - I used toothpicks to keep them closed

I served it with new roasted potatoes and it was so good! 

A really good salad also went great with it...

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup crumbled fat-free feta cheese
• 2 tbsp pesto sauce
• 3-4 skinless, boneless organic chicken breasts
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• basil, black pepper

To make the stuffing, you’ll want to mix the feta and pesto in a bowl. I mixed mine fairly thoroughly so that the stuffing was mushy and not too clumpy. Then, I slit pockets in the sides of the chicken breasts. You’ll want to make sure that you don’t cut all the way through– just enough to make a little pita-like pocket. Then, evenly divide the stuffing between the chicken breasts.
The recipe directions were to heat up the olive oil in a large, nonstick skillet. Cook the chicken until browned and cooked through, which should take roughly 6-8 minutes. Once cooked, sprinkle the breasts with black pepper and basil to taste. I decided to bake my chicken in the oven for about 30 minutes and it turned out wonderful!

enjoy... :)

Birthday weekend

We celebrated my 25th birthday a few weekends ago and it was wonderful! I had the perfect weekend...

Friday night we celebrated with my family by grilling out burgers at my parents house.

When my mom asked what I wanted for my birthday cake, I immediately said...



Their STRAWBERRY cake is one of my favorite things in the world!  And I am a HUGE fan of Edgar's strawberry cake...but there is something about Ashley Mac's *sigh*!! You will just have to try it for yourself :)

                                        We all enjoyed the cake a lot!                                           

Love that precious little face ....  

My actual birthday was Saturday and I spent the day laying out at my next door neighbors pool and relaxing. It was perfect. Saturday night Daniel and I went to...

 and enjoyed..   love those lettuce wraps :)

Sunday was another great lazy day and we went to dinner on Sunday night with Daniel's parents! We went to...

 I had a Shrimp burger and a wedge salad ~ probably one of the BEST wedge salad's I have ever had!!! And of course they are famous for their milkshakes...

                                             

All because of this amazing guy... I had the best 25th birthday ever!!!

Weekend at Smith Lake...

We spent this past weekend here...

 

 with this gorgeous view...

eating delicious food...

with these wonderful people...

 Love my family! Wish I could spend every weekend at the lake with them :)



ROLL TIDE!

In honor of football weekend and the A-Day game in Tuscaloosa tomorrow, I wanted to show another 'project' that Jana and I did in the fall of last year. We saw these wooden footballs in Spotted Zebra and decided we wanted to try and make them for football season! We took a picture of them, showed Will (her husband) and he cut them out for us! Of course I did mine 'Roll Tide'! Jana and Will are huge Auburn fans ...we still love them of course... so her football said 'War Eagle'.

                           Cut out football                                                    Painted the football red and let it dry

                                                                        Final Product!!!

ROLL TIDE!!