Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Hi!  It's me again!  It has been forever.........mainly because there has been so much that I couldn't really talk about, but now I can! 

      All winter we thought we might be moving to Boston, at one point I was even supposed to go up and start looking at houses but I may have been too busy with work to do so or made up a bunch of other excuses.  Anyways, I didn't really mind going but I also didn't really get a feeling that it would happen so I just kind of let the days and weeks pass by without going to Boston.  My husband has been going every month for a while now.  It was very difficult at first being by myself again, I cried a lot, everything was a major ordeal for me.  Really it's just that it was different.  I have never done well with changes, even if they are good changes.  But now his coming and going is routine and I miss him when he is gone but I've also learned how to fill the time and have restored confidence.  It is now mostly my responsibility to handle things around here and keep things in check and it has given me back the independence I once had. 

     After we found out we weren't going to have to permanently move to Boston we decided to sell our house anyways and move to a new house here in Nashville.  We were originally hoping to be closer to our church because we would like for our children to go to school there in the future but it really is too far from Jon's work.  We realized quickly after doing some basic math that I am currently not pregnant and that we didn't really have to worry about school for a while and both agreed that we would be comfortable sending our child to another preschool, Catholic or Protestant and that there were plenty to choose from.  We decided we can evaluate that subject in a few years and if we need to move again we will.  We both have moved so many times in our life it's a yawn now.  At any rate, we still need to move.  We have outgrown our current house and yes we could probably get rid of some stuff and we have discussed doing this but we could also move.  Honestly I think we are both just bored.  But as I have said before, we both have moved a lot throughout our lives so I think we just sort of get an itch.  We have spent the last few weeks getting our home ready to place on the market, we still have a few things to do, small things.

    The realtor is coming in a few hours to put our "coming soon" sign in the yard.  Then in a week or two we will put up the permanent For Sale sign.  I am also going to look at 3 houses today; 3 houses that are all completely different.  And if I like any of them my husband will go back and look at them this weekend.  We drove past 18 houses last weekend, all within maybe a 5 mile radius and were able to narrow it down to 3 based on lot size, price, etc.  So we shall see.  For someone who has done this so many times before I am kind of anxious though.  I guess it's just because I've gotten comfortable.  But onwards and upwards! 

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Good Eats

So I thought I would share a couple of  blog and Pinterest finds that I have made lately that turned out delicious.  And as soon as I went to type that first sentence our 40lb dog, Sadie, hopped up on my lap.  (she usually only does this at the vet) And while it's cramping my style, literally, I'm kind of enjoying this since she never wants to be held.  Anyhoo, back to the recipes at hand.
The first one I'd like to introduce I found on Pinterest.  Double Dark Chocolate Merlot Cookies.  For a dark chocolate lover like myself these were YUM!

And here's the link:  http://www.simplyscratch.com/2012/01/double-dark-chocolate-chip-merlot.html
The only differences were that I only had light brown sugar on hand rather than the dark and I conveniently had a bottle of Cabernet already open so that's what I used instead.  Things I also learned while doing this are that: 1) You need to let cookies set a few minutes before you put them on a rack or they will fall apart. 2) I need another silpat because I get bored waiting for the cookies on the one and only silpat to cool.  3) I used parchment paper to speed up the process since I have more baking sheets than silpats and it did just fine, but there is something cooler about the silpat.

Secondly I made a small version of skinny chicken enchiladas and they were, in my opinion, yummier than my favorite Mexican place (and I l-o-v-e my favorite Mexican place) but these were fantastic!

And here's the link for these which I found from a blog I follow:
http://www.skinnytaste.com/2010/02/chicken-enchiladas.html
I would put the name/link of the blog post underneath but sadly I'm not that savvy yet :(
The only modifications I made here were that: 1) I used a rotisserie chicken (b/c they were on sale at Publix last week). 2) I used a can of rotel sauce in place of one can of tomato sauce for the enchilada sauce, it gave it a nice kick! 3) I forgot to use greek yogurt on the top in place of sour cream like I was going to and I forgot to use the green onions I had bought but they were a slam dunk full of flavor without them.  4)The cheese I used was Cabot 50% reduced fat jalapeno cheddar.

I am planning on making a larger dish of the chicken enchiladas tomorrow.  I ate them this week while Jon was gone and I felt guilty that I wasn't sharing!  So tomorrow I will share!!