Grahams Move. Sad Day.

A couple of weeks ago Chad's sister, Kristen, and her family moved back to Virginia. For those of you that don't know, they moved here pretty much at the exacttime we moved here. Brett and Chad both got jobs here in the Tampa area at the same time, which was AMAZING. They lived about 15 minutes away and it was so great to have family close by, not to mention really good friends. Brett got transferred back to DC (he works for the FBI), but at least they still have good friends there as well as their church family. I miss our weekly dinners and game nights and our sweet little niece and nephew! Maybe at some point we can plan a visit up there. We love you Brett, Kristen, Kate, and Ian and we miss you!!!

Apple Dumplings

MMMMmmmm......these were sooo delicious and not fattening at all! This is another recipe from Pioneer Woman and if I have learned anything, it's that she does not skimp on butter in any recipe! This is incredible easy to make and incredibly addicting.

Apple Dumplings

• 2 Granny Smith apples
• 2 cans (8 oz.) Crescent Rolls
• 2 Sticks Butter
• 1 1/2 cups Sugar
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla
• Cinnamon to taste
• 1 can (12 oz.) Mountain Dew Soda

1. Peel and core apples. Cut each apple into 8 slices each. Roll each apple slice in a crescent roll. Place in a 9x13 buttered dish.

2. Melt butter, then add sugar and barely stir. Add vanilla, stir, and pour entire mixture over apples. Pour Mountain Dew around the edges of the pan. Sprinkle with cinnamon and bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes.

3. Serve with ice cream and spoon some of the sweet sauces from the pan over the top.

Italian Meatball Soup

Italian Meatball Soup (from Pioneer Woman)

Meatballs:

• ¾ pounds Ground Beef
• ½ cups Freshly Grated Parmesan Cheese
• 3 Tablespoons Fresh Parsley, Minced
• 1 whole Egg
• 2 cloves Garlic
• ½ teaspoons Salt
• ½ teaspoons Black Pepper
• ¼ teaspoons Ground Oregano
• 2 teaspoons Lemon Juice

Soup:

• 3 Tablespoons Olive Oil
• 7 cups Low Sodium Beef Stock
• 2 cups Water
• ½ teaspoons Salt
• 2 Tablespoons Tomato Paste
• ¾ cups Onion, Chopped
• ¾ cups Carrots, Chopped
• ¾ cups Celery, Chopped
• 1 cup Russet Potato, Chopped (do Not Peel)
• ½ pounds Cabbage Chopped
• Grated Parmesan Cheese To Serve

Tied in a Cheesecloth Bundle:

• 4 Tablespoons Fresh Parsley, Minced
• 2 whole Bay Leaves
• 1 teaspoon Peppercorns

1. To make meatballs combine all meatball ingredients and mix well. Shape into small balls and chill for 30 minutes.

2. Gather 4 tablespoons parsley, bay leaves, and peppercorns in a cheesecloth bundle. Tie to secure.

3. After meatballs have chilled, heat olive oil over medium-low heat in a heavy pot. Briefly brown meatballs, then remove to a plate. Add beef stock, water, tomato paste, and herb bag to pot. Bring to a boil, then simmer for 30 minutes.

4. Add onion, carrots, celery, and potatoes. Simmer 15 more minutes. Remove herb bag.

5. Add cabbage and meatballs. Bring to a boil, then simmer 8 to 10 minutes.

6. Optional** Serve with plenty of freshly grated Parmesan cheese sprinkled on top.

This recipe was okay. It wasn't awesome for the amount of time it took me to cook it (pre-warning...it took me 3 hours total! Although I'm pretty slow at cutting veggies.), but I'll probably cook it again during the cold months. I also omitted the cabbage and celery. I know it's good for you, but I just can't stand celery and as we all know, vegetables that Chad eats are few and far between. Oh, and fyi, the soup tasted better the second day.

Grandparents, Knitting, & Baseball

Whew, I haven't posted in a while! It seems like it's been a really busy past few weeks. First of all I am happy to say that I have increased my caseload by two and so I now have 5 children I see on a weekly basis, yaay! My two children I picked up are both only 4 months old, so sweet!

A couple weeks ago Chad and I went and visited my grandparents in Sebastian, FL. We had a really nice visit with them and Gram taught me once again (for about the hundredth time!) how to knit. It's just one of those things that I start and then stop and when I want to start again I don't remember how. Here's me and my grandparents. Awwwww.....

And here is how my knitting is coming along! Actually I must admit, I did all of this the afternoon I visited them and haven't picked it up since. BUT, I will not give up on it like I have so many times before! I just need to catch up on a few other important things beforehand. I know, I know, that's what I always say. But I'm determined this time.

We also went to a spring training baseball game with Chad's parents while they were in town. We saw the Tigers vs. Braves. It was a fun afternoon and one of the first days of nice weather. I liked playing around with the camera's different color settings.

We took the youth group kids ice skating this weekend, which was really fun. I hadn't been ice skating in a very long time. I used to go all the time with my dad, but sadly I'm not as good as I used to be (not that I used to be great). I forgot our camera, but Chad took a couple with his phone so maybe I can post some later.

Oh, I almost forgot! We also went to the strawberry festival! But that will be another post for another day.

The next few weeks will continue to be busy, so I don't know how much cooking we'll be getting in. I'm already two meals behind where I should be :(

Hope everyone's first day of Spring was fantastic, although I think about half the states got several inches of snow!! I miss snow...not ice mind you, but snow. Snow is so clean and fresh looking, not to mention a blast to play in!

Happy Spring!

Hands and Voices

Chad is gone to the church's Men's Retreat, so I'm here catching up on lots of stuff- laundry, cleaning, blogging, billing (for work), reading, researching, and getting ready for my two's and three's Bible class. Fun stuff, I know. I also got a movie to watch. Whenever Chad is gone or out, I always try to get a movie that I know he won't want to watch. Last week I got "My Sister's Keeper." Saaaad movie, but really good! I want to read the book. Books are always better than the movies. So tonight I got "Love Happens" with Jennifer Aniston.

I thought I would write a post about my job and what I do. Today was a good day as one of my kids got their hearing aids FINALLY. He's two years old. Typically, when children first get their hearing aids, it is a very long and difficult battle to make the child keep the hearing aids in their ears. This could be for a variety of reasons whether it be just because they are being stubborn, because they are uncomfortable and they are not used to them, or because they are used to silence and do not find this new noisy environment to be an enjoyable experience. However, this child (I can't use names) got his hearing aids yesterday morning and left them on all day until he went to bed that night. Today I went over for our session and not once did he tug on those hearing aids!! Amazing, I have never seen this before! He was constantly turning around to new sounds, it was a great thing to watch.

Anyway, back to what I do exactly. I am called a SHINE Provider/Early Interventionist here in Florida (Serving Hearing-Impaired Newborns Effectively). I work with infants and toddlers birth-3 with hearing loss. I work with the child to improve/develop his/her communication/ language skills, speech, listening skills, cognitive skills, and personal-social skills. Most of our children just need work on language, speech and listening skills. Some families want their child to learn speech only, some sign only, and some want their child to learn both. Whatever communication mode the family wants, that's what I work on. Basically, we play but I turn it into a learning activity. The point is to do activities that the parents can carry over into their daily routines. An example of a listening activity would be calling the child's name when he/she is not looking. The goal of this would be for the child to turn around. As the child continues to learn to use his/her hearing, the child will learn to turn around after hearing his/her name at greater and greater distances. I don't know if that made sense at all. Sometimes I find it hard to put into words exactly what I am doing. But to continue....We might use snack time as an opportunity to work on vocabulary (whether it's through sign or not), work on having the child communicate his/her wants and needs (requesting what he/she wants), a

nd I might integrate some speech into this activity (if the food was a banana we would work on the "b" sound).

So these are just some examples to demonstrate what I do. Because each child is a different age, has needs in different areas, has varying degrees of hearing loss, lessons are very individually based. I love my job and hopefully I will get some new clients soon as I only have three right now.

Oh and here are some awesome photos of hearing aid molds. I know most of you might find this very strange, but I think they're beautiful and it puts a smile on my face =) I found them on some person's blog when I googled hearing aid molds: http://www.octamom.com This lady has eight kids (hence the blog name octamom), one of which has hearing loss. She was actually on the news too!

I need to get watching my movie, it's late!!

Chicken and Bowtie Pasta with Asiago Cream Sauce

I wasn't the biggest fan of this recipe, partly because I liked the last pasta we made so much more (see previous Cajun Chicken Linguini). Plus it wasn't very good left over. But I felt I should still post it anyway. I think for our next pasta we will try a red sauce recipe.

Chicken and Bowtie Pasta with Asiago Cream Sauce

• Farfalle (Bowtie) Pasta
• Chicken Breast
• Peppers (any colors)
• Onion
• 2 Cups Heavy Cream
• 1 Chicken Bouillon
• 3/4 Cup Grated Asiago Cheese
• 1/2 tbsp. Cornstarch
• 2 tbsp. Butter
• 1 tbsp. Fresh Garlic

1. Cook pasta until al dente.

2. Cut chicken into cubes and cook. Set aside.

3. Saute peppers and onion in vegetable oil or butter.

4. In medium saucepan, bring 2 cups heavy cream to simmer, stirring often. Whisk in bouillon and cheese until well blended and bouillon is dissolved completely. Dissolve cornstarch in 2 tbsp. water and whisk into mixture.

5. Add pasta to sauce and serve. Top pasta with chicken and peppers/onions.

Fried Breaded Squash

Breaded Squash

• Vegetable Oil
• 1 egg
• Bread Crumbs
• Parmesan
• Squash, sliced

1. Beat the egg in one bowl.

2. Pour the bread crumbs and freshly grated parmesan into another bowl (I just eyed it, no measurements)

3. Dip the sliced squash into the egg, then dip them into the bread crumbs, coating both sides.

4. Heat oil in a saute pan (I used a fondue pot). When the oil is hot, add the squash slices. Cook until browned.

5. Serve with marinara sauce *optional

Blackberry Cobbler

MMMmmm......this was delicious!!! Another recipe from http://thepioneerwoman.com/

Blackberry Cobbler

• 6 cups Fresh or Frozen Blackberries
• 1/2 Cups plus 4 tbsp. Sugar
• 1 Tablespoon Lemon Juice
• Lemon Zest of Half a Lemon
• 2 Cups Flour
• 1/4 tsp. Salt
• 1 tbsp. Baking Powder
• 1/4 Cups Crisco
• 4 tbsp. Butter
• 1 Egg
• 1/2 Cup Milk

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Combine blackberries, ½ cup sugar, lemon juice, and lemon zest in a mixing bowl. Stir and spread out in a buttered pyrex dish.

2. In a separate bowl pour flour, salt, baking powder, and 1 tablespoon sugar. Add shortening and butter and work mixture together with a pastry blender (or your fingers) until the mixture is coarse. Measure ½ cup milk, add an egg, and mix together. Pour into flour mixture, stirring as you go. Mixture should be smooth and not dry, but not over stickly.

3. Take clumps of dough and place them on top of the blackberries. Lightly flatten dough with your fingertips. Sprinkle with 2 to 3 tablespoons of sugar and bake until golden for 30 minutes. Berry juice will be slightly thin, but don’t be afraid. It will gradually soak into the biscuity topping and make your life complete.

4. Top with Bluebell Homemade Vanilla ice cream.

Steak Bites

Okay so I am a little behind on posting my new recipes, BUT I have been making them. So the next four posts will be dedicated to those.

This recipe is steak bites. I know, it's kinda an iffy new recipe, seeing as how steak is steak no matter how you cook it. However, I'm pretty sure we have never even cooked steak before. We pretty much only have it if we go out or when we go to Brett and Kristen's once a week for dinner. So in my mind this is a new recipe.

By the way I got this recipe from http://thepioneerwoman.com/ Kristen suggested this website to me and I LOVE it! She has lots of recipes. You should take a look at it.


Steak Bites

• 1 Pound Sirloin Steak or Pre-cut Beef Tips
• Salt
• Ground Black Pepper
• 2 tbsp. Butter

1. Cut the sirloin into small bite-sized pieces.

2. Sprinkle generously with salt and freshly ground pepper. Toss the meat around a bit to thoroughly coat with the seasonings (I think we also added some season all).

3. Heat the skillet over medium high to high heat. As the pan heats, add about 2 tablespoons butter to the skillet. Allow the butter to melt, then brown, before you add the meat.

4. Place the meat in the pan in a single layer. It should sizzle loudly when it hits the pan – if it doesn’t, the pan isn’t hot enough. Don’t stir or disrupt the meat for 30-45 seconds. You want it to sizzle and brown on one side. Scoop as many steak bites as you can with your spatula and flip them over. Repeat until all the meat is turned. Cook for an additional 30 to 45 seconds—just long enough to sear the outside of the meat but NOT cook the inside (we cooked it quite a bit longer, it was pretty done inside).

hApPy bIrThDaY ySaBeLla!!

Today is my baby sister's 2nd birthday! Happy Birthday Bella!!! Love you!

Happy Valentines!!!

I know this title is almost a week late, I had meant to do it Sunday, but I guess I forgot. I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentines with their wonderful Valentine. Here's a picture of the beautiful flowers Chad got for me.

We didn't really do anything this year. First of all it fell on a Sunday and as we all know Sundays are not a minister's day off. But Friday we had a nice dinner here. I made him brownies (shown below) and we ate chicken and breaded squash and cooked them in our fondue pot. I LOVE using our fondue pot and we don't use it enough. Usually once a year. For our second anniversary Chad took me to "The Melting Pot" as a surprise. It was AWESOME!!!! If you don't know what it is, it is a fondue restaurant. And you can get a three course meal- bread dipped in cheese for the appetizer, meats for the main dish, and fruit dipped in chocolate for the dessert. MMMmmmm....Actually tonight we used our fondue pot to dip our fruit in chocolate. White chocolate that is. I don't really like chocolate.

Anyways...back to Valentines with my Valentine. I am very blessed to have such a wonderful husband. One of our youth group kids told me "He takes good care of you," and that is so true. If I have to grow old, I'm glad I get to grow old with him.

Baker's Chocolate & Mocha Sweethearts

• 4 squares Baker's unsweetened chocolate
• 3/4 cup margarine or chocolate
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup General Foods International Suisse Mocha Cafe (or any other flavor)
• 6 squares Baker's semi-sweet chocolate

1. Preheat oven to 350.

2. Line 13x9-inch pan with foil, with ends of oil extending over sides. Spray foil with cooking spray.

3. Microwave unsweetened chocolate and butter in large microwaveable bowl on high for two minutes or until butter is melted; stir until chocolate is completely melted. Stir in sugar. Blend in eggs and vanilla. Add flour and flavored instant coffee; stir until well blended. Spread into prepared pan.

4. Bake 30-35 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes with fudgy crumbs. Cool completely. Use foil handles to remove brownie from pan. Cut into shapes with heart shaped cookie cutter (optional*). Melt semi-sweet chocolate as directed on package. Dip tops of brownies hearts into chocolate. Refrigerate until chocolate is firm.

These were pretty good, but there are a few things I would change if I made it again. First of all, I wonder how it would taste if I used another flavor of instant coffee like Cafe Latte instead of Suisse Mocha. You just couldn't really taste a difference with the Suisse Mocha. Tasted like chocolate. Also, make sure you check the brownies several minutes before it says they are done. I took mine out after about 28 minuets and I wished I had taken them out sooner. And lastly, don't refrigerate the brownies. There is really no need. The chocolate will firm up whether or not you refrigerate them, and honestly, who likes cold brownies??

Puppies, Manatees, Stingrays, Oh My!

Yesterday was Saturday and I was in the mood to get out of the house and do something. So we did what we usually do over the weekends- went to the puppy store to look at and hold puppies and wish we could have one. We REALLY want one, but right now we don't really

have the money. Besides the fact that puppies are expensive to take care of, we would have to pay an additional like $200 per month on top of our rent to have pets here. And we don't have a yard and I would hate to have it stuck in an apartment all day. Needless to say we won't be getting a puppy for a while. But that doesn't mean we can't look!!!

How can you resist those eyes!

After the puppy store we went to Manatee Viewing Center (http://www.tampaelectric.com/manatee/), which I've been dying to go to for a while. It was AWESOME! It's at Tampa's power station (weird, I know) and is only open November-April. Apparently this is where manatees liked to gather when the water temperatures fell below 68 degrees. So when the power station began producing power, they awarded that area as an official manatee sanctuary. There were hundreds of manatees, which was really neat to see. They stay under water a lot though, so it was difficult to get a picture of them, but here is one I was able to snatch a picture of.

And here is a picture, which I found on their website, that gives you an idea of how many manatees gather. There was too many to count, but you could just see hundreds of mounds that stick a little bit out of the water.

And besides manatees, there were also a couple sharks jumping around. I didn't ever see one, but Chad did a couple times. And there were jumping stingrays! I never knew stingrays did that, but apparently they do this to claim their spot, or their dinner table as the man at the center said. It was pretty amusing to watch. Here is a short video I got of them. I know, I'm a nerd!

Anyways it was very cool and I think we will go back when we have a little bit warmer of a weekend. Off to make lunch!

Creamy Potato Soup

For our main dish this week we tried out a new recipe for potato soup. I make potato soup pretty often in the colder months, but this one is quite different from my usual. It's supposed to be a knock off of Panera Bread's potato soup, but I'll be the one to tell you, it doesn't taste quite like theirs. BUT it is still quite good. And I think I will add it to our menu! Here it is.

Creamy Potato Soup

• 6 cups Chicken Broth
• 6 cups Potatoes, peeled and cubed
• 1/2 tsp. Seasoning Salt
• 1/4 tsp. White Pepper
• 1/4 tsp. Ground Red Pepper
• 1 (8 oz.) pkg Cream Cheese, cut into chunks, room temperature
• Bacon Bits (optional)
• Chives (optional)

1. Combine broth, potatoes, and spices. Cook until potatoes are tender. Smash a few of the potatoes to release their starch for thickening. If you like it smooth and thick, smash more, if you like it soupy just smash a little of it.

2. Reduce to low heat. Add cream cheese. Heat, stirring frequently, until cheese melts (the cheese may look lumpy and rise to the surface, but just keep stirring and it will eventually melt).

3. Sprinkle soup with bacon and chives if desirable.

I figure if I'm gonna try these new recipes, I'm gonna go all out and so I bought a round bread loaf and made a bread bowl. After all, that's how Panera serves theirs!

Bacon Sausage Wraps

This is our appetizer recipe for the week and let me tell you they are delicious! My preacher's wife (in Missouri) made these a few times and they were so good I had to get the recipe. So I give the credit to Johnna for these. Chad and I made them for the Super Bowl Party and they were a hit. They were all gone by the time we left. And we made A LOT, thanks to Sam's bulk packaging.

Sausage Bacon Wraps

• Lil' Smokie Sausages
• Bacon
• Brown Sugar

1. Cut each slice of bacon into thirds.

2. Wrap a piece of bacon around each sausage. Use toothpick to hold it in place.

3. Sprinkle with brown sugar all over and allow to set all day or even over night.

4. Bake in oven on 350 until brown.

Very easy!!!

And as I mentioned in a previous post, there was Baked Bologna at the Super Bowl Party for all to enjoy. I did try it, and while I wasn't the biggest fan, it wasn't bad. The texture was a little too much and maybe just knowing that I was in fact eating bologna made me think that one bite was enough for me. But Mr. Bob did do a great job cooking and housing us at the Super Bowl Party.

Week's Happenings

Let me apologize in advance for my very uncreative Blog title. It will probably often be quite uncreative, I was never good at titles. Oh well.

I went to the fruit and vegetable market this week to pick up some, well, fruits and veggies. I love going to this little stand/market. It's actually quite big, is open year-round, and has lots of options. It's also quite a bit cheaper than the grocery store or Wal-Mart. Anyhow, I went to pick up some foods and saw stands and stands of flowers. I always have to have a look because I love plants and I love to have plants inside, I think it gives more of a homey feel and it just makes me happy. Well they were selling these flowers for $1! Yeah what a bargain. It made my day and cost very little! Oh and when I was picking some out, a butterfly landed on the flowers. I wished I'd had a camera and then remembered I had one on my phone. Though, not the best quality, it did the job.

Last weekend we also got rid of our tree. FINALLY. We just hadn't been home much since Christmas. Lots of youth group events and such. It was surprising, though, how good the tree looked for having been up for 2 months and 1 month with no water. It wasn't as vibrant a green, but still green and hardly any needles had fallen (that is, until we took the tree down).

Chad is about to get home and I need to get lunch going. Chicken Quesadillas, MMmmm...

Oh and we have a superbowl party tonight with the teens where we will be served Baked Bologna...yeah sounds delicious, huh? I'll let you know how it is, I will have to at least try it, but I admit I am quite skeptical.

Success!!

Happy Sunday! Chad is at church and so I thought I would do a little blogging. I went to early service, but poor Chad has to go to both services which makes for a really long day for him!

Well this week we made our first new recipes. One was a success and the other not so much. As I mentioned earlier, my goal is make one new dish as well as one new finger food or appetizer

or dessert. So we thought we would try and make sugar coated pecans. We LOVE these, but had never tried making these ourselves. Well, they were not good. First of all we burnt them. We checked them every ten minutes and stirred them around (they are supposed to cook for 30 min.) but the last 10 minutes is what did them in. Besides the fact that they were burnt, they weren't all that sweet. We are thinking that we need to not only add more sugar, but maybe replace the white sugar with brown. I don't know. Any ideas? Has anyone made these before? My aunt has and they are delicious, but she lost her recipe and this is one she found on-line, but they didn't taste anything like hers. So we will just have to try them again sometime. Too bad pecans are so expensive!

BUT our second attempt at creating a new dish turned out excellent! A couple of weeks ago we went to Red Lobster for dinner. We don't usually eat there but we had a gift card and who can turn down a free meal! So I got my usual shrimp and Chad got Cajun Chicken Linguini Alfredo.

It was absolutely delicious!!! So I thought, why not try to make that? So I googled the recipe and found a few different ones. I combined what I liked about 3 different recipes I found to make the perfect Cajun Chicken Linguini Alfredo. I went ahead and provided you with the recipe below. If anybody makes this, let me know how it turns out and if you make any changes!

Chicken Linguini Alfredo

• 2 Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts
• Cajun Seasoning
• Red Pepper
• Green Pepper
• Yellow Pepper
• Onion
• Linguini

• 2 tbsp. Olive Oil
• 1 1/2 cups Heavy Cream
• 1 1/2 tbsp. Minced Garlic
• 1/4 tsp. Basil
• 1/4 tsp. Lemon Pepper
• 1/4 tsp. Salt
• 1/8 tsp. Ground Black Pepper
• 1/2 cup Grated Parmesan Cheese

1. Cook linguini as you would regular spaghetti (as far as measurements go....I'm horrible with measuring how much pasta to use. I used a little pasta measurer and measured out 2 servings).

2. Place chicken in plastic bag and season with cajun seasoning. Shake to coat (we did not measure the cajun spice, we just eye-balled it. It really just depends on how seasoned you like your chicken). In a large skillet over medium heat, saute chicken in butter until almost tender. When almost cooked, add peppers and onion.

3. For sauce: In a saute pan over medium heat, add 2 tbsp. olive oil. Add garlic and lightly carmelize. Then add the heavy cream, basil, lemon pepper, salt, pepper. When sauce is to desired consistency (it won't be real thick, and don't cook too long or it will start to separate!) add parmesan (we bought a block of parmesan and grated it. There's something about real freshly grated parmesan- tastes delicious!).

4. Add linguini to sauce. Toss and heat through. Serve with chicken and peppers on top. Enjoy!

Napping...Not Always Such a Great Idea...

So I've been working on my blog...writing my first post and spending most of my time on the layout. If you know me, you know I am a perfectionist. Anything I make/create/do has to be perfect. I wouldn't say it's the best characteristic to possess. Especially when you're in graduate school and you spend hours on a project, not because you're making the content better, but because it has to "look" perfect and professional. Therefore what might have only taken a day or two to accomplish would take me more several more days. Perfectionism also kicks in when I am not good at something. If there is something that I cannot do well or at all, I get very annoyed with myself and this often turns into a bad mood. All this to say, sometimes I wish I wasn't a perfectionist.

Anyhow, you are probably wondering why on earth I am writing a second post on the same day. Well the answer is, I took a nap today. Usually it doesn't matter how much sleep I get, I can ALWAYS sleep some more. I always said a good night's sleep is when I get 12+ hours of sleep. I know that sounds ridiculous, but I have always needed more sleep to function. However, the older I get, the more naps seem to be affecting me and as such I am wide awake.

Okay so I watched the movie "Julie and Julia" this weekend. Chad went to our brother-in-law's house to participate in "Man Week" since Brett's wife and kiddies are in Ft. Walton visiting her mom. Since Chad was going to be gone I figured it was a good opportunity to go to Redbox ($1 dollar movies, yeah!) and get a movie that I knew he would never watch with me. It was a great movie!! I really enjoyed it and it made me want to do some more creative cooking. For those of you that haven't seen it, the character Julie goes through the Julia Child's cookbook and makes every recipe in the span of one year. So I think it was about 542 recipes in 365 days. I think that would be a little much for me, not to mention expensive, but I liked the idea of tackling a challenge within a certain timeframe. I am getting extremely bored with our menu options and I always am looking for new recipes, so I have decided that I will make one new dish and one new side/finger food/appetizer a week. Now for a goal. As I stated earlier, I am great at starting things and never finishing them. So I have to make a realistic goal for myself. A year is a little too long and I know I will not carry it out if I give myself such a long-term goal. So I think I will say 4 months. That will be February-May (before the craziness of summer starts). Every week for the next 4 months (starting in February) I will make 1 new dinner dish and 1 new side/finger food/appetizer. I am not really sure at this point where I will get my recipes from. I'm always skeptical of personal on-line recipes, especially if they don't have a picture. But, I guess that's part of the challenge. We may not especially love every recipe I try, but at least we are actually trying something new instead of sticking with what we know because I'm too afraid to make something I may not like.

Okay so I have made 2 new goals: to blog (at the very least twice a week) and make 2 new recipes a week for 4 months. I think I will post pictures of the new recipes I try every week for several reasons. One, I love to take pictures. Two, it will keep me more accountable. Three, you can see what these tasty meals look like and ask me for the recipe if you so desire.

Since I am on the topic of goals, I might as well keep going. There are two other specific goals I have in mind. Most importantly is spending time in the Bible. Yet another thing I start many, many times and then discontinue. And how can I being a youth minister's wife encourage these kids to be spending time in the Word if I am not myself. We have been talking a lot about spending time in the Bible in Sunday class, Sunday sermons, Camp, Youth Retreats. Maybe God is trying to tell me something?

And finally, my last goal. As most you probably know, I work with babies and toddlers with hearing loss. I received my master's degree in Deaf Education and as of last month, I am now employed through Florida's Early Intervention program. I LOVE my job. This was my dream job and I waited 8 months and and went through several hoops to obtain this job. It was my dream job, so it was worth it. And I'll talk more about it in another post as I know people are always curious as to what I do exactly. Anyways, so I work with children who are deaf and hard of hearing and thus use sign language quite frequently with these children. I LOVE signing. This is why I got my degree in Deaf Ed. in the first place. I love the smooth, fluid movement of the hands, the expressiveness that sign language brings and the fact that you can communicate with people (children and adults) who may have otherwise felt alone in the hearing world. Not that those who are deaf don't have any one else (hearing or deaf) to communicate with, but I would think it's nice to know that there are hearing people who are willing to learn a new language and reach out of their comfort zones just to communicate with someone. Now, I am not in any means trying to give myself a pat on the back or trying to fish for compliments. I'm just expressing why I love my job and why specifically I love to sign. So, back to my goal. I want to improve my sign language skills, I want to use it more, and I want to have fun with it. Therefore, I have decided to work on a song a month. I will pick a song every month, learn the signs to that song, and work on it throughout the month until I can sign the whole song perfectly. Remember, I am a perfectionist, so yes it has to be perfect. But signing songs isn't anything new so I know it's something I can accomplish if I just stick with it.

Well it is now 12:30 am which is waaay past my bedtime. The laptop has now warned me that the battery is almost dead and I am getting pretty sleepy, so I think this is a good time for me to close. I have 4 goals to work on so I need my beauty rest :) Good night, sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs bite!

Work At It With All of Your Heart

So I've been thinking for a while about starting up a blog. For those of you who were into xanga (does anybody use that anymore??) all know how horrible I am (or hopefully was) at keeping up with posting. I went on to my xanga site a couple weeks ago, just to see what it looked like (I told you, it's been a while!), and if anyone had posted anything in the past few years since it seems like blogger.com amongst other blog sites is now the way to go. As I stated before, I was NOT good at keeping up with daily postings and what not. Let me emphasize to you how bad I was. 2 postings. That's all I had!! This just serves as a reminder as to how bad I am with starting things and not finishing them. Therefore, I determined I was going to change some things.

So I came home from church, asked Chad to help me set up an account and turned on my i-pod. I decided that it was time I have some old school Acappella play while I write since it has been a while. Listening to Acappella brings back many memories. Some of you may think this is odd, but Acappella became very popular in my youth group back home for a while. Often, instead of jamming out to 'N Sync as teenagers (which we still did on occasion) we would wip out our Acappella cd's and crank them up in one of my best friend's little red convertible. And as we drove around town (and I'm sure got many stares) we would sing at the top of our lungs to Acappella classics. So anyway to make this long story short, I played one of my random mix Acappella cd's and put it on shuffle and the first song was "Work At It With All of Your Heart." And that is what I am going to do. Work at it with all of my heart. And not just at blogging, but several other things in my life which I will talk about in later posts.

And so begins my new blog spot...