Valentine's Day Dinner

So, I am finally getting to the Valentine's Day dinner stuff. 

These are the beautiful roses Dustin got me and arranged in a crystal vase we got for the wedding.

These are the amazing potato things that Dustin made us.  For the recipe, leave a comment.

Now we go onto making fondue.  This is a swiss fondue.

Shred 3 cups swiss and 2 cups gruyere cheese.  Coat in flour.

This is the dry white wine we used.  It was given to us by the hotel on our honeymoon.

Measure out some wine.  

Put the wine in a large saucepan and boil well to cook out the alcohol.

This is the wine boiling.  You can't really tell.

Gradually add the cheese while constantly stirring.

Mix milk, dry cooking sherry, and some nutmeg.  Add to the cheese and mix until all the cheese is melted.

Pour the cheese into the fondue pot.

Cut up various vegetables, fruits, and breads to dip into the fondue.  

We broiled cauliflower and broccoli and served those along with apples, pears, and italian bread.

It was an amazing dinner.

THANK YOU DUSTIN!!!  I love you!

XOXO

Eggs Benedict

I always let other people's opinions of eggs benedict push on me.  Everyone I knew in the past said eggs benedict is gross.  So, I decided to try it for myself.  I am not making the real hollandaise sauce, as it wasn't very good when I made it.  I made a "mock" hollandaise.  

First, you need salt, pepper, mayo, sour cream, butter, mustard, lemon juice, english muffins, and eggs.

Bring a pot of water to a boil.  This is what you poach the eggs in.  You want the water to be a rolling boil, but not too hard.  It just takes practice to get it right.

In a separate saucepan, add mayonaise, mustard, sour cream, butter, lemon juice, salt and pepper.  Cook on low heat and stir often until combined, creamy, and hot.

While the hollandaise is cooking, put your english muffins in the toaster and toast them.  You need one half for each muffin.

This is what the finished hollandaise should look like.

When the water is boiling you are ready to poach your eggs.  Crack an egg in a cup.  A measuring cup works great.  Put the cup as close to the water as possible and gently drop the egg into the water.  The egg will land at the bottom of the pan and it will fall apart a little bit, but if the water is boiling just right, it should mostly stay together.  It took mine anywhere from 2-4 minutes to finish, but you just have to keep checking.  

Assemble the eggs benedict with the muffin on bottom, egg in the middle, and top with hollandaise.  Serve right away while warm!

Bad Day

Today is not a good day.  I am extremely unhappy, tired, don't feel good (allergies I think), and have homework to do.  I'm also supposed to have night class tonight.  If I feel like this later, I'm not going.  I just hope I don't miss anything important.

On a different note.  Started Weight Watchers today.  I have some really good recipes coming up.  At least I hope they are good, I've never tried them before.  Here is what's to come:

Garden Omelette with hollandaise
Potato Nachos
Ratatouille on Polenta Rounds
Spaghetti Squash Primavera
Healthy Fettucine Primavera
Homemade falafel sandwiches
Vegetables and Quinoa
Spinach and ricotta calzones
Potato and Zucchini Casserole
Pan Fried Oatmeal

The other breakfasts I'm having, every day in two weeks but two days, is fried eggs and hash browns.  Now, I'm sure most cooks know how to cook this, so I am not putting them up here.  Unless someone requests.

Have a good day anyone that reads this.

If you read this, leave a comment, or follow me!  If I know you, write your name in the comment box, because you have to leave it as anonymous if you don't have an account.

Monopoly City

Well, last night Dustin and I watched movies and played Monopoly City.  That game is so much fun.  We woke up this morning and played again.  He won both times.  Why am I on such a losing streak!?  Plan for today is to make menus, as I'm starting Weight Watchers again.  I also would like to scrapbook some wedding stuff.

Crocheting

Here are a few of the things I have crocheted.  I have done a bunch more, but I don't have pictures of them.

Blanket

Scarf

Scarf

I made this purse from my Great Grandma's yarn

Scarf

Scarf

Scarf

Scarf

Little kid hand bag

Mini Market Bag

Handbag

Market bag

Scarf

Scarf

Nursery

So... tonight I worked nursery.  There were only two older boys.  They are 4 and 5 years old.  Today, one of them asked me, "Where your wedding ring? Can I see it?" so I showed him my ring.  He thinks its so funny that I'm married.  He giggles about it all the time.  Anyways, I then ask him if he is married.  He says, "No," and then waits a few seconds and says, "actually, yeah!"  So I ask, "Well what is her name?"  He quickly replies, "Sally."  So I say, "Where did you meet this girl?"  He pauses and kind of stutters for a long time while playing with toys and finally says, "Jail."  It was so funny.  I then asked him if Sally is nice to him.  He said, "No."  So I ask, then why are you married to her?  He says he doesn't know.  So then I ask if his Mom knows about Sally.  He yells at me and says, "NO!!!!"  He then got really embarrassed and we played with toys.  It was so funny!

Wednesday

I work nursery tonight.  Dustin is sick today.  So we are both sitting here doing homework/resting.

We have three cats, Jaspur, Mahllea, and Bella.  Jaspur used to get on the fridge all the time.  Somehow, Mahllea got on the fridge today, regardless of the dishes on the counter.  We have no idea how she got up there or how long she was there (it was sometime within the last hour), but she just suddenly starts meowing for help to get down.  It was weird.  Anyways, I'm too short, so Dustin went and got her down.

I am trying to think of something awesome to cook for lunch.  We are all out of eggs and they sound so good.  I will have to search around the pantry for something.

Sorry this is such a boring post.  I don't have enough time right now to put up a recipe or picture, but I will sometime!

Long Wonderful Weekend

This weekend was amazing.  Dustin was off work on Friday, and neither of us had school yesterday, so it was a four day weekend.  Dustin and I spent lots of time together, which we really needed.  It is so hard during the week to never get to spend time together.  I hate it.  For Valentines day, Dustin woke me up with breakfast in bed, except the plate, bowl, and cup were all empty.  This is because I hate eating breakfast when I first wake up.  He drew me a menu with food that he could cook and the cost was hugs and kisses, a certain amount for each, except the waffles were $100.  :-)  We actually ended up going out for breakfast/lunch at The Egg Factory.  I highly recommend the country garden omelet topped with hollandaise.  I think that's what it was called.  It was SO good.  Then, Dustin and I came home and put in a movie.  Dustin cooked us these potato halves with chive and onion cream cheese sour cream things.  There were amazing!  The main dinner was fondue.  We had broccoli, cauliflower, apples, pears, and bread to dip with.  I meant to make a cake on Valentines day, but it was SO late by the time I could make it.  So I ended up making the cake yesterday.  It is almost like a molten cake, but it's not really.  It was a two layer chocolate cake with a chocolate glaze, drizzled with peanut butter and caramel sauce.  Pictures to come!

I have school today.  I was sick last Wednesday and Thursday, so I missed school on Thursday.  My Math class was canceled, so I really only missed one class.  I hope every thing will be okay!

XOXO

Sick

Well, I woke up this morning at 4:30AM sick to my stomach.  Needless to say, I got sick.  It's not a cold, but my throat does hurt now, from being sick.  So, I'm debating whether I should work the nursery tonight or not.  I'm exhausted and my entire body is tired.

We ended up going to Mai Tai last night.  I don't want to get into food descriptions as it makes me nauseated, so I'll write on that later.

On a happier note, on Monday night, I got the new Scentsy scents!  I love them all!  I will write later on what my favorites are.  Going back to bed now.

Tuesday

Well, I'm all ready for school today.  I don't feel well this morning, so I'm not eating, but I know I'll regret it later if I don't.  I'm exhausted and feel a cold coming.  Yuck.  Let's hope it's not really, so I FEEL GREAT..... yeah right.  School from 12-3 today.  Dustin's Mom, or my mother-in-law, is in town this week, so we are meeting her for dinner after classes.  We are either going to Tucano's or to a vegetarian restaurant.  It's up to Dustin, so I'll find out later.  Either one is fine with me.  I was up late last night reading for my class today.  I still didn't finish.  I still need to read 50+ pages to catch up.

I'm going to go grab some food and throw it in my bag in case I get hungry later.

XOXO

Scentsy

Okay, so I woke up this morning and realized that THE NEW CATALOG is available for me to see in my Scentsy workstation today.  I looked at it and I love SO much in it!  The scents sound like they are going to be amazing and the warmers are so neat too!  Not to mention that I should be getting the new scent testers in the mail today!  They have new packaging too.  I really love Scentsy.  They have so many neat new things.  I know so many people that make a living just off selling Scentsy.  I hope to be there one day.  It may require moving though, since Scentsy is so saturated on the West coast.  Maybe to.... Florida?  or..... Pennsylvania???  :-)  I'm just kidding, Dustin.  Plan for today: homework and class until 9PM.

Have a great day!

Super Bowl Sunday

Yesterday, Dustin and I ran some errands.  He needed new work clothes, so we went out looking.  We won 6 free cookies from RC Wiley.

Dinner at my Mom's was delicious.  We had blintzes with berry compote.  Blintzes are crepes stuffed with a creamy filling.

Dustin and I then went to Footloose by the Starlight Mountain Theatre.  It was very cute.  There is one part where the main guy is "screaming" at the train because he's mad at his father for leaving him and his mom. During this part, a little kid started laughing.  Then the main guy screamed, "I hate you," because it was his line, but the kid started laughing even louder.  It was SO funny.

I guess it's Super Bowl Sunday.  We don't have cable, so we won't be watching it.  Dustin and I canceled cable over a year ago, to spend time together.  We found the tv dictating what we would do together, because we needed to watch shows on the DVR so it would record the ones we really wanted to see.  Without cable, we talk more, spend time together more, and actually do our homework.

I have made a few things to post on here like the soup recipe layout.
So, soon to come:
Macaroni and Cheese
Eggs Benedict

Have a great day everyone!  What are your super bowl plans?

Soup

So, a few months ago, in the summer actually, I made this soup for my old blog.  I am putting it on here now.  I don't remember what it's called, but it was good!

To begin, you need two leeks, 2 stalks of celery, oregano, garlic, salt, and pepper.

Put some olive oil in a pan with some pepper, salt, and garlic.  Let this saute' for a  minute or so.

Next, chop off the ends of the leeks.  Then chop it up into pieces and put into your pan.

Do the same with the celery and about 1/4 of a white or yellow onion.  Saute' until tender.

While the vegetables are slowly sauteing, start working on the green beans.  Buy fresh green beans and snap off the ends.

Snap the beans into smaller pieces and put them in your colander.

Go check on your vegetables, and they may have shrunk an incredible amount.

Next, add vegetable broth and bring to a simmer.

Once simmering, add small shell pasta.  As much or as little as you want.

After you add the pasta, go back to your green beans.  Finish snapping them and rinse them.

Once pasta is almost tender, add the green beans.

Next, add Oregano.

Let it cook until the pasta has absorbed a good amount of the liquid.  This may have happened earlier, so don't worry!

Serve with freshly grated parmesan or romano cheese.

It's FRIDAY!!!!

So, today is Friday. Sure, I have to do a bunch of homework, but once Dustin gets home, I get to be with him!!! We even sit together doing homework and playing movies in the background.

It is raining outside, and I LOVE rainy days where I have to do homework or watch movies.

I am super excited about a few things. First of all, I ran out of coffee, so I bought more at the store. I bought it in whole bean style instead of pre-ground, because we got a coffee grinder for a wedding gift! Second, we love all of our wedding gifts, and this weekend I think I will put more away. Third, a wedding gift from my grandparents came last night! They are a set of really nice cooking pots and pans!!!! I can not WAIT to cook in them! We plan on doing our big grocery shopping on the weekend of Valentines Day, so I'll try to plan some neat things to post on here. Lastly (if that's a word), for another wedding gift, I got an ice cream party set thing. I don't know how to describe it at all, except it's amazing. But at the store, I got Apple Pie ice cream and Peach yogurt blend ice cream. Taylor left a cookie dough kind at the house. I don't have toppings, but I will try to make some and maybe have an ice cream party!

I meant to write about this last night, but when I was working at the nursery on Wednesday, I noticed that one of the kids has started to call me "Winkie." Now, the twins are only 3, but they do pretty good saying my name. One calls me, "Whintey," sometimes, "Wheatney." But the other has given up on trying to say my name altogether and just calls me, "Winkie." It is adorable.

Last night, I couldn't stand it, because I haven't had a fresh vegetable in a while. I had bought some avocados that needed to be used. We were thinking, do we really want to do panini's again? Then I realized, taco salad is what we used to put avocados in, so Dustin and I were craving taco salad. I gave in, reluctantly, and went to the store to get food to make taco salad. So, here is the taco salad instructions!

TACO SALAD:

Peel and dice a cucumber

chop a 1/4 c. of green onion

peel, seed, and chop 2 avocados

drain and rinse 1 can of sliced olives

drain and rinse 1 large can of kidney beans

(you can put in any other kind of vegetables that sound good)

Put all of the above ingredients in a bowl and add as much dressing as you want, but the mixture is 1 part Catalina and 1 part salsa. Mix until all ingredients are well coated with dressing.

Use your favorite dressing and favorite salsa. Our favorite salsa to use is my Mom's homemade, but there's no way I am posting her recipe! Plus, we ran out. :-(

Next, I toss some lettuce in with the mixture.

Serve over a bed of either taco shells, tortilla chips, or what we like is Nacho Doritos.

If you aren't vegetarian, you can add cooked meat to the mixture in the beginning. I supposed anything would work. Before I was vegetarian though, I only had it with hamburger.

I'm off to get dressed in real clothes, as it's noon and I should probably be dressed by now. I usually naturally wake up around 9:30, but this morning, I slept until 11. I wish I had set an alarm. It's always better when I wake up to Dustin's voice though.

XOXO

2/4/10

I didn't do any cooking yesterday. Well, I guess I made hash browns and soy bacon, but that's nothing special. I didn't do any crafts yesterday either. I did finish a bag on Tuesday though. I'll put pictures up later. Hobby Lobby was just like the one in Parker that I go to when I am visiting my Grandparents. My Mom and I were in there for an hour and a half and we STILL didn't go through the whole store. I worked in the nursery last night and had fun as usual. We are out of fresh groceries, so I stopped at the store last night to get a few things. Quick food is really what I got, boxed food. I feel so gross eating it, but when you have no spare time to cook, like I do on the weekends, then the boxed food is super easy and fast. On the weekends I am going to have to cook the week's lunches and dinners so I don't feel so gross.

I have to finish writing thank you's from the wedding. It's only been a month and we were on our honeymoon for two weeks of it, so I think I'm doing okay. I just hope people don't think we are being rude. I think the deadline for wedding thank you's is three months though. I am waiting for some pictures to put together before we send them though. I'll work on them this weekend. My weekend starts tonight! However, I am WAY behind on homework, so I have to do school all tonight and tomorrow. Hopefully, I can spend some time with Dustin this weekend doing something awesome. We'll probably end up cleaning.

I guess I could talk about the dinner we had at Cottonwood Grille on Tuesday for our one month anniversary.

Appetizer:

Crispy Tofu

I HATE tofu, but this tofu was SO good! There were also zucchini spears that were battered and fried. You dip them in soy sauce.

Appetizer 2?:

Rolls that were really good and salads

Entree:

Dustin-Macaroni and Cheese

It was macaroni in a gorgonzola cheese sauce tossed with snap peas and walnuts. It was very good.

I had a Stuffed Vegetable Platter

It was a series of three different things. First, there was a roasted red bell pepper stuffed with parmesan, wild rice, and mini button mushrooms. Second, there was a roasted tomato stuffed with cabbage and celery. Third, and best of all, there was a hollowed out zucchini, stuffed with minced carrots, zucchini, celery, and other things.

Dessert:

Raspberry Creme Brulee'

It was a really fun evening and I love going out with Dustin places. Dustin likes to joke that he ordered root beer and mac 'n cheese at a fancy restaurant. We joked about ordering a bottle of ketchup too.

I'm off to do some more homework for a while, then get ready to go to school. Hope everyone has a great day!

XOXO

2/3/10

So, today I am going to go to my Mom's school, where she works, and show the secretary how to use a Cricut machine. Then we are going to go walk around the new Hobby Lobby, then I work in the nursery at church tonight until 8. I love going to the nursery. People at church are so nice, and I absolutely love the kids. They can make me happy anytime I am having a hard day. They put a smile on my face every time I think of them. They say the funniest things, sometimes, I feel like I probably shouldn't laugh and encourage the behavior, but it is so hard! For instance, a week ago, I was showing a boy a dog in the action figures and he said, "There a dog in there?" and one of the 5 year olds walks up and says, "There's a dog on your face." I should not have laughed, but I turned my face away and laughed so hard. It was hilarious, as I have never heard him say anything like that, and it was something I would hear Dustin say. I have to leave in thirty minutes, so I should probably go eat something, since it's 1:30Pm and I still haven't eaten.

My blog

So, I have decided to start a blog. I like to cook, do crafts, and do pretty much anything. I just thought I would start blogging it for my own personal "journal". I will post recipes, patterns, daily adventures, and anything I feel like. :-)