Wednesday, July 13, 2011

37 Years

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Happy Anniversary to my Mom and Dad who have been married for 37 years today!


Thank you for sticking out the tough times, embracing the crazy times, enjoying all the good times and teaching your family how to do the same. You are both wonderful people and wonderful role models. 

Have a fantastic anniversary! We love you!

Dad, you better take her somewhere nice. Mom, you better not make him take you to a quilt store.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Keeps him entertained...

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Aiden discovered my box-o-makeup the other day. I walked into my bedroom to find this...

He was surprised to see me there just watching him and proceeded to show me all the treasures he had found. Like hair ties and lip gloss and one yellow shoe.

Did I stop him? Nope, I got a good 20 minutes all to myself. Make-up really keeps him entertained.

By the way, out of this box, I really only use about 6 things. And there is another box under the sink, which is full of the really crazy stuff that I have not used in 10 years. I think I might be a make-up hoarder, I never throw anything out. Because what if one day I really, really need that bright pink eyeshadow/glitter eyeliner combo or nude lipstick and purple lip liner ;)

Thursday, July 7, 2011

4th of July Festivities

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We celebrated the long 4th of July weekend with a couple of warm days outside, playing in the water and enjoying some good food. Monday we had a little barbeque at our place with Chris and Lisa and the babies. We spent most of the time outside in the shade sipping on cold margaritas and the kids spent most of the time in their bathing suits.


 fourth of July Pinwheels, strawberry margaritas with blue swirly straws and a bucket of chips with homemade salsa - yum!

 Thank goodness Addison will pose for me, those boys want nothing to do with my camera


Ryan and Addison
 

 The boys staying cool

 Addison crawling around in the pool

 Lisa pushing Aiden in his car, Ryan um...fishing?


 I forgot to take pictures of dinner, but I got plenty of our ice cream sundaes

We ended the night by lighting a few sparklers for the kids, maybe next year we will go for the bigger fireworks :) Hope everyone had a great 4th of July!

Friday, July 1, 2011

Yummy Summer Dinner

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One of my favorite summer dinners is a big green salad with farmers market veggies topped with grilled chicken - easy, quick and no need to heat up my house by turning on the stove or oven. The only thing is, the green salad starts to get old after a while and I feel like I need to switch it up now and again. I was happy when I found this recipe for a yummy looking salad with avocado, corn, cucumber and tomato the other day and decided it would probably work for dinner if I topped it with chicken. Boy did it work, it was sooooo good. The cold salad with warm chicken was perfect on a hot day.


Even carb-a-holic Jeremy, after looking sadly at dinner and asking if there was tortillas or something to go with it, liked it. His exact words were "Wow, this is actually really good". And it was filling. I changed the original recipe up, because I didn't have some of the ingredients, I hate measuring, didn't want to take time to actually grill corn myself and also, I am not a HUGE cilantro person. So here is my version - but definitely check out the original also.

Avocado and Grilled Corn Salad with Cilantro Vinaigrette
1/2 bag of Trader Joe's Frozen Fire Roasted Corn
2 Avocados, diced and sprinkled with lemon juice (keeps em' green)
1 pint Cherry or Grape Tomatoes, cut in half
1/2 Small red onion, finely diced
1 cup Crumbled Goat Cheese
1 English cucumber, skin on and diced
1 tbls. Fresh cilantro, chopped


Add all ingredients to a large bowl and refrigerate while you make the dressing:

5 tbls. Olive oil
2 tbls. Rice wine vinegar
1/2 tsp. Garlic powder
3/4 tsp. Salt
Lots of fresh ground pepper


Add all of the above ingredients in a canning jar and shake well. When ready to serve, toss dressing with the salad. Divide into bowls and top each bowl with sliced grilled chicken (all I did was salt and pepper a couple chicken breasts and throw em' on the BBQ for a few minutes). So easy, and so good! Tastes particularly good paired with iced tea and eaten outdoors ;)