Aspen Turns 5!

Aspen turned 5 yesterday.


You know how when someone has a hyper dog, and other people tell the person, "Oh, he'll calm down in a couple years. He's just a puppy."



I'm still waiting.


I'm not sure that a 5-year-old dog can still qualify as a puppy. That's what? 35 in human years?



I'll give him a little credit (for his birthday and all).



He is a handsome dog.




He's been a good big brother to Duke from the very beginning, always watching over him without stepping ON him.


He's always good for a laugh.


He's a great foot warmer.


He's always happy to see me, even if I'm mad at him for dripping water from his bowl from one end of the kitchen to another.


He's a good running/walking partner.


So, I guess there's enough good stuff to keep us satisfied while we are waiting for him to grow up, but in the mean time, we'll just watch him do things like this while we are trying to take a family photo:



Maybe growing up is overrated after all. We could probably learn a few things from our carefree dogs.


Happy Birthday Aspen!

A List

I've been suffering from a case of writer's block lately, and well, let's face it...my life is a little (read: really) boring, so I really have to dig sometimes.


So here's a list of things that have made me very happy/grateful lately.


1. Starting this past week, I will have every Thursday afternoon off work. This means I may actually have time to run some errands on my own, rather than having Ryan do everything. I'm sure he's probably happy about that too.


2. Ryan FINALLY, after 6 weeks of limping around on an ingrown toenail, went and had the ingrown corner of the nail removed. It's still very sore, but at least it can begin healing now.


3. Dinner and pumpkin carving/painting with the girls Friday night.


4. Auburn beat LSU.


5.
Aspen let me trim his alien toenails last night without putting up a fight.


6. A two-mile walk without any hip pain.


7. Fall foliage.


8. Beautiful weather.


9. Photoshop for Dummies. Sometimes I think I need a level even lower than that for dummies.


10. Doing little more than this all weekend. I love a good, lazy weekend.


What has made you happy lately?

He Who Cuts His Own Wood

"He who cuts his own wood is twice warmed."

I'm not sure who to give credit for that quote, but it was on a picture in my parent's house for years.

Last week, Ryan's parents came for a visit, and Ryan wasted no time in putting his dad to work on splitting a whole pile of wood (thankfully his dad enjoys this type of thing). We spent a whole day splitting and stacking wood.

What? What do you do when your parents come to visit?

The pile started out looking modest enough.



But it grew...a lot.

Finally done.

And in case you're wondering if the quote still applies when you use a gas-powered log splitter, rather than the traditional ax-in-hand approach....

It was a toasty 80 degrees (or so) that day, so I guess that would count!

Macaroni and Cheese

My grandparents gave me Southern Living All-Time Favorites (compiled and edited by Susan Hernandez Ray, 2010) recipe book for my birthday last week.

This is the result of the recipe on page 86 of that cookbook.

It's so creamy and cheesy...they call it Creamy Macaroni and Cheese.

This is the recipe:

Creamy Macaroni and Cheese

1 8oz package elbow macaroni

1/4 cup butter

1/4 cup flour

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp black pepper

1/8 tsp red pepper

1/8 tsp granulated garlic

1 cup half and half

1 cup milk

5 oz extra sharp shredded cheddar

10 oz sharp cheddar shredded and divided

1. Prepare pasta according to package directions, drain and set aside.

2. Melt butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Gradually whisk in flour until smooth, cook, whisking constantly, 2 minutes. Stir in salt and next 3 ingredients. Gradually whisk in half-and-half and milk, cook, whisking constantly 8-10 minutes or until thickened.

3. Stir in extra-sharp cheddar and half of sharp cheddar until smooth. Remove from heat.

4. Combine pasta and cheese mixture, and pour into 6 greased (6 oz) ramekins or 1 (8 inch square) baking dish. Sprinkle with remaining cheese.

5. Bake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes.

I didn't have any half-and-half so I just used 2 cups of milk instead of 1 cup of each. I also just had mild cheddar (which I tend to prefer anyway). Even with the substitutions it turned out great!

There are so many yummy recipes in this book. I'm hoping to try a new one every week.

Now go make some macaroni and cheese...you've got to try it!

Pizza Night!

I made pizzas tonight using Pillsbury's Hot Roll Mix.

I heard about (and tried for the first time) this pizza crust at my last Bible study. It's a simple out-of-the-box approach, but it gives you the homemade goodness in less time!

I made a Mediterranean-inspired pizza with chicken, artichoke hearts, calamata olives, feta and mozzarella cheeses, red onion, and pepperoncini.




I used this instead of a tomato sauce as the base. It is a garlic-flavored extra virgin olive oil.


Here's the other pizza. Tomato-Basil...and some chicken (also with the olive oil base).

And the finished Mediterranean!

You've got to go try this crust!

4 more weeks...

Today, I had my 4-week follow-up on my hip. To keep it short and sweet... My hip isn't healed and I have to "rest" for 4 more weeks.

That will make a full 11 weeks without running, walking, biking, anything...except a few pilates exercises.


That's almost 3 months for anyone who's counting.


Because I'm not.


I'm not worried at all that I'll be relatively sedentary for 1/4 of a year.


But hey, it could be a lot worse. At least I'm still hanging on to my sanity.


Right?

Ryan's vote doesn't count.


Duke thinks I'm perfect, so we'll just go with his vote.


Duke? Help me out here.




Yes, mom, perfectly sane.

Thank you.

The End.

Fish Fry!

This is another event from Labor Day weekend, but I'm just now getting around to posting it. You may remember our early summer fishing adventures and hopes for a fish fry..eventually. Well, we went through a dry spell. Fish are just hard to find when it gets unbearably hot...until one late August evening... Ryan and his friend, Jonathan, went out for a few hours an brought home 4 fish that they caught in their last 30 minutes on the water!

This left us with a freezer full of fish when we added it to what they had already caught this summer. (Notice I said they...I still have yet to catch a keeper...and no, it's not just my aversion to cleaning them.)

This is the final product! (the darker ones are Cajun seasoned). We had the whole family over to help us eat it and still had leftovers!

Now with cooler temperatures here, we may have better luck catching more!