Chicken Tortilla Soup

We've finally had some cooler weather in Dallas! Coincidentally, I planned to make chicken tortilla soup from P-dub for a dinner with some girls I used to work with. Catching up was good but my pup was not good! She was so overly excited for new people and jumped all over everyone. Hopefully the soup made up for it.

Note: My soup wasn't nearly as dark or brothy looking as hers below... flavor was still good!

(photo from P-dub)

Snickerdoodle Cake with Brown Sugar Buttercream

I made this yummy cake for Ann's birthday. Its so good and literally smells just like snickerdoodle cookie. I added some gold sprinkles just for fun :)

I didn't have any good photos so this photo is borrowed from the original author, Always with Butter. (Which has so many recipes that I'm dying to try, anyone else need a birthday cake??)

The Freezer Meal Project

I'm sure lots of people have this problem... I cook on Sundays, more often than not, but we run out of this home-cooked food by Thursday. We end up eating out or hunting for things in our pantry until Sunday rolls around again.

We don't spend a ton of money on restaurants relative to most people but I do feel like its an expense we could control a little better. So, for the next few weekends I'm planning on making some ready-to-go freezer meals in order to have small, home-cooked meals ready for Thursday and Friday nights when we're out of food in the fridge but don't want to totally wreck the kitchen.

(I guess the key will then be not to forget what is in the freezer!)

Here are some sources/ideas I've been saving:

From Annie's Eats - Stocking the Freezer (Meals) and Stocking the Freezer (Individual Items)
From Simple Organized Living - Freezable Foods
From Shutterbean - Freezer burritos
From 100 Days of Real Food - Essentials

(Is it just me or is "freezer" starting to look like an odd word?)

First up - turkey meatballs and homemade marinara sauce. Yes, it took a while but its certainly easier to cook a lot of one thing one afternoon than multiple things during a week. I got our food for this week cooked (as of this post that has made it through 3 meals with more to go) plus I froze a serving of meatballs + marinara for one pizza and 6 other individual servings of meatballs + marinara that we can add to spaghetti on nights we are busy.

Daisy v. Thunderstorms

Daisy 0, Thunderstorms 2

The foster family we adopted Daisy from told us she heard thunder for the first time at their place just a week or two before we adopted her and she ran and hid under the bed. They just wanted to give us a heads up. Thankfully they did since it rained for the first time since we adopted her this weekend and she didn't do much better.

Friday night she paced the house in circles until I let her in the guest bath...


Sunday night we were out for a walk and it started thundering when we were at just about the farthest point from our house. She started getting really nervous so Mike ran her back home where she slid into our room under the bed...

(please ignore the creepy dog eye flash reflection)

Poor Dais! She has a lot to learn about our weather. These were mild storms... Hopefully she grows out of this otherwise she'll be spending a lot of time hiding!

She's much happier on days like this...

Magical Peanut Butter Cookies

My grandmother (known to everyone as Pat) is diabetic. For her upcoming birthday, I made these diabetic friendly magical peanut butter cookies from Paula Deen.

(pic from food network)

SUPER SIMPLE to make. 4 ingredients. 12 minutes for baking. Done.

Vegetable Pad Thai (+ Chicken)

I made Martha's vegetable pad thai this weekend for something quick/lighter and to use up extra ingredients we had in the fridge. (I also baked a chicken breast that I marinated in soy sauce, ginger, garlic, and brown sugar so Mike wouldn't starve.)

I'm not an expert on Thai food so I do not know how authentic the recipe or taste is. I thought it was pretty yummy and really simple to make though. I omitted the peanuts from my pasta but otherwise followed the directions. I really liked the green onions and cilantro. And, we got to use our wok for the first time!

Chairs for our Hale

From Knocked Up:

Pete: There are five different types of chairs in this hotel room.
Ben: That's way too many chairs for one room!

This is what I feel like! I'm trying to find something to fill up this space in our living room and can't pick anything to save my life.

I've got several issues... the tv will eventually be hung on the wall so that side will look very different. I don't want to cover up the plantation shutters too much (which is why I'm not looking at couches or loveseats). I also don't want the chairs to stick out too far in the room since its not a huge living room. Here's the wall that needs chairs (that rocking chair thing is being replaced):



SO. Given all that and the number of chairs out there in the world, I need help. PLEASE tell me which chairs you'd like to see/sit in if you were at my house :)

2 tulip leather or fabric chairs (west elm)



2 slipper leather or fabric chairs (west elm)



everett chair + to be discovered ottoman (west elm)

Or, I suppose chaises are still an option...

troy left arm chaise (crate and barrel)

HELP!!