Hope We Can Be Together...

It seems like just yesterday I was posting that I was a married woman -- but it's been 6 months already.  It's so hard to believe!  The time has flown by so quickly but I couldn't be any happier.

For our 6 month anniversary -- my wonderful husband sent flowers and chocolates to work.  Everyone thought they were beautiful...

 but it's the card that had everyone laughing..

"The last six months has been wonderful being with you.  Hope we can be together the rest of our lives."

Hope??? Dave says the lady at the florist was older and asked him multiple times what he wanted the card to say, but apparently she misunderstood.  We spent the evening at dinner with some friends who just got engaged.  Congrats to Kim & Brandon!!

Now that we've made it past the 6 months mark and through Thanksgiving, Dave is off in Texas working through Christmas. It sucks to be alone but he's making great money while on travel.  I look forward to getting to pick him in Atlanta and spend Christmas with his mom in Augusta.

While we are talking mushy love...  I wanted to share some of my favorite pictures from our wedding.  Judy Kay put so much time into editing our photos.. I can't thank her enough.  She had over 2,700 pictures from our wedding.... I can only imagine.  She sent us a disk with just over 2,100!!

Like I said-- these are just a few!

Pinterest Chicken Pillows

I have never been one to cook. You can ask my mom, you can ask my husband.  I never spent a whole lot of time in the kitchen growing up. I was too busy so I never really learned how to cook.  I can cook Tacos, Spaghetti, ... and brownies... and anything with directions.


But now thanks to Pinterest, I love cooking and trying new things. I have Dave sit down with me and we just search through the Food board and find things we want to try and this was one of them... Chicken Pillows.  Neither of us had ever heard of them, but Dave says it's the best thing I've ever fixed (at least thus far!)




INGREDIENTS:

1 can of 8 Pillsbury crescents (I only used 4 since it was dinner for 2)
8 oz. block of cream cheese
1/4 cup butter

Splash of Milk

1 Egg
2-3 cups shredded chicken, cooked
saltine crackers, crushed Or Bread Crumbs

TOPPING

1 can cream of chicken
sour cream (a couple spoon fulls worth)
milk
shredded cheese


Preheat oven to 400 F

Soften the butter and cream cheese. Then stir to a smooth consistency. Add cooked shredded chicken to the bowl.   I also added a little bit of cheese to the mixture. 

Before Adding Chicken

Added The Chicken

Stretch the crescent out on a cookie sheet. Place a couple spoon fulls of the creamy chicken mixture into the center of the crescent to fill it. Then fold the crescent around the mixture so that none of it is showing. I'll call this the "pillow".




In a separate smaller bowl, put the egg and a little bit of milk, maybe a couple Tablespoons worth and beat together.




Dip the "pillow" into the blended egg.

After dipping into the blended egg, proceed to dip it into the crushed saltine crackers and place on cookie sheet. Repeat for the remaining crescents.
Cook the pillows at 400 F for 20 minutes. Keep an eye on them your oven might cook them quicker.


For the Sauce Topping: 

Put can of cream of chicken and milk into a sauce pan. Add as much milk as you want to get it to the consistency you want i.e. thicker or runnier. When hot enough add 2 spoon fulls of sour cream and cheese to your liking.



The Finished Product:

Fresh Out Of The Oven

Yummy Dinner!

Thank you Chef-N-Training for your inspiration! 

Wedding Invitation Ornament

Now that the holidays are here, it's time to decorate the house for Christmas.  This year I'm actually keeping it simple -- Just lights on the porch and our stockings.  Dave is on travel for the entire month of December and we will actually be at his mom's for Christmas morning, so I didn't want to deal with the hassle of a tree on my own.  But that Doesn't mean I can't make ornaments.  I've made different ones in the past -- like printing a picture on transparence paper and putting it in the ornament, acrylic paint ornaments, etc etc.
We got some great ornaments last year at a bridal shower I had -- and I'm hoping to get an "Our First Christmas" ornament this year but I wanted a way to remember our wedding year.  Then one day on Pinterest, it appeared.  An ornament incorporating our wedding invitation!

Here is what I did thanks to another bloggers, From Glitter To Gumdrops.



I started with the invitation and using a paper cutter, cut each line of the invitation into a strip.

 From there, I took each strip and wrapped it around a pen.  I did them different ways -- wrapping it on top of each other (like seen in the photo) or wrapping down the pin to make it spiral more.

I then put the pieces in a clear glass ornament and tied it with a ribbon.

A simple project that's quick and easy to do -- but will always have a meaning to us.

Melted Crayon Art

They are all over Pinterest and they are so easy to make. We're talking about Melted Crayon Art...
Here are some that I was inspired by...

Supplies: you will need a canvas, a hot glue gun & glue stick, a hair dryer, lots of crayons and newspaper. For a 12"x12" canvas, I used one box of 64 crayons.



STEP ONE: 
Pick out the colors you want to use and organize them by colors.
Now some colors will get rejected - Like I kept out all the browns, greys & black. 
Start laying the crayons that you want to use across the board in whatever order you want, lining them up until you run out of space.



STEP TWO: 
Using a glue gun, make a line of glue across the crayons (if you want a certain part showing, like the label, be careful to put the glue on the opposite side). Quickly place onto canvas in a line, as shown below, with tips facing down.



STEP THREE:


You can choose to prop your canvas up against the wall or hold it. I held mine at an angle. I used a blow dryer on Hot & High to start the process. Every few minutes I would stop to let it dry. I would alternate between Medium & Hot. You have to experiment with your dryer to see how fast it melts the wax. 
It sometimes splatters so be sure to cover the floor and surrounding areas with newspaper.

After 3 minutes 

After about 10 Minutes

After 15 Minutes

Oddly, some of the colors melt slower than the others. You can go back and concentrate on certain areas if you like, to get the picture to look how you want it.


And that's it! You now have a colorful piece of art.  There are several different ways to do this so it's impossible to make a duplicate.

Pinterest - Oh How I love thee!!

I am so obsessed with the website Pinterest!  If you aren't familiar -- It's a website with virtual boards that allow you to organize things together that you like and it allows you to share your likes with others.

Some of the boards I have include DIY projects, Cocks & Vols  (all things Carolina & Tennessee sports), Entertaining Ideas, and the best of all -- YUMMY FOODS!!

I have found so many recipes for dinner and desserts that I've been trying and majority of them have been very delicious!  One of my favorites I wanted to share.
The only thing I would do different -- add an egg to the milk to make the base coat thicker for the cheese to stick to the chicken -- otherwise -- it's so good!

Crispy Cheddar Chicken

Time: 15 minute prep + 35 minutes baking

Yield: 7 servings

Recipe from Jamie Cooks It Up!

Chicken:

4 large chicken breasts

2 sleeves Ritz crackers

1/4 t salt

1/8 t pepper

1/2 C milk

3 C cheddar cheese, grated

1 t dried parsley

Sauce:

1   14 ounce can cream of chicken soup

2 T sour cream

2 T butter

 

1. Cut each chicken breast into 3 large chunks. 

 

2. In a small food processor grind up the ritz crackers. 

 

3. Pour the milk, cheese and cracker crumbs into 3 separate small pans or bowls. Toss the 1/4 t salt and 1/8 t pepper into the cracker crumbs and stir the mixture around to combine.

 

4. Dip each piece of chicken into the milk...

then the cheese....

and finally the cracker crumbs. 

5. Spray a 9x13 pan with cooking spray and lay the chicken inside the pan. 

6. Sprinkle the dried parsley over the chicken. 

7. Cover the pan with tin foil and bake at 400 degrees for 35 minutes. Remove the tin foil, bake for an additional 10 minutes, or until the edges of the chicken are golden brown and crispy. 

8. Into a medium sized sauce pan combine the cream of chicken soup, sour cream and butter with a whisk. Stir it over medium high heat until the sauce is nice and hot. Serve over the chicken. 

Enjoy!

From here on out -- I plan on sharing some of my Pinnterest finds so you can enjoy as well!