how right we were

Catching up on some memories here. Two months ago in May John and I celebrated 6 years of marriage.  We went to Nashville and ate our way through some bucket list items.  We finally got to try Tom and Chee which was a Shark Tabk favorite, one of our all time favorite shows.  John bought me a bouquet of flowers right off of a flower truck and we purchased some lemonade from some kids selling it on the side of the road.  

He had the fun idea to pack light and then to each get an outfit head to toe, it was a pretty fun idea!

 I just can't get over how much I love collecting years with him.  Each one is better than the last and I'm not sure how he manages to do it but I am still learning stories about him.  I thought I might know it all but he seems to save back details and stories here and there, I love it.  He makes me laugh HARD just about every day.  I am astounded by his work ethic and his devotion to school, I know he is trying so hard to lay a solid foundation for our family's future. He is so kind to me and just about the easiest person to get along with.  

We like to remember back to the night we drove out to my parents house for him to ask my dads permission to marry me. He wore a weird sweater that I'd never seen him wear before or since.  He was nervous and my dad gave him a hard time but eventually said yes. When we left that night we both shut our car doors and looked at each other and squealed at the top of our lungs and said, "this is going to be so fun! We have so much good ahead!" And we were right, we had no idea how right we really were.

I love him and I respect him and I like him. 

Happy 6 years my love, can't wait for what's to come for us. 

cauliflower crust pizza

 Many of you asked about the recipie for this Cauliflower Crust Pizza.  I'm sure you could find many recipies all over the Internet but I based mine off of Paula Deens recipie.  I made one small change though.  Which I'll share down below.

Ever since my sister inlaw visited back in January and introduced me to Cauliflower rice, I always keep a head of cauliflower on hand.  We make the rice about once a week and use it for a side with meals or we put it in to a whole wheat tortilla with fresh sliced peppers, pepper jack cheese, and some light ranch.   So since I was feeding the missionaries last week and I had a head of cauliflower I needed to use up I decided to try an experiment and make cauliflower crust pizza.  Besides, who better to try out food experiments on than hungry 19 year old boys.  Plus they have to eat whatever you fix, I'm pretty sure that's a mission rule.  

It turned out great! I actually really loved it and it is such a better alternative when those pizza cravings hit.  We topped ours with turkey pepperoni, roasted squash, zucchini, and yellow and red peppers.

Cauliflower Crust

Process 1 medium size cauliflower head in food processor until finely grated.

Microwave for 6 minutes.

Let it cool for about 10 minutes then stir in 1 egg, 1 cup shredded mozzarella, and 2 tablespoons Parmesan cheese. Add salt and pepper to taste.  I also added 1 tablespoon milled flax seed.

Spread crust out on a baking sheet and pre cook at 425 without toppings for 12 minutes.  Take it out and add your sauce cheese and toppings and then cook again until cheese is melted and bubbly.

I've made this two times. The second time I didn't let the cauliflower cool all the way from when I microwaved it and it was definitely a fork pizza.  The first time I made the pizza when it cooled from coming out of the oven we were able to eat it by picking it up.  All in all it was an experiment gone well!

kale, carrot, chickpea, & ham soup

This soup turned out better than I ever thought it would be! I had several requests for the recipe so here it is for you folks!

I have been trying my hand at finding uses for my leftover pulp from juicing.  So far I have made bread, fiber chews, and vegetable broth out of the pulp.  The broth is by far my favorite thing to do with it.  

I think part of the reason it is so satisfying is because I get use out of my fruits and vegetables THREE times.  1st time: juicing  2nd time: soup broth 3rd time: compost.  We are going to have some great soil to use in our garden this year.

I save about 4 days worth of juice pulp.  This weeks collection included pulp from carrots, beets, kale, spinach, ginger, red and green apples, lemon, yellow peppers, and celery.  I dumped all of it in to a pot and put 2 parts water to one part pulp.  Then I added garlic, bay leaves, cumin, red pepper flakes and salt and set it on medium-low heat to simmer for about an hour.

When it was done I strained the broth from the leftover pulp in to another pot and pressed it down and let it drip for about 30 minutes to make sure I got as much as I could.  Then I dumped the remaining pulp outside in our compost pile.

The night before I made Kale Chips with some Mrs. Dash chipotle seasoning and coconut oil.  Right after they came out of the oven they were amazing!  But I must not have stored them properly because come morning they were a bit soft again.  In an effort not to let any of our produce go to waste I decided to use them in the soup.

In to the big pot I combined the broth, the kale chips, 4 sliced carrots, 2 cups diced ham (leftover from our weekend dinner with my dad!), 1 package of lipton soup mix, and 1 can of organic chickpeas and some spices.  I let it simmer for about 40 minutes until the carrots were soft. 

We were shocked at how delicious it was and even my two year old ate up the kale, chickpeas, and carrots and had it all again for lunch today!

Recipe:  Kale, Carrot, Chickpea, and Ham Soup

8 cups of juicer pulp vegetable broth. (see recipe above) or other vegetable broth

4 large chopped carrots

6 stalks chopped kale

1 can organic chickpeas

1 package Lipton soup mix

1 tbsp Mrs Dash Chipotle seasoning

2 tsp chicken stock granules\

2 cups chopped cubed ham

Combine all and simmer about 40 minutes or until carrots are soft.

on the night before you were not born

Saturday night my sister and her husband were in town.  We were all sitting around and I happened to come upon a post on Baby Center that mentioned Scalini's famous labor inducing eggplant parmasean. Remembering that a friend had recently mentioned it to me as well I thought I'd look it up.  Low and behold it was 12 miles from our house! It didn't take much convincing for me to get Bekah to agree to go out with me at 8:30 on a Saturday to eat this famous dish. 

Rumour has it that over 300 women have gone in to full blow labor and delivered their babies within 48 hours of eating this dish. Being that I'm over 41 weeks pregnant at this point, I'll try almost anything!

So we went and it was a complete blast. Our waitress was amazing.  She said her sister ate the eggplant when she was due and went in to labor 30 minutes after.  She said there are some nights where all of the tables she is waiting on are full of only pregnant women and their husbands.  

The restaurant is full of pictures of babies and testimonials of the eggplant.  If you deliver your baby within 48 hours of eating it then you get a gift card for the restaurant and your baby gets a Scalini's onsie.

They have a baby book there that you sign if you eat the eggplant and according to the book I was the 10th pregnant lady there that night! And as my sister and I left there was another one walking in right in front of us for the eggplant.

Man I want that onsie...10 hours until my deadline is up.

apple picking

This past Friday Evie and I went apple picking with my mom at her husband's house.  We picked Yates and Fuji's.  My mom rode us around in their four wheeler and I would stand up in it and hand down the apples I picked for Evie to put in the bucket. She wanted to eat them straight off of the tree, so we let her.  That night I made two lattice top apple pies from scratch.  It doesn't get more homemade than apples right out of the backyard and a homemade buttery flakey crust with Plugra butter.  

I just love that fall is creeping in.  The mornings are perfect here but by 3 it's normally 79 or 80 degrees.  I'm so excited for when it cools down for good.  I love that October starts tomorrow.  That means so many good things are coming: my birthday, General Conference, holidays, fall weather, oh and WE ARE HAVING A BABY!  This could be the week!

Here are some polaroids from our apple picking.

vanilla italian soda

This weekend we tried to soak up the last bits of summer.  John and Evie and I had a pool day on Saturday and then when he got her down for a nap he said, "Why don't you go to Target and get a new maternity shirt and do some shopping!"  OK!   So I did just that but before coming home I stopped to get us a summer treat to sip on the porch as the sun went down.  I am ashamed to say I had to resist from buying a cinnamon broom though.  Even though I am craving fall, it can wait a little while longer.  I learned this fun trick from a girl from my church at our playgroup last week.

Vanilla Italian Soda:

Torani Flavor Syrup (any flavor)

Club Soda 

Half & Half

Ice

Fill up a big mason jar up to the 12oz line with ice.

Pour in Torani syrup to the 4oz line.

Add club soda to just under the 16oz line.

Splash in just a bit of half and half to top it off to the 16oz line.  Then stir it all up.

I was able to get the Vanilla flavor at Kroger but there are a lot more options for different flavors at World Market.

Enjoy your last moments of summer!

farmers market and a little update

This past weekend my little family and I went the the Buford Highway Farmers Market.  It was such a treat.  Evaleigh camped out in front of the European chocolate for a long time.  John and I came home with Mexican spices and soda and Finnish chocolate. It was a fun day.

The past week or so Evie has been pretty sick. We ended up in the ER yesterday and it was so scary for us both.  After some X-rays and tests they concluded everything was fine and that it's just a fierce and stubborn intestinal bug.  I hated seeing my little girl so scared and sick.  We are going to take it easy the next few days and recover.

pop pop pop

Last night I finally made these Jalapeno Cream Cheese Crescent Poppers. (pin here)  They were mind blowing awesome.  I mean crazy cream cheesy goodness with buttery flaky biscuits awesome. Then tonight I made Brunswick stew and I made them again.  I did not regret it.

You won't either.

I mean, you should probably go make them right now.

Like now.

GO!

a revival of an old favorite and a pretty darn great weekend

This was just about the best weekend I've had in a while.

Friday my sister and her husband came over and we all stayed up talking til 1:30.  I love them and I am going to miss them so much when they are in Augusta (good luck on your interview Joe!)

Saturday I got to take a two hour nap with my little and then we all showered up and went to see The Avengers at the dollar theater (well they all did, I had a wiggly baby so I went to Goodwill and bought a few blazers.)

Then we went to the fair.  It was SO much fun.  Daddy won a bat and a little dolphin for EJ. (We won't go in to the humiliating details of the basketball game that Mr. Murphy played.  Those carnies will get you every time.)  We had foot long corndogs, a deep fried Snickers, and an elephant ear in all of its fried glory.

Then Sunday after church we brought to Fender system and guitar outside on the porch and soaked in the fall wind and played music while eating chips and salsa with my mom and watching Evie roll around on a blanket.  We also layed out under a tree in the front yard and watched the hummingbirds enjoy the last bit of the feeders.  They will be migrating in a week or two.

After EJ went to sleep Mr. Murphy and I caught up on some of our favorite shows and then played "1-2-3 Come and Jump on me!".  It was a revival of an old favorite.  I love that man and our amazing weekend. 

lace cupcakes

Yesterday I had a little party over at my house for a few ladies.  My sweet Evaleigh slept through the entire party despite the 10 spirited children making ruckus downstairs!  I made these lace dusted cupcakes and they turned out pretty good!

All you do is place a piece of lace over the cupcake and sift powdered sugar on top of it.

The recipie I used was:

1 box devils food cake mix

a half box of vanilla pudding mix

cup and a half chocolate chips

Follow the recipie on the cake box. (except if it calls for 3 eggs, that's just crazy. Mine did so I only used two.). Mix all ingredients together. Then bake according to the box!

(If anyone local is interested in coming to our monthly Pinterest groups, send me an email!)

pin idea here