Recipe Roundup

When Reagan and I first started dating, we were both in Waco for the summer. The summer was pretty low-key, and we cooked dinner together almost every night. Before that summer I had baked the occasional cupcakes and helped my mom in the kitchen every now and then. However, I credit those couple of months with me learning how to actually cook a meal that someone else wants to eat.

Here's a recipe roundup of our favorite meals:

Cajun Chicken and Rice
Crockpot Taco Chicken Chili
Buffalo Chicken Soup
BBQ Chicken Enchiladas
Homemade Pizza
Filet Mignon with Balsamic Glaze
Sausage Pinwheels

And anything from this Taste of Home cookbook...

I got this as a wedding gift, and it is hands down the best cookbook ever. No recipe is too complicated or time consuming. Nothing calls for obscure ingredients that no one owns. A few of our favorites include BBQ Meatballs and Maple Ginger Pork Chops. Yuuummmm.

Now get to cookin'! Pin It

Slow Cooker Butternut Squash & Apple Soup

Sounds interesting, right? Ninety-nine percent of the time Reagan loves what I cook. The other one percent stems from a time I cooked a butternut squash. Reagan tried to force himself to eat dinner before saying he "wasn't hungry." Um, yeah right.

Reagan was out of town last week competing in a national moot court competition, so I decided to try out this butternut squash recipe from Clean Eating Chelsey.

Slow Cooker Butternut Squash and Apple Soup
Makes: 8 cups
Difficulty: Easy
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 6 hours
Total Time: 6 hours and 15 minutes

• 3 pound butternut squash
• 2 granny smith apples, peeled and diced
• 1 medium yellow onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 4 cups vegetable broth
• 1 cup water
• salt and pepper to taste
• nutmeg and cinnamon to taste

Directions: Begin by peeling your butternut squash with a vegetable peeler. Once peeled, cut into 1 inch chunks and place in a slow cooker. Next, peel and dice your apples – toss them in the slow cooker along with the diced onion and minced garlic cloves. Add your vegetable broth and water. Cover and heat on low for 6 hours. When 6 hours have passed, transfer your soup to a blender and puree until smooth. Season with salt, pepper, cinnamon, and nutmeg to taste.

If you can get over the fact that the soup has the consistency of baby food, it's pretty tasty.

Oh, and Reagan's team won the competition and is headed to Chicago for nationals in a month. You could say I'm proud of my favorite (future) lawyer! Pin It

DVF for Kids

I have seen Gap tweeting about Diane von Furstenberg for Gap Kids for a couple of weeks now. I saw these pictures today, and I am obsessed! Thank goodness my nephew isn't a girl; I could go nuts buying these adorable clothes.







You can see all these pictures and more here.  Too cute, right??
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For the Dream Home

This weekend I'm headed to my parents house to hang out with them while Reagan is out of town. My mom is re-decorating her bedroom and has enlisted my help. This is interesting because it's a well known fact that I am the least creative girl in our family. My mom and Brooklynn have received many picture messages of me standing in a store holding two lamps saying, "I need help."  In any case, I agreed to do some research (on Pinterest, of course) and find some inspiration. My research turned into pinning-for-my-future-dream-home.

There's more where that came from on my Pinterest board. Hopefully this weekend will result in a decorating success! Pin It

The Wedding Days Are Gone

I officially unsubscribed from all the wedding blogs in my Google Reader this week. After a year of reading, planning, crunching numbers, pulling my hair out, crying, and laughing, my wedding planning days are officially over. Notice, it took me almost two months to get the wedding business off my mind. (Put down the wedding magazine Allison....)

I always knew I'd be that girl who obsessed over every detail and aspect of her wedding day. Over the course of mine and Reagan's engagement, however, I realized that the wedding is a tiny part of our story as a couple. Our wedding weekend was probably one of the most fun times of my life, and we felt more than blessed to have everyone we love in the same place, at the same time to celebrate our marriage.  That being said - it was just a weekend.

I thought it would be sad when my days as a bride ended, but I felt the opposite. It was much more exciting to be relaxing in Jamaica with a husband. (That still sounds weird...) It's also pretty exciting to be married to your best friend.

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Real World Fridays

The biggest adjustment to entering the "real world" for me has been Fridays. Starting work at 8 a.m.? No problem. Wearing business clothes every day? Not that bad. No studying and getting a paycheck? I definitely like that.

Working until 5 p.m. every Friday? Boooo.

Freshman year of college you are still in the "5 day week" mindset. Junior year? The weekend starts on Thursday. By the time senior year rolls around, you are mentally checked out on Wednesday. So, when I started my full-time job I came to the realization that Fridays aren't the days I get to shop with my friends and catch up on the DVR.

Reagan, on the other hand, conveniently doesn't have class on Friday, so I give him a death glare every Friday morning at 8:10 a.m. 7:50 a.m. when I'm running out the door.

I hope someone out there can sympathize with that anxious Friday feeling. I normally end up drinking ten cups of coffee, listening to Pandora way too loud, and walking laps around my office building to keep from going stir crazy.

Happy Friday!


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Look who's visiting...

My favorite six month old is coming to Lubbock tonight! Pin It

Life in Lubbock

ESPN posted this article yesterday spotlighting Baylor's "home turf" of Waco. The article definitely made me miss Waco, and made me even more proud to be a Baylor alum. While I haven't visited Waco near enough since I graduated, living in Lubbock has its perks.

When I headed off to Baylor almost five years ago, I never dreamed in 10 million years that I would move back to the West Texas area. That's what happens when you meet a cute boy in college. Granted, I grew up in New Mexico, but Lubbock was the "big city" where we came to shop, watch college sports, and attend concerts.

Don't get me wrong, I would LOVE to be in Central Texas where almost all of my friends live. However, Reagan is here, so Lubbock is home. For those of you who have never (and probably will never) live in Lubbock, here's an idea of what Lubbock life is like.

·        Its 90 miles from my hometown. After living in Waco for four years, it is so nice to live close to my family again. Reagan and I get a lot of free dinners from my parents this way. Not to mention, I have a nephew that I love to spoil!

·        It's not humid. I think I've had more good hair days in the past eight months than I did my entire four years in Waco.

·        It's a college town. If I'm completely honest, Lubbock has more of a "college town" vibe than Waco. Everyone here eats, sleeps, and breathes Texas Tech. There are hole-in-the-wall restaurants, concerts, free activities, tons of young people, and plenty collegiate sporting events to watch.

·        There is no traffic. I'll say it again. There is no traffic. None. Even when all 30,000 students return from summer vacation, it doesn't take more than eight minutes to get to work.

·        Lubbock is our first home. It seems that Lubbock is mine and Reagan's own little world. We made friends, found a church, got married, and first lived together here.  Wherever we move from here, Lubbock will always be special for that reason!

Now that I’ve confessed that I actually like living here, I will tell you – we are always those people wearing green and gold on Friday’s. Sic ‘em.

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