All About the Cheese

Guess what I have for you tonight?
A new recipe for you to try!

When I find a new recipe that my family loves,
I totally get excited. Maybe a little too excited.
Is that weird?

Well, anyway.

My lovely friends, this cheesy recipe is:
fabulous,
very filling,
and
most importantly,
good for you.
So, I just had to share it with you.

Anybody out there love cheese as much as I do?
Oh gracious, I probably love it a little too much.
Anyway, when I was looking through new recipes
to try out, I saw the word "cheese"
and that was it, I was sold.

Let me just show you what we had for dinner tonight:



Yummy! It was oh so good. And healthy!
Oh yeah, I already said that.

You know what else is great about this recipe?
It takes 25 minutes to prepare and cook.
Are you sold?

I can assure you, if you are a cheese-lover
like me, you will love this recipe.

------------------

Broccoli & cheese Soup
(servings: 4; Weight Watchers Points: 4 per serving)

You will need:

-2 tsp olive oil
- 1/2 cup(s) onion(s)
-16 oz frozen chopped broccoli
- 29 oz canned chicken broth
- 4 oz Kraft Velveeta Light Reduced-Fat Cheese
- 1/2 cup(s) fat-free skim milk
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1/2 cup(s) water
- 1/4 cup(s) cornstarch

How to:

1. Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat.
Add onion and cook 3 minutes, until soft. Add broccoli
and broth and bring to a boil; reduce heat to medium
and simmer 3 minutes, until broccoli is tender.

2. Reduce heat to low, add cheese and stir until
cheese melts; stir in milk and garlic powder.

3. Whisk together water and cornstarch. Add mixture
to pan and simmer 2 minutes, until thick. Serve hot.
Yields about 1 1/2 cups per serving.

Easy, easy! Now it's your turn.

------------------

Josh wanted to add jalapenos to part of the recipe,
because he wanted to add a little zing to the soup.
So, I split the recipe in half, and added a
chopped jalapeno {without the seeds!} in with the onion.

And, I have to admit
{since I kept telling Josh how gross that would be},
it was a good addition to the recipe.
Very, very yummy!
But it was a little too spicy for me, so I stuck
to the regular boring ol' broccoli & cheese soup.

And, Noah, he was diggin' the soup.
He finished a whole bowl of it!

Hope you and your family enjoy it as much as we did!

Mother's Day

Early Sunday morning while we were getting ready
for church, I heard Josh tell Noah, "Give your card to Mommy."
I look down the hallway, and there comes little Noah
with a card in his hand.

Of course he took a detour and walked around the living
room a couple of times before he actually brought it to me. It was so funny!

I loved my Mother's Day card from Noah.
It was too cute, so I of course I wanted to show it off.
It said:

Noah even signed his own name for Mommy!
Melt my heart.

It was really funny though, because Noah
didn't quite keep his end of the bargain.
He was the wildest little monkey I've ever seen,
and refused to nap all day long.

I guess he just wanted to spend some
quality time with me on Mother's Day.
Thank you little monkey for entertaining
Mommy all afternoon. I loved spending
it with you.

And, Josh, well he got me a card too.
But you really don't want to know what
it said. Trust me.

Happy Mother's Day

I love you my sweet Noah.
You make my heart happy.



You, my precious child, are my pride and joy.
The reason I celebrate this day.

"Children are a gift from the Lord;
they are a reward from him."
Psalm 127:3

Noah, you are indeed a gift from the Lord.

-------------

Happy Mother's Day!
Hope it is a very special day for all of you.

Meet the Parents...with Swagger

Apparently these videos have been out for quite some time, so many of you may have seen them already. I just saw them for the first time a couple of days ago. I guess I've been hiding under a rock or something. Anyway, they are just too good to not pass along to all of you parents out there.



I just can't stop laughing. Oh my. But this next one has to be my favorite. Brace yourself. It is funnnnny!



Ohh mmmm geeeee. I love it.



Oh and P.S., we are in 2nd place for the "Awesomest Overall Blog" right now {darn!}, so every vote counts! We aren't too far behind, but we are gonna need a lot more votes to get ahead. If you haven't noticed already I have a pretty button you can click at the top right corner of the blog, which will take you directly to the voting page. Please click and vote {one vote per computer} if you haven't already. Voting ends on Monday May 10th. Thank you again and again! We appreciate your support.

Kansas City Part 1

Kansas City is gorgeous. I fell in love with the place. If Texas didn't hold my heart in its hands, I would move there in an instant. Instead I'll just be a frequent visitor of the beautiful city and enjoy it that way. I'm sure Abby and Bibi wouldn't mind sharing a bed with me. Right Abs?

About a week or two ago, Noah and I flew for a short visit to Kansas City to do a little wedding planning with my sister Abby. And my momma came too! The only person missing from our fun trip was our littlest sis, Megan. I guess school kind of is a priority over vacation right now. Missed ya Megan!

The morning we left, Josh drove me and the little guy to the airport. We got there a little early, so we had breakfast at Chili's there. Yeah, I know. Weird. I didn't know Chili's served breakfast, but I guess the one at the airport does. Anyway, we finished eating, gave Daddy a kiss, and were on our way. Of course I was a little nervous about flying alone with Noah, because you just never know with a toddler. The last time we flew, Josh was with us, and Noah was so good. He sat between us in his own seat and barely made a peep. And not one tear fell. It was a wonderful, easy trip.

So I had nothing to worry about, right? Wrong!

I stood in line waiting to board the plane repeating in my head, "Everything will be fine. Just breathe. It will be ok." The whole time I was sweating bullets, partly because I was nervous about flying solo with the little one, but mainly because I was trying to hold both my bag and a chunky little monkey at the same time. I'm sure I was a site to see. Ah, the joys of flying with children. I'm sure many of you have some fun stories to tell.

Finally, they called for boarding. Yay! I was relieved and just ready to find a seat at this point. We gave the overly-smiley flight attendant our ticket and headed towards the plane to board. Noah was doing good up to this point, and I was starting to relax a bit. Maybe this flight would be easy.

That's where I was wrong.

As soon as we stepped foot on the plane Noah starts bawling. There wasn't a face in the plane who wasn't looking our way. Some faces were sympathetic as they said, "Aww poor baby" and others, well, you can imagine their faces. They were just thrilled. They were the people who don't have kids. Josh used to be one of those people before we had Noah. I used to tell him all the time, "You just wait, some day you will understand."

So, I walked ran down the aisle as fast as I could to find a seat. Some guy in front of me was walking as slow as he possibly could. I seriously almost knocked him down. I mean come on man, I have a screaming toddler in my arms. Can we get to our seats before Christmas?

We finally got to an empty seat. Three empty seats! Thank the Lord. But Noah didn't want his own seat this time, so he remained in my lap. I sat there holding Noah praying he would calm down and also praying no one would sit next to me. It was actually pretty funny watching people hurry by our row of seats, like we had the plague or something. Not many people want to brave sitting next to a parent with a child--especially one that is crying. The people passing by us started getting less and less, and I thought we were good to go. I would be able to stretch out and not have to worry about Noah pulling off the wig of an old lady sitting next to us.

Of course, as soon as I started dreaming about how wonderful a seat to ourselves would be, I hear in a deep voice, "Do you mind if I sit here?" I looked up, a bit surprised, to see a tall, McDreamy-looking guy {sorry Josh} in a nice suit about to sit down next to us. There were plenty of other seats around us. Why was he sitting down next to us? I mean did he not see the crying child on my lap? I'm sure the look on my face was priceless as I said, "Sure." Come to find out he had a daughter about the same age as Noah. He was a parent himself. He understood how difficult it can be to travel with a little one. At this point, Noah was still crying. He quickly turned his phone on to show Noah a picture of his little girl, thinking that might help. Nope. Noah started crying even harder. We exchanged a few words and then nothing was said the rest of the flight.

To make a long story short {well I guess that's not really true since I've just about written a novel}, Noah calmed down almost as soon as we got into the air. And he was so good for most of the flight.

Anyway, we finally arrived in Kansas City. Noah was calm and happy, and I was finally starting to relax a little myself. I guess the guy next to us thought it was safe to chat so he striked up a conversation and we started talking about things our kiddos are into, like to eat, etc. You know, things only parents talk about.

In all seriousness, I was so thankful for his kindness and understanding that day. I was stressed. Deep down I was wishing I had some help. God provided exactly what I needed: a parent who could relate with me. God is so good.

Well, looks like I will have to continue our trip to Kansas City another day. And I promise that post will have lots & lots of pictures!

Have a fabulous day, my friends!



p.s. Happy birthday to my sweet Nana! I love you so much and hope you have a wonderful birthday! We are looking forward to seeing you and Roger this Saturday.

We have a Winner!

I'm sure you guys are ready to know who won the Gussy Giveaway, right?

So without further ado, the lucky winner of the $30 credit to Gussy's store is...

Mindy!

Congratulations lady! Email me and we will get you hooked up.

Thanks everyone for participating in this fun Giveaway!

Also, if you entered into the contest and would like to check to make sure you were included in the drawing, you can click the button below:



Note: Make sure you actually click the word "search" after placing your name in the box.

Giveaways sure are fun! We will have to do this again soon.

Have a wonderful evening!