What I made for dinner

Today started off as another gray and rainy Saturday. This weather has made me so happy, I can hardly stand it! The sun peeked out about 3:00, so I went for a nice walk around the lake, and then came home to the wonderful smells of white chicken chili cooking in the crock pot. Now the sun is setting, and the sky is a beautiful mix of pinks and purples. I'm curled up on the couch with a brownie, and life is good! Here's what dinner looks like today:



1 lb of cooked shredded chicken
3 cans great northern beans
16 oz jar of picante sauce
2 cups chicken broth
2 cups of monterey jack cheese

Combine all ingredients except the cheese into a crock pot. Cook on high for 4 hours or on low for 8 hours. Add cheese for the last 15 minutes.

And for dessert:



And, for an added bonus today, here's a picture from my walk last night around the lake. I loved how the trees were perfectly reflected in the water. I love how every time I walk out there it looks different. I'm excited to collect year round pictures of the changing seasons on the lake!

Thank you!

So, it would seem that God listened to my whiny-ness earlier this week and cooled the weather down for me. It took a couple days, but we just had a big rainstorm that dropped the temperature from 78 degrees to 66 degrees in about a half hour. Much better! We're supposed to stay cool now for the next week. Maybe I can go back to snuggling under my covers at night again.

Here's a picture of the lake a couple days ago during my walk. The trees haven't started to change just yet, but I'm sure they will soon!


In other news, I'm trying to figure out if I can pull off wearing my super high over the knee socks to work tomorrow. They're bright pink and dark blue striped. So far, I've decided that my long khaki skirt will look great with them, but I can't seem to figure out a good top... If I pull something together I'll post some pictures!

It's not fair!

Today I am using this space to pout a little :( All weekend long we had beautiful, gray and rainy weather. The temperature didn't get out of the 50's and it was wonderful! Last night, I curled up in bed under all my covers, and I loved it. I started wearing my slippers around the house, and got out my favorite pair of pajama pants. I made comfort food for dinner and snuggled up on the couch with a blanket. I was in heaven! Then today, we had a high of 89 and it was humid, not fair! I have no idea how the weather managed to change that fast, but I liked it better the way it was, thank you very much! Right now it is still 83 degrees outside and the sun is setting. There is no way I'll be able to open my windows tonight and the air conditioning is bound to turn on any minute now. I suppose I'll just have to stop complaining and deal with it, but I was blissfully happy with the promise of fall weather this weekend. It will be here soon enough, and I'm sure I'll be complaining about the cold and snow before long. Until then, I'm anxiously waiting for the next cooler day!

What I made for dinner, plus a few extras

This weekend, the temperature has been in the 50's and it's been gray and rainy, the perfect fall weather! In honor of my favorite kind of day, I decided to make the ultimate comfort food for dinner tonight. This is one of my very favorite recipes:

1 lb ground beef
1 1/2 cups water
1 packet brown gravy
2 medium potatoes, chopped
1 medium onion, sliced
1 or 2 carrots, chopped
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Brown the ground beef until no longer pink, drain
Return to skillet and add water until boiling
Stir gravy into pan and cook for about 2 minutes
Add potatoes, onions and carrots
Cover and cook for 10-15 minutes, stirring occasionally until veggies are tender
Add cheese and cook for 3-5 minutes longer

In other news, I bought a papasan chair yesterday! Now I can finally enjoy my downstairs family room. There's still not much there, but at least I can curl up in my comfy new chair with a good book. Here it is:


I was also so excited to wear the first sweater of the season today! This is my new sweater that I bought a couple weeks ago. This isn't the greatest pictures, so you'll have to use your imagination :)

A pretty sunset

I almost wrote "beautiful sunset" as the title of this post, but really, there is no more beautiful of a sunset than a Colorado sunset, so, sorry Nebraska, you'll never measure up :) But, tonight's sunset really is pretty. We had some thunderstorms this afternoon, which always leads to pretty colors afterwards. Check out the views from my back porch:

What I made for dinner

Cheesy Chicken and Salsa Skillet

The picture on the website looks much more colorful than my picture :) I also used a pasta variety since I had several boxes of "almost gone" pasta that I wanted to use up. It tastes yummy though!

What I made for dinner

Several of the blogs I've been reading post a regular topic like "what I wore today" or "picture of the week" so I've decided to add my own "what I made for dinner." I'll probably post this on Sunday's as that's when I usually make a big meal, but given the holiday, I decided to cook tonight. Here's a picture of dinner:



Cheesy Tortellini

1 package of whole wheat tortellini (I used Buitoni's)
1 can chicken broth
1 cup water
4 oz nuefchatel cheese
3/4 cup shredded Italian cheese blend

Bring chicken broth and water to a boil. Add tortellini and boil for 8 minutes or until tender. Do not drain (although I drained a little because I didn't want it to be too runny). Add cream cheese and cook 2-3 minutes longer or until cheese is melted. Remove from head and add shredded cheese.

Super easy and super yummy! I also added a salad with broccoli, carrots, and fresh garden grown green peppers! I topped my salad with cashews and balsamic vinaigrette dressing. I also added a slice of sourdough bread on the side. I found a mini sourdough loaf at Target for $ 0.50!! Perfect size for me!

Anticlimactic weekend

I apparently have not had much to say on this blog recently! Life has been busy with the start of a new preschool year, visits from mom and dad, and just keeping up with stuff in general. I have finally made it to my long awaited 3-day weekend, and I was so excited for the extra day off. It seems like such a novelty to have 3 days off in a row where I'm not traveling somewhere, and I couldn't wait for it to arrive. I had a fantastic day yesterday enjoying the beautiful fall weather, having breakfast at Panera and doing a little shopping. I even bought a super cute new sweater for winter! I'll post pics later. I decided to take a walk yesterday afternoon around the lake, and thought I would go all the way around the lake this time. All I've done up until now is walk a ways and then turn around and come back. I figured it couldn't be that hard, right? Wrong! I'm not sure how far I walked, but I do know that after an hour of brisk walking I still wasn't home. It ended up taking an hour and 15 minutes to walk the whole thing! It was a beautiful walk, but I don't think I'll be doing it often :) I was feeling a little sneezy last night, and chalked it up to allergies from my marathon walk. Turns out I was wrong, today the cold is in full swing. Major BOO! So instead of my relaxing weekend plans of coffee shops, walks and other pleasant things, I am exchanging that for tissues, zinc tablets, actifed and general yuckiness. I know I should be grateful that I have tomorrow off work so that I can rest and hopefully recover a bit before the week starts, but I'm just really disappointed. Of all weekends, this one?? No fair! I suppose I could have predicted this though, we've had lot of sick little one's at preschool in the last 2 weeks. Here's hoping this will be a speedy recovery!