Showing posts with label entertaining. Show all posts
Showing posts with label entertaining. Show all posts

Saturday, March 12, 2011

A Taste of Summer

Day light savings, nice weather, a 5 mile jog/walk outside with the doggies, and some excellent sales at the Teet all led us to our very first cookout of the year!!

For the main course we mad two dishes...delicious steaks which marinated for multiple hours and also a mixture of shrimp, orange and yellow bell pepper, and a lot of onions....served over wheat rice...this was a first for us and it turned out magnifico!!!

Grilled Sweet Potato fries are quickly becoming our favorite side item.  Before grilling we mix them and let them sit in a bag with some olive oil, honey, and brown sugar!!  mmmmm soooo tasty!!

And for dessert, a very colorful fruit salad...Now if this doesn't scream summer time I am not sure what does!!!
And to top off the night we had a fun and entertaining evening with the Freudiger's.  A very competitive game of Taboo, funny stories, and a very weird alien movie made for a perfect relaxing and healthy night!!
Hunter and Rocco photo sesh, TWINSIES :)

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Enchilada Casserole

Seriously, pen and paper and start writing...this recipe is awesome, so cook it!!  AND Super Easy, which if you know me, 30 minute increments of attention to one thing is about where I max out!  This is great for feeding a group of people also, we doubled the recipe and fed 10+.

Here ya go, head to Wegmans...of course if you aren't lucky enough to be in the vicinity of a Wegmans, any grocery store will do...

Ingredients:
1 pound of lean ground beef (king substitution- 1 pound of ground chicken)
1 large chopped onion
2 cups of salsa
1 can of black beans, drained and rinsed
1/4 cup reduced fat Italian dressing - yeah I don't get it either
2 Tablespoons of reduced sodium taco seasoning
1/4 teaspoon of ground cumin
6 flour tortillas (king substitution- whole wheat tortillas)
3/4 cups of reduced fat sour cream (king's serve on the side, mainly because neither of us like sour cream)
1 cup of reduced fat shredded Mexican Cheese
1 cup of shredded lettuce
1/4 cup of fresh minced cilantro
Jalapeno Pepper (**extra King Addition)

Large Skillet: cook meat and onion over medium heat until the meat no longer has any pink. 
Stir in Salsa, beans, dressing, taco seasoning, cumin.  Place 3 tortillas in a 2-qt baking dish coated with cooking spray.  Layer with half meat mixture, sour cream, and cheese.  Repeat Layers.
 
Cover and bake at 400 degrees for 25 minutes.  Uncover and continue baking for 5-10 minutes longer until heated through.  Let stand for 5 minutes, then top with lettuce, tomato, and cilantro.
No Mexican Fiesta is complete without some Margaritas!!!  Yo Me Gusta!!!
Enchilada Casserole, Margaritas, Great Friends are the recipe for a perfect evening!!!!

Sunday, March 6, 2011

awesome rainy Sunday


Every once in a while we sure do appreciate a nice rainy day.  For me, if the sun is out I HAVE to be out and doing something and being productive.  But when the rain is coming down like it was yesterday I am very content to never leave the house, or in this case the Farrell's house.  Sonya had a great idea earlier in the week to do brunch at Clydes on Sunday, weather permitting and Eric not working we were able to go!!  Deliiiiish, if you can't tell we are kinda obsessed with Clydes.  Eric had the omlet of the day while I had eggs benedict yummmy!  We returned home in the rain, crawled back into bed for a short nap, then drove .2 miles in the pouring rain that was blowing sideways because of the crazy wind over to the Farrell's.  We had a day full of Mimosas, tv, Pretty Woman, a nap, Thai food, a CAPS victory and just plain laziness that felt great and super rejuvinating.

Saturday, January 8, 2011

Nice lil Saturday....

After a crazy busy week we figured ...why stop for the weekend.  Saturday morning we woke up bright and early to start taping our bedroom...It's painting time....

Before:

 
After we finished the first coat it was goodbye Christmas....sooo sad :(, we had such a great Christmas, stinks when you have to pack it all up...
I told ya I love love love all of your Christmas cards with pictures of your families,babies, dogs etc etc...these will remain up all year...thank you for all the other cards as well, unfortunately they don't make the fridge :)
Andddd back to painting!!!  one more coat and we are done....This is not the color we were expecting, buttttt it kinda growing on us...Kinda reminds us of yoohoo, ya know the chocolate milk???
 
 
We also had our first basketball game tonight, Chantilly Fury (our team) vs Vienna, IN ALEXANDRIA...88 miles roundtrip for this game.  We don't really need to discuss the details of the game...Whitney and I did return home to a house full of some of my favorite people, a ton of food, and a nice glass of wine :)

Sunday, December 12, 2010

Christmas Partiessss!!!

Saturday Night was packed with great friends, great times, great drinks, and great food at all parties!!!!
 
Our santa and elves pants are packed!!!  Reindeer wine in one half and Christmas Kisses in the other, these were a HUGE hit for all of the hostesses!!!


1st Stop- Chris and Cheryl's
Such a beautiful house and TREE!!!
2nd Stop- Kere and Kevin Knapps- for some reason I didn't break out my camera, but they definitely won the drink of the night award with Kere's candy cane martini's soooooo cute :)
 3rd and Final stop of the Farrell's Ye Old Christmas Party!!!!  Thank you Eric for ruining this pic....
 This might have been during the dance party....All I want for Christmas is youuuuuuuuuuu!!! 
Such a fun night!!!  I think we ended right around 3:30am, just like college haha :)  
Thank you so much to all of the hostesses and for inviting us!!  Merry Christmas!!

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

how cute are these????

This black Friday was quite the successful one.  I always try to put a lot of thought into the gifts we buy (hence why no gift cards) to make sure everyone gets the perfect gift!!  Lot's of great ideas and purchases so far but my favorite by far is the gift I got for the hostesses!!!  How cute are these??  A bottle of wine in one leg and some Christmas Hershey kisses in the other....awwwww I know :)

 $4.99 at Kirklands - Dulles Town Center

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Giving THANKS :)

This year as most years I have so much to be thankful for!!!  I have the most amazing husband that makes me laugh all day everyday!  We have a house (roof included), perfect doggies, food on the table most nights, our health for the most part, and jobs that we don't hate!  I am so very thankful!

We are super thankful for our family and friends!!  Eric and I are blessed with so many people that care about us and we care about in return.  Our families are our best friends and our best friends are our family...we love love love all of you and are so lucky to have each and every one of you in our lives!!

YAYYYYYYYYYYY It's the HOLIDAY SEASON!!!!  My most favorite time of the year!!!!

Thursday, November 18, 2010

hosting Turkey day!!!

Mom's kitchen is currently in dissaray with the new "rip up tile and put down hardwood" project going on so Thanksgiving has been moved to our house!!  I am super excited because as we all know I LOVE to host.  Not a huge group this year but a few that haven't seen our house and a few more including Grandma (must impress) who hasn't seen it in a loooooooooooong time!!!  Of course with Debs and Gma I won't be doing much cooking -thank god, so top of my list is to figure out the perfect table decorations!!  I have been searching online and come up with a few ideas, please feel free to HELP if you have any other fabulously creative ideas :)
Flowers??  not my favorite idea but they're pretty I guess...
This is an interesting idea, I already have the laterns, what if I add leaves and a candle??  Knowing me thats a recipe for a fire....


I like the pear name tags, might do this one..
too much?

Obviously I need to spend some more time finding the perfect way to decorate my table!!!

Friday, October 29, 2010

trick or treat

So far one week strong and no candy...I am wondering though why I decided to quit candy the week before Halloween, another dumb decision by Brooke. I came in to work this morning, HAPPY FRIDAY by the way, to a little trick-or-treat bag of coincidentally allllllllllll of my favorite candy!! I will not touch it, not even open the twist tie at the top and here's why:


Reese's Peanut Butter Cup
1 Package = 234 calories/12g of fat


Hot Tomales
20 pieces = 150 calories


Twix Candy Bar
1 package = 234 calories/12g of fat


Sour Twizzerls
1 package = 180 calories


Candy Corn
22 pieces = 140 calories

DOTS
1 small box = 210 calories

I would suggest a trick rather that a treat this year!!! Happy Halloween!!!

Monday, October 25, 2010

festive weekend

Started off Friday night with a pumpkin carving party, hosted by us!! All the neighbors came over with pumpkin in hand, we enjoyed chilli and hot apple cider followed by a pumpkin carving competition and ending with none other than a game of celebrities!! Photo details below...

Super yummy and not so healthy but very cute Spice Cake Cup Cakes:



Some fall foliage with the "Superb Pumpkin" trophy for the carving winner!!



We had a nice fall fire in the drive way, it was so perfect to sit around:


There was some serious carving!! But seriously I was shocked at the carving ability, wasn't
expecting that or I would have gotten more trophies haha :)



And then there were 5, the competition was so close we left it up to a facebook vote to determine the winner...


And collecting the most votes from the very un-biased facebook community was...THE REDSKIN!!!

Saturday started with a Tech blow out over Duke which was awesome! Thanks Marstin for having us over :) We had a great time, and the subs and entertainment were top notch!!

Dinner at Deb's for Mike's Bday- steak, king crab legs, shrimp, mmmmmm:) Happy Birthday Mike!!


Then A-town Bound for a fabulous Halloween Party!!!




And on Sunday the Skins won and D-Hall is the man!!! A great great great weekend filled with fam, friends, some awesome food, good times, fires, pumpkins, costumes, and fabulous football...doesn't get much better than that!!!

Monday, October 11, 2010

baking

I was never into baking, ever, or anything in the kitchen really. But I was intrigued by the footed cake platter from Crate in Barrel when we were registering, and I got it at my bridal shower (Thank you Aunt Patty). Now I can't get enough, I don't know if I just like the way it looks on the counter or what but ever since we moved into our new house I feel like I bake something at least once a week, darn sweet tooth. This past weekend we had Mom and Mike over for a cookout!! On the menu: Steak, Sweet Potato fries, squash/zuchinni, jalepeno/cheese bread, and of course my famous salad. Dinner was delicious!! Of course we couldn't put on such a production without dessert, Spice Cake it was!!! We had bought mum's/pumpkins/straw that morning, I was feeling very fall-ish and spice cake fit the theme. I traded Apple Sauce for the Oil, Egg White egg beaters for the Eggs, and voila a very tasty spice cake for almost half the calories!!