Gummy

This is what I'm drinking tonight. You know, to get the creative juices flowing?

I'm completely loyal to Pinnacle Vodka now that they have a full selection of flavored vodkas and many, many recipes. My favorite is cotton candy, although I hear making strawberry shortcake martinis are to die for! 

Martinis are so chic, and can be created in any number of combinations. I'm not the type to drink regularly or in excess, but when I do have a drink, I want it to be something I really love!

For a full list of recipes, click here (as long as you're 21 years old or over!).

What's your favorite martini?

Eat up!

The only way to eat yogurt...yum!

Happy Saturday!

I always make a special breakfast on Saturday mornings, and I think today was the finest: cinnamon french toast smothered in butter and syrup and topped with strawberries and blackberries. Delicious!

Easter Egg Hunt

I love holidays, like Easter, not only because I get to smoosh and kiss my adorable nieces and nephew, but I get to see all of my brothers, sisters, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, too! It's so much fun to document the kidlets during the holidays and to preserve these memories for them. I guess that's why most of my holiday pictures are of them. Plus, the adults don't usually like their pictures taken (although sometimes I get their photo anyway via sneak attack). 

 The kids participated in the Annual Easter Egg Hunt. At first the babies didn't really understand it, but then they figured it all out and had a blast!

 Livi points out an egg...still unsure whether she should pick it up or not.

 Aidan kept Aunt Kelly on her toes!

 Lucy & Seth hunted, too!

 The adults sit around and watch.

 5 generations

 Grandpa points out a frog croaking in the pool to Aidan.

 And I made a coconut cream pie, which looked perfect the night before...but I found out that I should make it the day I serve it, because condensation formed while it was in the fridge and it ran everywhere! Regardless, it was the first time I tried (and did it successfully) to temper an egg and to create a meringue.

I hope you all had a wonderful and blessed Easter!

Mix & Match

Do you ever have one of those weeks (or months) where you're just praying, "God, please get me through this!" It's been a rough week already & is only about to get more stressful. I just want to crash, but I know I've got to keep moving.

So I went to the store with my brand new Eco Bags, which I purchased on Amazon. They were totally worth the money!

And I filled them with things like......

Cotton candy pudding...

and my eyeballs nearly fell out of my head when I saw the mix and match beer option at my local Kroger store! For something like $8.50 I was able to pick my own beer selection, and for a snobbish beer drinker like me on a day when I desperately needed a beer, this was a terrific surprise.

 But the whole reason for going to the store was to get salad supplies for tonight's dinner. I was planning on using a recipe that I found on familyfreshcooking.com, but I had to substitute a few items. First, instead of the $7/package pine nuts, I toasted in olive oil some almonds that I had in the cupboard.

 I topped the spinach leaves with cherry tomatoes, which is tasty in itself.

 After toasting the almonds slightly, I threw some golden raisins in the pan for a few seconds. Pour the sizzling goodness on top of the spinach leaves, then I topped with freshly grated Dublin cheese, a little balsamic dressing and pepper, and that's dinner!

Will You Be My Valentine?

A lot of people plan weeks, maybe even months ahead, to make reservations at a fancy restaurant for Valentine's Day with their loved one. But not Aaron and me! We don't technically celebrate Valentine's Day because it's too commercialized, but somehow these gifts just happen to appear for each other on that exact day. Instead of dining with 50 other strangers, we prefer to cook something special and eat at home, just the two of us.

I bought Aaron something he had wanted from the antique store. Do you know what it is?

Antique ski poles, of course!

I came home to the lovely surprise of Aaron cooking and nearly finished with the entire meal.

Jumbo shrimp...

and delicious cheeses (I am a cheese fanatic, and so is Aaron).

Homemade German Potato Salad. Aaron makes it the best. You're really missing out if you've never experienced it.

We also had bratwurst smothered in sauerkraut. Yummy!

I bought some delicious pink champagne and strawberries, and since Aaron doesn't like champagne, I had it all to myself.

What a lovely surprise! I collect coins, although I haven't been much in practice lately. My wonderful and thoughtful husband bought me a Bavarian coin from 1911. It is so amazing, and I love to think of all the people who used this coin. Perhaps it was originally owned by a Bavarian dirndl maker or yodeler or something else terrific. Just think of all the hands it's passed through from 1911 to 2011....100 years of sellers and purchasers and different people around the world.

And to finish off the night, I still (amazingly enough) had room for some molten chocolate lava cake.

(Click here for the recipe. Not the recipe I used, because I can't find that one. But it's still close.)

Seriously, does life get any better?