Hey all!!
Well, these past few weeks have been eventful. We've been taking advantage of sunny days with friends complete with lots of food (and drinks!), and this past weekend we loaded up the crew and headed down to Port Aransas for Sandfest 2011. We had so much fun!! It was very relaxing, the weather was gorgeous, the company was great, and the sandcastles were awesome. It was one of those weekends where I just kept telling myself, "I don't want this to end" and "I wish it could last another day." Although the next festival isn't for another year, we're all looking forward to heading down there for a weekend during the summer and enjoying it all over again!
A few posts back I made a wish list of items I want in my backyard and I've finally checked one of those items off! I went to Hobby Lobby and they have all of their paper lanterns on sale! I have regular string lights that I'll hang them on so I didn't need to purchase any of those. Anyway, I loaded up on 8", 10", and 12" lanterns in blue, yellow, green, orange, and pink. They're absolutely perfect for Spring (not that we've had a Spring season), Summer, and a Fiesta party I REALLY want to have. I'm holding off on hanging them up outside because I'm using the blue, yellow, and green lanterns inside my home for a baby shower I'm hosting this weekend, but they'll definitely be going up very soon.
Oh, FYI, I'm hosting my very first baby shower this weekend for a very close friend of mine. She's coming into town and won't be back until after little Liam enters the world, so I figured "why not?!" I've only had about three weeks to prepare for this little shindig, one of which where I was out of town for an entire week, but I think it's coming together nicely. Guests will only have to go through the agony of playing games twice and they're not all that bad. It's at 2PM so I'm having appetizers and finger foods. The decorations have been ordered and delivered! I really just need to clean the house, prepare the food, and put up decor...oh wait, that's all of the hard stuff that I still have left to do! Geez...please wish me "Good Luck!!"
From time to time, I have what I like to call "pothead" moments. I am NOT a pothead, but these moments have to deal with food and I feel like they would occur after someone has lit up, hence, "pothead" moments. They occur when I'm thinking about food, particularly when I'm thinking about a dish I've recently had. So, I caught myself thinking about cream cheese stuffed jalapenos wrapped in bacon and thought that the combination would work well with chicken. I found myself at HEB right after work buying absolutely everything I would need to make this moment a reality. I halved and seasoned both sides of one chicken breast, then sliced it to create a pocket. Next, I chopped and seeded a large jalapeno and pulsed it with about 3oz of cream cheese in a food processor. Scoop cream cheese mixture into the pockets of the chicken, wrap with bacon (I think I ended up using about 4 slices) and secure with toothpicks. Bake in the oven at 450 degrees for about 25 minutes and eureka...cream cheese and jalapeno stuffed chicken breast wrapped in bacon! It was delicious and Rick even liked it, and it's hard to introduce him to anything new! Try it out!!!
