We have been a busy bunch around here. But it's been fun. My sister, Mary, visited a few weeks ago and we had much fun. (It's practically impossible not to have fun when she's around.) She hadn't been to Albany yet, and I hope it did not disappoint. :) She was so sweet to cook for us some and babysit Jonathan one night so Jon and I got a date! Woohoo! :)
We also had a long-awaited visit from the Alligoods! They were some of the fortunate fans who witnessed Bulldog domination down in Jacksonville and they came through Albany on their way home! We didn't mean to wear matching clothes... guess we were just in the spirit.
I've had a little break from rotations, so I've been busy in the kitchen trying to get ahead to make our weeks easier in the future! The casserole pictured below was absolutely fantastic. Since it's just the two of us, I split the casserole into two dishes and stuck one in the freezer for later! Definitely a good cold-weather comfort food. (Plus you don't use anything from a can, so it's healthy!)
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| Cheesy Chicken and Wild Rice Casserole |
Today was also a bean-cooking marathon. We've found beans to be a great way to get protein while keeping the grocery budget manageable, so I like to cook big batches and freeze them in can-sized portions in Ziploc bags. We now have over 15 bags of black and kidney beans in the freezer! (Alluding to the gaseous connotation that beans carry, Jon very sweetly asked me, "I don't know if girls would do something like this, but you should take a picture of all these beans and put it on the blog! ...I didn't take a picture.)
I've also made chicken stock (most of which we've already used up) and baby food, which is another post for another day...
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| Family photo before church. |
The last thing I will share with you today is our first pumpkin carving endeavor.
I love fall. It's definitely my favorite season (along with most of America). Cool weather (sort of, in GA), beautiful leaves, football ... and pumpkins. Pumpkin breads (I will share my favorite recipe soon), pies, lattes, roasted pumpkin seeds, and Jack-o-Lanterns, of course! We did not carve a pumpkin last year because we were living in an apartment. Apartment life can be awkward when it comes to holidays. There are no real rules on what's fair game as far as outdoor decorating goes. Someone should write them. Wreaths are okay. Doormats are okay (except ours stuck out in front of the stairs to go to the next floor and it made me feel weird). But what do you do about the poor naked bushes outside who really want to wear spider webs or lights? Who knows? No one really has ownership of them. So naked they remain.
But I digress. We no longer live in an apartment, and we even have a little front porch thing, so I was bound and determined to have at least a jack-o-lantern this year.
We started out right and got a pumpkin from Publix for $5.99. One day we'll be cool and not as poor and take Jonathan to make pictures and pick out a $60 pumpkin from a real farm. My dear husband and I decided to be patriotic and carve a Georgia 'G.' I say "we." Really it was "he." He did all the work. Even scraped out the gook inside (which was an act of love for him).
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| Start with a good knife. And a scary face. (Our neighbors called their kids inside.) |
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| Carved! (Notice the toothpick on bottom left - that was to keep our 'G' from falling.) |
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| The man and his art. |
So this was all two weekends before Halloween. Yeah. Oops. I didn't know that was really early. So when I realized that it was, I consulted my trusty friend, Pinterest, for a way to keep it from rotting. The article I found seemed very logical:
1. Create diluted bleach solution and spray all over the inside and cut surfaces of the pumpkin. (To kill any bacteria already there.)
2. Cover inside and cut surfaces with petroleum jelly. (To keep any new bacteria from getting in.)
Sounds like a great idea, right? Well, it doesn't work. Our poor pumpkin didn't even make it to Halloween. Perhaps we were not thorough enough in our bleaching or jelly-ing. Who knows? (The bacteria do.) But the ending wasn't pretty or pleasantly aromatic.
Have any of you had success in protecting your jack-o-lanterns?
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We were excited about the little cold spell we had and got out our cool football beanie!
(Yes, I'm wearing a fluffy pink robe.)
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