A fun weekend with Lisa Joy!

I have this really fun, sweet, and super creative friend Lisa Joy. We have been friends since High school an its always fun when we have time to get together and catch up in real life {and not only through our blogs!}

She is very talented and has, along with her handy husband, Logan, completely remodeled their old bungalow themselves. You should most definitely check out her blog and her fun DIY projects!

Also, check out the great photos she took from our day hiking crabtree falls a few weekends ago! It was a blast and such a beautiful spring day spent with friends!

Lime Chicken & Orzo Salad

yes, another recipe...
but is delicious, & simple, & healthy, so at least take a look :)
i've been cooking a lot recently...Jay has even been doing some grilling now that the weather is warming up and its been fun!
I found the recipe in southern living a just tweaked it a little.

What you'll need:
1 Lime
Chicken Tenders  

5 Tbsp Olive Oil

2 minced Garlic Gloves

2 tsp kosher salt

1/2 tsp ground pepper

Grate the zest from lime to equal 1 tsp. Cut lime in half & squeeze juice. Save a little bit of lime juice for the pasta sauce {about a 1 tablespoon}. Combine zest, lime juice, 4 Tbsp Oil, garlic, salt, and pepper. Marinate Chicken for 10 minutes and promptly hand to your hunk of a husband to grill for you. Or be a real woman to do it yourself. Both get the job done. 

Now for the Orzo Salad:

1 Cup Uncooked Orzo Pasta

3 Tbsp Red wine Vinegar -- {this stuff is amazing! Buy it and use it often!}

2 Tbsp Honey Dijon Mustard 

1 Med. Red Bell Pepper, Chopped

1 Med. sized Cucumber, peeled & Diced

1/2 tsp dried Dill

Prepare pasta according to box directions. Combine vinegar, mustard, remaining 1 Tbsp olive oil, Dill, & juice from the little bit of left over lime juice. Toss Orzo, Bell Pepper, and cucumber in vinegar mix. 

Its so yummy and very light!

On a side note, remember I mentioned how Jay has been grilling a lot recently? Well we decided to grill hamburgers one night last week. It was fairly late, probably 8:30ish {which is a normal time for us to eat because we own a chick-fil-a which equals never eating meals at the designated "normal times" and I've come to terms with the fact that we simply eat when hungry and just forget looking a a clock} Anyway, it was late and Jay was grilling hamburgers and it began to POUR down rain so I quickly threw Jay an umbrella and naturally stayed inside to snap this photo of my sweet husband finishing our dinner in the rain. {the photo doesn't do justice to the rain, but just take my word for it... it was raining. hard.}

While I was busy photographing Jay stuck in the rain sweet bella decided it was the perfect time to escape and run like a wild woman all over the back yard and return soaking wet & muddy & very, very gross. I did not photograph this because I finally decided it was a good time to join my husband outside and get wet chasing her down. Her hiney was immediately thrown into the bath tub and we ate cold hamburgers at around 9:30 {so basically we learned that Chick-fil-A is not the sle source of our eating dinner at un-naturally awful times of the night}

On that note, Happy Mother's Day to my sweet Mama, and all you mamas out there! 

Greek Chicken Pitas from Mrs. Lang!

• My dear, sweet, best friend for life, just got married and now she is Mrs. Lang, and now she has delicious recipes she has been sharing with me and I am totally loving it! She emailed me a recipe for these greek chicken pitas last week and Jay and I totally ate it all up (literally!). Hope you enjoy!

First I made the yogurt sauce. My home-girl Kate Lang just bought tzatziki sauce which I was planning to do until I woke up to the reality of the fact that we live in Waynesboro where the man at the grocery store informed me that he has never heard of anything like that in his entire life. So I moved on made my own sauce and it turned out pretty good! 

3/4 cup plain low-fat yogurt

• 1 teaspoon lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon dried Dill (fresh would be excellent I am sure)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt 
• 1/8 teaspoon paprika

Combine yogurt, 1 teaspoon lemon juice, dill, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and 1/8 teaspoon paprika in a bowl; cover and chill.

• 3 (4-ounce) skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
• 2 Teaspoons Olive Oil

Sprinkle chicken with oregano, pepper, remaining 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon paprika. Heat oil in a nonstick skillet over medium heat; add chicken, and cook 5 minutes on each side or until done. Transfer chicken to a plate; cover and keep warm. 

• 1 small onion, sliced
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1 1/3 cups shredded iceberg lettuce
• 1 cup chopped tomato
• 4 (6-inch) pitas, warmed
• 1/4 cup (1 ounce) crumbled feta cheese

Add onion to pan and cook 7 minutes or until browned; stir frequently. Cut chicken into 1/4-inch-thick slices and return to pan with onion. Add 1 tablespoon lemon juice. Cook 2 to 3 minutes.

• Arrange lettuce and tomato evenly over pitas; Cover with chicken and drizzle each with yogurt sauce. Sprinkle with feta cheese. Enjoy!

Hope Y'all have a great spring weekend! 

Easy Beer Cheese Bread

I don't love the taste of alcohol, but I LOVE cooking with it! This bread recipe is very easy, very yummy, and quick when you need a homemade addition to dinner.

1 Tbl Olive Oil
1/2 Cup Yellow Onion, chopped
1/4 Tsp. Ground Black Pepper
1 Garlic Clove, minced
3 Cups Flour
3 Tbl Sugar
2 Tsp Baking Soda
1 Tsp Salt
1 Cup Monterey Jack Cheese, shredded
1 Bottle Lager Beer (12 oz)
2 Tbl Melted Butter, divided

Heat oil in a small skillet over medium low heat. Add onion to pan and cook until browned (10 - 15 minutes). Stirring occasionally. Stir in garlic and pepper. Cook 1 minute.

While onion is cooking, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a medium bowl, stirring with a whisk. Make a well in the center. Add onion mix, cheese, and beer. Stir just until completely moist. Pour into a 9 x 5 loaf pan coated with cooking spray. Drizzle 1 Tbl melted butter over batter. Bake at 375 for 35 minutes. Drizzle remaining 1 Tbl melted butter over loaf and bake for an additional 20 minutes until golden brown. 

Enjoy! 

Our First {and maybe only} 80's Dinner Party...

This past weekend, Jay and I went to an 80's Murder Mystery Dinner Party with our sunday school class at church. It was so fun to everyone's wacky and totally hip 80's get-ups!

Don't get too scared by the below pictures, although I think our neighbor was a little confused when we came out wearing this strange attire. Its not everyday you are watering your flowers and you see your neighbor getting into a car to leave their house with a teased side ponytail and a very loud, bright pink blazer. Jay and I decided to avoid eye contact and move along instead of try to explain the choice of our wardrobe.

We all had fun play-on-words names too. I was a soap opera star named Clara Seal {like the face wash Clearasil} and Jay was a Contractor named Bill DeHause {like Build A House}. There was Sandi Shorts, Barbie Dahl, Barrie M. Deepe, Crystal Ball, Tim Burr, Em Burr, Herb Evore, Angela Deff {Angel of Death}, Kelly Bluebook, Ray Beaze, Robyn Banks, and Archie Bisphop just to name a few! 

We laughed a lot and had fun getting to know some more people in our new church! 

Kate & Jeff Lang

  Kate is married! She is now MRS. LANG!! 

She has been for a couple weeks now... I am just a slack blogger and haven't made the time to sit down and go through my photos from the wonderful weekend. 

These photos were taken by kate's dear high school friend Angelique - Such pure joy in their faces!

I didn't have my camera with me for much of this special weekend because I decided to enjoy the moments with my best friend - sister and my "second family", but I did take a few and there are a couple of my favorites. 

In the past couple of weeks Jay and I have talked about how fun Kate & Jeff's wedding was, and we decided that it was so very fun because Kate and Jeff Lang are so perfect together. They Love Jesus and they love life and they love each other. They care about those around them and they want to make a positive impact. It makes me smile to think about all the many, many things that Kate and I have done together in our lives, and the ways that we have walked through life together. I love Jeff as Kate's husband and I am excited for all the ways that they are going to make this world a better place together!

Our Chick-fil-A Mother - Daughter Tea Party

A few weeks ago Bethany and I planned a Mother - Daughter Tea Party for a Saturday morning at Chick-fil-A. I love planning events like this because I have so many fun memories of doing similar things with my mom and friends growing up. I remember feeling so special to get dressed up and have time with just mom or just dad. I am blessed that Jay and I get to create an environment for kids to have similar memories with their families.

We had about 80 moms and daughters and it was a huge success! We always have things that we learn to improve upon for next time, but we're happy with how it turned out.

 We painted flower pots and had flower seeds to take home and plant with mom later.

 Princess Cow is also always a big hit! We have great cows too... they are rockstars and really know how to make kids smile!

Bethany and I found tea cups and tea pots at a thrift store for super cheap and it was fun to "play tea" with lemonade at each table.

It was a great morning to kick off spring for our waynesboro community!

Happy Birthday Sweet Mama!

Happy Birthday! You are so beautiful and strong, and I am beyond thankful that you are my mama. I am excited what the next year of life holds for you!

a few of our february adventures

Up until yesterday I had neglected this little blog in a huge way! Life just got too busy.

But we are back in Virginia for a few weeks and I wanted to share a few of the pictures from our Wyoming / Yellowstone Adventure! We traveled to Jackson Hole Wyoming for a few days and it was a wonderful winter get-away. Yellowstone in the winter is a little crazy I know, but it was on our "before kids" bucket list. {yes we have a "before kids" to do list... its just how we roll}

It snowed every instant of our time in Wyoming and it was quite chilly, but so much fun and lots of awesome new experiences! 

Like driving a dog sled

 And swimming in natural hot springs in the snow

 And literally wearing five pairs of pants at the same time

And going snowmobiling! It was SO much fun... if you have never been you need to. period. 

We saw lots of Bison. It was neat to be so close to such HUGE wild animals.

Old Faithful was really amazing, but not very photograph friendly in the winter against a white sky... so, that means we just have to go back :) 

We got to go on a sleigh ride through thousands of Elk on the national elk reservation. 

It was a great trip and a much needed time of rest and adventure together. 

it's a marriage monday.

Jay and I heard this quote over the weekend and both said "Oh! SO True!"

"A great marriage is the union of two forgivers."
- Ruth Graham

So simple and so very true.

Be encouraged friends. Forgive your husband for leaving his wet towel on the floor in the bathroom and then go make him this for dinner. We made it with Chicken instead of shrimp because I loath shrimp. And Jay forgives me for this.