I heart The Office

Two fun things I found this weekend:

1. Dunder Mifflin Rabies Race For The Cure t-shirt . Everytime I see this I crack up.


2. A real Tripadvisor post for the Schrute Beet Farm. Hilarious.

halloween

I love halloween...I was one of those kids who dressed up and went trick or treating way past the point where it was socially akward. So I busted out my knife and went to work on our pumpkin, made roasted pumpkin seeds and spiced pumpkin cupcakes and I was back in my groove. My favorite adult Halloween treat is pumpkin beer. Mmmmm. Yum.
Spiced Pumpkin Cupcakes -
http://www.williams-sonoma.com/prod/R100662.jsp
**I initially saw this recipe in Annie's Eats blog(linked in favorites to the right). I love her blog! I cut the oil in half and added 1/2 cup of all natural applesauce to lighten these a bit. Turned out great! **

Dave wanted to put braces on my pumpkin's teeth. No seriously, he tried.

And just for kicks - a hurried sunset pic I snapped outside our place:

Pumpkins and Apple Cider

Saturday Dave and I drove up to our favorite Indiana orchard to get our fill of pumpkins and apples. I think Dave mainly goes for the hot apple cider they make fresh on the farm and I like to see the trees changing colors. We got a huge pumpkin that I cant wait to dig into to make roasted pumpkin seeds. Yum!

sweet potato chili w/ crunchy pea salad

Usually I forget to snap a pic of the meals I make before I inhale them....but tonight I managed to remember about 1/4 of the way through my salad. I wanted to use up the fresh cucumbers and radishes I got from our CSA program so I tried a recipe Daf found and it was awesome:
(originally from Cooking Light)

Crunchy Pea Salad

2 1/4 cups shelled green peas
1 1/4 cups diced cucumber
1/2 cup thinly sliced radishes
1/4 cup thinly sliced green onions
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 teaspoon coarsely ground pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt

Steam peas, covered, 6 minutes or until tender. Rinse under cold water; drain well.

Combine peas, diced cucumber, radishes, and green onions in a bowl. Combine vinegar and remaining ingredients in a small bowl; stir with a whisk. Pour over vegetable mixture; toss well.

Yield: 5 servings (serving size: 1 cup)

CALORIES 101 (28% from fat); FAT 3.1g (sat 0.4g,mono 2g,poly 0.4g); PROTEIN 4.2g; CHOLESTEROL 0.0mg; CALCIUM 32mg; SODIUM 127mg; FIBER 2.9g; IRON 1.4mg; CARBOHYDRATE 15.2g

I omitted the green onion b/c I didnt have any - oh and I microwaved the peas.



The entree was Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili. I didnt follow this recipe exactly - but it's pretty close:
http://www.recipezaar.com/15503

taking a break

Life has gotten pretty hectic for me lately. Lots of work, business trips, blah blah blah. I havnt had much time to relax but I wanted to make sure to post this weekend so here i am! We're dog watching our little dog nephew Rocky while Bro/Sis in law are in Baltimore visiting the city and going on interviews. Rocky's such a great dog and we really are enjoying having him. We've kept the cats in 1 bedroom just to avoid pet drama, which worked until this morning Mellow escaped and a chase ensued. Rocky chased Mellow, I chased Rocky, and Dave chased us all trying to get one of them to stop. All ended well - but we've made sure to be more careful about shutting the doors tightly! Here are some pics of the little cutie:

laces out

the streak is over. I finally managed to make a good batch of cookies. And these are damn good cookies if I do say so myself. :) After many, many years of failed attempts at baking(you actually have to measure - shocking) I bought all fresh ingredients and went to work on allrecipes.com's 'outrageous cookies'. I added some craisins just for fun and they were a great addition. Dave usually calls my cookies 'sugar bread' - but these actually turned out good.



The rest of the day was spent watching football - Mellow was rooting for Peyton.

M&M's beautiful wedding

This weekend Dave and I drove(dont recommend that form of travel btw) to Winston-Salem, NC to attend our friends' wedding. It was one of the most beautiful weddings we've attended and it was great to see all our friends again. One thing I learned - aside from that our backup QB isnt very good - is that it's difficult to take pictures when you're drunk. Good to know.

Here's a few I tried to salvage. Focus was my main problem....shocking.