Sunday Morning

Sunday morning Andy and I swung by Corner Bakery picked up breakfast and then headed over to my dad's strip center to eat and do some cleaning and maintenance. We had a great day together! But then again, we always do :)

This is my favorite item on the menu. The Anaheim Scrambler. 

Here's Andy in his new car! 

Luminaria

Just another reason to love San Antonio! 

A perk of being a city girl is that I can soak in the views like this one from my balcony. 

A disadvantage of being a city girl is that I had to put in ear plugs to fall asleep Friday night. 

Luminaria kept going until 1 a.m. or so! Although I didn't sleep well, I can't complain because the pros outweigh the cons. I get free rent, I walk to work, I get to spend a lot of time with my dad, I have someone to cook for, I have a gym 12 flights below me, I have a pool and hot tub one flight above me, I have the best water pressure in my shower, I have an amazing closet, covered parking, the river walk is my backyard and the list goes on. 

I'm trying to work on my perspective these days and it's amazing how much better things have been. I'm learning that everything in life is a matter of perspective. Will I look at the job I didn't get as a blessing, or choose to see it as a failure? Will I take joy in the few good friends I have, or complain that I don't have enough? Will I accept who I am, or nitpick the things I don't like about myself? I hope to always choose the former and not the latter of all of the examples ^.  

“Life is 10 percent what you make it and 90 percent how you take it.”

― Irving Berlin

Coconut Pecan Chocolate Chip Cookies

Slice and bake cookies are already so good to begin with, but when you add a drop coconut pecan icing they become amazing!

Here's what you need.....

Shopping List
Betty Crocker Rich &Creamy Coconut Pecan Frosting (14.5 oz)
Immaculate Baking Co. All Natural Chocolate Chunk Cookies (or any brand you prefer)
Parchment Paper
Milk (for dipping)

Here's what you do.....

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

                                  Open package and break apart dough into individual pieces.

 Line baking sheet with parchment paper. 

Thanks for the rolling pin Mrs. Fisher and Allie! Love it!

Smash dough pieces until they are about the size of a silver dollar. 

You can use anything for the filling.... Nutella, peanut butter or even some cream cheese frosting.

Using a very small spoon place a drop of the icing in the center of the 

dough then top with another piece of dough to make a sandwich. 

Once complete, you should have 12 Coconut Pecan Chocolate Chip Cookie 

dough balls on your tray. 

Bake for about 11-13 minutes. 

Let cool and enjoy with a glass of milk. 

* Pointers to help achieve the perfect cookie:

• Spread cookie dough out on the baking sheet as much as you can, because using two pieces of dough for each cookie makes for a really big cookie. I made the mistake of using just one baking tray, which caused the cookies to touch. 
• Don't overdo it with the amount of frosting you use. Too much and the frosting will seep out and make a sticky mess. 
• The colder the cookie dough the easier it is to flatten, transfer and fill with the frosting. 
• If your cookies do end up touching edges, like mine did, use a small cookie cutter to re-achieve a circle shape for your cookies. 

Let me know what you think of the recipe!

Just a regular Wednesday night....

Last night my dad enjoyed a relaxing and fun evening together. I made this: 

Broccoli and Sausage Fusilli

It was a variation of this recipe...

What i changed from the original recipe that I got off Mix and Match Mama's blog was the type of pasta I used. I replaced the sausage ravioli with whole wheat fusilli for a healthier alternative. I also eliminated the panko crumble on top and added crushed red pepper for some heat and a few other ingredients to spruce it up! It turned out to be super delicious. 


Here's what you do:

Shopping List

1 box of whole wheat fusilli
1 bag of frozen broccoli
1/2 white onion (finely chopped)
1 link of italian sausage
1 (16 ounce ) jar Alfredo sauce
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1 tablespoon Italian seasoning
1/2 table spoon of crushed red pepper

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Cook pasta and in another pan brown sausage and onion. Then add brocoli, that has already been defrosted, to the pan and reduce heat to low. Once the pasta is cooked add it to the pan with the entire jar of Alfredo sauce. Then remove from stovetop pour into a pyrex and cover the top with the Parmesan cheese. Cover with foil and bake 30 minutes. Remove from oven, remove the foil and let it broil for 5 minutes to make the cheese crispy and slightly brown. 

We watched this movie while we ate: 

Good movie, but too much cussing and yelling. 

And for dessert we had: 

A+ but I sure wish it would've had chocolate in it!

It was my first time to try this flavor. I didn't love it as much as I love the Half Baked flavor, but it was still amazing. I truly think all of Ben & Jerry's flavors are terrific and I probably couldn't buy one I didn't like! I'd be extremely surprised if that ever happened. 

Nights like these are fun and are memories I will look back on for forever. I know one day I won't be living with my dad, so I am trying to cherish our time together as much as I can! 

Impromptu Dinner

Last week Andy and I met for an impromptu dinner at Huebner Oaks. We branched out and went to a new place for us. We typically only stick to only this list of restaurants:

• Chipotle
• Chick-fil-A
• Pei Wei
• Pappa Johns

^ Eeek now that I look at our list I feel like an unhealthy person. uh oh

Anyways, since our list is rather short and we didn't want to get tired of our favorites we decided to be  adventurous and try something new. We decided on Genghis Grill for dinner. It was a fun experience, but on a scale of one to ten I would give it at six! I give it a six because the bowls we created weren't that tasty. Too many options turned into too many flavors that didn't mix so well together. Andy's theory is that the more you go the better you get a creating your bowl. This could be very true, but I don't want to have to try it to find out. 

My bowl had carrots, pineapple, scallops, shrimp, onions and cilantro. It was pretty funky...

Lola

Her name is Lola....

She's the perfect mix of cute and ugly if I've ever seen one! She came to us via a friend of the family. She was just a little puppy... maybe 3 or 4 months old. We all thought she was darling, but that wore off pretty quickly. Do you want to know why??

Well.....

She turned into the Tasmanian Devil!

No joke.

In the year and a half we have owned her she has:

1.) Chewed a massive hole in our living room sofa.
2.) Chewed the majority of the outdoor furniture cushions.
3.) Ruined one of my favorite pairs of underwear.
4.) Peed on my dad's bedspread.
5.) Peed on my bedspread. Did I mention it's all white?
6.) Peed on my dad's bedspread.... again!
7.) Chewed the leg of our dining room table.

I know I must have missed a few here and there, but all in all you get the point. It's not that we haven't tried training her, it's just that she's untrainable!

But even with all that said, she has still managed to grow on me.... just a little. It's crazy.

She's a part of the family now. She joins us at the dinner table, swims with us, watches movies with us, helps clean up after dinner, but most importantly she's my dad's BFF.