What's Up?

It's been a while since I just wrote out a post about random things that are going on. So here it goes....not sure what all this will contain or how long or short it will be.

The biggest thing that has happened lately is David changing offices. He is still doing the exact same thing as he was, but is about 15 minutes closer to home and got a significant pay raise. This came to us a a surprise. It is great that he is getting home a little earlier. It isn't that big in the morning, but in the evening his time with Landon is so short that each minute extra is great! We believe the pay raise was used as an incentive to get him to change offices...it was a nice incentive and will help us getting our 2nd mortgage gone quicker!

In other news...I have 2 months, 2 weeks, and 6 days left until I am done with my Master's! BIG WOOHOO!!! I like learning new things, but I am ready to give my brain a rest for a while. It feels like I have something to do all the time because of my Master's. I am looking forward to next school year when I can come home and not have to jump on the computer and do work. Of course, I will still be getting on the computer, just not to do my Master's!

We are still plugging along trying to have another baby. My patience is going down the drain quickly. I have so much patience when working with my kids; I just wish I had the same amount with this situation as well. I hope and pray everyday that we will have good news soon. I will keep you guys posted on this!

Landon's personality is showing itself more and more each day. I am amazed at what he does everyday. He keeps me entertained all the time with his "stories." We joined the reading club at the library and he enjoys going to the library and checking out new books each week. This is helping his attention span greatly. I try to find books that are a little bit longer than others so I can work on his attention.

I'm sure I will think of more to blog about later. I have something new planned for dinner and I will post about it later. I have also been playing around with my camera and trying new tricks with it. I hope to have some good pictures to share next Wordless Wednesday.

Summer Reading

Since it is the summer I have decided to do some luxury reading as I would like to call it. During the school year I really only have time to read what I am required to read for my Master's. Now that I have a little more time on my hands I am doing more reading for me. I just got done reading this book:
It was WONDERFUL! I wasn't sure I would like it at first since it deals with history, but it had a twist to it that did not let me put it down. It is a 661 page book and I read it in 3 days. That is pretty good considering I still am working on my Master's and have a 2 1/2 year old running around! The best thing is that this book is also a movie. Thanks to Netflix David and I will be watching it tonight. I cannot wait to compare it to the book.

I just picked these two up from the library:

The above book is about a 20 something year old man how has Asperger's (high functioning Autism). From what I have skimmed, it seems he is a math genius. I am ready to read it and get into his mind!The Constant Princess is written by the same author as The Other Boleyn Girl so I know it should be good. I believe it is about Queen Katherine (King Henry VIII's first wife who he divorced).

I am not sure which I will read first but I am excited about them both!

Wordless Wednesday

Check out more WW here and here.

Potatoes and Onions

Of course these were good...who can go wrong with potatoes and onions?
Ingredients:
Potatoes, cut into chunks
Onions, sliced
Salt & pepper
Parmesan cheese, canned

Cut up potatoes and place in a greased casserole dish. Sprinkle potatoes with salt, pepper, and Parmesan cheese. Slice onions and add to the top of potatoes. Pat or squeeze butter on top of onions. Cover dish with foil and cook for 1 hour.

Vegetable Casserole

This was okay...I used the wrong kind of soup (which is why it is orange) so it had a really strong taste. It would have been better had I used the kind of soup the recipe called for.
Ingredients:
2 cans Veg-All
1 cup grated cheese
1 can water chestnuts (I didn't put these in)
1 stick margarine, melted (I used the spray butter and just coated the top with it)
3/4 cup mayonnaise
1 can cream of mushroom soup (I used golden mushroom..BIG mistake)
1 onion, chopped
1 1/2 packages Ritz crackers, crushed (I used much less....maybe 1/2 pack)

Mix all ingredients together except margarine and Ritz crackers. Pour into casserole dish. Sprinkle crackers on top. Pour melted margarine over crackers. Bake at 325 for about 45 minutes or until golden brown.

Poppyseed Chicken

This was delish!
Ingredients:
2 cups cooked chicken
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 1/2 cups sour cream
8 oz. crushed Ritz crackers
1/2 cup melted butter
1 Tbsp. poppyseeds

1. Melt butter and add crushed crackers and poppyseeds to make a topping.
2. Mix chopped chicken, soup, and sour cream in a bowl.
3. Add 1/2 of the topping mix and put it in a baking dish.
4. Top with remaining topping mix.
5. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

Our Mini-Vacation

Wonder where we have been? We left on Thursday and headed up to Asheboro, NC to go to the North Carolina Zoo. We had a blast there. We spent the night Thursday and got up early Friday and headed to the zoo before heading home. Here are some pictures with captions highlighting some of the fun we had:
Here is one of the many alligators we saw shortly after getting to the zoo. There were probably about 8 of these suckers in the water right under our feet! They were being fed when we got there and I am thankful they liked chicken and fish rather than us!
Next we saw the big tortoise. Landon looks for the big tortoise at every zoo we go to. He LOVES watching these even though they do very little.
In the children's section they had a huge wall with chalkboard paint on it for kids to draw on. Landon liked the paintbrushes they had to clean the board off with when done.
This polar bear was so cool! It has been a long time since David and I had seen a polar bear in real life. This polar bear was actually rescued from a Mexican circus and brought to the NC zoo.
Next were the seal lions. Landon wasn't so sure about them.
I am so surprised we got this shot! Landon rarely wants to get near statue type things but he let us take a picture next to the big buffalo!
Here's a real buffalo. I am guessing he looks so bad because he was shedding his hot fur.
Here's an Ocelot. It was right next to the glass and just sat and watched us.
Here's a turtle enjoying lunch!
Here's Landon on the carousel. He was not a happy camper at all. I could tell when they were about to come back around because I could hear Landon's crying.
Don't worry about the bad carousel experience, Landon got his first taste of cotton candy right after the carousel ride.
Here's Landon next to a mini-statue of a turtle. This is as close as we could get! :)
Chicken Little actually got in a helicopter! He did it all himself as well. I was shocked, but he liked it. Excuse the nasty look of me...it was HOT at this point and we were very tired from walking.
In the parking lot there were ton of geese. Here is one goose that came right up to our car looking for food. These things were swarming all over the parking lot.

Homemade Pizza

My bread machine has so many uses! This time we made pizza crust from scratch instead of going out and ordering pizza. It was so good too!

Ingredients:
1/2 tsp. salt
3 cups all-purpose flour
1-1/2 tsp. active dry yeast
7/8-1 cup water
2 Tbsp. olive oil or vegetable oil

Put ingredients in bread machine and select dough option.
Put dough on greased pizza pan, top with toppings and bake 15 to 20 minutes at 400 F.

It helps to have a good helper like Landon!

Hawaiian Quesadillas

The ingredients:
4 flour tortillas
2 teaspoons fat-free mayonnaise
3 oz thickly sliced cooked ham, cut into strips
1 can (8oz) crushed pineapple, well drained
1/2 cup chopped green bell pepper
1/4 cup finely shredded mozzarella cheese (1 oz)
1. Spread tortillas with 1 teaspoon of mayonnaise.
2. Top with ham.

3. Top with green bell pepper.
4. Top with pineapple.

5. Top with cheese.

6. Put tortilla on top and bake on 350 until cheese is melted (about 10 minutes).
Nutritional Info:
Calories: 390
Fat: 10g
Cholesterol: 30 mg
Sodium: 940 mg
Carbohydrate: 57 g
Dietary Fiber: 4 g
Sugars: 18 g
Protein: 19 g

Paula Deen's Chicken and Wild Rice Casserole

All I can say is yum!
Ingredients:
One 6-ounce package long-grain and wild rice, cooked according to directions
4 cups diced cooked chicken breast
Two 10 3/4 ounce cans cream of chicken soup
1 cup mayonnaise
2 teaspoons curry powder, or to taste
One 8-ounce package cornbread dressing mix
1/4 cup (1/2) stick butter

Put the rice in a greased 2-quart casserole. Layer the chicken on top of the rice. Mix the soup, mayonnaise, and curry powder, and pour this over the chicken. Sprinkle the dressing mix over the casserole and dot with butter. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until bubbly.

This was great. I think next time I am going to cut the amount of "sauce" in half using 1 can cream of chicken soup and 1/2 cup mayonnaise (I used miracle whip). I also used crushed red pepper instead of curry powder.