Crazy - Busy – Weekend

This past weekend consisted of a lot of running around for, of course, the wedding. On Friday night our first stop was Tommy Bahama's to look at shirts for the guys and yes Andy did find a shirt that he really liked. Since we were in Kierland and one of my favorite shops was a couple stores down I had to stop in. Ok, this was not for the wedding, but I had to stop and good thing I did because I found a super cute summer dress. After being in the store for a while I exited to a very crabby looking Anders as he stood on the sidewalk waiting for me. His response was "I thought you were going to be quick?" Really, did he actually believe that I would shop quick in one of my favorite stores? Ok, after that we were on our way to Michael's to pick up some must needed items for the wedding. Then it was time to "feed the beast" as we were both getting hungry. After dinner we had to call it a night as we were both getting pretty tired. Saturday morning approaches and we headed to Toys R Us to pick up a special little girl a birthday present. I was looking for an educational toy and Andy was looking for a more obnoxious toy that will annoy the parents. My thought is that paybacks come much worse...if there is ever a day where a payback could happen. We opted for a compromise between learning and obnoxious. After some good times roaming in Toys R Us we headed across the way to JCPenney so I could try on a pair of shoes for my wedding dress that my mother found for me. They had the shoe, but not in my size in the color I wanted. No biggie, I thought I would just go home and order online...wrong! They were back ordered! So, I frantically call my mother in WI and she runs to the JCP in Madison to pick up the shoes since they had them in my size and the color I want. Phew! Glad I got the shoes I want. Another item checked off the wedding list. Ok, after JCP we took a road trip to Christopher's in Chandler to get a wedding band for Andy and to get a quote from them to make matching bands for my ring. I am glad Andy found a ring he liked and it is in titanium. It looks great! It also looked odd to see a ring on him when he was trying them on. The ring will come in about 10 days from now, so he can start wearing it ASAP. Just kidding! Grooms ring...check! Next up we went to Sports Chalet to sign up for scuba diving certification only to find out that our calendars are way too full for their scheduled classes. So, we went home and contacted other places and we are baiscally out of luck. Our schedule is way too full from now until the wedding to get certified. Ugh! Oh well, we can do it for the honeymoon. After our long day of running around and frantically getting the shoes I want, we ordered Chinese food, watched our Netflix movie and called it a night. Then Sunday morning we woke up bright and early for the last Cubs Spring Training game of 2011. I am not going to lie, I am actually not sad that it is the last weekend of sweating out in the sun for hours on end only to be completely wiped by the time we get home at 4:30 in the afternoon. We were so tired that we went to bed at 8:30 on Sunday night. We felt old for doing that, but hey, I definitely appreciated it on Monday morning. So many wedding items checked off our list, but so many more to go. My dress arrived at the bridal store yesterday so I have an appointment on Thursday evening to go and see it. Hopefully none of my nightmares come true. Stay tuned for more wedding updates.

Easy Panko Chicken

This recipe is a regular in our household because it tastes so good and is so easy to do. I believe I got this recipe from a Panko commercial and I am so glad I did because it's so good. Here is what you need to make easy Panko chicken.

Ingredients
4 Chicken drumsticks (you could do a whole chicken, but I like drumsticks)
1 Egg
3 Tablespoons of Soy Sauce
1/2 Cup of Panko Italian bread crumbs
1/2 Cup of grated Parmesan cheese
Cooking spray

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. In a plastic bag you will want to combine the panko bread crumbs and the Parmesan cheese - shake until all mixed together. In a bowl you will want to mix the egg with the soy sauce. Once your chicken is cleaned you will want to soak it in the egg mixture for a few minutes and make sure it's coated really well.


Then put one chicken drumstick in the panko mixture and shake the bag until your chicken piece is coated. Do this until you have all the chicken covered in the panko mixture.


Place the chicken in a baking dish that is coated with your cooking spray. Bake in the oven for 35 - 45 minutes until the chicken is cooked through. Halfway through bake time you will want to turn the chicken over so as to ensure crispness all over. You do get a nice crispy skin with this chicken. I served this with spinach noodles and corn. A very yummy staple in our house!

Pesto Chicken Panini

We received our first wedding gift a couple weeks ago and it was the Cuisinart Griddler to make panini's. This is what Andy really wanted so he was glad to receive it. I am not familiar with panini's but I was excited to receive our first gift and use it. I went online this past weekend and found a great recipe for a pesto chicken panini.

Ingredients
1 package of chicken
1/2 cup of pesto (Andy made his fabulous pesto)
1/2 cup of mayo
Slices of mozzarella cheese
Ciabatta bread (we used panini bread)
Baby arugula
Tomato
Fresh basil leaves

Marinate the chicken in a 1/4 cup of the pesto for at least an hour and then grill the chicken until cooked all the way through. In a bowl stir the remaining pesto with the mayo and then spread the pesto mixture on each side of your bread. Place the sliced mozzarella on each side of your bread. On the top bread add the arugula, tomato, and basil leaves. On the bottom half add your chicken breast.



Put the top on the bottom and place on your griddle or panini maker. Grill for 3 - 5 minutes. This is yummy.


This is what I learned:
Next time I won't slice the chicken breast and stack it on the bread high. This made the sandwich very thick and hard to grill. My ingredients started sliding everywhere and it got really messy. Also, I didn't let it grill long enough as my panini bread didn't get very crispy. Oh well, I have plenty of chances to make a lean mean panini sandwich and we look forward to using our wedding gift many more times so I can get this down right...until next time.

Beauty Preparation for the Wedding

So, when I have some spare time I read up on what I am supposed to be doing for the wedding and I came across a beauty regimen. Apparently I should have started six months prior to the wedding; however, I am not that into hanging out at beauty salons so 2.5 months ahead of time works for me. The first thing I did was get my eyebrows shaped and waxed last week. I have never done this before as I always relied on my trusty tweezers since I was about 14. In preparation for the shaping I quit tweezing 6 weeks prior to the appointment to make sure they were nice and bushy to give the tech something to work with. To my surprise the eyebrow waxing wasn't painful at all. Kind of like ripping a band-aid off my face really quick. I will have to go at least one more time prior to the wedding...maybe two more times. Next up a bikini was...ouch!

The other thing I did was get a french manicure. This is something I have only done one other time before. I don't like having my nails grow long as they get in my way, especially when I am typing. I find it super annoying and cut my nails often. It's also super annoying because my nails grow really fast. I also don't have time or energy to keep up the maintenance on manicured nails. Anyway, I researched all the nail salons close to our house and I found one that sounded great. I went on Saturday and the place seemed nice. After about 10 minutes of sitting in my chair a gentleman 60+ in age walked in and approached the front desk asking about a massage. The front desk person responded by asking the man if he wanted 30 minutes or an hour. The man then asked if it came with a "happy ending." The front desk person was uncomfortable as he stuttered "ah, huh, ah, we don't do that here." The man then asked the front desk where he could get that done. The front desk didn't know so the older man left. I wasn't sitting that far from the front desk and I did everything I could to not bust out laughing. I could tell the ladies doing nails were trying to be professional by not laughing too. Anyway, it was pretty funny while I am on my road to my wedding beauty regimen. I am very happy with how my nails turned out and I picked the perfect salon to go to.

All of this is time consuming so hopefully I don't get addicted so I can quit my beauty regimen after the wedding.

On Wisconsin

We are currently in the middle of March Madness and for my blog followers you know how Andy's life revolves around basketball this time of year. I participate too with three different brackets and currently two of the three are worthless. I have one still that could possibly win. If you follow March Madness you then know our beloved Badgers made it to the second round. The Badgers played the first two rounds here in Tucson. The first round was this past Thursday and since Andy has a ton of vacation and personal time he was able to make the trip down to Tucson to see the Badgers beat Belmont. Since they proceeded to round two they were also playing in Tucson on Saturday and this allowed me to attend. This was my first NCAA National Championship game. I really went to support something Andy loves; however, once the Badgers came out I was 100% into the game. I was that person cheering, clapping, up and down from my seat and completely immersed in the game. Andy thought this was comical. I did explain to him that it was all for my brackets as I had Wisconsin winning round two in all three brackets. I don't know a whole lot about basketball, but I do like to win. Here are pictures of my first NCAA National Championship game.

The Badgers are warming up prior to the game.


Introducing the Badgers for the second half of the game. Just a side note that our cheerleaders and band were ten times better than theirs.

Flip-Flop Season

Flip-flop and open toe shoe season began about a couple weeks (or more depending on who you talk to) ago. So, for the past few weeks my toes have been naked and looking pretty gnarly for everyone to see. It was kind of embarrassing so I finally went today on my lunch to get my toes done. I went to the usual spot that has the hand painted designs. Not the friendliest place, but the best hand painted designs. My toes are looking fabulous now and are ready to show off for everyone to see!

Pork Chops with Herbed Cream Sauce

Thanks to the Taste of Home cookbook I was able to make these fabulous (and very easy) pork chops with herbed cream sauce.

Ingredients:
2 Thick pork chops
2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
1 Tablespoon flour
1/2 teaspoon beef bouillon granules
1 Tablespoon fresh parsley
1/2 Teaspoon dried basil, thyme or tarragon
2/3 Cup milk or half-and-half cream
2 Tablespoons water
Pepper

In a skillet sear the pork chops on each side in the oil. Then put in the oven to finish cooking the pork chops all the way through. Our thick pork chops took 30 minutes in the oven at 350 degrees.

In the skillet stir the flour, bouillon, parsley and basil into the skillet. Gradually stir in the milk, water and pepper until smooth. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for two minutes or until thickened. Spoon the sauce over your pork chops.

The sauce was pretty tasty and added a lot to the pork chops. Here is a photo of my quick and easy pork chop recipe that I found in the Taste of Home cookbook.

Weekend Two of the Cubbies

On Sunday we went spent the day at Hohokam stadium for some fun with friends...and the Cubs! Since it was a beautiful 80 degrees outside we met our friends for tailgating at 10am. The game didn't start until 1pm so we got a good few hours of tailgating in. As you can see it's always WI against IL when we hang out with the Campbell's.


We played beer pong on Brian's new beer pong table. One side represented the Bears and the other side the Iowa Hawkeye's. As ugly as this beer pong table was we still had fun playing against the Campbell's. Once Andy and I lost to Brian and Amber the boys started playing against our neighbors. This was good because Andy needed a partner to help him drink the beer since I was not interested.


Here is a photo of my sweet Anders shortly before we went into the game.



Until next weekend...Go Cubbies!

Clean Floors

With two dogs and one cat in our house our floors were over due for a professional cleaning. My Marketing Assistant's boyfriend does floor cleaning and his prices are very reasonable so Andy and I decided to do it. I think the only thing that took us a long time to get our floors professionally cleaned because we did not want to move everything out of our house. Yup, that is what we did. On Saturday morning we woke up and started moving everything into the garage. We had five hours before the cleaning people came to get our whole house into the garage. I was kind of worried that it was not enough time, but as Andy and I worked together just to get it done we did it in three hours. I felt like we were moving. Our house was completely empty. Our kitchen, living room, and three bedrooms were sitting in the garage. Our house was so empty you could hear an echo in the house as we talked. See how fast we got everything in the garage I told Andy this shows us it wouldn't take us long to move when we are able to. The cleaning people showed up and they started with the carpet and then moved to the tile throughout the rest of the house. While this was being done Andy and I were trying to relax out back. Madison definitely did not let us relax as she was being extremely annoying with her barking and grumbling because she wanted to meet the men in our house. Madison's bark might be scary to some, but people don't know she is a huge baby and really just wants to check them out. Anyway, for the next two hours we dealt with crazy Madison so we didn't upset the neighbors with her barking.

The floors were finally done and super cleaned. I was completely impressed with these people. The tile looked super clean and our carpets looked brand new again. The carpet looked like dogs don't live here. I was super happy. The bummer was we couldn't move our furniture back in until about 7pm when the carpet was dry. So, our Saturday night entailed us putting our house together...while drinking a bottle of wine. After taking our house apart, dealing with Madison and putting our house back together everybody in our house was exhausted. Especially these two as they did not get a nap in all day since they were more concerned on what we were doing with everything in the house and then more importantly who was in our house for two hours! Super exhausted doggies below!

Wedding Nightmare

So the other night I literally I had a nightmare about my wedding dress. I don't know if this is a normal bride thing or not, but it freaked me out so I will share. I this nightmare I was going to pick up my wedding dress from the place I purchased it as I received a call that it arrived. I got there and this overly happy lady was ecstatic to see me and was saying how amazing my dress is. She pulled it out from back and it was not my dress. This dress was strapless, white on top and the bottom was tule with thick black and white vertical stripes. There was also glitter all over the dress. It looked like a princess fairy dress. I was not amused. I explained to the lady how that was not my dress and what my dress looked like. She said no, this is your dress. She then proceeded to show me the purchase slip and that was the dress that was written down with my signature on it. I kept saying how it was not my dress and nobody would listen. The woman actually got me to try the dress on and it was hideous and there was nothing I could do about it. I was now stuck with this absolute horrendous dress. It scared the crap out of me and when I woke up I realized it was just a nightmare. I started to wonder if this was normal to have nightmares like this. I hope so because otherwise that was pretty bizarre.

I am sure the nightmare came because March is the month my dress is supposed to come in and I have been a little worried that I am not going to like it anymore. It's been so long since I purchased the dress and I am afraid that I won't like it when it actually gets here and then I am stuck with it because it's not in the budget to purchase another dress. I did discuss this fear with my girlfriends and they all said this is quite normal. Is the nightmare normal though????