Coffee, Calories, Stoves and Such...

What a weekend!! I attend a church with an amazing Pastor. She, yes, I said SHE, spoke at a women's conference over the weekend. It was fantastic! God has done some amazing things in my life this weekend. I'm still praying through some of these things but I will share them soon.

Hubby and I went on a date today. Actually, we had the time set aside to go shopping for an oven, but you know how it is when you have time alone without the kids. You have to work in some time for lunch, coffee, and catching up on all the things you haven't gotten to say to each other over the week. We had a fantastic time. I feel like we haven't talked in ages and it was so nice to look him in the eyes and have a conversation without interruptions. 

We ate at Olive Garden. I got Bruschetta, soup and salad. As Jeff was looking through the menu he said, "I don't like that they put the calories on the menu! Now I can't eat any of this stuff." *sigh* Ignorance sometimes really is bliss. The Chicken Fettucini Alfredo is 1440 calories. What?! That's more than I'm supposed to eat in a day! So, we talked it out and found a justifiable way for him to eat his meal - split it in half. Eat half now and the other half for lunch tomorrow. See? Problem solved. That was enough justification for him. He dug into his meal and enjoyed every bite of it. 1440 calories. Yikes. It kind of makes me wonder how many calories are in the other foods I eat. I probably should check into that...

Anyway, onto more exciting news, WE FOUND AN OVEN!! We went to my favorite store, Lowe's, and there it sat, in all it's gleaming glory. Really, it's just an oven but I have to make it sound more interesting than it is because I'm blogging about it. Although, there is this "steam clean" feature. You put a bit of water on the bottom of the oven (which you can do because it's a convection oven and the coils are hidden), turn on the self-clean, go back half an hour later and wipe it clean. It steam cleans! How cool is that?! Now if I could only get it to do carpets.

Here is a picture of our new household appliance:

Wow. What an amazing piece of machinery, huh? Fantastic. I can't wait to use my mad culinary skills and feed my family using this beauty. Again, it's a blog thing. There's nothing truly amazing about this oven, but it works and we can bake food in it.  That's a far cry from where we are now. 

So, tomorrow I'll be pulling out my cookbooks and reminding myself how to cook in something other than a toaster oven.  I love Pioneer Woman's Blog.  She makes me feel like I can do anything in the kitchen.  I think I'll try these recipes: 

Mini Meatball Sandwiches

Chicken Spaghetti

My Favorite Meatloaf - this one is covered in bacon.  Hubbs will LOVE it... maybe I should check the calories for him first *wink*  

BBQ Meatballs

Tiramisu - I've actually made this before.  Delicious!!  Time consuming, but worth it! If I can do it, you can do it.

What is your favorite tried and true recipe?  You know, the one you use for company along with the good dishes and fancy silverware...

Thanks for stopping by,

  

 

 

LoVe

Happy Valentine's Day!  Some of you may not celebrate Valentine's Day, thinking it's just a Hallmark Holiday.  I felt that way for a while.  But now, in the midst of marriage and motherhood, I am grateful that there is a "holiday" that forces me to slow down and intentionally show love.  I said to my husband yesterday that we need to show love for one another more throughout the year.  We get so busy that our marriage gets put on the back burner.  We know our spouses will be there, so we'll just nurture that relationship when we have time and energy.  Then, before you know it, so much time has passed that you don't even know how to relate to one another as husband and wife.  

So, in order to be more intentional with showing love for my husband, I'm going to start doing things for him throughout the week.  My husband is an easy man to please, that's what makes it so much worse that I haven't been doing the little things for him.  He's so laid back that I think I let things go even more because of that.  He doesn't really say much unless something's gotten way out of hand (ie. he's on the verge of recycling underwear because the laundry isn't done.  I wish I were joking here.  Sad.)  Here are a few of the things I'm going to do for him: 

• Pack his lunch
• Put his clothes away after I do laundry (sometimes it sits in the basket for a week)
• Surprise him with a Starbuck's coffee that I've picked up on the way home from an outing
• Give him a foot rub (ick.. not my favorite, but he LOVES it)
• Offer to get him something to drink or eat if I'm in the kitchen and he's not

These are simple things.  Most of them are things I should already be doing.  The first thing I'm going to do though, before any of the things listed above, is pray.  God created us.  He knows what we need.  I'm going to ask God to show me what my husband needs. 

I was reminded of this Bible verse this morning: 

"LOVE is patient, LOVE is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.  It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. LOVE does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.  LOVE never fails."    

1 Corinthians 13:4-8 

I think it would be a good idea to pick this verse apart and examine how we're doing with each key phrase.  This is always a hard task.  Not many people I know like self-reflection.  But, if we want to honor God with our marriages and relationships, we need to be willing to look at it all.  I started getting hives just underlining the words.  I know I fall short in many of these areas but, I know that I can accomplish these things through God's grace.  

I love this verse because it speaks about the way we love, but it's also about how God loves us.  Amazing.  

How will you be celebrating Valentine's Day?  How do you intentionally show love to your spouse?  

Blessings and LOVE, 

Heather