howdy folks! You ready to turn that frown upside down? Ya, you are!!!
Here are a few things that have me smiling today....
1. Amazing voices that cause full on chills. I am going to buy their album on itunes because I love them that much..already:) Thank you Gina for sharing these wonderful guys with us!
2. Leftovers!! We had a great throw-together-and-bake dinner last night and it tastes even better today:)
Mmm!!
3. My sis-in-law's kitty that she took in from the street had her kittens last night:) All survived and are doing well. I can't wait to see them and hopefully convince Ry to keep one...te he that's going to take some work:)
4. Sunshine!! Seriously it has been raining here everyday for I don't know how long. I was so excited to see the bright light in my office instead of grey:) I think my back is holding up well so I'm going to try biking in to work tomorrow.
5. Finding the ability to love who I am. This is a day to day task but I'm seeing the value and in giving myself credit and letting go of the perfection thing.
6. Adventures in the kitchen. I'm trying to just play around and combine different flavors to see what happens. This was from one of those adventures:)
This was a bar I worked on. It contained oats, chia, cashews, maple syrup, cranberries, orange zest, grated sweet potato, coconut butter, ginger, and nutmeg. It was good but needs some tweaking! See if you can spot the red onion that someone got mixed in HAHA!
What's got you smiling today?
Have a happy afternoon!!!
Sounds like a familiar combination from a Disney classic?
I'll let you decide which is which after reading the rest of the post:)
Let's start off with the weekend shall we. Yes, I know it's almost hump day but that's how I roll!
Friday night was good fun where we celebrated a very close friend of ours 60th birthday. They rented a hall and had a southern-style BBQ dinner and they even hired a square dancing caller! Now I've never square danced in my life but it was great fun learning how to "spin your partner" and "circle to the left."
Then on Saturday my SIL's had a Halloween party which was a total blast. I brought the Nikon along and caught some pretty hilarious moments! My drink(s) for the night were a combo of OJ, kombucha, and rum. It was pretty delish! Okay so who attended this Halloween bash?....There were...
plumbers, princesses, and male nuns! Oh my!
There were creepy men from the boonies!
This is my SIL's boyfriend and he absolutely played the part! I laughed so hard throughout the night!
Pirates galore!!
Witches and zombies!!!
That's my SIL in the green!! She got that paint sprayed on my a make-up artist! It looked awesome!
and doctors and nurses!!!
It was so much fun!! Everyone dressed up and we all had some good laughs! We had some great party tunes going and so I did a lot of dancing to this song. LOVE it!
I haven't drank at a party in a long time (BC has very strict driving policies when any amount of liquor is involved) so I knew I had to pace myself . Thankfully I did that and I felt a lot better than some people the next day lol! One reason I don't like to drink a lot is because the next day I feel lazy and want to eat bad things and it feels like a whole day is wasted. So I pick and choose wisely..hopefully!
After a big breakfast with the family, we headed home and began carving our pumpkins!
Yes, the first house guest was on the chopping block!!
Look at all those guts I need to scrape out!! But that means lots of seeds so it's worth it!
Here's one of mine! Stellar work, hey? HAHA!!
Then the hubby got involved and look at how he scared this poor guy!
Mine are the first two, the hubby's devil pumpkin is on the end.
So, who has more skill? Wait!!!...don't answer that. This is my blog, remember? Te he
After googling and playing around with the buttons and functions on the Nikon, we were able to take a picture of the pumpkin in the dark..yay! Although it's not exactly the glowing pumpkin we were hoping to capture. But hey, read and learn, right?
Thinking we were on a pretty popular road for kidlets, I bought the big box of candy. Bad idea. We had about 8 ghosts and goblins come to the door. 8!!! So, guess who got to eat the rest of the chocolate and did I tell you I have a sweet tooth. Not good!! Now that I'm chocolated (it's not a word but just roll with me here )out for about a week (maybe) I thought I would share a yummy casserole I made the other night when we had a friend over for a spontaneous dinner.
I was in the mood for a casserole. Since pasta is a pretty good dish to serve meat-less, I did a google search and decided to base my dinner on the Italian Veggie Casserole on Vegweb.
Spontaneous Veggie Casserole
1 onion, chopped
1/2 large zucchini, cut the way you like
1 head of broccoli, cut into small florets
1 package mini cremini mushrooms
1/2 bunch of kale
2-3 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon basil, dried (can use fresh too, use 1 tablespoon)
1 teaspoon parsley, dried (can use fresh too, use 1 tablespoon)
1 package of swirly, macaroni, or any small shaped pasta
1 28oz can of tomatoes or use approximately 3 1/2 cups fresh
2-3 cups bread crumbs - I took a loaf of french bread, chopped a couple slices into cubes and baked it on 250 degrees until crispy
Vegan/non-vegan cheese or your choice.
1 jar of your favorite pasta sauce
salt and pepper
Heat up some oil in a pan (coconut is my fave!) and add the onions. Cook until they become soft. Add the minced garlic and cook for 2 minutes. Add in your veggies and herbs. Cook until soft.
In the meantime, cook your pasta
Once everything is cooked the way you like it, start layering!
Put a layer of veggies on the bottom of your pan. Then add some veggies. I only made one layer of each but you could do multiple layers if you wished! I found that it needed some additional sauce and so I added some pasta sauce over the veggies. Top the sauce with bread crumbs and then grate your cheese on top.
Stick the dish in the oven on broil for about 10 minutes or until the cheese is melted and you are ready to chow down.
I used goat cheese in this dish and there were not complaints from the guys!!
I tried a bit of the cheese and it had a pretty good flavor to it!
PS aren't I good blogger taking photos over my stove element..geesh!
Have a great rest of your week!! I'll be back soon as I need to get my Vegan Mofo on!! I totally missed the sign up date but I'm going to contribute on my little blog none-the-less!
This was a bar I worked on. It contained oats, chia, cashews, maple syrup, cranberries, orange zest, grated sweet potato, coconut butter, ginger, and nutmeg. It was good but needs some tweaking! See if you can spot the red onion that someone got mixed in HAHA!
