fall soups

I love soup.  We even served it at our fall wedding (3 yrs ago!), and that reminds me, I need to try and get that butternut squash soup recipe from our caterer.  It was delicious when we tried it, and everyone said it was sooo yummy (I didn't have any the day of).

This fall I've tried a few new soup recipes that T and I have loved.  The first one was crock pot Jambalaya.  I had some shrimp and chicken in the freezer that I wanted to use, so I just googled "crock pot jambalaya" and found this winner. See recipe ---> here.

Of course tweaking needs to take place when cooking for T, so this is what I did:

Crock Pot Jambalaya

Chicken
Turkey Sausage
Diced tomatoes
Onion
Chicken Broth
All the spices listed in the recipe
Frozen Shrimp

Threw all these in the crock pot and cooked on high for 3 hours.  I threw in the shrimp after 3 hours and cooked for 30 more minutes.  Served it with some wild rice and it was delicious!

The next one was my favorite I think, and I saw it on pinterest.  Well I went back today to find the recipe and I can't exactly find the one I used online, so good thing I wrote it in my recipe book.

Lasagna Soup

2 T olive oil
1 lb turkey sausage
(1 green bell pepper) left this out because we don't like green peppers
1 onion, chopped
32 oz chicken broth
3 cloves garlic
15 oz can tomato sauce
14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
1/2 t salt
1/4 t crushed red pepper
4 oz broken whole wheat lasagna (about 4 noodles)
1/2 c chopped basil
3 T parmesan cheese
1/2 c grated mozzarella cheese

Heat oil over medium-high heat in dutch oven.  Add sausage, onion, garlic and cook until sausage is browned and crumbled.

Add broth, tomato sauce, diced tomatoes, salt & crushed red pepper.  Bring to a boil.

Reduce heat & simmer for 20 minutes.

Add noodles and bring to a boil.  Reduce heat and cook until noodles are tender, about 15 minutes.  (Whole wheat noodles cook longer, so if using non-whole wheat, then about 10-12 mins.)

Remove from heat and stir in mozzarella, basil and parmesan.

Serve with your favorite bread!

 [photo courtesy T man]

T absolutely LOVED this recipe and talked about it for the next few days.  We froze the leftovers, so I'll get to bring that out when we get some chilly temps again!

We had our church class over on Sunday and again, I wanted some soup to go along with the fire we had out on the patio.  I pulled out our church cook book and made a taco soup recipe that everyone raved about, so I wanted to share this one, too.

Taco Soup

1 1/2 lb ground beef (I used ground turkey)
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cans black or chili hot beans (I used one can of black)
11 oz corn
1 can rotel
1 pkg. dry taco seasoning
1 pkg. dry ranch dressing mix
8 oz tomato sauce
1 can hominy, drained

Brown beef (turkey) until done.  Drain well.  Add beans, corn, ro-tel, dry seasonings, tomato sauce, and hominy to meat mixture.  Bring to boil.  Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.  Serve over corn chips and top with grated cheese, sour cream and cilantro!

Gibson thinks soups are delicious too

don't we have the cutest dog you've ever seen?  I hope he looks like a puppy forever....

a guest is with us

I know the desktop calendar is a little tardy (it's already November 7th!), but I had the idea this month to see about getting a friend of ours to share her awesome designs with everyone.

Jennifer Ferguson, who lives in Oklahoma, is one of T's dear friends from Oxford.  Jennifer is a graphic designer and I've always loved everything she creates.  First thing I ever got to see were her wedding invites (which were amazing), and everything since then is just so fun and so different!  She has an etsy shop where she makes the cutest greeting cards, so I urge you to check it out here ---> squirrelintheattic.

Here is what she created for us!

I hope everyone enjoys Jennifer's cute November desktop!  Go visit her etsy shop and leave some comments below!

Thanks Jennifer!

photos

I love photos... I love old photos... and I want more of them in our home.  I just feel like a home with lots of photos and memorabilia is so very cozy.

I want to do a gallery wall in our hallway, but I have questions before pulling the trigger and nailing everything up...

1.  If you do a gallery wall in a hallway, does it need to be on every wall in said hallway?
2.  It's ok to mix all textures and colors and shapes of frames and sizes, right?
3.  It's ok to mix art and photos and other items in said gallery, right?

Here is our hallway now (with awesome doorbell and alarm)...

And I'm picturing gallery on the left empty wall.  So to expand on my first question, if I do it on this one wall, will the right wall (which is actually a shorter open space than the left) look off-balance?

Here are some images I've seen that I like...

via here

via pottery barn

I've also seen some floor to ceiling ones that are awesome.  We will use the ole-cut-out-paper-the-size-of-your-stuff trick and tape it up to see the best layout.

Anyone have any thoughts?

on the go + craft + pouf

Since the beginning of October we have been in Oxford every weekend, and while we do love it, we are glad to finally enjoy a weekend at home (this weekend).  The weather has finally turned chilly in Memphis, and while I was ready for it now that it's here I'm freeezzinggg.... And Gibson is shivering too. But I love sweaters and scarves and boots and wool socks and fires, so here we go!

I've done a few crafty projects around the ole house lately, and I never want to feel all braggy on this here blog, but one of them T absolutely loves, so I thought I'd share.  My inspiration for this came from pinterest... this yarn wreath below:

via here

Leslie had just made a yarn wreath for Juliette's door, and I guess I hadn't remembered how she told me that it takes SO LONG to make a yarn wreath... Well it does.  And I only did 2 layers (you're "supposed" to do 3).  I just loved the colors of this so I found some pumpkin colored yarn at Hobby Lobby on sale and already had the off-white felt.  My MIL had just given me this huge bunch of decorative sticks, so I new I could use those for the accent brown.  I hung it on our bedroom door...

Another new item I've been enjoying is our new pouf!  I spotted it while we were in Oxford shopping around the square with Margie, and I just had to go back to get it.  In our den we have 2 chairs, an ottoman, couch and coffee table, but there actually isn't room to have the ottoman in front of the chair.  Plus, Gibson would be depressed if we took away his perch...

So I this awesome kilim pouf and T and I went back to grab it up--good thing too because it was the very last one.  He mocked me for a little while that we bought a "pouf" but then he realized how awesome it actually is.  A sturdy stool that is just the right size and easily mobile.  Here it is on the way back...

Future possibilities for this little pouf are endless.

--> UPDATE of pouf in our den (per request):

opening day

October 1 brought opening day for a few things around our house...

Most importantly fall and fall weather!  We woke up on Saturday morning to low temps, and then enjoyed a beautiful sunny fall afternoon.

Secondly it was opening day of bow season for T.  He washed his gear in no scent detergent and loaded up his pack with the necessities.  I didn't venture down to Oxford with him this time as Gibson had a morning at the "spa" and I was going to frame our Italian prints at the frame corner.  I did receive a few photos of T in his element.

He his a "real hunter" and using face paint this year for the first time... eye black included.  Watch out deer, he's hiding from y'all!

When he returned from his weekend in the woods, we went to the pumpkin patch to pick out our pumpkins this year.  Twas a fun time.  We did have to find a new pumpkin patch this year because our usual one at Schnucks (now Kroger) was no longer.  We found this patch at an Ike's (thanks Audrey for the affirmative here).  I grabbed up an awesome green one for our mantel plus some others for elsewhere.

I put out some fall decoration around the house and made a new wreath for the front door this year.  The inspiration is via pinterest.

While working on October desktop today, I received a little message from the cutest baby on the block. Look at this smiley little owl... She's ready for fall, too!

Juliette (my perfect and precious niece) is growing so much and she is smiling all the time.  I love snuggling her and usually can't go a day without visiting.

(remember, just click this to open in a new window.. then right click to set as desktop background)

Has everyone decorated for fall?  Have you gotten a pumpkin spiced latte yet? 

labor day

We love long weekends around the Carter house and this one was perfect in so many ways.  We got to eat lots of delicious food, enjoy cool weather, spend time with family, snuggle with our niece, and watch football!  Today the temperature outside is 70 degrees and it feels so amazing--I can taste fall and it makes me so happy.

Our weekend in photos:

Saturday night we went out to see T's brother, Austin, do his running thing at the Memphis twilight classic.  Let me just say he's the man, running a good 6ish min mile.  Way to go Austin!

We came home to watch the [recorded] Ole Miss game since we'd been gone with T's family all day.  This is how my boys watched the football game.

Sunday night my parents had us over for this delicious Emeril shrimp dish.  My mouth is still watering thinking about it. Oh, and mom made a chocolate cake! yummy.

Here is our little weasel pup Sunday after church enjoying our couch blankets (he loves when we pull those back out from being up in the summer).  I decided to just sit on top of him where I was sitting and he didn't budge.

Yesterday was the perfect weather.  We got to sleep in and enjoy a lazy morning with coffee and bottletree blueberry muffins (blueberries from our trip to Shreveport).  We did some yard work and then headed out to ride bikes on the Greenline with my parents.  T likes to be artsy with [my] iPhone camera and apps.

 We closed out our Monday evening with our good friends, Ross and Audrey, watching the tube and enjoying chatter among the 4 of us with some killer ice cream sandwiches! See, weekend of deliciousness all around.

This weekend made me so happy to my favorite season coming around the corner.  Looking forward to more weekend football, bike rides, and yummy fall food!

here we are

Well it's been a month and a lot has happened around these parts...  I am officially an aunt to the sweetest little nugget baby -- see Leslie's blog for some great updates on the little beauty.  I've gotten some great time in with her and I just love her.  She's the sweetest.  Here she is on her birthday, August 10, 2011.

[one of our favorites taken by Uncle T]

We finished up some outdoor projects in the front of the house and have some green green grass now!

We saw Laura and Ryan here in Memphis and had some great times.

We played some wii with the Hursts.

We snuggled with our niece.

We had our first guests under the age of 5 stay with us, and it was so so much fun (their parents were here too).

[Sam didn't want his photo taken...]

We joined the zoo.

We celebrated my Granny's 91st birthday.

[all of the Memphis Guinn ladies on Granny's birthday... Aunt Gwynne, Leslie, Granny, Juliette, Me, Mae, my mom/Pam/Grammy]

We spoiled our puppy some more.

We've just been enjoying life together with great friends and our sweet family.

Each morning I get up and while I'm drinking coffee on the couch, I look out the window in the den and feel like I can just taste the fall weather.  I can't wait for the weather to even be in the 80's!  I love everything that fall brings--cardigans, pants, scarves etc (I've said it here probably every fall).

As successful as the marathon was last year, I won't be doing another one.  This fall I'll be training for the half-marathon and I'm so happy about that.  Love those 6 mile runs as opposed to 13+.

Pumped about the upcoming 3-day weekend to enjoy time outside, running, and snuggling that little niece.

[all you have to do is click on this desktop. it will open in a new window, then just right click to set as desktop background]