One night in Biloxi

Sometimes Ben's job requires a whole lot of social events that can get old after a while when you just want a weeknight free or spend your anniversary away from work functions.  But most of the time, his work events are a lot of fun and we get to spend time with good people and do some exciting things.  On December 9th, Ben's work event took us to Biloxi, MS for a night at the Beau Rivage! 

There was a great reception at the hotel with delicious food (caviar!), live entertainment, and open bars.  

After the reception, we all had tickets to the Martina McBride concert.  Now, that's not necessarily a concert I normally would have said "o yeah lets get tickets to that one" (then again, I don't ever say I want tickets to ANY concert, I'm just weird like that) but it was SO much fun.  She has an absolutely incredible voice, I knew almost all of her songs, it was very adult and relaxed, and she genuinely seems like an amazing woman.  

After the concert, Ben & I went to the casino floor and watched other people lose lots of money on craps & roulette (2 games I would never want to put my money in) and then played our own games of BlackJack.  We played off of $30 for at least 2 hours, winning as much as $250 and then losing it all and walking away from the table with our $30 still in hand.  That's the only way I like to gamble, bet small, lose none, but be entertained for hours! :)  

Even though we were around other people the whole night, it felt like a fun date night adventure away. We had a really fun time, explored the casinos the next day, ate lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe, and then came back home!!!  Biloxi is only an hour away so we decided we would do stuff like this more often! :)  

wordless wednesday

need recipes?

As I mentioned before, I am loving finding new recipes on Pinterest these days.  We also just had a new Publix open up right next to our house, so now I feel like there is absolutely no excuse not to go grocery and cook delicious meals every night.  The past several weeks I have made week night meal lists and bought ingredients for other goodies (like appetizers on the weekends and breakfast items).  Now rather than printing out my recipes, I can just pull up the Pinterest app on my iPhone and cook straight from looking at my phone.  

I made a variation of these Breakfast Quiche Cups to have premade for breakfast for the week.  All you have to do is pop them in the microwave for about a minute and head out the door with breakfast in hand (am I the only person who ALWAYS eats my breakfast in the car? I mean, ALWAYS).  I included the spinach, onion, red bell pepper, mushrooms, and cheese! Delicious.  

Appetizers:  These Sausage Balls were a huge hit with the boys at the Farm one weekend... 4 ingredients, couldn't be any easier!  Who doesn't love Jalapeno Poppers (well except for people who don't like jalapenos)?  Well this was a great variation I made for a family dinner appetizer which was a hit; Jalapeno Popper Dip.  We had ingredients to make regular ole Queso dip (Rotel tomatoes & Velveeta cheese block) for a football game one weekend & Ben decided to vamp it up a little bit by adding black beans and cilantro... YUM

I found this Chile Rellenos Casserole recipe and it just sounded like good yummy comfort food.  I substituted the beef for ground turkey since that's what we use instead of beef most of the time.  It was phenomenal, but I have a warning for you: if your husband has an aversion to having an egg included in the ingredients of his dinner food, don't serve it to your husband.  Lesson learned, just meant more leftovers for me!  

Soups:  We love soups here at this house.  Both because we love 1-dish meals and because they are so easy to make in the crockpot, like all 3 of these soups were made!  This Chicken & Wild Rice Soup was great and I was shocked at how great this Jambalaya turned out, although I would definitely classify it as Gumbo without a roux and is definitely worth it to make considering the taste you get without the time it normally takes to make Gumbo.  Our most recent try was this Potato Soup that did not disappoint and we paired it with an awesome salad and have been enjoying the leftovers ever since.  

So I hope I inspired you to cook something new, try out one of these recipes, or at least look around at Pinterest for some new ideas!

how random can I be?

Let's see, what else has been going on?  After seeing Breaking Dawn with Ben in Atlanta, I also had a promise to Natalie to see the movie with her.... so one day after work we (& my mom) went and saw the movie in an empty theater and missed Rachel!  We were kinda giddy:

We had a function with Ben at the Exploreum here in Mobile for their Australian exhibit and I got to meet a baby kangaroo.... so cute!

I finally decided to start decorating for Christmas and had a day in mind to get started.  I headed up to the attic and started bringing all my boxes down.  On my last trip, I had a small little accident and, um, well, just kinda stepped through the ceiling.  I didn't even realize that I had gone all the way through the sheet rock because my foot hit something soft.  I did some serious damage though but was mainly just frustrated by the big mess I made.  Luckily I didn't actually FALL through, it just went up to my thigh, and I was glad it was the closet ceiling vs. our den or bedroom.   So, now I get to call a handy man over to fix this mess.  :)

We found out that our great friends Austin & Stephanie are having a baby GIRL in May, so that's VERY exciting!  

I have also been on jury duty for the past 2 weeks.  What an interesting process the whole thing is.  They make you change your attitude from being annoyed to be on jury duty to understanding that it's your civic duty and very important to assist your peers in the justice system.  I was struck from the 1st jury I was questioned about and luckily never had to go back for another case.  Maybe next time I'll get to experience something cool! :)

Thanksgiving 2011

Thanksgiving was wonderful; isn't it always?  Even when nothing is asked of me, I still like to contribute something to the spread!  This year, I made 2 pecan pies: Regular & Chocolate.  One turned out much prettier than the other but they both tasted divine!  

When we were on our way back from our weekend trip in Atlanta, we picked up Ben's grandmother and brought her home for the next week for Thanksgiving.  She cooked some delicious food and we loved spending time with her.  We have Thursday lunch at Ben's parents house with everyone.  

Grandmother with all her Kennemer grandkids:

Ms. Leigh

Cool Polaroid pictures from the day with Ben's family

Later that afternoon, we met up with my family and had the annual Steelwood Thanksgiving golf cart ride! The Roe Fam

Back at our house later that night, Ben fried 2 turkeys to have for the weekend and Rachel & Hollis came over to visit for a while!  Fried turkey is the best way to have it, so moist and flavorful!  

Love these newlyweds! 

We spent the weekend relaxing at the Farm with Ben's siblings, and watched the IRON BOWL on Saturday!  I was vastly outnumbered with all the Alabama fans in Ben's family, including Leigh whose favorite phrase is apparently "Roll Tide, Boo Auburn."  I tried to get her to say "War Eagle" but was reprimanded for the brainwashing attempt.  :) Oh well, I still cheered for my Tigers with the only paraphernalia I had with me!  

We had "thanksgiving" lunch with my family at my parents house on Sunday before Rachel & Hollis had to go back to Houston.  The holiday kinda snuck up on us and went by quickly but was spent with those we love most and are extremely Thankful for all the wonderful Blessings in our lives.  :)  

Hot-Lanta Celebrating

Well, I can't believe it's already been this long, but Ben & I celebrated our 4 year Wedding Anniversary on Thursday November 17th.  Well, actually we didn't really celebrate that day, but that was the anniversary date.  We had a work function to go to for Ben's work that night so we went straight from work, to the work function, and then had some Chick fil A for a late night dinner.  Not really my idea of a 4 year anniversary celebration, so I suggested some additional plans.  

I had a work function in Atlanta that Sunday, so I suggested that instead of me going up to Atlanta and back on Sunday all by myself, he could come with me on Friday and we could enjoy the weekend together.  So, we did!

Friday night, we went to dinner at the Tavern at Phipps before going to see Breaking Dawn (the 4th Twilight movie) at 11:00pm.  The best part was that we went to this cool place called the CineBistro- where you can eat a delicious meal and drink while watching the movie!  Since we already had dinner, we just ordered some chocolate cake and wine/drinks.  We definitely need to get one of these places at home!  

 Saturday was extremely relaxing, just what we needed!  Then we went to the Summit and bought some Christmas presents and clothes and such.  Our official anniversary dinner was at Hal's... an amazing steakhouse.  We had never been before but had several people recommend it to us...

 That is LUMP crabmeat on this appetizer.... massive! The oysters were amazing... 

 I love this boy.  It has been an incredible 4 years of wedded bliss.... I get to spend every day with my best friend and we have been on many adventures together.  I can't wait to see what this next year brings... :) 

Photo Shoot

I mentioned a few posts ago that my very good friend Erin had her baby girl in September and I took some pictures of her at the hospital when she was less than 24 hours old.  Since before she was born, Erin has been asking me to take newborn pictures for her, and I happily obliged!

I have always loved photography and had people suggest to me that I should take up it up as a business.  I have considered it, but now that I have a job I would just love to do it on the side.  Both taking pictures of my nieces and nephews and family, and for friends on the side as well!

Anyway, so at 3 weeks and 2 days old, we did a mini photo shoot of Olivia (if you consider almost 200 pictures "mini").  Everything didn't go as planned; she was awake the whole time, a little fussy, and we didn't get to do outfits changes or poses like we had planned.  But all in all, I think it went great for my first official newborn shoot.  Enjoy a few of my favorites:

Oh I just love squishy newborns!  Can't wait to take pictures of another soon!  

The big game

The big game this year was the Alabama vs. LSU game the first weekend of November.  Ben planned a big tailgate since it was a night game and so many friends and customers would be in town.  Our set up:

I think we overshot a little bit on the amount of food we needed but had a lot of fun!  

The game was such high energy and intense.  As everyone already knows, it was a game of defense and obviously wasn't won until the last minute.  Yes, Alabama lost, but since I am so behind on blogging, I now know that they will get to rematch each other for the National Championship game and it should be even more intense this time!  Hopefully we will be going.  

This is my drink of choice at the games: it's called a SWEET PEA (my nick name in Ben's family): vodka, cranberry, pineapple, splash of sprite, and a cherry! :)  

someone wasn't happy about losing.  

Can't wait to go to New Orleans at the beginning of January to watch this game again!  

(and WAR EAGLE, because I can't stand to write a whole post about Alabama stuff and someone think I'm not still an AUBURN fan!) :)  

Guess what?

I'm a bad blogger.... 

oh wait you already knew that.  Just needed to get the Halloween post off the top b/c everyone keeps telling me to blog.  I promise I will soon!