Excuse me while I.....

Put my hiney in the lawn chair, toes in the sand, not a worry in the world a cold cocktail in my hand, life is good today, oh life is good today!!! Taking a break enjoying the tropics:)

Pawleys Island, I love my Sis!

What a great weekend I spent with my new sis and her family (sister and sister-in-law) and friends at her Bachelorette Weekend in Pawleys Island! I just adore her sisters and her friends are amazing and so fun. These weekends are so looked forward to but they just go by way to fast. I thought I would share a few pictures from our weekend full of laughs and great times. Lot's of the pictures were for our eyes only so you get a select few;) I love you Em!!! Can't wait, 3 more weeks.

The Beautiful Bachelorette, my soon to be SIS!!!

Love the sombrero

Beautiful table scape

MEXICAN NIGHT

Appetizers before out fajitas!! YUMMMY


Breakfast spread: assorted muffins, bagels and cream cheese, peanut butter and jelly, fresh strawberries, bananas, grapes, cereal, YUMMY!

The Famous Bachelorette cake that I made.

A July Southern Living Treat

This is a great side dish to a weekend cookout with burgers:) Hope you enjoy!!! xoxo

Okra-and-Corn Maque Choux

1/4 lb. spicy smoked sausage, diced
1/2 cup chopped sweet onion
1/2 cup chopped green bell pepper
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 cups fresh corn kernals
1 cup sliced fresh okra
1 cup peeled, seeded, and diced tomato
Salt and freshlyground pepper to taste

Saute sausge in a large skiller over medium-high headt 3 minutes or until browned. Add onion, bell pepper,, and garlic, and saute 5 minutes or until tender. Add corn, okra, and tomato; cook, stirring often, 10 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

4th of July part 2.. all about the food

After several trips to Costco and Harris Teeter, both fridges were packed and all the meals were planned ao let's just say we did not starve this weekend. I wanted to share several of the yummy recipes that I made this weekend. ENJOY!

American Flag Cookie Cake

1 roll of Sugar cookie dough

1 80z stick of Cream Cheese

Powdered Sugar

Strawberries

Blueberries
Roll cookie dough out onto a cookies sheet, covering the entire bottom. It WILL stretch, you just have to be patient and keep pressing with your fingers and keep in mind the dough will be thin. Cooke for about 10 minutes and let cool completely.

With an electric mixer, mix cream cheese and approx 2-3 cups of powder sugar. I just taste to make sure it tastes sweet and not too much like cream cheese. You may need a whole box, one of these days I will measure:)

Spread over the entire cooled cookie and decorate with strawberries and blueberries. Now you have a wonderful INDEPENDENCE DAY dessert:) This has been a tradition that my mom use to make every 4th of July, so I am just keeping with the tradition.

Best Blueberry Muffins Ever

FOR THE MUFFINS:

1 1/2 cup All-Purpose Flour
3/4 cups Sugar
1/2 tsp Salt
2 Tsp Baking Powder

1/3 cups Vegetable Oil (or applesauce)
1 Whole Egg
1/3 cups milk

1 cup Blueberries

FOR THE CRUMB TOPPINGS:

1/2 cups Sugar
1/3 cups Flour

1/4 cups butter
1 1/2 tsp Cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Grease muffin cups or line with muffins liners

2. To make the muffins, combine flour, sugar, salt and baking powder.

3. Place vegetable oil into 1-cup measuring cup; add egg and enough milk to fill the cup. Mix this with the flour mixture. Fold in blueberries.

4. Fill muffin cups 2/3 full, and sprinkle with crumb topping mixture.

5. To make crumb topping: Mix together sugar, cup flour, butter, and cinnamon.

Mix with a fork, and sprinkle over muffins before baking.

4. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven, or until done.

This was a great breakfast treat for the morning and went great along with our Ham, Cheese-n-Egg Cups, grapefruit salad and Grits. YUMMY!

Ham, Cheese-n-Egg Cups

12 oz slices reduced-sodium Virginia or Black Forest Ham
3 (1oz) slices 100% whole grain or white bread, each torn into 4 pieces
12 eggs
3 c cheddar cheese
3 tbl chives
1/4 tsp. Black Pepper

400 Degrees

Grease the Muffin pan.

Gently fit ham slice into each cup (edges will stick up) add some bread into each cup then pour egg on top. sprinkle with cheese and pepper.

Bake 15 minutes or until set. Sprinkle with chives and serves. This picture is ready to go in the oven, sorry I don't have a finished product picture, we were so hungry I did not have time to take a picture. Matt and I LOVE these and thought we would share our yummy find.


G.R.I.T.S, yes and also grits:) You can't have eggs without good ol southern grits

Paula Deen's FRIED OKRA SALAD

If you like okra or even if you don't you MUST try this recipe. This is a crowd pleaser for sure. I did not take a picture of the final product with the okra but once again I did not have time.. Sorry folks, but check the link about for the recipe.

4th of July part one..

Beach, fireworks, family, friends, cookouts and American flags,....yes, you guessed it, it is INDEPENDENCE DAY that we are celebrating. The 4th of July is always so fun, especially when you even get to live at the beach:) My brother, Meade and soon to be sister-in-law, Emily as well as our friends Katie and Klare Burch came to visit and we had a blast. The weekends are never long enough no matter how many days you have off and we are so sad it is over:( We shared great laughs, lots of great food and lots of fun drinks! I will share the recipes on my next post but wanted to share our fun pictures from the weekend. Hope you had a wonderful 4th of July, HOORAY for the RED, WHITE and BLUE!

FIRST BEACH DAY

CORNHOLE

Lots of Karaoke and singing until the wee hours. We had a blast. Meade, in the blue and white shirt gave quite the Michael Jackson performance. Matt, my sweet husband, is always amazing on the microphone. The girls love singing girlie songs, my favorite of the night.. INDEPENDENCE DAY, by Martina McBride. So patriotic:)