Some Summer Reading

It's no secret that I'm a crazy reader. I can't go a day without doing any reading. I don't go to bed unless I've done some reading before hand.

Something that happened that I didn't plan for was that I read like 3 books this summer that were centered around WWII. And all three have been excellent. In fact, I'm not done with the third one but I'm blahgging it anyway because it's going to be my favorite, I can already tell. It's so good. I already know which of my friends will pick it up. Ok so here are the 3 WWII books. Skeletons at the Feast, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society and The Book Thief. That's the one I'm reading now that is so so good.

Another excellent series that I read the sequel too this summer is the Tea Rose series. I read The Winter Rose this summer and it so good. They are long though, like 600+ pages long and the books themselves are huge. Good historical fiction and not to mention that the covers are beautiful.

Starting Tuesday, my first book of the fall comes out. Catching Fire. It's the second Hunger Games book and I way stoked for it!!! Then 2 weeks later, Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger comes out and she wrote Time Traveler's Wife so I'll definitely be reading it.

Also, everyone congratulate Jared. He got his library card this week. hee hee. We're such nerds. Oh well, I lllloooovveee it.

I have a question . . .

So totally random question . . . ya'll know that I like to cook right? And I think I'm pretty darn good at it. Anyone . . . comments are welcome as I'm putting this out there. If I were to start making meals, ready to go, ready to eat that were good meals, say better than your average chicken dishes. Meals that you would definitely be impressed with . . . if I were to start making meals for a minimum of 4 people a meal . . . do you think people would pay to have meals already made for their families? And what if they were delivered to their house? Do you think there would be people that would do that . . . even if it was moderately priced? It wouldn't be cheap but it wouldn't be knock your socks off expensive either.

Just putting that out there.

The August Review

So I didn't post a ton this month. I've been busy with various things so here's the run down.

Ok so as posted before, I decided to learn how to ride a motorcycle spontaneously. It's one of those things that I always thought would be cool to learn and I just pulled the trigger. I like to think of it as working on my marriage. hee hee. Jared rides and so I hate for him to be out there all alone seeing the sites and me sitting around the house watching all my BBC shows or reading my books. So I'm being selfless and trying to spend more time with him. Not bad, huh? This is me in the church parking lot just getting started. Don't worry though, I've graduated to major streets. Tonight we took a ride into Farmington. So fun!! Got a few bugs stuck in my lipgloss but I'm still alive.

Next item. This is just a funny pic of my cat. He loves boxes and crawled into my boot box that had the lid attached. He got in a laid down. Silly boy. Psst . . . don't look, I'm hiding.

I'll do a separate post about some of the books I read this summer. Saw Time Traveler's Wife last Friday with some neighbor friends and it was really good for being a book adaptation. I loved the book and thought the movie was pretty good. TTW will probably be on my list of top 10 books I read this year. I know 10 seems like a lot but we're pushing 50 books this year so far.

Lastly, I discovered Cutler's cookies. This was not a good thing. I have a craving for one of their cookies about once a week. I especially love their brownie marshmallow cookies. Yum!!!

Oh . . . I used to have the best snickerdoodle recipe that made puffy cookies instead of flat ones. I'm on the quest to finding that recipe again. Jared and I tested out some snickerdoodles this week and they were yummy. Gooey and yummy . . . but flat. Once I get that figured out, I'll post it.

Crouton Chicken Anyone?

I love it when you realize you have more friends than you thought. The more the merrier I say!! Apparently quite a few of my neighbors like that I put lots of recipes on my blahg and so I'm happy to oblige with more. This recipe comes from my best friend in high school. So this one is tried and true and been a long for awhile. It's also a favorite of Jared's. Here it is.

Crouton Chicken

6 skinless chicken breasts

6 slices swiss cheese

2 cans of cream of mushroom soup

1/4 cup cooking white wine (you can use chicken broth if you don't want to use wine)

2 Tbs melted butter

Your favorite croutons

Preheat over to 350. Arrange chicken in a greased glass casserole dish. Put a slice of cheese on each piece of chicken. In medium size bowl, combine mushroom soup, white wine and melted butter. Poor over chicken and just pour it all into the casserole dish. Sprinkle lots of croutons on top. You can put as many or as little as you want.

Bake for 45 minutes uncovered. Serve chicken on top of a bed of your favorite rice. mmm, delish! Here's a bad pic I took of it before I cut into it.

29 Spankings

That's right . . . I received 29 spankings from my silly niece Paige on Saturday night, it was my 29th birthday. Jared and I kind of celebrated all week by doing lots of little activities. First, I decided to learn how to ride a motorcycle. I rode a few times last week and I'm switching gears and going around Jared's warehouse. I'm not up to par to ride on the street yet but I'm taking a 2 day course starting this Friday. I'm excited and scared at the same time so wish me luck. I learned on Jared's little bike but it will be a big girl bike for my classes. I know, I'll be careful, I promise.

On Friday night we went to The Roof restaurant and I decided that was the last time we were going there. The food is really not that good, let's be honest. And for what they charge for a plate, they should make a better effort at making their food taste better than what I can cook at home. It really wasn't good. Big disappointment. However, I did eat a decent piece of pecan tart and I am still trying to find a recipe that is close.

Saturday night we went to the Training Table and ate some cheese fries with my sister Tiffany, my niece Paige and my parents. It was delicious and made up for the LAME dinner I had the night before. We topped the night off with a few rounds of Mexican Train dominoes and the delicious chocolate chip cake from Nothing Bundt Cakes. If you haven't driven out to 106th in Sandy to get one of these guys, you need to. Worth the money. Best bundt cake I have ever tasted. Yummy!!

Sorry no recipes tonight. My sister Cerise, who lives in Texas, and I have recommitted to eating healthy. If I make it past three weeks it will be an accomplishment. Thanks Cerise for keeping me motivated. We'll have to check in a lot with each other. I'm determined to find some healthy recipes that taste just as delicious as my regular recipes. When I find some winners, I'll definitely post them.

Also, these pics were taking with my new point and shoot camera. Pics look pretty good I think.

Talk to ya'll soon.