:: Chi-town, I'm coming home again ::

You guys, you guys, you guys.

Chicago is the greatest.  It cracks me up living in Houston, because people are always like, "Oh you lived in Chicago?? It's SO dangerous there."  I have several responses to this...varying from "Well I lived in safe areas..." to "Oh and Houston's such a prize all the time?!" JK on the last one--usually I just say that not all Chicagoans live in the bad areas.  All major cities of  course have their issues, though.  But I don't think most Chicagoans would say "gun violence" as the first thing that comes to mind.

Personally, I think of all of the amazingly fun times I've had there, and the hilarious stories, and my bachelorette party, and my college and grad school days spent in the loop, running scared from all the pigeons on Wabash.

the buildings.  sears tower. 'nuff said.

always taking architectural boat tours even though you've lived there. (i've done at least 7.)

brewers vs. cubs at wrigley.  from a neighboring rooftop. ps go brewers.

friends who make you emergency kits like this full of treats when you move to milwaukee

view looking right from my balcony

View straight-on from my balcony (this was at my fifth apartment in the city)

Work Christmas party at The Palmer House

Watching the Packers crush the Bears time after time on their turf

the sweatiest fourth of July's imaginable

watching Transformers 2 or 3 or whatever film right in front of my place! 

old place! Small, but well-loved

having to drive an hour minimum to get this close to farm animals

the storied ornament house at the Chriskindlmarkt where you can only walk one direction and not double back!

potato pancakes and gluhwein at Chriskindlmarkt--omnom.

I have a million more memories & photos of living here.  I am so excited to be going back in a month for a weekend trip to see everyone and celebrate one of my best friend's graduations from law school!

Setting it all aside

Usually I post recipes, and tell you about my weekend, and of course, wrap-up my weeks!  When I start DIY-ing things I will definitely be sharing more of those, and a lot of that is in the works right now.  But for now, I'd like to share a semi-serious post about what's been happening.

Right now, we have a lot going on in our lives.

Since one year ago, we have moved across the country for B's cool, new job (& away from both families) (but hey, we love TX now!), I finished grad school (& left school for good for the first time in 21 years!), got married (!!!!), we lost his dad in January, and then my mom had a big health scare in February.  Life is starting to relax again, but it's still a balancing act.

While there are obvious positives, like getting married and finishing school and new jobs, a lot, ok, most of it has been tough too.  We both get overwhelmed by everything that's going on, but I just want to say how good it feels when we decide to put the anxieties aside, and enjoy our life together.

We have been through a lot more than we ever expected this early on in our marriage, but I think that in a couple years, we will look back and realize that we made it through the fire relatively unscathed, and for that, I'm proud of us!

So if anything, this should serve as a reminder that sometimes you need to pop in a movie/go out for a meal/take a walk together and make the time to unplug from your phone, blog, iPad, laptop, etc. and just enjoy your good company and the other blessings life has given you. 

Well, well, well.

As some of you may have noticed, I took a little blogging hiatus this week while my lady pals from Wisconsin came into town for a visit Wednesday night through Sunday morning!  Since all but one hadn't been to visit us in Houston, it was fun to enjoy the weather, shopping, and most importantly? the drinks.

Here are all the abbreviated highlights in photos:

Gave myself a really nice bright pink pedi.  Color does not show through well on film but it's Elephantastic Pink by OPI.  Perfect for summer mani/pedis.

Wednesday am started off right.  Pinterest does not always mean a win.  Snapchatted this gem to the girls.

Wed. night we went to IKEA for pillow covers & I got a froyo.

pre-thursday night bar crawl

baked in the sun friday & got a side pony shadow-burn

Three Olives Loopy Vodka + gummy bears = delicious treat.

:: besties ::

Thursday night at the bar

So that is basically everything that has happened around here!  Today I dropped the girls at the airport around 4:30 am and came home to sleep for about 7 hours.  It was a really great weekend full of lots of shenanigans that shall not be spoken about on the internets!

Nom :: Cashew Chicken

And today, the recipe for cashew chicken.  Like I said yesterday, this is a pinterest recipe--and it comes from the blog of MommaChelle.  When I wrote it down, I must have auto-adapted it slightly, so what you'll read here is a slightly adapted version.

Ingredients:
2 chicken breasts (we had a little under a pound)
2 tbl. low-sodium soy sauce (really, use low-sodium.  there is a lot of soy in this recipe and it would definitely be salty if you used regular)
1/4 c. oil.  (I used more like 2 tbl. and a few spritzes from my Misto sprayer)
1 tsp. red pepper flakes (or to taste)
3 green onions diced (I used the top, more green parts, and I just cut about 1/4 down on the whole bunch)
2 cloves of garlic (we both agreed 3 would maybe be tastier)
1/2 tsp. sesame seeds
1/2 c. cashews, unsalted or lightly salted

Sauce:
4 tbl. low-sodium soy
1 1/2 tbl. cornstarch
4 tsp. sugar
2 tsp. white vinegar

Steps:

1.  Cut chicken into small pieces and toss in the 2 tbl. of soy in a small bowl.  Let it marinade a bit while prepping other ingredients.

2.  Whisk the sauce ingredients together and slice up green onions if you haven't done so yet.  Heat your oil in a wok and add tin the red pepper flakes and garlic.  Saute for about 1 minute and then add in the chicken.

3.  Cook the chicken until it is just done, and then add the cashews and remove it from the heat.  Then pour in the sauce mixture and coat the chicken and cashews.  Finish by sprinkling sesame seeds and green onions on top. Enjoy over rice, quinoa or whatever you choose!

the sauce thickened a little more after this 

It's April, Peeps!

Ok, so here's my recap of what we did this weekend--

Friday Bry had off from work (and as we all know, I still haven't found a new job), so in the morning we went to check out a potential new apartment.   VERY excited.  I can't tell you how much we were overpaying at our current place, and now that he's been in Houston for almost a year (!) and myself since October, we have a  better grasp on areas, and whether or not we really needed to live in a "cool" neighborhood.

Let's be real, we are *not* that cool, so clearly we didn't need to overpay on location.  I think we will be very happy at our new place at the end of May since it will also mean that it's puppy time then...and wow do we need a puppy in our lives.

We had breakfast together, and then he went off to bottle some beer he's been making with a friend.  Because even on days you don't go to work at a brewery, you brew beer, check it's quality, and bottle it for a competition.  Ended up having dinner at said friend's house--huge steaks, artichokes, double baked potatoes, and probably other things I am forgetting.  It was a fat kid pig out fest.

Saturday started out very innocently.  We applied for our place and got approved.  Then we somehow ended up at the Galleria on a mission for sunglasses which quickly de-railed into a couple new dresses, new tops, some shorts for him, etc.   *cue danger zone music*

I made a ridiculously delicious meal for dinner on Saturday, cashew chicken over rice.  I will post the recipe later this week--so easy and literally haven't gotten such good reviews on a meal since I learned my mom's beef stroganoff.  It is a pinterest recipe, and a pleasantly surprising one at that!  (I think we've all been there with the shitty internet recipe situation.)

as bryan said, "the chicken looks like steak...and i like it that way."  that is code for, wow lots of soy sauce!

Sunday morning---Happy Easter!  I made another killer meal-honey ham, cheesed-up potatoes, green beans with green onions and bacon, and an arugula salad with green apples, red onion, walnuts and the most amazing champagne vinaigrette (it's from Trader Joe's, go now.) (And no, I can never spell "vinaigrette".  Thx spell check)   We had some angel food cake with fresh strawberries and of course some Easter candy.

oh and we had a really nice bottle of red too. oops.

someone else had approx. double the amount of perfect potatoes i did.

Oh, also, I made some killer caramel pecan rolls that are a family recipe for brunch along with hard-boiled eggs (dyed, duh.) and some crispy bacon that wasn't needed for the beans later.

this is an old pic from Christmas, but you can see the aforementioned pecan rolls.
can you tell i have a favorite holiday breakfast?! 

Pretty domesticated weekend as far as all that goes--we also got to Facetime with our nephew for his 10th birthday on Saturday.  We sent him a Dr. Who Monopoly set, and a couple of books, so it was fun to watch him open everything in real time.

This week is going to be crazy--I have FIVE amazing girlfriends coming into town Wednesday night-Sunday morning (6 am flight out), and they are all staying with us....so there may not be as many posts this week, and I may not even make it to Friday at the rate we will be enjoying sun & cocktails.