New Recipe Tuesday

We've had pretty good menus this week and last, but I just haven't posted them! Here are a few new recipes that we thought were good.

Beer-Braised Meatballs with Horseradish Sauce

The sauce was great! It's simple, and I would use it as a dip for other dishes too. The meatball "gravy" was a little greasy though, so we really didn't use much of it.

Steak with Blue Cheese Potatoes 

 The sauce for the potatoes was yummy (if you like blue cheese!). It paired really well with the saucy steak and a salad.

Spicy Sausage Pasta

This was a true one-dish dinner! You don't have to cook the pasta in advance, which makes it super easy. I had regular diced tomatoes (not Rotel), so we used those and spicy andouille instead of the smoked sausage. Yum! This was really good.

Fall Fun

This was our first weekend at home in a month, so we decided to make the best of it with some fall fun! We visited the Haygood pumpkin patch, which has become our ATL pumpkin tradition. Even though it is in a parking lot. ;) We wore red to cancel out all that orange! And may we just go ahead and say -- GO DAWGS!

We sure picked a big one. This pumpkin turned into a two-day affair. One day for cleaning it out and one day for carving!

After a fun but busy month of weekends on the road, we were thankful to have some time to catch up on errands and laundry, eat some good food, carve a fun pumpkin, pick up some candy for the trick-or-treaters we probably won't have, and most importantly, watch the Bulldogs beat some Gator tail.

Happy fall, y'all!

M + R in SAV

This weekend marked the end of our stretch of travel weekends, but we ended it on a good note. In Savannah to see our friends MacKenzie and Ryan get married! Saturday was a beautiful day for a wedding, which is a good thing since theirs was outside at the Bonna Bella Yacht Club!

The weather and the setting were just so pretty. It was sunny but not hot, and there was no major wind. It was a perfect marshside setting! The ceremony was down on the dock, and we all stood up on the deck to watch.

Then the new Mr. & Mrs. S joined us on the deck to par-tay! We had drinks while they took pictures, and then we all enjoyed a low country dinner of shrimp and grits (among other things). And we topped it all off with wedding cake, of course!

As the sun went down, the weather dropped to the perfect temperature for dancing and socializing. :) There may have even been some groom-led Gangnam Style!

Naturally, there were mandatory dance breaks for watching the Georgia game.
 

We had lots of fun, but soon it was time for the bride and groom to be on their way. We sent them off in a shower of confetti!

So glad we got to share your special day with you, M & R! Thank you for including us!

Congratulations, too, to our friends Michael and Audrey who also got married yesterday! It was a happy wedding weekend for all. :)

Fire it up, Devils, fire it up!

Over the weekend, we were in Statesboro for my ten year high school reunion. Having witnessed some of the planning on Facebook, I have to say that it was a much-anticipated event! And I'll just leave it at that. ;)

We left for the reunion festivities on Friday after work, and we got to the Boro in time to eat a Sugar Magnolia pizza and have some kitten playtime.

Baby Girl

a.k.a. The friendly one. Grizabella was traumatized by her lady surgery and has no interest in socializing. (And according to their medical charts, these are their official names!)

We missed the Friday night cookout since we got in late, but we were able to make it for a tour of the new Statesboro High School on Saturday morning. It's on the same piece of land that our SHS was on, but it is a far cry from it in every other way!

When my class was at SHS, it was essentially a main hallway with four classroom halls on one side, a lunchroom and media center on the other side, and a few surrounding smaller buildings. But the new school is a huge, two-story campus that we all thought was very fancy. And, FYI, "the 90s" is now an acceptable theme decade for Homecoming dress-up/decoration purposes. Yikes!

New Gym

Our Gym
(The only thing left from the old SHS. It smelled the same!)

This marquee was actually our senior class gift!

There was a dinner social scheduled at Millhouse on Saturday night, and that's where we expected to see the biggest group.

It didn't disappoint! I got to see and talk to so many people, and Andrew had a few other non-SHS husbands to talk to in between meeting classmates of mine.

 High School Friends/College Roomies :)

Several of us said that it was much more fun than we expected it to be, and we were so glad that we went! There is talk of having an 11-year reunion or at least having one every five years from now on.

Just for fun...here's the senior portrait I submitted for the "Where are they now?" slideshow. Sleeveless turtlenecks were very cool in 2001.

On Sunday, we had a yummy lunch at my house and watched Felix jump from space(!) before heading back to Atlanta.

Rocco waiting patiently...

...and Toby not caring.

Enjoyed seeing all of you '02 Blue Devils! Keep the fire burnin' til we meet again. ;)

Another Gardens Getaway

On Saturday, we headed southwest for a little weekend getaway to Callaway Gardens! We knew we wanted to take an anniversary trip, and we didn't want to spend too much time in transit. We looked at going to Asheville again, as well as a few places in North Georgia, but in the end we decided on the Lodge & Spa at Callaway Gardens.

I haven't been to the Gardens in a long time, and although Andrew has been there more recently, it was just for the Christmas lights display. So technically this was a "new" place for both of us -- always the most fun! The Lodge has a mountain/woodsy feel, which Andrew called "Grove Park Lite". :)

Pretty soon after we checked in, we got a knock at the door and had a surprise delivery from "Mom" and "Dad".

Andrew thought it was a mistake because I don't call my parents "Mom & Dad" (and they would never sign a card that way). But sure enough, it was for us -- just signed incorrectly by the hotel! ;) We thoroughly enjoyed the wine and snacks while we lounged and watched football. Thanks again, yall!

A little before 7, we headed down to the Ironwood Lounge in the hotel to watch the Georgia game.

We ordered kettle chip nachos, pimento cheese fritters, fried green tomatoes, and black-eyed pea hummus. Yum!

Obviously, we won't dwell on the rest of that game-watching experience. So we'll just focus on the food! We also enjoyed the musical stylings (and occasional football commentary) of local band Backtrackin'.

Our hotel rate included breakfast and admission to the Gardens, so our plan for Sunday was to enjoy both! We slept in a little, ate, and then headed up the road a little ways to the gates.

We started out at the Cecil B. Day Butterfly Center, which is filled with butterflies -- most notably blue morpho butterflies. Even though they were practically swarming us, it was almost impossible to get a good in-flight picture of them! (Whenever they landed, they almost always closed their wings, which are more moth-like on the underside.)

See it?

Half the people in there were just walking around holding out their cameras or phones, hoping to catch one. We managed to get a few! (And shoutout to the black and white butterflies, who were much more patient, still, and photogenic.)

Next, we headed over to the main gardens to see the fall display of mums, college football colors (UGA, Tech & Auburn), and the beautiful greenhouses.

I am not a fairweather fan.

 

 

 

 

 

By the time we made it through all that, it was early afternoon and time for (more) food. We headed over to the beautiful new Discovery Center by the lake for lunch, fish/turtle feeding, and the birds of prey show. The weather was perfect!

We had a great day and decided to take the "Scenic Drive" out to the main road and then stop at the Callaway Gardens Country Store to look for a Christmas ornament.

They didn't have one single Callaway ornament, which we thought was odd. Especially since they had an entire tree full of wine-themed ornaments. Oh well. I did think this cork garland was cute!

Anyway, we left empty-handed but enjoyed the overlook across the highway for a few minutes before heading back to the hotel.

For dinner, we decided to just eat at the hotel again -- in the Piedmont Room. It was about as crowded as you would expect a remote hotel dining room to be on a random Sunday night. ;) But we enjoyed it!

We checked out on Monday morning and enjoyed the breakfast buffet before leaving. Since Warm Springs and FDR's Little White House are so close to Callaway, we made a last minute decision to stop there before coming home. And we were so glad we did!

It was only $10, and they had an amazing collection of FDR memorabilia in a beautiful new museum.

We also toured the house (of course), along with the flag walk and the final/unfinished portrait exhibit.

 

The gift shop there did not disappoint either, as it had several different Christmas ornaments to choose from! We came away with a miniature replica of the Warm Springs stagecoach -- and a copy of the Southern cookbook that FDR's cook used (I couldn't resist).

 
We left in the super cool, fall-like temperatures (YAY) and headed back to Atlanta. We had a great time!