chicken empanadas.

I can never tell if photos of food look appetizing or just like piles of disgusting. Either way, here was dinner last night. Paula Deen's chicken empanadas. Con quac and black beans y cerveza. Tried to get out of our little taco pie, salmon, or baked chicken routine. Dinner at the Johnson house is those three on repeat - mixed with different sides. But not last night!!!!

Yum! Paula says it's Intermediate level cooking - so here ya go if anyone wants to give it a go.

3 cups chopped, cooked chicken

1 package shredded Colby and Mont. Jack cheese

4 ounces cream cheese

1/4 cup chopped red bell pepper

1 jalapeno, seeded and chopped

1 tbs. ground cumin

1 1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1 package refrigerated pie crusts

Preheat oven to 400. Combine chicken and next 7 ingreds. (Make sure your cream cheese is softened - your combining process will be much easier) Roll out pie crust dough and cut out 3-inch rounds (with cookie cutter or kitchen glass in my case). Makes 12-15 circles. Fill with chicken mixture. Fold over dough and press edges, use fork to seal. Bake for 15 minutes!

The only improvement for next time would be, for me, to make the pie crust circles much thinner, for a crispier outside!

playing catch up.

Here we go blog. It's been a while.

Today I received an email from a co-worker. Without a choice in the matter, I was added to an inner-office email list. The emails are the ones that you have to pass to 10 friends to tell them you love them or else you'll never make a new friend for 25 years, while your love-life seriously dwindles and your stricken with bad luck for eternity. Either way, I was pleasantly reminded today of God's sovereignty.

This email told the readers that God is in control - whenever you have a problem - put in the the SFGTD folder. "Save for God to do" I think we were going with a cute little e-mail pun. It went on to explain that God will get to in his own time. Once you put your worries in the SFGTD folder, you must forget about it, let it go. Even in the cheesiest ways - God keeps his flock close to his heart. This email was a tad juvenile, yet still grounded in truth.

With all the changes lately, it's good to remember that my worries are already being taken care of. Faith.

For two or three weeks now we have been very busy little bees.

Things on this list back here are getting crossed off! What a great feeling.

• Texas Rangers games, preferably dolla-dog-night!

• The Dallas Arboretum - perhaps a picnic

• Burn the Floor at Fair Park

• lots of dog parks

• the pool, a pool, any pool

• enjoy all 3 weddings - make the most out of the wedding weekends

• random weekend getaway
• run. outside. a lot.

• move? to a house maybe

• start design school

• beach house

• help Blake build a kitchen table

We're getting moved into the new place. Met all the neighbors as they sweetly welcomed us into the neighborhood. We are absolutely loving it. We've been busy getting this old house up to our standards. More posts to come. We know we're just in a rental, but we're hoping to stay here for the duration of Blake's school, 3 years, so we want to make it our own.

On the list - take time to enjoy the 3 weddings we were invited to. Below, we're at one of Blake's best friend's, Zach and Meagan's gorgeous July wedding. She was a beautiful bride and the whole night was full of love and friends. They had delicious desserts and they left through a tunnel of sparklers. It was so fun to be there.

an unexpected item to cross of the list. a new job!

hopefully I can get into the swing of blogging again very soon. I miss it. Now - off to "Thrift Universe" and other such stores with Kate. Hopefully I can find the perfect china hutch for our new kitchen. Yay for weekends!