Ellie Rose Mercier, born on February 12th, 7lbs, 12oz and 20 inches of pure cuteness! Being that this is baby number two in the Mercier family for Lance and Kristina, Cole is now the big bro who I'm sure will grow to love and protect this darling sister of his.
And also my brother Jonah and Sister-in-law Deborah are expecting their third child, which we found out is ....A BOY! It's baby fever on the Nelson side of the family as far as I can see.. but be forewarned, our plans for a baby aren't anytime soon. We will not hesitate to revel in the joy of nieces and nephews though!
I had a surprise waiting for Ryan on that friday afternoon at the apartment, with balloons attached to photos along with words of love to show how each month of marriage has been so amazing.
Rounding out our weekend, we indulged in the italian cuisine of Macaroni Grill. Ryan knows me well in that you can't go wrong with Italian food :D Oh, and even though I am the young age of 23, I instantly felt old when a student of Ryan's was at the restaurant and stopped by to say hi. She said "So y'all are doing the PVD thing?" ... I had NO IDEA what that meant. I suddenly had been faced with an acronym that I didn't know was common knowledge. Hahaha. PVD = Post Valentine's Day. My bad.
There were some fails, some laborious meals, but over all happy to have tried new things :)
Smoked Salmon Eggs Benedict.
Sounds fancy right? Yeah, but homemade, at least our homemade... is BLECK! We at least salvaged the biscuits and jellied them up for a sweet escape from the fishy goopy mess we made :( You could try the recipe and see if it's just our incompetence, by all means!
So yummy!! I used a Pillsbury Pizza dough to save time, but it was super flavorful and mounded with avocado on top was the best!!!
No distinct recipe for this, but it was so much better tasting having used the Tennessee Pride sausage to cook our own sausage instead of buying frozen sausage patties. Highly recommended!
I made the original 'Magic Cake' and I think I like that better than this chocolate version. Still a fairly simple recipe with a twist of chocolate to mix it up a bit :)
This was a personal favorite of mine. Very fresh and easy to make. I loved the combo of these two complimenting ingredients that made this chicken super good!
This recipe made a huge batch that went a long way and was great for freezing the extras. Ryan and I both agreed Mexican food should be a staple every week!
What an ordeal to make this meal! It was like preparing a 5 course meal; there was so much time involved! It seemed like 5 millions dishes were dirtied in the process of making this because they were piled so high in our sink. Preparing the dish + eating it + cleaning the dishes = 3.5 hrs! Gah.. You wanna know the best part though?? It tasted amazing!!! Super authentic, and had that spice that General Tso's is known for.
Audrey & Ryan