St. Patrick's Dinner...

For most people, St. Patrick's Day is a meaningless holiday that consists of wearing green and maybe making green pancakes. For me it means a whole lot more. My dad served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to Ireland in the late sixties during the "Troubles". At this time the Protestants and Catholics were literally at war with each other and my dad talks about many times when his life was in danger as he heard gunfire and bombs exploding. I grew up listening to stories of the wonderfully faithful Irish saints and have grown to love the Irish culture. I love the Irish lilt and am CRAZY about Irish music. Every year for St. Patrick's day my mom cooks an amazing corned beef and cabbage dinner and it's something I look forward to. This year was a little different. For the first time in my life, I wasn't there to celebrate with my family. While this made my heart hurt, I decided to make the most of things and cook my own St. Patrick's meal. I turned on my Chieftains Pandora station and started chopping and peeling. I must say that I was very happy with the results.

Mashed red potatos with leeks, cream cheese and butter. Mmmm....

The main event: corned beef

Irish soda bread. This bread is so simple to make and tastes like a large, sweet biscuit. Jordan is crazy about it.

Carrots boiled in the corned beef juices.

And a little green jello sans carrots.

Hope you all had a lovely St. Patrick's Day! Missed you mom and dad.

An Electic Post....

Remember how I said I'm trying to be more crafty? Well, I found a tutorial on how to make pillows on Pinterest and jumped right in. Not only did I enjoy myself, but I'm really pleased with the way they turned out.

Whaddya think?

It has been a very mild winter here in Georgia. Already the blossoms are in full bloom in our front yard.

It's a little weird for me that it's the beginning of March and t-shirt weather here. I can't wait to see what the rest of our yard will look like once everything else blooms.

Last night, Jordan and I went to a fancy dinner for his work. He has been working with an audit team on a big client and they have been putting in crazy hours to issue the financial statements the past few weeks. After big jobs, the company rewards them with a "wrap-up dinner". We got all dressed up and headed into Atlanta to the St. Regis hotel for pre-dinner drinks (or in our case, pre-dinner Cokes). After cocktails, we drove to Hal's Steakhouse. We had a private room upstairs and were told to order anything we wanted, because there was a $2500 minimum. Oh boy. I ordered the filet mignon, crab, shrimp and a scrumptious chocolate cake for dessert. I could not believe how much everyone drank. They ordered bottle of wine after bottle of wine, cocktails, tequila shots, you name it. It was highly entertaining to watch all of these serious professionals get completely toasted. By the end of the night, people were downright jolly. One girl even told me she loved me. One of Jordan's co-workers was so plastered that he couldn't walk straight and Jordan and another guy had to help him down the stairs. Wowzer. After dinner they all went to another bar for after-dinner drinks. Jordan and I respecfully declined and headed home. It was so much fun! I think I'm going to love these wrap-up dinners. It was great to get to know the people that Jordan works with. We'll see if they remember meeting me. :)

Jordan completed a major rite of passage today. After hours of research, he bought himself his first lawn mower. In his words, "I'm a real man now."

Argh, argh, argh, argh! (Tim the Toolman Taylor's bark)

Moments after this picture was taken, Jordan went to start the mower back up and there was fuel leaking everywhere. I guess Jordan had purchased a lemon. Ha ha. He was less than pleased. Luckily we were able to trade it in for a brand new one.