Homemade Basil Pesto

Since I am growing my own basil this year and have a BUNCH of it, I decided that I would make some pesto, since I love it. I found a recipe that is super easy and then I tweaked it a bit. If you love pesto AND basil as much as I do, than you should definitely try this recipe!

It is as follows:

3 C basil leaves

3/4 C grated parmesan

3 minces garlic cloves

1/3 C pine nuts

1/2-3/4 C extra virgin olive oil

salt

pepper

*lemon juice (as much a desired by taste)

*I added this to the recipe

Place everything but evoo in blender. Give it a few chops if your blender will allow (mine would not do anything until I added the oil, so you may or may not have the same trouble). Slowly pour in evoo until desired consistency is reached. And VIOLA there you have it!

After I tasted it I decided that it needed a little kick, so I added lemon juice, and kept tasting it until I thought it was right. I also decided that next time I am going to add a little less cheese, because it was a bit much for me.

So, what do you ask did I use my pesto for? Well, I decided to make a pizza with pesto as my sauce, and then added some grilled chicken, mozzarella and feta cheese. It was DELICIOUS if I do say so myself. And to give myself even more credit, my mom said it was one of the BEST pizza's she has ever had!! (Hope she wasn't saying that just because she's my mom? ;) )

So if you are growing some basil in your garden this year, go on, give this recipe a try, your gonna love it!!

Until next time, BYE!

Linking up to: Life Made Lovely

Savvy Southern Style

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

Happy Father's Day to the love of my life and father of my child. Sweet pea and I LOVE YOU!! Also want to wish a Happy Day to my daddy (you are the best!) and all the other great daddy's out there. Enjoy your day!!

Sweet Pea and her daddy on her 1st Birthday!

Scenes From Around My House

My life has been utter craziness and I have not been able to post lately, even though I have a TON of stuff to tell you about! But today sadly I am home with an ear ache so I thought I would take the opportunity to give you a little peek at our home. Hope you enjoy!!

Sweet pea says "Come back soon and see what's been going on in our crazy life!" :)

Linking up this monday with Heather at Life Made Lovely!

Out with the OLD in with the NEW

Saturday we are having a multi family yard sale at our house, so I have been digging through stuff for weeks now, and boy have I found ALOT to get rid of. I told hubby that I am not playing around this time, and I am gonna clean house! Basically I am getting rid of anything that we are not currently using. I know this may sound drastic, but since we live in a 1000 sq. ft home with only 4 closets, we don't have a whole lot of room to store things.

All this cleaning out got me thinking that it was time to give the house a little face lift. We have lived in our home for almost 3 years, and since then I have moved stuff around and from room to room, but I never got rid of much, SO, I think it's safe to say that it is time.

The wheels started turning in my head about what I could change, without having to spend much money. One idea I came up with was to change the look of some books I have laying on the entry table. They were just a collection that I picked up routing around my mom's house, so since they were free I wasn't too picky at the time on how they looked. So I thought to myself, "What could I do to change these books?", and then it hit me, I'll find some cute scrapbook paper and wrap them in it, and "viola" instant change.

So, I got in my car and drove to my favorite store Hobby Lobby, picked up a couple sheets of scrapbook paper and brought em' home. When I actually sat down to wrap them I wasn't sure they were going to be able to wrap all the way around, and sure enough I was right, but it didn't matter I just turned that side to the back and you can't even tell.

Here is how they turned out........

CUTE right?? And the best part is it cost me less than $2 to give my whole table a different look. My sconces are a new addition as well, only $11 a piece in the clearance section at Hobby Lobby. Have I mentioned that I LOVE Hobby Lobby??

Well I hope this inspires you to give your house a little Spring face lift as well. Until next time visit Heather over at Life Made Lovely on this lovely Monday!

Mother's Day

Last Sunday was my very first Mother's Day with my sweet pea and it was a very special day! Hubby let me sleep in until 9:30 which was wonderful and then we got to spend a little time together before we parted ways to see our mothers. (I know it seems weird that we didn't spend the day together, but being as both of our mothers live here, it makes it hard to see both families in the same day, so we compromised, which was fine.)

Hubby went to brunch with his family and then went to his mothers to work on building her flower beds for her mothers day gift. Sweet pea and I went to brunch with my parents and my dad's side of the family at the River Valley Club (a small private club in Louisville where my grandmother is a member, and where hubby and I had our wedding reception). The club is located on the Ohio River and even though we have had a lot of flooding over the past several months, the sun ended up coming out and the river actually still looked pretty.

Brunch was delicious and it was nice to get to spend time with my mom and family because since everybody has such different schedules it is always hard to try and get everyone together. After sweet pea took her nap we headed over to my mom's house to hang out with her the rest of the day. Sweet pea loves my mom (Nana) so much and gets so excited when she gets to see her, so she was very happy to be spending the day with her Nana.

Since the day was so nice we decided to take a long stroll in my mom's neighborhood and little did we know what we were going to see on this adventure. Mom's neighborhood is very quaint and quiet and it's VERY suburban. There is some new development going up next to the neighborhood so we decided to peek in the windows of the beautiful new show home. As we were doing so, we heard a noise that we never thought we would hear in the city and became very confused. It was the noise of chickens (yes, you heard right)! We turned around and low and behold behind one of the older homes located next to the new development there was a whole coop full of chickens, and 2 small goats. It was like a mini farm right smack dab in the middle of suburbia. So we just had to walk over and check it out and yes folks, I took a picture.

So all in all my first mother's day was pretty eventful and I wouldn't change it for the world. I am looking forward to next year already. Until next time, BYE!

Me and my sweet pea

River Valley Club

Sweet pea in an old fashion high chair

my love

Mom and all her girls

3 generations

On our walk

The chickens! Aren't they cute??

The Most Exciting 2 Minutes in Sports!!

So being a Louisville native this weekend was one that I look forward to every year, it was Derby weekend. Derby is by far one of the most exciting things about living in Louisville. The festivities kick off at the end of April with the biggest fireworks display in the world "Thunder of Louisville", followed by the Great Steamboat race (which got postponed to June because of the river flooding), Balloon Glow, the Great Balloon Race, The Pegasus Parade, Chow Wagons, The Oaks, and ending with the most exciting 2 minutes in sports. Whew, that's a lot of stuff!!

It's also an exciting time, because of all the celebrities that travel to Louisville during this particular weekend. There is a party held every year the night before the big race called the Barnstable Brown Party. It is hosted by Trish Barnstable and her twin sister (can't remember her name right now), who were the Doublemint twins back in the day. All the celebrities that come in town are invited, and the who's who of Louisville are there too. Not gonna say how hubby got in, but he has attended twice and gotten to meet people such as Michael Jordan and Richard Branson!

This year was hubby and I's 4th Annual Derby Party. I'll take any excuse to throw a party, but throwing one for Derby is so much fun! We get to bring out all the Derby glasses that we have collected over the years, and make all the food that's native to Louisville, like hot browns (yum). You get to wear fun outfits and beautiful hats, and especially get the chance to win a little CASH, if you pick the right horses (which we didn't :( )

This year we decided to throw a little theme action in the mix and called it a 70's themed Derby party. The theme didn't go over so well, so I think next year we may just stick to the normal Derby theme. I think everybody that came had some good food, conversation, and most importantly a good time. I am excited to start planning for next year's party, but for now I have some planning to do for a certain sweet pea's 1st birthday party!!

This weekend was also my 1st Mother's Day and I had an awesome time celebrating with my family and most of all my sweet pea! Pictures to come in a later post. But for now I will sign off and leave you with some photos from the Derby party.

Until next time!!

An Easter 1st!

I know Easter was a few weekends ago, but I am just getting around to writing this post. This Easter was even more special to me than any before, because it was the 1st for my sweet pea! Something about having a kid makes every holiday that much more exciting. I think because as a parent you finally get to buy all that cute stuff they put out in the stores for the holidays, and you get to start your own family traditions to go along with the ones that you may already have from being a kid yourself.

Even though I had fractured my arm the day before I still wanted to make the day as special as possible for her. (Yes I know she is only 10 months and doesn't know any better, but I like to think she does!) Thankfully hubby was such a big help and recorded and captured the day on film. I don't know what I would have done without him! Here are a few shots of sweet pea opening her Easter basket.

After we ate breakfast we all got ready (Which took me forever with just one arm!) and headed over to my mother in laws house for Easter lunch with hubby's family. It was very delicious and we were so excited that hubby's Grandma was still in town and got to spend Easter with all of us this year, especially for sweet pea's very first. Mom helped me make a chocolate chip cookie pie for dessert the previous day, another delicious recipe from the ladies at Our Best Bites.

Once our food settled (and hubby snuck in a nap) we headed over to my parents house for ROUND 2 with my mom's family. Everyone was so excited to see sweet pea and snuggle with her because they don't get to see her that often. Sweet pea also got to open another Easter basket from her Nana and Pop.

All in all the day was pretty perfect (Except for the nasty rain), and I look forward to next year when sweet pea can walk and have her very first egg hunt. Hopefully everyone else out there had as great of a day celebrating the Resurrection of Jesus as much as we did.

Until next time!