I’ve recently found that I am a million times more productive if I leave the house to do things. For example: I have a long, long list of thank you notes to write for all of the lovely gifts we received at our baby shower, and somehow I can’t make myself sit down at my desk long enough to just write them. For me, the same thing happens with blogging. I have a list of recipes and lots of photos just waiting to be published, but nope. It just hasn’t happened. Does this happen to you? What is it about sitting yourself down at a coffee shop that makes you work harder? Maybe it’s the people around that are watching…making sure you’re doing what you should be. In any case. Here I am…and guess what? My notes are written and you’re reading a shiny new blog post. Yipee! Thanks to all the encouragement of perfect strangers sitting around me.

On a side note: I’m full term today, so this baby can safely come any day now. Let’s all say a prayer and hope really hard she comes sooner rather than later. Let me know if you have any tips on making that happen.:)

Here’s a yummy new way I’ve used up my zucchini! The nice thing about this soup is that you can enjoy it hot or cold. Personally, I like my soup hot…but I hear it’s really refreshing chilled as well. However, I’m thinking the cheese would be omitted in that case.

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My mom introduced this recipe to me after finding it in a cookbook she recently bought called “One Pot” (unfortunately I can’t find a link to the book at the moment). It’s full of delicious looking soups, stews and stir fry’s and though this is the first recipe we’ve tried from this book, we’re impressed so far. This soup has an amazing combination of spices including cumin, coriander and cinnamon, and the addition of the semi-sweet chocolate really completes it. It may sound odd, but if you haven’t had chocolate in a beef stew before, it’s high-time you do. Yum.

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My charger has finally arrived! I’ve been so happy to finally be able to photograph some of my meals again to show you. Here’s one I made a few months ago, I was so pleased with the flavor that I decided to make it again. I thought the soup could use a little more of the garlic and onion flavor, so I doubled the content that was in the original recipe. I also added half & half to make it a bit more creamy. It’s a mild soup with a lovely flavor. Perfect to serve alongside some garlic toast and a nice salad.

P.S. Sorry that I don’t have any pink cupcakes or heart shaped cookies to share with you on this lovely day. My valentine is off firefighting for the holiday, so I’m putting off celebrating till he returns.:) hopefully you are all enjoying a sweet time with your special someone and eating enough chocolate for all of us! Happy Valentines!

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There’s nothing like a hearty vegetable stew to comfort us during this chilly season…and I think this one hits the spot. I didn’t worry about peeling my carrots or potatoes, just gave them a good scrub clean and roughly chopped them up. I think this gave my stew a more rustic feel. But…If you are like my sister Lauren and anything resembling a peel gives you the heebie-jeebies, feel free to peel ‘em.

For the past 2 Christmases since Clif and I have been married we’ve stuck around in South Carolina due to Clif’s work schedule, but this year we’ll be heading up North! We’ll stick around here for Christmas-Eve festivities with my fam and then drive up late that night to be in Maryland for Christmas morn. So very excited about seeing how this side of the celebrates, and maybe even having snow for Christmas! Woohooo!

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