Easter and some cooking...

Spring is still busy as I'm trying to wrap up a busy semester while squeezing in as much subbing as possible, and Matt's working hard being a rockstar at work winning things like "Recognize Points" (never heard of them?  Me either.  All that really matters is that they are redeemed for cool gifts!  Yay Matt!).  We've also been busy getting ready for our friends' wedding - Matt is hard at work putting together play lists, fooling around with DJ software, practicing piano tunes for the ceremony, etc... he literally is a rockstar ;)  It's going to be an amazing wedding!

This past weekend was Easter, and it was another great one here in Denver.  We spent the weekend relaxing (we went to bed at 8:30pm on Friday.  Yes, you read that correctly) and catching up with Keri/Joe at Stoney's on Saturday evening (thank you Groupon!).  We caught the 8:30am service at church (which was great, as usual) and saw some dear friends, reminding me once again how much God has blessed us here.  We are so thankful for all He's done - most of which being sacrificing His son for us - we who most definitely do not deserve it.  We enjoyed celebrating His resurrection in a church that has been so good to us with friends who we love so dearly.

After church we rushed home to clean/cook for our guests' arrival (the usual ritual is me frantically trying to cook while Matt is frantically trying to clean the first floor... it's quite the scene).  We served a nice brunch for my dad (my stepmom is out of town taking care of my grandma in Chicago), sister, and DJ and had a great time catching up and practicing some tunes.  Since my dad is doing dubdub too, I made some very WW-friendly recipes (well, experimented with is more accurate).  They turned out to be pretty tasty!  I will definitely make them again.

A delicious turkey sausage and reduced fat cheese strata:

My own weird low-fat cheesy potato concoction (would've been totally awesome had they cooked a little bit longer):

Peep pre-mircrowave.  Better than eating it, huh? :)

In other dubdub news, things are going pretty well for me - down 18 lbs in two months!  It is no easy (or fun) ride, but it is most definitely worth it.  I'm having an off day where I just feel like grabbing some candy or some chips or something... sometimes fruit and whole wheat stuff just doesn't cut it!  But thankfully dubdub allows for some cheating :)  All in all, I'm trying to just change my mindset more than anything.  No easy fixes unfortunately.  So - I've been cooking a lot more lately (poor Matt is my guinea pig!).  Some hits, some misses.  One miss lately was a soup I saw made on the Today Show.  It looked SO easy when Kathie Lee and Hoda were helping out (maybe they were tipsy...), but oh no no.  Not only was it EXPENSIVE to make (strike one, well, that would count as three strikes in and of itself), but it was not easy, and the end result was nothing to write home about.  Well, since I'm writing about it, I guess it's lack of being something to write home about actually made it something to blog about.  But I digress.  Here are a few pics of the "easy" parts.  If you come across a recipe for Orange Pepper Soup, skip it.

But in successful recipe news, I tried a recipe for Chicken Rollatini with Spinach alla Parmigiana and it turned out fabulously.  Totally a keeper. And super WW-friendly!!