Housewife Weekend

Well, according to Hubby, this weekend was a housewife weekend--meaning I was basically the definition of housewife with my chosen activites. I'm not sure whether I should consider that a good thing or a bad thing--but I had a pretty great weekend so either way is fine with me!

Friday night I had planned to cook dinner at home, but by the end of the day I was less than excited about spending time in the kitchen. Hubby treated me to a quick dinner out followed by nothing other than a bit of fro-yo from Orange Leaf. We finished up the evening by stopping by our friends' Derek & Andrea's house with the intention of playing some cards. Seeing as how we hadn't hung out in a while, the card games never happened but we had some great conversation which is always a great way to end the night.

Saturday was my true housewife day. Hubby had class all day so I spent the day working around the house spending most of my time in the kitchen. I baked & did laundry & washed dishes. I was able to take a quick break to go help Andrea with preparations for craft show season. She sells hairbows, flowers, hats, & tutus for little girls & the craft show season is starting at the end of the week. I helped out last year at a few shows & I'm doing so again this year. It's a great way to spend time with my best friend & also just a lot of fun. Our main goal was to come up with a great table display & think we definitely succeeded!

Definitely not the finished product, but I love all the bright colors...doesn't that just make you want to buy a hat and put a big flower on it?

Before & after spending time with Andrea I had several things to work on in the kitchen. We had a 5th Anniversary Celebration at our church this morning which included an all church lunch. Our small group was in charge of pasta or potato salad so I whipped up a quick pasta salad. I used a recipe from Tasty Kitchen and was certainly pleased with how it came out.

Next on my list for the kitchen was an idea I had on a whim. I've never made bread or rolls from scratch & I decided what better day to do it then a day when Hubby is gone all day & I've got plenty of time. So, I turned to my dear friend (ok well maybe I don't know her, but I feel like I do) Pioneer Woman & decided her dinner rolls were an easy place to start for my first bread-making experience. It was super easy, just time-consuming; which I'm sure had something to do with the fact that I'd never made bread before!

The dough, all risen & ready for the rolls!

Now just waiting on the rolls to rise a bit...this recipe made about 3 dozen rolls--I ended up freezing a lot of them so Hubby & I could have fresh bread with dinner.

This particular recipe was for pull-apart dinner rolls. You simply roll up 3 walnut-sized balls of dough & put them in muffin tins. I also made a small pan of regular rolls which worked out fine as well. However, the pull-apart aspect made it look like I knew what I was doing!

Golden brown on top, they might seem a little brown in the photo but they were perfect. Even PW said to let them get a little brown and she was right...which I think she probably always is when it comes to the kitchen!

Unfortunately, the last ones didn't come out of the oven until after 9:00 last night so I avoided the temptation to eat one so late. However, I'm a huge fan of peanut butter & honey on rolls so that's what was on the menu for breakfast this morning. Yum....I just love homemade bread!

I'll definitely be trying this recipe again. It was so easy & required no kneading! This is the same recipe PW uses for her famous cinnamon rolls so I think those will be next on my list to try.

As I mentioned, today's church service was a celebration of what God has done at Northbridge Church in the past 5 years. Nick & I have been members of the Northbridge family for 3 of those 5 years and it's so exciting to see how God has been at work & how I know he's going to bless our church family in the years to come.

The members of our original small group who attend Northbridge. The great thing about our small group is that it's certainly not exclusive to those who attend Northbridge; but it's also wonderful to worship with these fabulous people each week.

After lunch Hubby & I came home to finish up a bit of yardwork. We had two additional flower beds to finish up & while we didn't get completely finished we were able to get quite a bit done. We stopped when we ran out of supplies & were able to spend the rest of the afternoon relaxing.

Tonight we had a casual meeting with our new small group. Our original small group was feeling called to birth a new group so our group separated. Now we have 2 groups who will hopefully be bringing the blessings of small group life to many more families. The new group Hubby & I attend still has 3 of the couples from our original group & we're hoping to add 1-2 more families in the coming weeks. I can't wait to see how God works through our small groups to reach more & more families!