A family living, laughing, loving, and hoping through childhood cancer
Father’s Day….a day to send love to my father, Peter’s father, and Pete…to grandfathers and uncles, cousins and friends.
But also a day to send love to some other fathers I love who will be hurting on this day…this day made bittersweet by the loss of one who made this day special.
To Mat, Danny, Dave, Dirk, Donnie, Brian, and far too many more.
NEVER forgotten.
When you all wreck your keyboards from drooling all over the place, don’t blame me…blame Rachael…who regularly sends my mental taste buds into overdrive with her mad-wicked-NOM-NOM-NOM recipes at her blog A Southern Fairytale! And I swear that one of these days I’m totally going to kidnap her use one of her recipes and force her at gunpoint to cook for me create some of this yummy goodness for ME ME ME my family.
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I met Anissa in February at the BlissDom conference in Nashville and like many people, I was immediately taken with her. There has been a lot of talk about her awesome cleavage, but what’s even bigger and more impressive, are her giant heart and wonderful smile.
Anissa simply lights up a room and makes you feel as if you are the most fascinating person she’s ever met, so when Anissa sent me an email asking me to guest post for her… how could I say no?
Being the food lovin’ gal that I am, I asked her what her favorite food was and she asked me if I had a recipe for Shrimp and Grits. HELLO! I am a Southerner, I am a Texan.. yes woman, I have Grits recipes.
Now, if you aren’t a southerner, you are probably wondering what in tarnation we are talking about. Grits are also known as polenta and are made mostly of ground corn. You can serve grits in many ways but my favorite are Garlic Cheese Grits.
So, in honor of my darling friend Anissa, here you go:
Garlic Cheese Grits
* 6 Cups water
* 2 tsp salt
* 1 ½ C grits
* ½ C (1 stick) butter
* 3 eggs, well beaten
* 1 pound sharp Cheddar Cheese, grated (roughly 4 C)
* 3 cloves garlic, minced
* dash of cayenne pepper
1. Salt the water and bring to a rapid boil; gradually stir in the grits, using a fork. Cook covered until all the water is absorbed.
2. Stir in the butter, bit by bit and then carefully add eggs, cheese, garlic and cayenne.
3. Place in a buttered 2 ½ Quart casserole dish and bake at 350 for one hour and 20 minutes.
This makes 8 servings.
If you’re feelin’ feisty: serve with some spicy shrimp.
* 1 pound peeled and de-veined shrimp
* 2 Tbsp butter
* 2 – 3 Tbsp Rachel’s All Purpose seasoning
* dash of tabasco (if you like)
* ½ C chopped green onions
* 1 Tbsp minced garlic
1. Put butter in a pan over medium-high heat and lightly brown, add in green onions and garlic and sautee lightly for about 1 minute
2. toss the shrimp in a bowl with a light drizzle of olive oil, (tabasco) and the Seasoning mix until well coated, add to the pan and cook, stirring gently to turn the shrimp until they are pink.
3. This will only take a couple of minutes.
4. Remove from heat and serve with grits.
Totally tonguegasmic and southern delight.
“So, what do you think about me digging a hole in the backyard?”
A single look from me apparently left scorch marks on my husband’s forehead.
“WHY? Why would you dig a hole in the backyard?”
“I was thinking I could build a hot tub!”
*silence*
“Peter, you know…they have companies that do that…they call them HOT TUB COMPANIES {I know, you’re staggered by my mad arguing skills. SHUT it, I was tired, this was only day 2 in the house} and they do this thing called ‘building hot tubs.”
“Yeah, but I read on the internet blah blah blah and then I could make blah blah blah and then we would have blah blah blah and beer.”
*silence*
“You know what? You should DO THAT!”
Peter gave me his “Have You Been Drinking Before Noon?” look.
“NO! I’m totally serious, you should absolutely start digging that hole, like, right now. I’ll go get you a shovel. AND THEN? I’m going to check online to buy some cows…I’ll raise them right here in the backyard…then kill them and skin them WITH.MY.OWN.TWO.HANDS. and sew that leather couch I’ve been wanting so bad.”
He smiles at me.
I smile back.
“So…you’re saying don’t dig the hole?”
“Don’t dig the hole.”
The great thing about our marriage is that a conversation like this might sound ludicrous to most people, but we have them on an almost daily basis around here.
We can laugh…that’s important, people!
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The move-in process is going well. We’ve made paths through the piles and stacks of crap so that we can at least pretend to have a normal life. We finally get some TV hooked up on Saturday….not that I haven’t fully enjoyed daily doses of “Beauty and the Beast”. Thanks for hanging in there with me, I SWEAR I’ll be back to blogging about not-move stuff soon. Soon-ish, anyways. Soonesque?
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And I wrote about something over here that nearly made my head fall off in shock and anger and so, of course, I had a bit of a rant about it.
Hello there! This is not Anissa, this is Dave2 from Blogography. Anissa asked me to guest-post for her so she can unpack, chase phantom mice in her kitchen, and install a nuclear reactor in her garage.
Whenever I write a guest-post, I try really hard to come up with something that fits the style of the blog I’m writing for. This is tough with Hope4Peyton, because Anissa is all about her three beautiful children and I don’t have any kids. All I have are cartoon characters, so I decided to go with that. Thus here are Lil’ Dave and Bad Monkey when they were kids…
Welcome to your new home in Atlanta, Mayhew Family!
TNT is premiering their new medical drama tonight “HawthoRNe” and I haven’t seen it (with this move and ALL), but being that it’s the network that drops “The Closer” and “Saving Grace” each week, pretty much means it can’t suck.
I did want to take the time to let you know that with the premiere of “Hawthorne”, TNT is running the “Hawthorne Salutes Nurse Heroes” program that recognizes the unsung heroes in all communities. This contest allows the people to nominate the hero nurses in their lives, share their story, and give this hero the recognition deserved.
Cause, let me tell you, when you spend three years seeing pediatric oncology nurses every week, if not every day, you UNDERSTAND what tremendous people they are. What they give and how driven they have to be to do their job. This is a breed of person above and beyond awesome.
Maybe it was a nurse that took extraordinary care of your grandma in the hospital, maybe it’s a nurse in the ER who was there for you in a crisis…maybe it’s the nurse that held your kid down while getting her first chemo spinal tap and managed to get her to smile afterwards…MAYBE.
Just saying. *cough* Cindy *cough*
Besides that, nurses can enter TNT’s sweepstake that will send a winner and a friend to LA to visit the set of “HawthoRNe” and for a day at the spa. Spread the word to anyone you know that deserves that prize as a small token for all the amazing work they do.
(My mom, who’s a nurse, will be RUNNING to enter that contest, I hope you win, Ma!!)
“HawthoRNe” premieres tonight on TNT at 8PM EST, and “Saving Grace” premieres tonight at 10PM EST…catch ’em both if you can. I DID watch the “Saving Grace” premiere episode and can I just tell you WHOA.
PLUS!!! I’ll pick three random commenters to win “Saving Grace” tshirts!! So comment away folks, and if you comment ABOUT a nurse in your life, I’ll count that as two entries….tweet the contest, that’s one more entry!
