Fun, Food and Friends…….

……Three essential ingredients to my life and I got all three last weekend with my best friend Judy.    Whenever I know I’m going to Judy’s house, I know the food is going to be great and the fellowship is going to be fabulous.     I have many friends but there is only one I consider my “bestest” friend and I know she feels the same about me.

We had planned on eating at a little sandwich shop near Judy’s house but when I got to Judy’s  she had made chicken salad, pimento cheese spread and another cheese concoction I just called “cheesey wonderful”.     I’m going to share all her recipes with ya’ll at the end of this post.      After making a pig of myself at lunch, we got out and did a little shopping.     Along the way, I took a few pictures of while cruising down “Main Street”.

This first picture is of a quaint little church on “main street”.    This is actually the side entrance of the church but I loved the red door.

 

Coming up on the “square” in the downtown area.     I love how so many little Southern towns still have their town square.

Courthouse on the square….Judy “works” here part-time

The theatre where you can see a movie for $2.00!

Tudor style home

This house was really cute.    

 

Look at the size of the birdhouse

Wrought iron gates with huge iron butterfly’s

Now we’ll take a peek inside of Judy’s home.   

Here I’m standing in the kitchen looking out into the den area (upstairs landing is seen at the left top of this photo)

This shabby white cottage style table (above) is a new purchase along with the china cabinet (below).     She is going to change out all the red in here but she’s not sure what color she wants to go with

 

She makes all her floral arrangements.      I love the way she uses boxes….I love boxes too but have put most of my away for the time being.

 

Looking into the kitchen.    She plans on removing a lot of her decorations from above the cabinets…..some still up from Christmas (as well as her tree which you’ll also see!)

Looking into the foyer where her tree is still up!    She says she thinks she’ll just add Easter eggs so her husband will get motivated to put the tree up (in his defense, her husband had been quite ill for almost 2 years and works out of town so it’s hard for him to get all their stuff put in storage).

I was with her when she bought this table from Big Lots!.    You’d never know, would you?

She got the large lime green “plate” at a discount as it has a small nick in it but she just turned the plate where it wouldn’t be seen, then added in a piece of lime green fabric .

  

Looking into her bedroom from the den

Display on the coffee table

Top of TV cabinet in her bedroom (to the right of the cabinet are double french doors which lead to her screened-in porch…..and there are double french doors in the den leading to the same porch…..so beautiful!)

She always says she learned how to decorate from me and I always say I learned how to dress from her but she has lots of talent in the decorating department so I don’t think she got it from me!

Now for a few recipes I enjoyed this weekend.     Let me just say that Judy is a fabulous cook and doesn’t really measure anything or go by a cookbook.     So these recipes are mostly a guideline and you just have to figure out how much you want to make for your situation:

CHICKEN SALAD

4-5 chicken breasts (bone in) – cook, drain and chop fine

seedless grapes (I use green grapes)

chopped pecans (approximately 1 cup)

1 can crushed pineapple, drain juice (I used a 20 oz. can but you can use less)

2 TBSP. powdered sugar

mayo to taste

Cook chicken, drain, remove bone and chop fine.    Add grapes, pecans, crushed pineapple and powdered sugar.     Add enough mayo to mix ingredients thoroughly.    

Serve with crackers and ENJOY!

(I like my chicken salad sweet and adding the powdered sugar does just that).

HOMEMADE PIMENTO CHEESE

Extra sharp cheddar cheese

1 TBSP of pimento (in the jar – mash out the water)

Fine chopped black olives (sm. can)

Mayo

Pecans (optional)

Grate the cheese (about 1/2 block ---more or less depending on how much you are making)

Add pimento, black olives and nuts to the grated cheese.    Mix with mayo to desired consistency .

Serve with crackers or use as spread for sandwiches

CHEESE WONDERFUL!

4 green onions, chopped fine

1/2 block extra sharp cheddar cheese

1/2 cup chopped pecans

heaping TBSP (or more) mayo

Grate the cheese and add in chopped onions, pecans and mayo until all are thoroughly blended

Serve with crackers and top it off with Red Pepper Jelly…..this gives it a little sweetness with a kick!    I use Braswell’s Red Pepper Jelly.

 

Here’s my version of the chicken salad and red pepper jelly topped cheesey wonderful!

You will love any or all of these recipes.     If you make any of them, I’d love to know if you enjoyed them as much as I did.

Saturday night she served homemade chicken and dumplings and cornbread….YUM!

 

Things go better with Coke!

This week is Spring Break and I will be babysitting all week.     I had the twins on Monday (and will have them on Friday) and Taylor will be coming to work with me the other three days while Jackson goes with his daddy to work.    

I hope to be back to some decorating projects soon…..if things ever slow down around here!