Tortellini Pasta Salad

I couldn't wait to post this after making it tonight.  We are having a birthday pitch-in at work tomorrow and I needed an appetizer that was easy and could be refrigerated.  I decided it was the perfect opportunity to try something from Pinterest [of course].  I've been wanting to try this new rendition of pasta salad for a while now.  It has tortellini, cherry tomatoes, pepperoni, basil, and fresh mozzarella.  It turned out SO GOOD.  I'm SUPER excited to take it in tomorrow.

The original recipe can be found here by "Dream Home Cooking Girl."  I made a couple changes.  First, I was making it for a large group so instead of using all tortellini, I used a box of colored spiral noodles as well.  I figured it would make it a little less rich and add some more color.  Second, my little basil plant that has done so well all summer while I didn't need it, is now pretty sorry looking so I used dried basil to taste.  Really, I didn't do a lot of measuring; just kinda eyeballed it.  All-in-all, it was very easy and VERY yummy.  

• Cook tortellini and spiral noodles in separate pots following package directions 
• (I used a normal box of noodles and two 8 oz packages of tortellini.)
• Once done, drain and rinse with cold water
• Add in:
• about a cup of cherry tomatoes, halved
• 3/4 cup of pepperoni cut in to small pieces
• 1 cup fresh mozzarella cheese, diced
• about 3/4 cup Ceasar dressing
• basil, salt, and pepper to taste (Original recipe calls for 3/4 cup copped fresh basil)
• Gently stir and refrigerate

Pay Day!

I've been at my new job for three whole weeks now.  Since I started in the middle of a pay period, today was my first big girl pay day!  That is a milestone in any college grad's life and mine is no different.  I would love to say that I went and celebrated in some way, but truth be told, I am just enjoying a lazy weekend at home catching up on some much needed sleep.  I've had a time getting use to these early mornings.  I get up at 5am now and, as a night owl and ANTI morning bird, it has taken its toll.  

I have enjoyed my first couple weeks on the bench though and have been "checked off" to work in blood gas, troponin iStat, Urinalysis, and kit testing.  It's been a lot of fun and I am looking forward to starting a new bench sometime next week.  

I'm sure this will make for a story later....

Well, I've survived my first week of work.  And when I say survived, I mean it.  I started the week with two days of orientation.  At the end of the second day, the Wishard computer system crashed and was down for more than 36 hours.  The WHOLE computer system.  No way to register patients, order tests, view histories or results, nothing.  While  "down time" creates a problem for almost every area of the hospital, it creates a very chaotic and incomprehensible problem for the lab.  Everyone handled the mess gracefully but the backlog of work, manual processing, and endless phone calls meant no one had time to deal with new employees.  They were all very apologetic but I spent most of the week sorting papers and doing what I could to help and stay out of the way.  The majority of my processing training has been rescheduled for Monday and Tuesday, then I can finally begin training to be a generalist tech in the core lab's chemistry and hematology departments!  Yippee!

It's a boy!

Yes, it's true!  We've adopted another little bundle of fur and this time he is extra fuzzy.  We have named our new 8 week old Kind Charles Cavalier Spaniel Sulley.  We have been thinking for a while that Mia needed a little play mate and we fell in love with this little guy when we went to take our niece to see the puppies at the pet shop.  We were so excited to bring him home and happy that our family could enjoy him too!  The adjustment has been a little more difficult for Mia than we had hoped.  Her little feelings seemed to be a bit hurt and she ignored me and the puppy altogether for a couple days.  She seems to be coming around now though.  They run around the house and tackle each other for hours on end.  We are still working on sharing chew sticks though.  Sulley keeps trying to take Mia's beloved chew sticks.  Mia gets her little feelings hurt and sulks.  haha.  It's a doggie world in our house these days, but it is fun nonetheless.  

Pinterest snacks for little ones

Just wanted to take a quick minute to tell you about a couple of the pinterest snack my sister-in-law and I made for her beautiful daughter last week.  The baby was teething while she was here, so we tried out these teething biscuits by ImprintAlish.  They were quick, easy, healthy, and tasty.  The texture was perfect for teething biscuits as they were chewy and didnt crumble.  The baby loved them and even the boys snuck a couple.

We also tried out these homemade goldfish crackers by Tasty Kitchen Blog.  They were also really good.  They tasted a lot like cheez-its.  They took a bit more time for a lower yield but all in all a fun and delicious snack.

Ok.  now the last one I want to share is a real keeper.  We had bbq pulled pork for dinner one night and made these quick and easy buns from Taste of Home.  They were SO GOOD.  The boys managed to sneak the rest of them as a snack later with and without the meat.  Ronnie made me promise I would make them again soon for dinner rolls or buns.  Love them.  (I will mention that a friend recommended to me that we let the dough rise for 30 minutes instead of the recommended 10.)  

***pictures are all from their respective sites.  please follow links to recipes and credits.   

together at last

Just a short day after we got home from Alaska, Ronnie's two younger sisters and his sister's husband and baby came for a week long visit.  It was the first time they made the treck out to Indiana to see our home and the first time for me to meet out sweet baby niece.  She is 9 months old now and it is hard to believe I had yet to see her!  We all had such a good time.  We ventured around town some, played with the baby, shopped, and did several pinterest recipes (of course!).  The guys spent a lot of time fishing while us "ladies" chit-chatted about life.  I cant even tel you how good it was to spend time with my sister-in-laws.  We had yet to have a chance to just be friends.  Needless to say, we are already trying to plan another get together really soon!

Mia wasnt quite sure what to think of the baby, but they were never apart!

she loves lemons!

we took a quad bike around the canal on a double date!