Tasty Thursday!

So back when i updated my blog i would sometimes post yummy recipes. I am always looking for awesome recipes that are easy, cheap and are something that you don't need every dish in the kitchen to make, so that's what kind of things I cook and I like to share them with you!

So tonight for dinner is:

Baked Penne Rigote

2 26 ounce jars of pasta sauce (any kind)
1 box Penne pasta
1 lb. Mozzarella Cheese grated
1 package Italian Sausage

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cook Pasta according to the package instructions and drain. Cook the sausage in a skillet until they are fully cooked. Slice the sausage and stir it, the pasta sauce and 1/2 of the cheese into the drained pasta. Spread into greased pyrex dish and bake for 50 minutes. Spread the rest of the cheese on top and bake another 10 minutes.

Ok so my veggie loving friends won't be happy with this one, but i know you can leave out the sausage and it still be yummy or you could add roasted veggies. Tonight I used spicy sausage, and I'm hoping it turns out well, what i tasted before it went in the oven was really yummy!!

The best part of this recipe in my mind?? This recipe makes a TON of it, like enough to fill two small rectangle pyrex (maybe 9x11?) So it perfect if you have to take dinner to someone (you can make two pyrex and eat one yourself and do your neighbor a favor at the same time) What I did tonight was freeze the other pyrex, and some day I can pull it out in the morning and pop it in after i get home from school and then we have a ready made dinner!

So I hope that you try it out, and if you love it then you can thank my greatest friend, Jessica for her awesome recipe!

Julia

what's been going on?

not a lot of anything!! And it has been awesome!! I love being at home for Christmas break and so very little has been happening around here. We got back from Christmas on Sunday, after an awesome time with family. We flew to New Orleans and then drove to my Aunt and Uncle's house for the holidays. We spent the time really just hanging out with family. we got some awesome presents. Audie and I decided to get a Wii for ourselves for Christmas, which has been an awesome gift, and we have enjoyed it a lot! Audie got some good DVDs and Blue Ray movies that he has wanted for a while. I got some shoes, earings and a few measuring cups. They are really cool because they are the same kind that Alton Brown (i love him) uses for sticky liquids. I LOVE them, i want to make something with honey or mayo in it just so i can use them!! I also got to do a bit of shopping and i got some TOMS shoes!! So that brings my total up to 5 pairs!! I love wearing them for work because i have to wear closed toed shoes and they are super comfy, like wearing flip flops all day!

But definitly the best time was just sitting and hanging out with family and getting to see all my cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and my sisters and mom and marcus! but now that we have been home it has been a boring kind of week. I really need to be cleaning our house up and getting everything settled in for the next semester, but I haven't really been motivated to do that stuff yet! so we've just been chilling out. Audie did catch a cold and stayed home from work yesterday to recuperate, which never happens, so it was nice to have him home, but sad that he was sick feeling!

well i know you were glad for the update, even if it was pretty boring. So i'll get back to catching up on my DVR and sitting around in my PJs!!

TTFN!

Julia

Job interviews!!

so if you know me, or heck even read my blog you know I was thinking and planning on applying for full time chaplain jobs in NC hoping to finish up here quicker than i would with chaplain jobs in GA. So i put in applications recently at 3 area hospitals. I got calls back to do interviews with all three, which is really encouraging (though i just got the last call today). I have ranked the three hospitals in case I get multiple offers, but I think that I would be happy basically at any of them, so i'm trying not to put too much stock in getting one over another.

So I had my first interview today (with the #2 hospital on my list) and I think that it went well. They seemed to ask me some tough questions, but also to understand and appreciate my answers. I really liked their office area, but the hospital where i did my internship seemed better. (like prettier, which is really arbitrary, it doesn't matter what kind of rooms i'm visiting in, just the people i visit.) But the people i encountered were really nice and I think i would be happy there at least. They pay a good amount, but 2000 less than the #1 hospital.

So we'll see as the other interviews unfold. the next is on the 5th of Jan. and another on the 18th of Jan. But no matter how well they go I won't hear from any of them until Feb. 16th. The area hospitals have an agreement to notify all of the applicants on the same day. So if any of the hospitals put me in their top choices (about 5-6 per hospital) they will give me a call and offer me a position on that day. If I don't get the top spot at any of them that doesn't mean i'm out completely, just that i'll have to wait and see after the top folks make their decisions. I think that these hospitals kind of figure that many of the applicants are also applying at the other places too so they know that they may offer a position to a person that decides to go somewhere else.

So that's what is up. By the way: Audie and I both had a very blessed Christmas, we traveled to Louisiana to be with my family, but that blog is for another day i guess. The job stuff was just way more on my mind!

ok ta ta for now!!

Julia

Merry (Early) Christmas!

So i know i have been MIA for the last four months, but i have a good excuse, my last post (i have never been so busy in my LIFE) was true for the last four months. BUT i'm setting all that aside to say hi to all my bloggy folks, if there are any readers left! maybe there are some folks that are still reading, and maybe i'll be better this coming semester about posting. I worked really hard at the hospital this semester, about 25 hours a week on top of taking two classes. Grades came back last week and I wound up with an A- and an A!! that is pretty difficult to accomplish in grad school so you can be impressed and i will be bragging about it. Since school let out I've been working on "chillaxing" and submitting applications for jobs for after graduation.

Right now I'm continuing to focus on chaplain jobs in this area. I hate that we'll not be back in GA as soon as we hoped, but i think that it is where God is leading me. I had a meeting recently in my hometown and they approved me for another year and gave me the go ahead to stay and continue doing chaplaincy for now. So I put in my applications at Duke Hospitals, UNC Hospitals and WakeMed (which is in Raleigh for you folks that don't know) and I have gotten interviews with two of them so far. In fact my first interview is next week! Ahh, kinda crazy! I'm really trying to focus on just putting this in God's hands, because i know his plan is to prosper me and not to harm me! So I put in my applications and will do as well as I can on the interviews, and have ranked them in my preference, but wherever God wants me to be I know he'll give me the green light to go there. Whatever place that is highest on my list, and offers me a job, that's where I'm going to go and trust that it is God's plan!

In other news: We got a new car! it happened about a two months ago, but Audie's car completely died on us (it had a messed up transmission) and we had to have a new car. It was really fun to pick out a new car, but it is way not fun paying for it!

We're definitely excited about the coming holidays. We spent Thanksgiving with Audie's parents in Atlanta and so we're spending Christmas with my mom's whole family in Baton Rouge! I'm really excited to get to fly with Audie this week (we haven't done that in a really long time- three weeks after we were married to Puerto Rico(fyi NOT our honeymoon, but a mission trip with 20 youth)) i think it will be really fun to get to sit next to my hubby on a flight and not some stranger.

Ok so we've been really busy, so don't judge the fact that we haven't sent out Christmas cards, finished our shopping or put up any decorations!! but that doesn't mean that we don't know and appreciate the real reason for the season!

TTFN

- Julia