Naman's Bacon Cheese Ring

My favorite thing we served at our wedding was hands down Naman's Bacon Cheese Ring. The West Indies salad was pretty tasty - a close second, really. But this. This is hard to beat.

My best friends mom stalked down a lil old lady from Naman's and had them write down the recipe ... or so the story goes. But she passed it along to me, by virtue of this hand-written note. 

I made it last weekend for our friends' Master's crawfish boil and it a hit!! I wanted to share the recipe here, in a little easier to read format. 

2 blocks sharp cheddar cheese

1 block white sharp cheddar cheese

1 bunch of green onions, chopped

1 lb. bacon, crumbled 

1 cup mayo

1 tsp red pepper (we used cayenne)

1 cup pecan pieces

Cook Bacon. Crumble and set aside. Shred cheese, chop onions and pecans. Mix all ingredients together, reserving 1/2 cup pecans for topping. Spray bunt pan or line with plastic wrap to avoid sticking. Line bottom of pan with pecans and layer the cheese filling on top. Let sit overnight for best turnout. 

Top with raspberry preserves and serve with Ritz crackers. 

Enjoy!

Junkin Reno: Demo Day!

House updates!! We are making all kinds of progress. The real demo "day" lasted about a week... and is still on-going. Not sure how HGTV's Fixer-Upper gets it done in a day. But our crew has been working all week - maybe not 24 hours a day - but they are certainly making progress. 

The kitchen demo is completely done. They ran into one little snafu and found more asbestos tile under the current kitchen flooring - so one day was spent on remediation - but glad its done. And really, easy fix in the grand scheme of things. 

They opened up the kitchen to the dining area. In the end it will be more open, but anything structural had to stay put for now. Or just until they can place in a new beam.

They also opened up the dining area into the living room. It already makes a huge difference. This one will stay pretty close to this footprint - with a large cased opening to set apart the dining and living areas. 

Did I mention that we inherited a piano with the house?  Sweet deal, huh?  Not sure where it's going to go... but in the meantime, it's just hanging out in the middle of the demo. 

Habitat came by on Monday and picked up all the appliances, sinks, and toilets from the current kitchen and baths. I was happy to be able to donate what we could and also happy have those out of the way.

One item still hanging out on the front lawn... the tub from the master bath. ha! I'm sure our neighbors love us at the moment. 

All of the master bathroom demo is complete - with the exception of some structural things in the soon-to-be master bath and closet. You can currently see from the kitchen all the way through to the attic at the moment. It's sorta crazy. 

Kitchen ceiling through the master bath to the attic...

Other baths in progress. Jack and Jill below... that lil insert to the left is where the current sink was. It is a linen closet in the hallway that will be gone soon to create more space in the bathroom for an actual vanity. 

And this is the cute lil square tub we are keeping... with new hardware of course.

This was an interesting find. This is the main level bathroom, behind the mirror.

It's the back of the fireplace in the living room. 

Once was a shower. 

I guess that's all the updates at the moment. 

Termites are all cleaned up from the porch too. They did that last week before demo got started. 

It's almost time to start picking out paint colors and fixtures. My head is already swimming!

Crawfish and Masters Weekending

We had the best weekend in town. Friday night we enjoyed time with Jesse's co-workers at one of their houses out in the county. He lives in a renovated barn, so neat. The views were incredible!

Saturday we slept in - thank you Annalee! I never thought I would see the day when I was woken up by the sunshine from my bedroom window. But that was certainly the case on Saturday.

We made pancakes for breakfast - Annalee wanted sprinkles in hers - whatever the princess wants, right?  We then made an early morning run to the store, while Daddy tackled yard work.

I found the most adorable pineapple plates at Wal-Mart and just had to have them. They come in yellow and pink, I got one of each.

Our good friends hosted their annual crawfish boil in the afternoon, complete with Masters coverage for the gents. I'm not sure I actually ever watched any golf... other then our tiny golfers in the backyard.

It was such a beautiful afternoon and we loved spending time with friends! 

Just for fun a look back at the Masters crawfish boil in 2016.

Saturday evening was spent late night on the porch with our neighbors, laughing and catching up with cocktails for them and cocktails for momma.

On palm sunday our local church community hosts a palm sunday processional where all members are welcome to join in a short walk around town, stopping at each church to pray and give blessings. We caught the end of the processional, just in time for mass. It was a really great reminder of how lucky we are to live in such a small town where things like this are still a tradition.

Palm Sunday mass started outside - perfect day for it! And we made it through the extra long passion  as well. Annelee was a sport!

Other than church, Sunday was spent at home. We let Annalee open a lil Easter happy from her godmomma - Thanks Meg!

I unpacked maturity clothes, packed away 5 boxes of my wardrobe that doesn't currently fit, cleaned and did laundry. Jesse tackled some of the yard at the new house and we grilled steaks for dinner.

We did venture out for a later afternoon walk to take Miss Annalee to see the helicopter at our local hospital. She was SO excited!!!

It was a much needed weekend at home with good company and great weather. Cheers to a great holy week friends!

Easter Decor at Moore, Our Last!

We unpacked a couple of Easter items last week and it instantly made it feel like spring all over the house!  That, and a good deep-cleaning. :) Easter is a holiday that is always tricky for decorating... especially when it falls early and you have Mardi Gras, Valentine's Day and St. patrick's Day all back-to-back-to-back. I am loving that Easter falls late this year, so it actually feels like spring and has given us a good month of Easter decor!

I don't have too many Easter decorations... but each year I have begun adding a new little item to our collection. Just like Classic Annie! This year, I purchased these adorable little bunnies at 3 Seasons Antiques & Unique Treasures in Fairfield, Va. I thought since it was our last Easter as a family of three, the three little happy bunnies was only fitting!

Other items I've added include Annalee's basket for egg-gathering. 

Easter 2015

We have another white one from Micheal's that we use for Easter morning. 

Also from Easter 2015

These cute little felt eggs were in my basket last year... 

And a hippity-hoppity bunny flag for the flowerbed. 

What are your favorite Easter decorations?  

Junkin Reno: Getting Started!

It's finally starting to sink-in that we just bought a house. A really big house, one that needs lots of love, time and that lil green stuff that we wish grew on trees. Speaking of... we have lots of those. I need to find my green thumb. And quick - everything is starting to bloom. It's beautiful and overwhelming all at the same time.

Demo officially started on Friday, March 31 at 6:45 a.m. when our asbestos removal crew arrived. They were done by noon - and it was like the icky basement tile never even existed. ha!

When the dumpster arrived, it started to feel real.

We have five rooms that the contractor isn't touching that need wallpaper removal, so we got to work. The foyer was the hardest because of the stairs, so we tackled that first. It took about a day and half of work, (and some much needed helping hands and baby-sitters) but the foyer, stairs and upstairs landing are now wallpaper-free. The key to wallpaper removal - HOT WATER!! And lots of it. We soaked the walls, let it sit, and it peeled right off with a good putty knife.

My fabulous membership coordinator, who just happens to love peeling wallpaper. Yay!

This is the glue under the paper, but it looks sorta cool, huh?

We had lots of visitors over to see the house, and it was so fun watching Annalee explore. She loves the stairs - of course - and the huge hill in the backyard. We hid some eggs in the bonus room just off the dining, and her and Hadley had a little Easter egg hunt Friday after work. They also loved playing on the {really dirty} screened porch. We may be moving that one up on the priority list

Kara was so gracious to let Annalee come play Saturday morning, so we could work. This was taken later that afternoon after nap time. We had a much-needed popsicle break 

and by Saturday evening... wallpaper free!

On Sunday, we started work in the study, just off the foyer. The wallpaper was a quaint little red brick pattern and the only non-flower room in the house. It was newer (replaced in 1998, according to the previous owners), so it came off a little easier.

We  also had our first fall at the new house, walking down the front brick steps. She missed one and took quite a tumble. Poor girl. We let Daddy do work the rest of the day and spent time at home napping and taking it easy.

Other than the work in those two/three rooms, we picked up piles and piles of sticks from the yard, cut back a few overgrown vines, and met with our tree service. They will be by later this week to trim up the beautiful trees in the front yard and open the lawn up to some light. Our utilities were all switched over on Friday and we stocked the house with essentials.... toilet paper, trash bags, paper towels, lots of beer (lacroix for momma) and snacks.

Our contractor and his demo crew arrive first thing this morning to begin demo in the kitchen, bathrooms and master suite. I'll try to keep us as much as possible - would love to be able and look back on this reno project!