Chicken and Rice Casserole

I made this delicious Chicken and Rice casserole last night for dinner, it is great!!  I got it from Paula Dean on the Food Network site.  You can go here to get more great recipes from Food Network.  I LOVE Paula Dean but her dishes can be so fattening, I did make a few changes to this recipe to keep the calories and fat content a little lower, but I think my version came out just as good! 

photo from foodnetwork.com

Ingredients


2 tablespoons butter
1 medium onion, peeled and diced (everyone in my family besides me HATES onion so I left this out)
3 cups diced, cooked chicken ( I used 3 chicken breasts that I cooked in the crock pot)
2 (14 1/2-ounce) cans green beans, drained and rinsed
1 (10 3/4-ounce) can condensed cream of celery soup (I used cream of chicken soup)
1 cup mayonnaise ( I used 1/2 cup of light mayo and it worked fine)
1 (6-ounce) box long-grain wild rice, cooked according to package directions
1 cup grated sharp Cheddar
Pinch salt

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Heat butter or oil in a small skillet over medium heat. Add onion and saute until translucent, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and transfer to a large bowl.
Add all remaining ingredients to bowl and mix together until thoroughly combined.
Pour into a greased 3-quart casserole dish. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until bubbly. Let stand for a few minutes before serving

This was so good and a very easy weeknight meal, I will make this recipe again!

Watch Week!

This week is Watch Week at Ava's dance studio!  I got to watch 3 of her classes tonight, it was a lot of fun!  Her schedule for Mondays is Hip Hop, Tap and Lyrical.  Poor thing she goes from one class to the next she doesn't get a break in between her classes.  She is SO tired when she gets home on Monday nights! 
I did take some pictures of her tonight but they didn't turned out really dark so here are some pictures that I took of her last year during dance.

Ava with her dance teacher Jill right after the Christmas dance show

Ava with her friend Gracie before the end of year show in June

Beautiful Ballerinas!  Before the show last June

Ava with two friends at their dress rehersal in June!

I also get to watch her do Jazz on Friday night and Ballet on Saturday morning.  This should be a fun week!!

Sunday sneak peak

Today was a VERY productive day!  I LOVE days like that.  Brock was at a friends house, Ava spent the day with Grandma Jan and Graig was watching football at his friends house so I had the WHOLE house to myself!  I spent the day cleaning and organizing, it was fabulous!  I finally got to clean Ava's playroom in the attic, it has been a wreck for such a long time!  I also organized my craft area in the basement and took 2 naps!  I am still not 100% better from when I was sick and I get tired SO easily.  I took a nap this afternoon and another little one earlier this evening.  I am happy to finally be going back to work tomorrow!

Here's a sneak peak of a project that I started today, I hope to finish this project this week!

Happy Sunday!

Christmas Swap!!!

Clemsongirl is hosting a Christmas swap!!  I participated last year and it was SO much fun!!  I am participating again this year and I can't wait to shop for presents for my swap partner!!  You can go to her site to get all the details about the swap, the deadline to sign up is next weekend.  Here are my gifts from last year's swap,  I love all the sweet gifts I got!

Have a good weekend!!

Show us your life-Thanksgiving Traditions!!!

Today Kelly's Korner is doing a "show us your life-thanksgiving traditions!  So I thought I would share our traditions.  I LOVE Thanksgiving!  It seems like each year we do something a little different.  Two years in a row we went to NYC to see the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, last year we spent Thanksgiving Day at home,  and this year Brock and I are going to Illinois to visit my family and Ava and Grandma Jan are going to Colorado to see Uncle Garth while Graig stays home to work.

We will have Thanksgiving Dinner together as a family this year the weekend before we leave and these are two dishes that I am going to make

Rice, broccoli, cheese casserole ( I LOVE this!)
1 onion dices
3 tbsp. butter
1 can cream of chicken soup
1/2 cup milk
1 (10oz) pkg frozen broccoli
1/2 lb. velvetta cheese, cut up into squares
1 1/2 cups cooked rice
Saute onion in butter.  Combine with remaining ingredients in a greased 1 1/2 quart casserole dish.  Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.  Makes 8 servings

Double layer pumpkin pie (my Dad's recipe) sooooo good!!
4 oz. cream cheese (softened)
1 cup plus 1 tablespoon cold milk
1 tablespoon sugar
1 8 oz. tub of cool whip
1 prepared graham cracker crust
1 can (16 oz.) pumpkin
2 pkg (4 serving size) instant vanilla pudding and pie mix
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
1/4 tsp, ground ginger

In a large bowl mix cream cheese, 1 tablespoon milk, and sugar with wire whisk until smooth.  Stir in 1 1/2 cups whipped topping spead on bottom of crust.
In a second bowl stir pumpkin, pudding mix and spices unto remaining milk, beat with wire whisk until well blended (mixture will be thick) spead over cream cheese layer
Refigerate 5 hours serve with remaining whipped topping. 

I just found this thankfulness jar on etsy so I ordered it today, I think it will make a nice addition to our Thanksgiving table this year!  I want us each to write down some things we are thankful for and then we can put them in the jar and talk about them during our Thanksgiving meal.  

Some of Ava's turkey artwork from last year

Our Thanksgiving Table last year.

Have a good weekend!!

Here we go again...

I am back to feeling bad again, YUCK!!  Last night I kept coughing and coughing and I couldn't get to sleep.  I think I got about 3 hours of sleep last night total, I am the kind of person that needs a solid 8 hours to function so that lack of sleep + lots of coughing = another day home from work.  I called my doctor's office to get an appointment today because I think I have bronchitis but they were all booked up today so I made an appointment for tomorrow morning.  I hope I can get medicine so I can get better for the weekend!  I don't want to waste another weekend being sick! 

To cheer myself up today I went up to the attic and got out our Thanksgiving decorations.  We don't have too much stuff but I do like to add a little thanksgiving cheer!

Turkey hotpad in our kitchen!  I love this little turkey!

Thanksgiving Platter I got last fall.  I love the golden yellow color of this platter!

Give Thanks sign, this is my favorite Thanksgiving decoration, I got it SO many years ago but I still love getting it out every year.  I put it in our living room. 

Tonight I am watching my Thursday night shows and going through my work email...exciting I know!!

Today I am thankful for my supportive students and co-workers!  Everyone has been SO nice during my sickness, I have gotten a ton of "get well soon" emails and they really make me feel SO good!

Uncle Garth!!

Graig's brother Garth just got into town today!  He lives in Colorado and is here visiting for a week!  Brock and Ava are so excited because they haven't seen him since he came to visit last fall.  Ava and Grandma Jan will be spending Thanksgiving in Colorado this year with Uncle Garth and Jill, while Brock and I are in Illinois visiting my family.  So Ava gets to see Uncle Garth twice this month!

Tonight Graig got Brooks takeout and we ate and caught up with Garth.  After dinner they watched the Yankee game!!  I really really hope the Yankees win the World Series tonight!  Brock and Graig would be SO happy!!

Here is a picture of Brock, Ava and Uncle Garth from last year.  I love this picture of them, it's on our fridge!

Ava wasn't feeling well today so I stayed home AGAIN!  She slept for 5 hours this afternoon, poor thing!  She is going back to school tonorrow and I am going back to work!  I bet I have aboout 100 emails and phone messages, it will be crazy but I HAPPY to be feeling better finally!!

Today I am thankful for our siblings-Graig has two brothers, Gary and Garth, and I have one sister, Shelby.!!

Happy Wednesday!