1 lb of regular sausage Sausage

6 Chicken Breasts

10 jalapeños

8 oz cream cheese, softened

1 lb Bacon

Barbecue Sauce

Toothpicks, soaked in water

Brown sausage in a skillet on medium heat. Remove the stem from the jalapeños and cut them in half lengthwise. Clean out the seeds and cut each jalapeño in half lengthwise again. Open the cream cheese and cut into six equal portions. Set these ingredients aside for later use.

Next, butterfly the chicken breasts. To do this, first lay the chicken breast flat on the cutting board. Holding the knife parallel to the cutting board, slice down the length of the chicken breast. Stop cutting about one fourth inch from the other edge. Open the chicken breast like a book. Do this to all chicken breasts.

To assemble the Chicken Jalapeño Poppers, first lay two slices of bacon across the cutting board about one inch apart. Lay butterflied chicken on top of bacon. Spread one portion of cream cheese on the chicken breast. Put sausage on one side of the chicken breast. Fold the chicken over the stuffing leaving the bacon on the cutting board. Put three slices of jalapeños on top of the chicken and fold the bacon over the chicken. Roll the chicken back over leaving the bacon on the other side of the cutting board. Put three more slices of jalapeños on this side of the chicken breast and fold the bacon over the jalapenos. Use the toothpicks to secure jalapenos and bacon to chicken.

Grill the Chicken Jalapeno Poppers for ten minutes per side or until the meat is thoroughly cooked. Add barbeque sauce during the last five minutes of cooking to both sides. Remove toothpicks before serving.

*Thanks to MIO for some of the inspiration for this recipe

This past weekend we went to the Renaissance Fair at the Castle of Muskogee in Muskogee, OK. We had a blast! People watching is, of course, on the top of the fun activities list.

We also watched a jousting tournament.

Got henna tattoos.

Little Brother rode a horse for the first time!

And the boys were knighted for completing the Queen's Quest scavenger hunt.

Today is Big Brother's last day of first grade.

When I dropped him off the first day of school, I was fine. Peachy.  Today, I am emotional about it. Isn't it supposed to be the other way around?

Beginnings are exciting. They are filled with promise and hope. There is a sense of wonder and adventure when you start on a new journey.

Endings are rarely easy. It means something is stopping. When I finish reading a good book, it feels like the whole world shifted a little. When I finish a series of books, it gets even harder. You develop a relationship with the characters and are sad to end that relationship. When a TV show I like ends its run like House, M.D. ending tonight or Lost. Sure you can reread books (I rarely do) or watch reruns, but its just not the same as it was when it was new. When a relationship ends, even if its an unhealthy relationship, there is still a feeling of loss.

Big Brother will never again be a first grader. He will never again be learning to read. He will never again learn in his first grade classroom with his first grade teacher. The 1st grade journey is over for him.

Of course, I'll get to do first grade all over again in 2 years with Little Brother.

For Mother's Day I made several recipes I found on Pinterest. (Do they have an I did this button yet?)

Grilled Chicken Bruschetta

Find the full recipe at SkinnyTaste.com. This recipe was easy to make. I doubled the recipe it because we had 6 people to feed. It was easy to make and took about half an hour to make the bruschetta the day before. I ended up adding in two extra TBSP of balsamic vinegar (or just 1 if you aren't doubling) because I like more kick to my food. We ended up with plenty of the mix and I probably didn't need to double the recipe. I marinated for about 24 hours before serving. Dad cooked the chicken cutlets on a George Foreman Grill. This was yummy. I still think I should have added a bit more vinegar though.

Cheesecake Stuffed Strawberries

Find the full recipe at The Sweet Life. This recipe was super simple. I am not the best at knifework in the kitchen. To cut the tops of the strawberries I pulled the leaves off first then cut a circle around the top. There were only a couple of strawberries in the whole bunch that I had to make a little more space inside. I also cut a little off the bottom so the strawberry would stand up. Using a ziploc bag for the filling was easy and turning the stuffed strawberries upside down to dip in the graham crackers wasn't any trouble at all. Nothing fell out. Overall this took about an hour to do a full batch from start to finish.

Oreo Truffles

Find the full recipe at Chef in Training. These are a little slice of heaven. Big Brother pretended to faint, repeatedly, because they were so good. Easy to make although if you don't have a food processor (I don't) it takes a while to crush all the Oreos. Shaping into balls went smoothly. Make sure the chocolate is good and melty before putting on the Oreo balls. You may need to stop and remelt the chocolate part way through dipping. These were a huge hit with everyone that tried one.

Apple Pie Dip and Cinnamon-Sugar Tortilla Chips

Find the full recipe at The Peach Kitchen. There has got to be a faster way to dice apples. I would make this all the time if there was. If you know one, leave a comment please please please. Again I doubled the recipe because we had 6 people. I used 6 smaller Pink Lady apples. I didn't want it to be too tart and I like the sweetness of the Pink Lady apples. Instead of 2 tbsp lemon juice I used 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar for a little kick. Important to note – if you live in the US the oven temp should be 375. This tastes a lot worse for you than it is which is a bonus.

Super easy and yummy! This is a recipe I have seen all over Pinterest lately.

1 pkg crescent rolls

pepperoni slices

4 low fat string cheese sticks

pizza sauce

garlic powder

oregano

Unroll the crescent rolls. Put as man slices of pepperoni as you want and 1/2 a stick of string cheese on each and roll up. Close the sides using your fingers. Sprinkle the top with a little bit of garlic powder and oregano. Bake at 350 for 12-15 minutes.

The rolls should be golden brown and the cheese should be melted. Dip in pizza sauce.

Are you mom enough? Really Time? This is the new cover of Time Magazine.

Of course images of a woman breastfeeding always spark controversy. But that kid is 3 years old! I"ve always been of the opinion that breastfeeding should be for the first year.

I myself had bad luck with breastfeeding. Big Brother couldn't figure it out no matter what ingenious tricks we tried so he was feed breast milk from a bottle until my supply dried up, which didn't take long.

Little Brother did great, but I had to have my gallbladder out when he was 6 months old. I couldn't keep my supply up enough after surgery but we were able to make it until he could have milk instead of formula.

What makes me angry about this cover is the question, "Are you mom enough?" implying that if we aren't breastfeeding out kids until they start going to public school, we have in some way failed.

As if moms need more pressure and more to worry about.

What is your reaction to the cover? Would you breastfeed a 3 year old?

Nuns tweet. Apparently. As soon as I heard about this I had to find out.

After an interesting discussion in my office which ended with the formation of a business to help nuns and priests with their social media endeavors, appropriately called Connected Clergy, I set out to become the foremost expert on nun tweets.

After all, as Leslie (a girl in my office) says, someday someone will want to write a thesis on the social media activities of the clergy.

As I began my research, I was frankly astounded by the sheer number of nuns on Twitter. In fact, there is even a hash tag #WhatSistersMeanToMe for how nuns have made a difference in your life.

(This is the part where I show how ignorant I am about nuns in general.)

I have always pictured nuns as being like this…

What I discovered is that Nuns are really more like

Even more surprising, the Vatican WANTS nuns to tweet. According to USA Today, "The Vatican wants the powerful women's voices to stress the Catholic vision for marriage and sexuality and to spend more time campaigning against abortion, gay marriage and women's ordination."

So what do nuns tweet about?

Good books

Complaints – albeit MUCH nicer than most

Inspiration

Poems

Prayers

Current Events

And limes

Nuns even blog. I'm loving The Awkward Catholic. It's extremely enlightening (no nun pun intended).

And give shout outs

I'm starting to think that nuns are WAY cooler than we are led to believe.

On Big Brother's Birthday

BB: Since I'm 7 now it won't be long until I'm 8, then 9 then 10, then 11, then 12.

Me: I'm glad you aren't 12 yet!

The Daddy: (laughing) When you are 12 are you going to get a job and start helping pay the bills?

BB: (sighs) I'm gonna have to.

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On picking Big Brother up from school yesterday

BB: I went out to the football field today. Its usually deserted but there was a crowd of kids being mean to Walker.

Me: Maybe you shouldn't go out there then.

BB: Yeah, I'm like Amy from 39 Clues. I'm not used to crowds.

Me: (heart melted at my son's first literary reference)

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Little Brother's new favorite joke

LB: Darryl said buffalo.

Me: I don't get it.

LB: (laughing hysterically) It's a funny joke!