Chicken Packets and other random things

Before going into the oven

On the dinner table - with our elegant salad bowl:)

Chicken Packets are one of my favorite meals my mom makes and since she gave me a recipe book when I got married with most of my favorite recipes I thought I should probably start to use some. A few weeks ago I sat down and planned out what was supposed to be 2 weeks worth of meals - little did I know the recipes my mom gave were to feed an ARMY so I have frozen half of everything I have made and made groceries last twice as long! But back to the meal - While living in Waco I didn't prepare many meals at home or by scratch b/c there was no time - well here in Alaska I have plenty of that on my hands so we eat homemade meals most nights. I figure I only have Jon another 5 months so I better perfect this so he is excited about coming back to my cooking after eating in a chow hall for a year (in case you forgot he deploys in March for a year)!! I have made my Mom's peanut butter balls, Aunt Julie's Lasagna, Aunt Terry's chicken, Grandma Rumbaugh's fruit salad and other family favorites. This week we get Mrs. William's Chicken Pot Pie. See the recipe book my mom gave was filled with family favorite collected over the years - you know the ones that you only got when you were at these people's house (but wanted again). I have added a few of Jon's family along the way. So no longer to I have to travel to Georgia, Tennessee, Oklahoma and Maryland I can make them where ever we are stationed - and sooner or later they will turn out just like they are supposed to OR no one else will know and think I did things just right!! Sunday I made my first pot of Chili - I got the recipe off the Internet since there wasn't one in the cookbook and it was pretty good!

Other random things!
*Army life is good but they sure have some funny rules. They have specific gear you can wear and it depends on date NOT weather so the other day in 25 degrees outside Jon had to wear shorts, a long sleeve t-shirt and gloves to run. He could not wear a jacket or pants because it was not October 1st!!! Tell me that makes any sense??? So needless to say he is excited tomorrow is October.
*The weather is not supposed to get above 47 this week but most mornings for Jon's PT it hovers around 20/30- oh boy!
*We start kids church this week at chapel and I am SOOOOOOO excited
*I am still wearing my Adidas flip-flops with no socks - holding out as long as I can:)
*We finally got Big Brain Academy for the Wii and have a blast playing it!! We were introduced to this by our friends Kelli and Paul right before we left Texas and have been holding out but broke down Sunday and bought it. It is totally worth it - you can play up to 8 players - great party game!!