Fall

We have loved seeing all the fall foliage covering the rolling hills in Nashville! Each season brings a new look to Nashville and so far this has been one of our favorites. Unfortunately, with some recent rain, the beautiful colors are almost all gone, if only the trees could look like that year round. 


Before all the leaves fell to the ground, we snapped some pictures on the Vanderbilt campus. Thach loved running around campus in the temperatures and jumping in the leaves.  

 

 We are embracing fall with some new recipes as well. For the big football game tonight, we are trying a new recipe called Doc's Corn-and-Potato Chowder. Courtesy of Southern Living we should be enjoying a nice warm bowl of soup as we watch LSU win a big game tonight (hopefully- we can't help but support a tiger). 

Doc's Corn-and-Potato Chowder

Ingredients:

2 cups peeled, diced Yukon gold potatoes (about 2 lb.)

2 tablespoons butter

1 (10- oz.) packaged frozen diced onion, red & green pepper, & celery

1 cup chopped yellow onion

2 cups milk

1 (12-oz.) can evaporated milk

1 (11-oz.) can whole kernel corn, drained

1 (10 3/4-oz.) can cream of mushroom soup

1/2 cup thinly sliced green onions

1 tablespoon chopped parsley

1 to 2 teaspoons hot sauce

Salt and pepper to taste

Garnish: thinly sliced green onions

• 1. Bring potatoes and water (covering potatoes) to a boil in a Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Cook potatoes 10 to 15 minutes or until tender. Drain and place in a large bowl. 
• 2. Melt butter in Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Stir in frozen vegetables and chopped yellow onion; sauté onion mixture 6 to 8 minutes or until tender.
• 3. Add 2 cups milk, next 6 ingredients, and potatoes. Reduce heat to medium, and bring to a boil; reduce heat to low, and simmer, stirring occasionally, 15 minutes or until thoroughly heated. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Let stand 10 minutes before serving. Garnish, if desired.

Enjoy the weekend, we plan to!

MF

Punkin'

 Happy Halloween Punkin’!

All the rage this season is pumpkin, and I jumped on the band wagon. With the help of pinterest (where most or all of my ideas stem from) my most recent dessert adventures have all included pumpkin. One of my favorites has been the dump, stir, and bake cake. Adding a can of pumpkin to a boxed cake mix and baking can't get much easier. My first attempt at this was good, but the second was exceptional. The second time I added the can of pumpkin to a Krusteaz Coffee Cake mix. Incredible. Danny and I couldn't get enough. A friend of mine described it as a fall festival in her mouth. This has nothing to do with my baking skills, just the pure genius and simplicity of the recipe.

No need to add anything else to the mix except the pumpkin. Bake as directed on Krusteaz box. Enjoy!

What else can you do with pumpkin? My next try was a Pumpkin Pie Crumble. Borrowed from "Annie Oakley's Kitchen" it is my contribution to a Saturday afternoon football watching party. What better way to spend a fall afternoon than watching football, eating chili, and sharing pumpkin dessert?

Of course we continued our Halloween tradition of carving pumpkins and roasting the seeds. I tried a few new recipes to roast the seeds, but I can honestly say that the extra effort involved in the new recipes was not worth it. My simple way of spraying the seeds with some cooking spray and sprinkling with salt or cinnamon/sugar and roasting in the oven is just as good as the other more complicated ways.
Next year I will for sure return to my easy way.

Salted Seeds

Cinnamon & Sugar Seeds

Danny decided to go with the more complicated, ambitious pumpkin carving design. I went for the straight forward, simple, get it done design. Sounds like our personalities showed in even our carving choices. Both turned out great and added some Halloween cheer to our deck.

 Check out the detail on that Aubie the Tiger pumpkin! Obviously we miss our Auburn Tigers! War Eagle!

Of course Thach joined in on the celebrating!

Happy Halloween to you all! Enjoy some pumpkin treats for us!!

MF

Blessings

After missing our first week in quite awhile of church, I almost let laziness keep me from getting right back in the habit. It wasn't that I wasn't awake this morning. The exact opposite actually. I am completely off of the college schedule and officially an adult. I "slept late" this morning. 7:00. It was great. Thirty extra minutes.

With some internal convincing, I got myself ready for church and woke up the sleeping bear. On our way to church, I admitted my plan of skipping big church but making it for Sunday school. I had even planned to tell him it was because he overslept. He told me to think about that while we were in church. The absence of napping, watching numerous hours of TV, and eating out every meal (the college life) is really turning me into a different person...

Once at church, we were greeted by the news of a true miracle and blessing. Initially both Danny and I were just thrilled by the fact that the main pastor had returned from sabbatical and would be preaching. As Pastor Mike introduced the new sermon series and prepared for the time of offering, he touched on a meeting he had with the trustees of the church. When he was asked to present his hopes and goals for the church at a trustees meeting, Pastor Mike told them he wanted to be debt free in the next 5 years and plant 10 new churches. As a church with around 8,000 members, a huge building built in 2002, and continued additions to the campus, the debt free idea just didn't seem plausible. As of this summer, the church was 11 million dollars in debt.

As of today, the debt owed by the church is 1 million dollars. 10 million dollars was donated this past month during an economic and political "crisis". God is mighty. God is good. God is bigger than our economy and our government.

I have never felt such intense chill bumps. If giving continues as normal, the church will be completely debt free by December 31, 2011. Only a few short months away. I am excited to see what all this church family can do with no debt to attend.

While we ourselves have not received a 10 million dollar donation recently, we have endless blessings to reflect on. We continue to love Nashville more each day. The incredible weather and brilliantly colored trees doesn't hurt. Thach is loving his "spacious" deck but is confused as to why I felt it was necessary to plant pansies in his rain catching water pot. Hopefully he doesn't decide to remove the plants while we are at work...

Of course fall brings football. We have had some ups and downs already this season, but regardless we are enjoying Saturdays. We spend ALL day watching football. It starts with gameday and continues with every major game until bedtime. Doesn't get much better. Needless to say, I am not accomplishing all the creative things I expected. After all, I don't have any free time, let alone the abundance I was hoping for. However, I have snuck a few things in during halftimes or on sunday afternoons. 

Thanks to my wonderful sister's donation, our collection of coffee mugs (continuously used/dirty due to the law school demands) has expanded. Using the special paint pin for ceramic, I added a special touch to each mug. I decided on an idea for each one and traced on the lettering/picture using graphite paper. Surprisingly hard to find in the craft store but well worth it for a perfect result.

To add a little fall cheer, I went with another easy "craft" that didn't take much of my time, attention, or funds. I saw this one on pinterest, where I gain most or all of my inspiration. It was as easy as cutting out the leaf shapes, threading a needle with some yarn, and stringing the leaves on. Danny is still deciding what he thinks of the fall addition, but it will do until Christmas comes around.

I will attempt to post more frequently to avoid long-winded explosions on information like this post. Until then, blessings...

MF

D. Feltham v. Self

103 A.M.  921 Felt. Blg. 4 (2011)

So burning the midnight oil on some Contracts reading somewhere between “The Elusive Purpose of Consideration Doctrine” and “Mutuality and Its Limits” I had a moment. I simply realized now how necessary giving up on the myth that I can do this myself has become. It is quite possible that law school was the test God put in my way to conclusively show me just how weak I actually am. I see now that trying to work on my own, with my own limitations, is not sufficient to accomplish the task laid out before me. Instead, it is only when I submit in my weakness, accept it and allow the Lord to work for his Glory that His purpose can be fulfilled. My purposes for law school are small and futile. I did come to law school for His Glory following what I believe to be His plan for my life, but up until this point I implicitly and covertly assumed I could succeed by my own means and in many respects my actions showed that those means led to my own end. I understand that ultimately in pursuing my own end I found it.

The end of myself (my self-made goals) has finally brought to assume God’s end for my life, his purpose, to pick up my cross and trust in him in a deeper and more powerful way. Moving forward is requires accepting your weakness and giving in to his sovereignty.

Consequently and counter intuitively, I now realize the task before me is too great and my purpose was too small. However, God’s purpose for me is far greater and in Him my problem is very small. It is in my weakness that God shows his strength.

I continue to learn this lesson daily. His glory will be manifested through the things that I could not otherwise even hope to accomplish on my own. His glory is in the impossible, and I find this comforting because I serve no small God with no small purpose. I intend to work harder only in that I may not be a hindrance to His purpose and that I may reside in accordance with His will. I am excited to see what the Lord has in store for Meghan and me, we look forward to growing closer to God in these times of trial understanding we are truly blessed beyond measure.

Our wonderful small group leaders at BBC, the Kauppila’s, reminded us of just how much dealing with life is a lot like passing through a downward spiral. In both you go round and round struggling with similar problems at different points in your life, but each time you encounter a problem it is at a deeper level. This time my encounter with this "self-insufficiency standard" has led to the deeper understanding of God's purpose in light of our weakness, and as every good law student knows sometimes Purpose is a pretty good argument to rely on. Life has taught me this lesson many times before, and I know it will many times again. I look forward to seeing God in a deeper way, and through all the daily trials grow closer to Him.

Law school is easy,

Danny

War Eagle

As football season kicks-off, I can't help but think about what the first football Saturday was like for us last year. We were busily getting ready for a family tailgate with all of our friends. I had helped to plan the event so I spent most of the morning getting food and setting up for a day of tailgating and football. Little did I know that my other half was also busy planning something.

During halftime of Auburn vs Arkansas State, I got the surprise of a lifetime. Even now that I had the wedding of my dreams, I really can't decide which day I would consider to be the best. I think I just have to concede and say they are equal.

I can't begin to describe the shock I was in when I saw Danny drop down to one knee on the 50 yard line. For any Auburn fan, or football fan for that matter, this is the ultimate proposal. I was asked to marry the man of my dreams with 87,451 Auburn fans cheering. We were so blessed to be surrounded by our best friends and our families on that day! It was such a great way to celebrate our relationship and future marriage!

I will never be able to thank Danny enough for making me feel so special, so important, so loved. Even in all the daydreaming throughout my childhood, I never knew I would be so blessed.

MF


P.S. Law school is still easy - Danny

The Locker Room

Law school is a lot like high school. There are students and there are
teachers. Everyone has lockers. A lot of people bring their lunchboxes
to school; others eat in the cafeteria. Everyone eats lunch together,
and no one ever leaves the building. There are even different crowds
of people. For instance, there’s the popular crowd (the politicians),
the partiers (the people that you can just tell they have a life
outside of law school), the brown-nosers (the gunners), and the nerds
(funny, unlike high school this group now consists of about 99% of the
class). All in all it’s like you just stepped out of Saved by the
Bell.

But, law school is also like a baby. It constantly needs attention;
never seems to be satisfied. It never lets you sleep through the
night. It always needs to be changed.

Lesson I’ve learned from law school, don’t have a baby in high school,
the two should never be combined...

Just kidding, law school is easy.

Well I think I here the baby crying, gotta go...


-Danny

making new friends with food

We are so blessed that we have already found a church home in Nashville. It took a few weeks of wandering, but we settled on Brentwood Baptist Church. We felt the most at home there, despite its large size, because of the connection we had with one of the pastors. It was so nice to go into a place in a new city and see a familiar face that immediately introduced us to church members.


After our first week, we decided to visit a bible study that was recommended to us by several people. It is a group of soon to be married or newly married couples. The leaders are a married couple who Danny and I love. We felt immediately connected there as well. After attending a few weeks, we volunteered to bring the breakfast this week. Of course I saw this as a great opportunity to try out some new recipes that keep popping up on pinterest.

My first choice was a Glazed Doughnut Muffin. What could be better? Two of my favorite things combined, yes please. They were super easy to make and tasted great. Second, I chose to make individual monkey muffins. Another killer breakfast item. We were all in sugar shock by the end of bible study, but we were all full and happy as well.

Glazed Doughnut Muffins

From Sweet Peas Kitchen

Ingredients

Muffins

• 1/4 c. butter (I used margarine)
• 1/4 c. vegetable oil
• 1/2 c. granulated sugar
• 1/3 c. brown sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/4 tsp. baking soda
• 3/4 tsp. ground nutmeg (after tasting, I will probably use less next time, although that is just my personal preference)
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• 3/4 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 2/3 c. all-purpose flour
• 1 c. milk

Glaze

• 3 Tbsp. butter; melted (again used margarine instead)
• 1 c. confectioners' sugar; sifted
• 3/4 tsp. vanilla
• 2 tbsp. hot water

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425 ℉. Line 12 muffin cups with liners or spray with nonstick cooking spray (Baker's Joy is my favorite for baking).
2. With a mixer, beat together butter, vegetable oil, and sugars until smooth.
3.  Add eggs one at a time. 
4. While mixer is on low speed, add baking powder, baking soda, nutmeg, cinnamon, salt, and vanilla, mixing just until combined.
5. Add the flour alternating with milk to the mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Make sure everything is thoroughly combined.
6. Spoon the batter into cups. Fill the cups and smooth the tops. 
7. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes or until the tops are a pale golden and spring to the touch. 
8. Cool in muffin tin for 5 minutes and cool an additional 10 minutes on cooling rack before glazing. 
9. To make the glaze, mix together melted butter, confectioners' sugar, vanilla, and water. Whisk until smooth. 
10. When muffins have cooled for 15 minutes, dip the muffin top into the glaze. Allow glaze to harden. Muffins can be dipped a second time once hardened (I did this and would recommend it, who wouldn't enjoy a little more doughnut glaze?!?)

Yields: 12 muffins
Source: My Baking Addiction, originally adapted from King Arthur Flour

Monkey Muffins

From Pioneer Woman Cooks

Ingredients

• Leftover Bread Dough/ Refrigerated Biscuit Dough/ Crescent Rolls (made into three walnut sized balls per muffin tin)
• Butter 
• Sugar
• Ground Cinnamon
• Sweetened, Condensed Milk

Instructions

1. Place 1/2 tsp. of butter into each muffin cup.
2. Add slightly less than 1 tsp. of sugar and 1/4 tsp. of cinnamon to each muffin cup. 
3. Place three walnut sized balls of dough into each muffin cup. 
4. Add another 1/2 tsp. of butter, 1/3 tsp of sugar, and cinnamon to the top of each muffin. 
5. Bake at 375℉ for 15 minutes or until golden and bubbly (note: if you are using homemade dough, you will need to allow the dough to rise before baking).
6. Remove from oven and immediately drizzle with sweetened condensed milk, be generous! Allow to sit for a few minutes.
7. Scoop out with a spoon. 

Yields: 12 muffins

Source: The Pioneer Woman Cooks
*Since I was sharing with others and serving the monkey muffins at a later time, after I removed the monkey muffins from the muffin tin, I placed each one into a muffin cup liner (although I am not sure I would bake them in the muffin cup liners. 

Define

brief (verb): to give essential information to

A brief in terms of law typically describes a document presented at trial to defend something. For us, it could mean lots of things: the amount of time we have to clean the apartment, the amount of free time Danny will have away from the books, the amount of sanity I have left after a day with preschoolers, or the amount of regurgitated law I (Meg) can understand. Briefings, as used in our blog title, means to us that we will share tidbits of our life. Our thoughts, our experiences, our growth, our new knowledge, our pastimes, and our ideas will be posted here. In some ways the blog is for us to express ourselves and keep in touch, but it is also a way for us to inspire others.

To some getting married, starting a new job (with preschoolers mind you), moving to a new city, and starting law school within a two months span sounds crazy/insane/stupid. But to us, it just made perfect sense. We are thankful to have the Lord's guidance and blessing in the whirlwind of these changes. Danny and I are excited about our future. You may look at the first three years of our marriage and see struggles, but we know it will be a time of growth. Danny will learn all he can of law to become a lawyer after God's heart. I will pour my heart and passion into the hearts and minds of preschoolers while keeping myself occupied during Danny's long hours of studying by crafting and cooking. We look forward to sharing the essentials of our life with you...