Wichita Botanica gardens

This past Sunday, my mom and I decided to check out the Wichita Botanica Gardens. The admission was pretty inexpensive (Only $7 at the time we went.) So it sounded like a nice place to spend the afternoon! And there really isn't much to do in Wichita, so it was pretty much our only choice.

Anyways, it turned out to be a good choice because there was some interesting things to look at and quite a few things to photograph!

We ended up getting trapped in the Japanese gardens with a bunch of other people. Haha! The doors locked and wouldn't open again! Someone eventually came out and we were able to get back in to explore the rest of the gardens.

I've never seen a bush like this! Looks perfect for Halloween!

This was possibly the weirdest/most interesting looking flower I've ever seen! There wasn't a label on it so I have no idea what it is or where it is from!

There was also a butterfly garden, but they only had three different kinds of butterflies. I managed to get a few pictures of them! They kept flying around too quickly and wouldn't land on anything very often.

Have you ever been to a botanical garden?

Southwestern chicken salad

This Southwestern chicken salad became a family favorite over the summer! My family loves salads, so I am always looking for new and different salad ideas. It's really filling with the guacamole, beans, and chicken. 

1 bag romaine hearts

Grated cheddar cheese

Corn and black bean guacamole (you can also just use chopped avocado, but the guacamole is SO worth the time it takes to make it!)

Corn chips

2 chicken breasts (around 1 pound of chicken)

Barbecue sauce

About 1 tsp. Pepper

About 1 tsp. Onion powder

About 1/2 tsp Garlic powder

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1 can black beans (rinsed) *

1 cup frozen corn*

*Optional if not making the corn and black bean guacamole.

Additional toppings: Black olives, chopped onion, diced tomatoes, peppers, and anything else you like!

Barbecue ranch salad dressing

1/2 cup sour cream

3 tablespoons barbecue sauce

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

2 tablespoons milk

1/2 tsp garlic powder

2 tsp dill weed

1. Prepare your chicken breasts by removing any fat, then place them in a Ziplock bag with the barbecue sauce, pepper, onion powder, garlic powder and Worcestershire sauce. I don't typically measure out those ingredients, I just add enough to coat the chicken. Squish bag around to coat chicken, then place bag in the fridge. Refrigerate for at least half an hour.

2. Cut up, wash, and dry your romaine lettuce. Once the lettuce is dry, place in a bowl and set aside.

3. Prepare the corn and black bean guacamole. 

4. Grate cheddar cheese, set aside.

5. Prepare the dressing by mixing the sour cream, barbecue sauce, Worcestershire sauce, milk, garlic powder, and dill weed. Feel free to add more milk to make the dressing as thick or runny as you like.

6. Heat your barbecue grill to about 350. Lightly spray grill grate with cooking spray, then place the chicken on the grill and cook for about five minutes. Turn over, and grill for another five minutes or until no longer pink in the center.

Once done, cut into bite sized pieces.

7. Fix your salad with all of the toppings and enjoy!

This should be enough for about 4 - 6 adult sized salads

Five for Friday

Hey and welcome to my Five for Friday! I hope you all had a great week! I am linking up with Cup of Tea , Della Devoted , Bright on a Budget and Coffee With Caitlin!

1. My mom and I have been in Wichita, Kansas for the past week and we'll be here for another week. My mom has lyme disease and has been going to a clinic here. So far, after a week, there's finally been some improvement! It's been a really long journey with the lyme disease. My mom has had it for over 12 years but wasn't officially diagnosed until a little over two years go. It's just been so nice to finally have some improvement! 

2. We had a stopover in Portland and I picked up this Starbucks mug. I was torn between the Portland one and the Oregon one. I liked the Portland one because it had roses on it. I still need to get a Washington one. I don't like the Seattle one. I think they have just a Washington one? Anyways, I really want it ;)

3. There isn't too much to do here in Wichita, so while my mom is in her appointments, I've just done a little shopping. They do have a Super Target though! I wish they had a Super Target near where I live, but unfortunately they don't. 

Here's what I picked up while walking around Target.

4. I shared my fall decorations earlier this week. I had been searching for some Halloween/fall decorations, and picked this Thanksgiving sign up from Target. They didn't have anything Halloween related that I liked, so I just decided to paint my own Halloween saying on the back! The lettering didn't turn out quite how I wanted, but it's not too bad!

5. And last but not least, since national coffee day was this week I took an obligatory coffee pic. Vanilla iced coffee for the win! ;)

Have a great weekend!

Fall decorations

We finally pulled out the fall decorations last week; despite the fact summer is still hanging on. I really can't wait for the weather to cool down! 

We bought a few new decorations, and I made this leaf garland. You can find the leaf template here.

Have you decorated for fall yet?

Super blood moon

Did you see the super blood moon last night? I had forgotten about it; but then my mom and I were in town when we saw the moon. I happened to have my camera with me so I pulled off the road and took a few pictures. I wish I would have had my tripod and my other zoom lens, but this is what I was able to get. 

So did you see the super blood moon? What did you think?

Five for Friday

Hey and welcome to my Five for Friday! I hope you all had a great week! I am linking up with Cup of Tea , Della Devoted , Bright on a Budget and Coffee With Caitlin!

Sorry for the lack of blogging this week. The week has been pretty busy! Between work, errands, starting a church home group, and some other stuff going on, I just never got around to putting together a decent post. But I have some things planned for the next few weeks, so check back!

Anyways, on with the Five for Friday!

1. I decided to pull out the fall decorations earlier this week. Despite the fact it is still in the 80's here. Sigh. But, I'm going to do a post about our fall decorations next week!

Here's just a few of the things I have...

2. I finally got all of my pictures from our trip to Europe and some other summer stuff edited and sent in to Costco! It took SO long to do that! So here is what 441 pictures looks like. I am still going to have to sort through them and organize everything. That is going to take a while! 

And in case you didn't know, 4x6 prints are $0.09 at Costco right now since their photo center was down for so long. So if you have pictures to get printed, I'd recommend doing that soon! I believe the sale is good until October 7th. And the discount comes off once you get ready to place the order.

3. I made a pretty nice dinner last night if I do say so myself! I made a large batch of spaghetti sauce. I like having a large batch of something so it's easy to already have something ready to fix throughout the week. This is a recipe we've been using for quite a few years and it's always good! I also made a Caesar salad, which was quite good too! I made homemade croutons and used fresh parmesan.

4. I got my Hallmark ornament yesterday. Every year my mom buys my siblings and I a Hallmark ornament and this was the ornament I picked out. Hey, it's Harry Potter, I couldn't resist ;) Hannah got the same one. It even plays dialogue from the scene when Harry first goes through Platform 9 3/4!

5. We are a little excited that The Amazing Race is starting tonight! As well as Shark Tank and Hawaii Five-0. We watched Castle and The Voice this week too. I am already kind of tired of The Voice after two episodes. And I felt a little lost while watching Castle. I hope Five-0 won't be too bad! Sometimes it can be cheesy, but we like it anyways. 

Are you looking forward to any shows coming back?

Have a great weekend!

Five for Friday

Hey and welcome to my Five for Friday! I hope you all had a great week! I am linking up with Cup of Tea , Della Devoted , Bright on a Budget and Coffee With Caitlin!

1. Have you heard about Chatbooks? They're subscription photobooks for your Instagram pictures. They do photos from your cameraroll and Facebook, but the Instagram series is cheaper. For $8 you get 60 pictures (One picture per page). I finally ordered some and was so happy when I got mine in the mail! I uploaded my Europe pictures. While the quality isn't prefect, they're not too bad. Definitely worth $8 a piece! And if you sign up with my referral code, you get your first book free! Code is: PR7UNE6N

2. Wednesday was my sister's birthday. It's crazy that she's eighteen! We did some shopping and went out to Red Robin for dinner. And she requested a caramel apple cake, so I made that for her. I used this apple cake recipe. (I didn't make their filling or frosting.) I just used a basic buttercream frosting and drizzled caramel syrup on top. The cake is SO good! It isn't too sweet either. I cut the apples into chunks instead of grating them. I would definitely recommend making this cake! It's perfect for fall! I think next time I would add more spices and apples.

3. We got a storm yesterday. It's so rare that we get any sort of interesting weather, I had to take a picture. And I really enjoyed the few minutes of rain we got. If only it had lasted longer! We got some thunder and lightning in addition to the rain.

4. These gel pens. Pens can be so annoying; they never seem to work when you want them to! My cousin introduced me to these Pilot G2 ones and they work SO well! They're pretty much magic the way they glide across the page as you write. If you do much writing by hand, I definitely recommend giving these a try!

5. And last but not least, Doctor Who starts tomorrow!!! Hannah and I are pretty excited about it!
Trailer 1 - Trailer 2 - Magician's Apprentice trailer

Have a great weekend!