A Potpourri of the End of October

I can hardly believe that October will be over at the end of this week. Ricky and I have been San Antonio for 3 full months and are now experiencing the Texas version of fall. (The picture to the left is stolen from a website that features "Fall in the Hill Country of Texas"!) While my parents report temperatures in the 40's in Indiana, we have been steadily reaching highs in the upper 70's with sunshine. Ricky was in D.C. for his solar competition for ten days and the cold dreary weather of the upper east coast made him realize how privileged we are to have our fabulous weather. Granted, we are making up for the drought of the summer months with scattered days of torrential rainfall. This morning I made my commute to work at 45MPH as heavy rain, thunder and lightning followed me all the way to Floresville.

Two weekends ago we visited the Atkinsons in Houston who are preparing for the move to their first (purchased) home. I remember how horrible it was to sort and pack before our last move so I eagerly volunteered to help. Granted, Garrett maintains that he packed more boxes than MJ and I combined but I was on hand to make lunch and give pep talks when they got discouraged:) Plus, I packed a lot of beautiful china that took a lot of time. Little Samara is no longer an 8lb newborn but instead a big healthy five month old! Here's a video of her exploring her developing sense of touch with her most sensitive appendage...her tongue.

Also while visiting Houston we visited a furniture store called, "The Dump." They sell all kinds of high priced furniture at a discounted rate. As most of you know, I have been obsessed with mirrored furniture ever since I saw the large mirrored armoir in Tori's bedroom on "Tori and Dean, Home Sweet Hollywood." We have a fairly traditional bedroom suit but I thought some mirrored bedside tables would bring a modern twist to the decor. I have been searching forever for some in a reasonable price range. I fell in love with some sold at Neiman Marcus but I was NOT in love with the price tag of about $1,000 each, including shipping. I found the EXACT same ones at The Dump and purchased TWO of them for less than the cost of one from Nieman Marcus. Gosh, it was so exciting. There are pictures below; the second one is obviously from our own bedroom. Sorry, it's hard to get mirrors to photograph well.

Aside from incredibly boring trip to Defensive Driving School for a bogus speeding ticket I received last month, our weekend was pretty fun. Ricky and I visited Coco Chocolate Lounge, a French restaurant/lounge with a menu centered around chocolate. I couldn't imagine chocolate integrated into an entire meal being that tasty but it WAS! We each enjoyed a tasty salad that featured mixed field greens, balsamic vinaigrette dressing, dried cranberries and shaved white chocolate. I will definitely be adding chocolate our our salads at home now because it's SO GOOD! The sweet chocolate is a great complement to the bitter vinaigrette dressing. Our entrees were excellent and the dessert, of course, was amazing. They also sell a wide variety of chocolate martinis that you drink from a chocolate straw. Delicious! We were also surprised to find out they had a live band playing that night, Breezin' featuring Beverly Houston, and a DJ on their outside patio. The live band was fantastic and after stalking their website, I plan on making their next performance at Coco on December 12th. To check them out, visit: http://www.sa-coco.com/

What Dr. Lauren Does at Work

For the most part, I can say that I love my job. There are days that are harder than others but overall, being a dentist is pretty cool. I think I'll love it even more when I get to run my very own practice but only after I develop my burgeoning dental skills. Yesterday I saw one of my favorite patients who hasn't smiled in years because of some pretty bad cavities in in lateral incisors (the small teeth next to your two front teeth). He and his wife just started their own business and don't have any dental insurance and were worried that he wouldn't be able to get the care that he really needs. Many community health centers claim to do, "No cosmetic dentistry" which I don't really understand considering ALL dentistry is cosmetic. I don't remember learning two standards in dental school, one for cosmetic and one for...umm...non-cosmetic? Anyway, I just ignore what the other general dentists say in our group and do work that I'm proud of. Here are some pictures of the case I did yesterday. Needless to say, the patient was very happy, so much so that he was caught giving his wife "inappropriate" PDA in the lobby afterwards. This was done with composite, or tooth colored filling material, not crowns or veneers. The slight darkness you see in his teeth in the final picture is from the lighting in the operatory, not from any cavities I left behind! Oh, and sorry for the weird pinkish skin in the first shot but I needed more contrast to show how crummy his teeth were before.

Before....

After!!

Solar Power!

Ricky left yesterday for Washington, D.C. to compete in the annual Solar Decathlon competition. In his final semester at UK, he worked with a team of engineers to design a solar powered house from the ground up. Over the summer, I would occasionally come by as he worked on the house and when we left, the design was complete but only a sturdy steel frame with some dry wall was complete on the construction end. Ricky sent these pictures last night of the house and as you can see, it's considerably more complete! There will be more pictures to come but I wanted to get these up first....

So I'm at home hanging out by myself until he returns. I have plans to do some deep cleaning, reorganize our heavily stocked pantry and hang out with my friend, Dr. Norma.

Everyone always asks me what good recipes I have tried lately. A few weeks ago I made this one from Allrecipes.com and it was delicious! I recommend making your own pesto sauce because that's what we did and I think it makes a BIG difference. I used scallops instead of shrimp because that's what I had on hand. You can also use half and half instead of all heavy cream as well as whole wheat linguine.

Creamy Pesto Shrimp

INGREDIENTS (Nutrition)
1 pound linguine pasta
1/2 cup butter
2 cups heavy cream
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/3 cup pesto
1 pound large shrimp, peeled and deveined

DIRECTIONS
Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add linguine pasta, and cook for 8 to 10 minutes, or until al dente; drain.
In a large skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Stir in cream, and season with pepper. Cook 6 to 8 minutes, stirring constantly.
Stir Parmesan cheese into cream sauce, stirring until thoroughly mixed. Blend in the pesto, and cook for 3 to 5 minutes, until thickened.
Stir in the shrimp, and cook until they turn pink, about 5 minutes. Serve over the hot linguine.

Finally, I'd like to officially congratulate Chris and Annalee Taylor as they recently discovered they are having a baby boy! I'm so excited that I get to spoil a little boy in addition to Mary Jacqueline and Samara's little girl, Samara:)