A Delicious Summer Dinner

It hit me last night that July 4 is this weekend! And as I mentioned yesterday, we really don't have any plans other than going to the park to watch fireworks. Normally Luke and his friends buy a bunch of fireworks and set them off at a cookout. This year, though, most of his friends are going to be out of town. And maybe they're getting a little old for that anyway...I don't know. But since I think we are both secretly a little bummed that as of yet we have no plans for the holiday, I decided that I want to make the whole week fun and festive for the two of us :-)

Last night was a beautiful night. Sunny, blue skies, and relatively low, comfortable temperatures for the end of June. The perfect night to cook out! So to begin our fun week, Luke grilled burgers outside while I cooked the side dishes inside. I ran to Giant Eagle quickly before Luke got home from work to buy a few last minute things. And thanks to couponing and stockpiling, we are very ahead this month in our grocery budget, so I splurged a little bit in the produce section (my grocery store weakness!) We had fun making dinner together, and it turned out pretty good if we do say so ourselves ;-)

First of all, I made guacamole for the first time ever. Just for fun and to have something to snack on while the rest of the meal was being prepared. I actually had to Google "how to skin an avocado," because I had never handled one before. It turned out to be pretty easy, suprisingly. Avocados are just pretty, don't you think?
I didn't really follow any specific recipe, but instead mixed and matched some I found online based on the ingredients I had. It was so easy to make! I just threw 1 avocado, half a chopped onion, half a chopped tomato, 1 clove of garlic, minced, a teaspoon of lemon juice (it was supposed to be lime juice, but I had to improvise) and a bit of salt and pepper in my blender. I mixed them all together, and voila....guacamole! It was good, too...even with the lemon juice instead of lime juice.
While Luke was outside grilling the burgers, I stayed in to make parsley potatoes and steam the asparagus.I then melted some butter over the asparagus and sprinkled on some Parmesan cheese, and it was delicious.
It took us awhile to make all of this, but it was gone in a matter of minutes. And I have plenty of leftovers for lunch tomorrow, too. Yum! This meal was just so summery, and I loved it!

After dinner, Luke went to work outside getting rid of this hideous bush beside our walkway. It is actually on our neighbor's property but was very overgrown, and was starting to block our walkway. So Luke was granted permission to pull it out tonight, and we're really excited that we don't have to look at it's ugliness anymore! We completed the landscaping in the front of the house earlier this year, and now we are working on the landscaping on the side leading up to our apartment. I will share pictures when we have the flowers planted!
Later last night we watched "Twilight" in order to get ready for Eclipse. And by "we" I mean "I." haha...I also rented "New Moon" and that is on the agenda for tomorrow! I wanted to go see "Eclipse" at the midnight showing last night with a friend, but we were too late in ordering tickets. You snooze, you lose, I guess! I'm hoping to catch a matinee sometime later this week (anyone wanna come with me?? ;-))

I will have to think of some more ways to make this week fun so Luke doesn't feel the void of his friends missing! ha! I'm sure we will have fun together :-)

Wedding Wednesday post will be up later today! Only two more Wednesdays before our anniversary!