Falling in Love

How did you meet your spouse? The answer to that question is often stranger than fiction! Check out Falling in Love with You, a love story anthology compiled by Jennifer Wessner and Ramona Tucker, and read the story of how I met my husband. You'll also find many other crazy tales of how marriages came to be...sometimes against all odds. Here's the opening line to mine:

A cop once told me to listen to your instincts. The prickle crawling up your spine is sending you a message, and you better listen. As I pulled into the parking lot of my apartment complex, the prickle was shouting loud and clear. Danger. Evil. Drive away. But when I looked at the stranger walking aimlessly around the lot at 10:30 on an autumn night, I ignored the warning.

Don't worry -- the creep in the parking lot did not go on to become my husband. The guy who got my hand and heart comes along later in the story.

If Falling in Love with You sounds like a book worth reading, you can get it from amazon.com, oaktara.com, barnesandnoble.com, and many other booksellers. It was just released a couple of weeks ago by Christian publisher OakTara.

Since this blog is mostly dedicated to travel and recipes, I'll tell you that my story is set in a suburb of Chicago. Here in Illinois, we're famous for our corn, so I'm sharing one of my family's favorite recipes: corn casserole. You may have seen this before, but we add a secret ingredient to sweeten things up a bit.

Corn Casserole

1/2 cup softened butter
1 cup sour cream
1 egg
1 can whole kernel corn (16 oz.)
1 can creamed corn (16 oz.)
1 pkg. corn muffin mix (I use Jiffy, 8.5 oz.)
2 Tbs. sugar

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Mix butter, sour cream, sugar and egg. Stir in both corns. Blend in dry muffin mix. Pour batter into a well-greased casserole dish (I use a shallow one). Bake for 1 hour until puffed up and golden brown so it's crispy on top. Don't underbake. This is meant to be soft and very moist inside. Great side dish!