Cream Cheesy Mashed Potatoes

Dear god my mother made these for our "After Christmas" Christmas dinner, and I literally died and went to heaven.  I have never tasted mashed potatoes so good in my life.  Even my 2 year old, who has hated any mashed potatoes I've ever made (and I make good mashed potatoes), ate and ate and ate these potatoes.

They have two secret ingredients - lots and lots of butter and cream cheese! My mother requested they be named for her, so henceforth, these amazing mashed potatoes (which can be made a day ahead of time) will be named Mary's Cream Cheesy Mashed Potatoes.

Also, I usually whip my potatoes, but we used a masher with these and there were NO lumps.  Just make sure you cook your potatoes long enough and the lumps will melt away as you mash.

Mary's Cream Cheesy Mashed Potatoes
4 lbs peeled and cut potatoes
8 oz pkg of cream cheese
1 stick of butter
1/2 to 1 cup of half and half

Peel and cut up potatoes into fourths.  Boil for about 25-30 minutes until they are done.  When I can slip a knife through one of the potato pieces like butter, they're done.

Drain the potatoes.  Next, mash the heck of them.  Slice up an entire stick of butter and add to the potatoes and keep mashing.  Next, add an entire 8 oz pkg of cream cheese.  We added it in whole and it melted just fine.  Next, add the half and half until the potatoes are fluffy.  If you're going to bake these, add enough half and half to make them a teensy bit soupy so they won't dry out while baking.  Add salt and pepper to taste -- we probably added about a 1 tsp of both.  You can also add Lawry's Seasoning Salt, but we forgot that step and they still tasted heavenly.

Lastly, I think this step is optional because they tasted so good before we put them in oven.  Bake at 350 for 15-20 minute.

If you make them up a day or so before, take them out of the fridge an hour or two beforehand, then add several pats of butter on top and bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

Seriously, if you don't try these you will never know what heaven is like. 

The BEST gift I have ever received....like ever

Yesterday was my wedding anniversary.  We've been married 3 years.  Almost 4 years ago, we met in the midst of starting our lives over.  I had been married for almost 13 years, and he had been in a long term relationship that had just turned into a marriage.  But both our lives came crashing down, and we had to start over.  If you so desire, you can read my descent into madness at that point in this blog.  (I've considered deleting it off my blog, but I feel like this record of my life should stay, even though it is probably the lowest point I've ever been in my life.)

We met, fell in love, introduced my children into the mix, got married, had an adorable baby, and the rest is history.  This is the man I will grow old with, and I love that.  He is my soul mate, my rock, and my best friend.  I could live on the silliness he emits that bring me to a fit of giggles.  I feel so very lucky to have found someone like him.  Now, our family is a happy one, and I love that other people can see that, too.

This jar was what I woke up to yesterday.  His gift for me.  He spent all morning working on it.  I love that he was tooling around in my crafty things making something for me. He found an old jar I had been saving, painted the lid and glued a note to it.  Then tied ribbons around it.  But...the best part is what's inside.  He wrote countless little notes of why he loves me.  Gosh, I just tear up writing this.  He even folded each one into a tiny envelope.  Where did I find such a wonderful guy? I'm savoring opening them.  I've only looked at a few so far. 

And, we had a date night!  DH had taken the past couple days off.  He even cleaned the carpets today!  We got a little dressed up, and my mom came over to babysit, and we went to dinner at this wonderful Italian restaurant called Guiseppe's.  It's in a quaint old house right next to a bed & breakfast off the square in Denton.  It was delicious!  We had never been there before, but every time we've driven by we kept saying we needed to go.  So, we thought our anniversary was the perfect time.

It was a candle light dinner (with no kids!), and on a Tuesday there was hardly anyone in the entire restaurant.  We had the room we were in to ourselves.  The service was amazing.  I can't remember having such good service -- when the waiter is attentive, but knows just the perfect time to come back. I had this dish called Capellini Rustico, it's pasta in this delicious champagne marinara sauce.  It does not taste like typical marinara sauce.  Even my sweet husband liked it, and he's not a fan of tomato sauces.  Then, we shared a plate of canoli.  My meal tasted more and more delicious the more I ate.  It was such a wonderful night.  Then, we stopped for groceries (with no kids!), and topped the night off with a couple of episodes of Breaking Bad on Netflix before my hardworking hubby had to head to bed for a day of work tomorrow, while I attempt to get the ready-to-party toddler into bed.