Chicken Pox

Well... At the start of a busy week, Isaac decided to stop us in our tracks with the chicken pox. First sign of them was Monday night. We are now at home for 7 solid days :)) 

We've been taking it easy. 

Hope you all have had a GREAT week!! We have enjoyed slowing down a bit and hanging at home...

Mexican Stuffed Shells

Well I haven't been doing Monday Munchies so here is a Tasty Tuesday! Thanks to pinterest we had another successful dinner.  My Bestie Allison tried it first and told me it was a good one so we gave it a whirl. It was a HUGE hit. Isaac (my 4 yr old) told me to add it to the favorites list... TeeHee!!

(Sorry for the low quality pic. I forgot to take with the big camera so we settled for the iphone pic.)

Mexican Stuffed Shells

Ingredients:

1 lb. ground beef
1 package low-sodium taco seasoning (or better yet use this Taco Seasoning!)
4 oz. cream cheese
14-16 jumbo pasta shells
1.5 cup salsa
1 cup taco sauce (This is a smooth, tomato based sauce found in the Mexican section)
1 cup cheddar cheese
1 cup monterey jack cheese
3 green onions
Sour cream

Directions:

In a frying pan cook ground beef; add taco seasoning and prepare according to package directions.  Add cream cheese, cover and simmer until cheese is melted. Blend well. Set aside and cool completely.  While ground beef is cooking, cook the pasta shells according to directions; drain. Set shells out individually on cutting board/baking sheet so that they don’t stick together.

Pour salsa on bottom of 9×13 baking dish.  Stuff each shell with the meat mixture. Place shells in 9×13 pan open side up. Cover shells with taco sauce.  Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes.

After 30 minutes, add shredded cheese and bake for 10-15 more minutes, with the foil removed.  Top with any condiments you’d like (green onions, black olives, etc.) Serve with sour cream and/or more salsa.

Let me know if you try it...

Groupon!!

I am LOVING me some Groupon!! I've heard about it for awhile now but never really checked it on a regular bases, but here lately I have been. I have actually found some really GREAT deals on there. Today I got an oil change and tire rotation for $35 at Hermitage Quick Lube. This is perfect because my truck will need it in just a few months when we drive her 500 miles south to Mexico Beach, FL. Here's a link if you would like to check it out. 

http://www.groupon.com/r/uu2038045

Happy Shopping!!

Swing... Batter batter Batter

This past Saturday March 24 2011, my baby boy had his very first baseball game. 

He looked like a little major league player. 

He did amazing!! If you didn't notice in the pic, he had a direct hit on the ball!!!

 And he ran with all his might!!

I am one proud Mommy. I could just eat him up... Love this kid :))

Go Padres!!

BIG 35!!

Today my honey turned 35! We celebrated by cooking some Monterey Chicken, homefries, and green beans. Thursday we will be indulging in some all you can eat ribs down at a local cafe here in Mt. Juliet called Courtney's. 

Here he is in all his silliness Blowing out all 35 candles on his cake!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MIKEY!! Love you bunches Xoxo

Cowboy flair

Most of you know we were re-doing Isaac's room into cowboy theme. Ever since, I've wanted to bring in some kind of natural wood through a shelf. Mikey mentioned we had some old wood in the back yard, so we went to check it out.

This is what we started with.

Mikey got to dust off the ole wood tools out of the shed. He was (kinda) excited. 

With the use of the tools Mikey came up with this for me. I LOVED it!!!

A little stain and poly...

And some old iron pieces = VOILA!!

I am so proud of our little Saturday project. I don't think we could have done any better. It turned out fabulous.  What kind of projects have you done lately?

Letter Boxes

I am loving pinterest, but it's going to break me. Since I love crafting & cooking I have to pick and choose what I do because I want to do everything I see on there.  

Last year we changed Isaac's room to a cowboy/ western theme room. Well I saw these letter boxes for sale on there via etsy. I quickly realized I can do that so here is another pinterest project...

I started with 5- 8x10 wood squares from JoAnne's and some black paint. Painted all the edges with two coats of black paint and let them dry about an hour.

While my paint was drying on my boxes, I started painting the wood letters. I already had these from his nursery so I just had to re-paint them. I did two coats of black paint on these too. You can find wood letters at any crafting store.

Next it was time for the mod-podge :)) I searched everywhere for cow print scrap book paper. After looking at walmart, Joanne's, and Hobby lobby, with no luck, I found a cowboy theme scrap book pack at hobby lobby and settled on it. After measuring and cutting my paper, I mod-podged the paper to the wood. You have to do this quickly because mod-podge dries FAST! I let it completely dry for about 15 minutes. Now it was time to mod-podge a coat over the paper. I did two coats just so I knew it had a good sealant. 

I glued my wood letters on with gorilla glue. (Will NOT use it again) The gorilla glue bubbles up as it dries so some of my letters didn't glue flat to the box. I ended up sitting a thick book on the letters as they were drying then cleaned off excess after it dried. 

Here is the finished product. It turned out better then I imagined. Wish I had cow print, but love all the colors together. 

List of...What you will need:

5- 8x10 wood boxes or canvas

black paint 

small paint brush

scrap booking paper

mod-podge

sponge brush for mod-podge

wood letters

wood glue

Teenagers are taking over

Wow! I now have two teenagers. Marisa is 13 today! She was 5 years old when I met Michael. I Can NOT believe it has been 8 years since they entered my life. It seems like they (Tiff and Roo) should still be silly little 5 year olds playing in the dirt at the park. Instead they are silly teenagers :) talking about boys and what car they want when they turn 16. 

Happy 13th Birthday Marisa!! We love you Xo 

He's Here!!

On January 12, 2012 Amy gave birth to a Beautiful baby boy. Keith, Amy, and William are home and Mommy and baby are doing GREAT. 

He is just perfect and extremely precious!!

Newborn pics in the next couple weeks :))

Daniel Fast Day 18

Well I just wanted to post an update on our fast. My hubs (Mikey) is still doing the fast but unfortunately I can Not. Thursday I came down with a high fever. I went to Dr. to find out I had two middle ear infections which was causing Vertigo (Not Fun) and tonsillitis. I was put on some meds that I have to eat enough to coat my stomach :(  Dr. said it wouldn't be good to fast on fruits and veggies with the antibiotic.She said I really needed some bread, so I am eating light and watching portion control but eating normal foods. I'm still watching cokes and caffeine. Tonight we are eating tortilla soup from the The Preacher's wife blog, so we haven't totally busted it. Still focusing on God and his word. 

This fast has been a great experience and definitely brought me closer to God. If you haven't ever fasted, I would strongly urge you to do it. There are some powerful things that come from it!! 

Daniel Fast Day 10

Today my friend Natasha introduced me to a yummy wrap. This is what's for dinner tonight. Avocado wraps and left over bean and rice casserole. The wraps are very simple and very tasty if you like the ingredients (which I LOVE) 

Ingredients:

• avocado 
• 100% whole wheat tortillas
• salsa
• brown rice

Directions:

• Just spread on some salsa. Then add some rice and a few slices of avocados. Of course you can get creative with lettuce and such, but I liked them just as is. 

I really enjoyed these!! Thank you bunches for sharing with us Natasha!

Daniel Fast Day 9

Well today is day 9 and I feel we have finally settled in to the fast. It takes quit a bit of planning and research. I know I'm not the top chef, but I hope that this info I have put on the blog helps some one out there. Today we did our usual for bfast and lunch. For dinner we are trying a recipe out of the Daniel Fast cook book, it's bean and rice casserole. Here's the recipe for it:

Preheat oven to 375
Ingredients:
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cup uncooked brown rice
1 can red kidney beans (15 1/4 - 19 oz), drained and rinsed
1 can black beans (15 1/4 - 19 oz), drained and rinsed
1 can garbanzo beans (15 1/4 - 19 oz), drained and rinsed
1 can stewed tomatoes (14 1/2 - 16 oz), drained
1 can chopped mild chilies (4 oz), drained
10 ounces frozen green peas, thawed by placing under running water
1 cup frozen corn, thawed by placing under running water

Preparation:
1. In a 5-qt Dutch oven over medium high heat, sauté onion in liquid of your choice (balsamic vinegar, olive oil, water) until tender, stirring occasionally.
2. Add rice; cook while stirring until parched and slightly opaque.
3. Add beans, tomatoes, chilies and 3 1/2 cups of water to rice and onion in Dutch oven and bring mixture to boil.
4. Cover tightly place in oven, baking until rice is tender and liquid is absorbed (around 1 hour for brown rice).
5. Add peas and corn, adjust seasonings, and return to oven until heated through


I did mine a little different. I cooked my rice first cause I was making more then called for the recipe. Then I just added all ingredients to a 9x13 dish. Cooked in oven for 30 minutes at 400.

Daniel Fast Day 6 & 7

Day 6 

Tonight for dinner we went to Cracker Barrel. I needed a night to relax and have someone feed me instead of me coming up with ideas and cooking and cleaning. Mike agreed so we had veggie plates. They were good and it was OH SO NICE to sit and have someone do the work for me :)) but I will add this...Cracker Barrel DOES NOT have Daniel Fast approved veggies. I ordered potato, green beans, corn, and pinto beans. They were close to natural but could taste some butter in the green beans and my pintos had bacon in them so I had to pick them out. 

I'm going to try vegetarian chili and will share that recipe soon!

Day 7

Our day 7 seemed to go by super fast. After tonight we will be 1/3 down. Well for bfast and lunch we had our usual. For dinner I thought hmmmm... let's try sweet potatoes home fry style. WOW!! I love them. Mikey on the other NO. I tried my first sweet potato this year at Thanksgiving. Then I had some more at Christmas. I have found that I have a new LOVE for sweet potatoes. YUMMO!!! All I did was cut and cook them the same way you do normal home fries. I put some Evoo in pan with some sea salt and pepper cook at 450 until golden brown = yumminess!!  We also had roasted cabbage. They were yummy too. Here's how I did them:

Roasted Cabbage

Ingredients:

• one head cabbage
• lemon for juice  (as you desire)
• evoo
• garlic powder
• sea salt and pepper

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 450
• Cut cabbage into slices or wedges. I did slices, seemed easier. place on greased cookie sheet
• whisk together lemon juice and evoo in small bowl. Baste on cabbage.
• Sprinkle with garlic, salt, and pepper
• cook in oven for 10-15 minutes.

Daniel Fast day 4 & 5

Day 4

On Wednesday I didn't cook any meals. For breakfast and lunch we had our usual. For dinner I made home fries again w/ roasted Brussel Sprouts and Green beans. The Brussell sprouts were Awesome. Thanks to my sis (Pretty is as Pretty does) for the recipe. 

Brussell Sprouts

Ingredients:

• 2 lbs Brussell Sprouts
• 3-4 cloves of garlic
• evoo 
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 425. 
• I moved my oven rack up to third from top.
• Put evoo in 9x13 pan
• cut brussell sprouts in half and place in dish with chopped garlic, salt, & pepper
• cook about 30-35 minutes, stirring about halfway through, until brussell sprouts have browned around edges. 

These are so yummy! I could eat them every night :))

Day 5

Well, I tried my hand at Vegetable Soup and we will just say I'm not sharing the recipe. It was a tomato base and ended up tasting like bland spaghetti sauce with veggies in it. I am going to try one with a veggie broth base and see how it turns out!! I ended up eating a baked potato with some of the soup, salt and pepper on it for dinner.  

My friend  Natasha introduced me to another cookbook from The Daniel Fast website. I will try some of these recipes and let you know the good ones :))

.

 

Daniel Fast Day 3

Today I am making home made re-fried beans. This is my first time ever making beans from scratch. I started soaking them yesterday and let them soak about 20 hours. After they soaked I put them in the pressure cooker and cooked them for about 25 minutes. In the meantime I had some onion, sea salt, and garlic sauteing in olive oil in the skillet. Once the onions were translucent I added the cooked beans. I stirred them to incorporate them with the onions and garlic. I taste tested and much to my surprise they were AWESOME!! Tiff even approved. That says a lot from a 13 yr old. LOL!! 

I plan on putting the beans on natural corn tortillas with some organic salsa, avocado, tomatoes. We can make it into the salads. I'm kinda excited about tonight's dinner because all of you who know me know my FAVE food in the world is Mexican!!


Our tortilla soup last night was excellent. I will make that again but add flour tortillas and chicken next go round :))  We are truly blessed and the blessings just keep pouring over us. 

Ok so I'm adding this after dinner...
 I made Guacamole tonight and it was tasty!! Here's how I did it

1 avocado (cause I thought I was only one eating it)

1/4 of a tomato

1/4 tsp sea salt

1 tbsp of onion

little bit of lemon juice.

I just put all this in the blender and blended til it was still chunky but some smooth. Needless to say I wasnt the only one eating it. Mikey ate it too :)) It was good!!!

Daniel Fast Day 2

Today is day 2 of the fast. This morning we each had a piece of fruit for breakfast. Tiff and I went out venturing the whole foods section at Kroger, where we came across some sweet potato chips cooked in sunflower oil :)) They were a nice crunchy snack. We had a baked potato for lunch w/ sea salt and black pepper. Our meal for the day is Tortilla soup found here on The Preacher's Wife.  It's smelling really good as it simmers.  I'm cooking it in the crock pot instead of stove top. Tomorrow I am making a vegetable soup. Gonna try and stock pile some in freezer since tomorrow is our last day home before returning to work. 

Daniel Fast Day 1

We started the Daniel Fast yesterday January 1 2012. Each for different reasons, but as I was doing some research I realized there is NOT a lot of info about this on the web. Some sites say do this and some say do that. Well I decided to blog how we are doing it (simplicity) so maybe it will help others. We are not doing anything fancy just getting some creative but not too much. Our main focus is going to be God. We are planning on a Fruit for breakfast, fruit and small veggie for lunch, and then a cooked Daniel fast meal for dinner. Today we mainly are just trying to get all of our groceries in the house. Doing some meal planning and prep. 

Day 1 meal was Stir Fry and brown rice.

We had our main meal for lunch since it was Sunday and we had just got out of church. I did stir fry with

 red pepper, green pepper, zucchini, onion, broccoli, and little bit of soy sauce (I read soy sauce was Ok but I'm not going to use anymore due to salt.) Then I cooked up some brown rice (I just can't seem to get use too) It was ok (relatively speaking)  :)) We made home fry potatoes for dinner, which were GREAT!! Cut a potato into slices like a chip. Then sprinkle with some sea salt. I baked them on 425 until golden brown. Yummo!! We had broccoli with them :)) Day 1 was a success and I can already feel God's presence in our home.