No Milk

I hate when I forget we're out of milk after I've already delicately sliced a banana over my Honey Nut Cheerios! DANG IT!

Not Bad For a Monday

Like Monday even matters to a "stay-at-home mom." That's what we're called now instead of "housewife." Never really thought about it. What do you call a SAHM who wishes she was a part-time-work-out-of-the-home-mom? PTWOOTHM? I have to admit I'm a little bummed today that I didn't get a call from a place I applied. They said they were accepting resumes through last week so I thought fo' sho' I'd get a call today inviting me for an interview (just a formality of course, since my resume totally sold them on me). So I'm bumming, yes. Whenever the phone rings, I get a bit of hope till I look at caller i.d.

But on a happy note, I get to go out to eat tonight and it won't cost us any gas or food budget money! Work-related for Mr. Gma is feeding the kids and taking them to pick out pumpkins. The best! See, we (I) decided at the beginning of Sept. that we wouldn't go out to eat AT ALL for the whole month. That lasted till the 3rd when I took E to BK. So at that point I just started keeping track and called it "over" when we hit $100. It's scarily EASY to spend $100 on eating out!

Ooh, my dinner date's home. Gotta run!

Old Fashioned Potato Soup

I got this recipe from a co-worker um, about twelve years ago. It's surprisingly good for how easy it is.

1/4 cup butter
1 lg. onion
6 potatoes, peeled and diced
2 carrots, peeled and diced
3 cups water
2 Tbsp. chicken bouillon powder (or cube, or whatever - I used the "better than bouillon" paste stuff you keep in the fridge)
ground black pepper to taste
3 Tbsp. all-purpose flour
3 cups milk
1 Tbsp. dried parsley (didn't add)
1/4 tsp. dried thyme (didn't add)

Melt butter in a med. saucepan. Cook onions till translucent.

While the onions are cooking, place the diced potatoes, carrots, water, and chicken soup base in another larger pot and bring to a boil. Cook until tender. Do not overcook. Season with ground black pepper to taste.

Add the flour to the cooked onions to make a paste. Gradually add the milk and stir well. Cook over low heat stirring constantly until warmed through. Add to the potato and carrot mixture. Stir in the parsley and thyme (if using) and heat through.

I guess you could add bacon, like some people like in their potato soup. Oh, and cheese! And sour cream. Consider mine the diet version!

Quiet Sunday Morning

D and I are up before the kids (rarity). It's VERY foggy out. S will be mad that it's not a school day b/c if it were a school day, there'd at least be a delay, and possibly a CANCELLATION! It's supposed to turn in to a gorgeous sunny 80 degree day.

D is reading his yawner book about Abe Lincoln written by Doris Kearns Goodwin, a known plagiarist! Remember? She got in trouble during the Bush/Gore campaign. He loves anything about history, which I think is pretty cool. Just not my thing. I can count on him for tough crossword puzzle help though!

I'm enjoying the seasonal flavor of International Delight's Pumpkin Pie Spice creamer. I think I'm going to stock up and put it in the freezer! It's that good! The fun thing is, these seasonal flavors go on sale about the first part of Jan. for <$1 just because the "season" has passed. That tells you something about how much we are paying in mark ups.

We have company coming this Thurs. (Hi M&R!) I'm so excited! It gives us the incentive we need to clean spaces that don't get a lot of attention! I also get to plan some great (I hope) meals. D is going to do his almost-famous BBQ ribs in the smoker.

I don't have any recent recipes to post! We've been eating out of the freezer a lot. Meaning stuff I've made extra of and frozen. We cook it before we eat it. Did you ever notice the warning on a frozen pizza, "cook before eating?" Here's Your Sign!

I did make a Lemonade Pie yesterday. I was so excited about it but it was a dud to me, so I'm not sharing the recipe. Don't get me wrong, it's edible, just nothing to brag about!

Oh! I did make some yummy (and easy) potato soup last week. Let me find the recipe...

I'll put it in a separate post.

Love to all. R

The Art of Ironing

That's an hour and forty-five min. (Or one episode of Dr. Phil and 3/4 of Oprah) of my life there in those crisp shirts!
I need a job so I can start sending them to the dry cleaner again!

Shepherd's Pie!

This recipe is a big winner at our house. I've adapted it from Rachael Ray. Took it from 30 min to 25! Also, she uses LAMB (?). Who actually eats lamb? Certainly not folks looking for a 30 min. meal before a soccer game or piano practice!

Anyhoo, here's my adaptation:

Cuss when you get the ground beef out of the fridge that you just bought a day ago and it's all brown and gross. Go down to the basement and get a rock-hard frozen pack of beef out of the freezer. Defrost it. Oh, wait. that was just me probably.

Make some mashed potatoes (or ideally, use leftover mashed potatoes). To your taters (your usual recipe) add one egg yolk. Set aside.

Brown 1 lb. of ground beef. Add some cut up carrots and onion if your kids won't gag. I used onion powder and garlic powder and carrots, no actual onion. In another pan (or the same pan after you've set aside the cooked beef), melt about 3Tbsp. butter, add about 2Tbsp. of flour and whisk around. Add one cup of beef broth and about 2 tsp. of Worschestershire sauce. Mix that in with the cooked beef.

Place the beef mixture in the bottom of a square baking pan. Top with mashed potatoes. Top that with cheddar cheese (or any cheese you like). Bake in 350° oven for about 20 min. Rachael Ray suggests topping with paprika and fresh parsley. I know, right?

I had a meeting so didn't eat it but Doug said both kids had 2nd helpings! Score!

This Morning I've...

• Dressed one kid
• Made one bed
• Made one lunch
• Made two breakfasts
• Folded two loads of laundry
• Washed one load of laundry
• Hung out one load of laundry
• Drank (drunk?) two cups of coffee
• Bitched about the leftovers being left on the counter all night

This guy is Amazing!! Please watch.

Barbecued Shrimp

This was last night's supper. Served w/ Zatarain's (sp?) Caribbean Rice. Yum!
Note: I did scale this recipe down for two people. The only thing I think I'd do different is actually marinate the shrimp before baking next time. Lots of good flavor here!

The kids had spaghetti w/ alfredo sauce and E had shrimp on his. S won't get near a shrimp!

INGREDIENTS:
2 cups butter
2 cups olive oil
3/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
6 tablespoons ground black
pepper
4 lemons, sliced
1/2 teaspoon hot pepper sauce
1 teaspoon Italian seasoning
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon paprika
4 teaspoons salt
8 pounds large shrimp - peeled
and deveined
DIRECTIONS:
1.Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).
2.Heat butter and oil in a large saucepan. Add Worcestershire sauce, black pepper, lemons, hot sauce, Italian seasoning, garlic, paprika and salt to the saucepan. Mix well and simmer 5 to 7 minutes.
3.Divide shrimp between two Dutch ovens. Pour 1/2 of the sauce into one Dutch oven and 1/2 of the sauce into the other. Heat the sauce in both Dutch ovens to a simmer and cook the shrimp for 6 to 8 minutes; until the shrimp begin to turn pink.
4.When the shrimp have begun to turn pink pour the shrimp and sauce from both Dutch ovens into a large baking pan (or two pans depending on how much sauce you have). Bake the shrimp for 10 minutes, stirring once.

My notes: Based on reviews at allrecipes.com for this recipe I did not cook the shrimp on the stove at all. I put the raw shrimp in the baking pan and covered w/ the cooked sauce. At this point, next time I think I'd put this in the fridge to marinate a while. But then just stick in the 450° oven and stir a couple times. Mine took about 13 min.

Aloha!

I have this handy gadget on my blog called FEEDJIT that shows me the geographical area of where someone is checking out my blog. I had a visitor from Hawaii! How fun. And Texas and Florida. HI! From Ohio! I just wish someone would leave a comment? Tell me how you go to my blog and just say "hey!"

The Boy in the Orange Shirt

Picking E up at preschool yesterday:

E: I want to go home with that boy in the orange shirt
Mommy: You do? What's his name?
E: I don't know, but he's my best friend!

btw, we found out his name is Matt. I guess Brent is ancient history!

Well, Hello Ike!

You came all the way up to Ohio to see us! (See pictures above to see how we spent our time!)

Crazy day here on Sunday. Winds up to 80MPH around our area! We were only out of power for four hours but our neighbors to the south may be out till this weekend! Understandably, our area isn't used to something like this and it's challenging their resources and manpower. In Dayton and Cincy they are literally having to call personnel back from TX where they went to help with Ike down there. Um, we need you in OHIO! Crazy.

Sophie's Turn

I'm having fun with these!

Rainy Saturday here. S is singing in the children's choir at church this evening. Then we are going to a soldier fundraiser to see Blair Carman. D is involved in this fundraiser where they raise money to send care packages to soldiers overseas. And of course the BUCKEYES play tonight @ 8 so thank goodness for DVR! D keeps saying, "the kids will really really like this piano guy so I figure you won't mind if I leave to catch the game!" LOL

Love to all. Is anyone reading this?

Seven Years Later

more animals

I was looking at some blogs and lots of them had made special mention yesterday of the anniversary of Sept. 11th. So I felt like a heel that I didn't even post! We did pray for the victims and their families yesterday and of course, thought about where we were that fateful day.

My Mema (Neva) Garrett was visiting from Arizona. I have great memories of that visit. I was also babysitting full time and she was a great help and entertainment for the kids. She supervised the neighbors and Doug in the yard trying to figure out a mysterious water leak. All while reading and smoking those dag-gum cigarettes! Anyhow, the morning of Sept. 11th we were watching the Today Show. I actually had both A&M home from school sick. I remember just being very confused when we realized what was happening. Just disbelief. It's like when you hear someone has died and you just don't know what to do, but you feel compelled to do something. I called the girls' school and asked if they would take up a collection for the Red Cross. Everyone was still reeling and just trying to make sense of it all. It never did and it never will. I remember Mema was so nervous about flying home on the 16th. They took her nail clippers away from her! In a way, I'm so glad she was here at that time. It makes the memories of that visit much more embedded in my memory and that's a good thing to have now that she's gone.

Those kids I used to babysit? Their baby sister died yesterday. Rare form of cancer that kids are not supposed to get. She just turned five. I did not know her as I stopped watching her brothers before she was born. Cara had been OUT of the hospital for a total of four days since February. You know what I said when I heard she passed away? Shit! That covers it. We're a small community here so everyone is connected in some way. Everyone will be affected. Shit!

Look What I Did

I made this scrapbook page on scrapblog.com. I made my header there also. So fun, but it can be time consuming!

Food of the Week: PORK

So Sunday's Fried Bologna Casserole was technically beef bologna. Monday we had the fab pork tenderloin. Last night I turned those leftovers into pork fried rice (yum). MIL (mother-in-law) is coming over for supper tonight b/c FIL is fishing in Canada. I found this great turkey breast crock pot recipe but I can't get a bone-in turkey breast in the vicinity of my house! So... perusing allrecipes slow cooker recipes I came across this. Yes, it's PORK! I think we'll do meatless tomorrow!

Look what we're having for a veggie on the side: southern fried cabbage. I think the cooler fall weather is making me crave comfort food.

Speaking of getting fat... you know how I just LOVE exercise? Weeellll, that's kind of not happening much right now. In my defense, I'm walking about fifteen miles a week, which I'm enjoying a LOT. But all that walking isn't negating all this EATING!

Speaking of dessert, here's what E helped me make for dessert!

Pineapple Upside-Down Biscuits
1 (10-ounce) can crushed pineapple

1/2 cup packed light brown sugar

1/4 cup (1/2 stick butter), at room temperature

10 maraschino cherries

1 (12-ounce) package refrigerated buttermilk biscuits (10 count)
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Grease 10 cups of a muffin tin. Strain the can of crushed pineapple, save juice for later.
Combine the pineapple, sugar, and butter, and mix well. Divide the pineapple mixture among the muffin cups. Place a cherry in the center of each muffin cup, making sure cherry hits bottom of cup. Place 1 biscuit in each cup on top of sugar and pineapple mixture. Spoon 1 teaspoon reserved pineapple juice over each biscuit. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, or until golden. Cool for 2 minutes. Invert the pan onto a plate to release the biscuits. Serve warm.

Paula Deen will never let you down!

Fun With a Boy and a Grasshopper

This is what kept us busy for about fifteen minutes this afternoon. Aren't boys great?

Monday's Supper Spicy Honey Pork Tenderloin

From Kraft Food and Family Magazine
Spicy Honey Pork Tenderloin In our opinion there was nothing "spicy" about this! Just good flavor
1 pork tenderloin (1 lb.)
1/4 cup Catalina dressing, divided
1 tsp. chili powder
1 tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp. dry mustard
1/2 tsp. paprika
1/4 tsp. dried thyme leaves
1 Tbsp. honey
Preheat oven to 425ºF. Brush meat with 2 Tbsp. of the dressing. Mix dry ingredients; rub onto meat. Place in baking pan. Mix remaining 2 Tbsp. dressing and honey; set aside. Bake 15 min.; brush with dressing mixture. Bake an additional 10 min. or until cooked through (160ºF).Remove meat from oven; cover with foil. Let stand 5 min. before slicing. D grilled ours. It took about 40 min. to get it to a good temp. The meat was tender and delish!

Also:
zucchini cakes from Pioneer Woman. These were good. Not as messy as breading and frying zucchini slices. Next time I'd add chopped onions and REAL parmesan cheese (I only had the powdered kind). I'd also brown them a little crisper, but they were good with ranch dip! The biggest deal was the kids ate them!

Fried Bologna Casserole!

I know, I know. But it's GOOD!

INGREDIENTS:
8 slices bologna
3 tablespoons butter
1 onion, chopped
4 cups warm mashed potatoes
1 1/2 cups shredded Cheddar
cheese
DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 1 1/2 quart baking dish.
2. Heat a skillet over medium-high heat. Fry the bologna slices in the hot skillet until browned on both sides, about 1 minute per side. Drain on a paper towel-lined plate. Wipe excess grease from the skillet, reduce heat to medium, and stir in the butter and onion. Cook and stir until the onion has softened and turned translucent, about 5 minutes. Stir the onions into the warm mashed potatoes. I didn't add the onions to ours b/c the kids won't eat them. I kept them on the side and we added ours at the table. The onions really made the dish! They turn out so yummy from the bologna grease! Seriously!

3. Spread half of the mashed potatoes into the prepared baking dish. Layer with half of the fried bologna, and sprinkle with half of the cheese. Repeat with the remaining ingredients.
4. Bake uncovered in the preheated oven until the cheese is bubbly, and the center is hot, about 30 minutes.

Granted, this isn't something you'd serve your family every week (or every month). But we had fun with it! I served green beans and strawberries on the side to "balance" it! LOL

Criss-Cross Crossword

Do you see anything wrong with this crossword puzzle? I don't think you can make out the numbers, but trust me, this crossword was printed in our paper like it's in a mirror! Yep, I solved it anyhow! Except that pesky spot where one letter is missing. I should've kept the clue, and you could help me out.

Feta's Mo Betta!

Doesn't this sound yummy?
Avocado Feta Salsa
INGREDIENTS:
2 plum tomatoes, chopped
1 ripe avocado - peeled, pitted
and chopped
1/4 cup finely chopped red
onion
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tablespoon snipped fresh
parsley
1 tablespoon chopped fresh
oregano
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon red or white wine
vinegar
4 ounces crumbled feta cheese
DIRECTIONS:
1. In a bowl, gently stir together tomatoes, avocados, onion, and garlic. Mix in parsley and oregano. Gently stir in olive oil and vinegar. Then stir in feta. Cover, and chill for 2 to 6 hours.

Yeah? Well, I wouldn't know because I can't buy feta cheese within a 10 mile radius of my house (Yes, I drove all over looking for it)! I have to wait till I get "to town" sometime next week! So I made plain ol' guacamole. We're going out on the lake with friends. Oh, and when I handed the girl at the store the avocado, she looked at me like, "what is this?" It's a FANCY veggie (fruit?), sweetie!

Rain Dance, Happy Dance

Wow. It was a strange feeling last night to hear a genuine rain storm outside. Like, I had to go outside and take my garden flag off before it blew into the woods! I literally was jumping with excitement. We NEED rain desperately. I know if you're on the east coast you'd love to give us some of yours! The rain continued through the night and is just very light now, but we'll take it!

Sorry I haven't updated this week. A was home for a couple days so we did some running around and had a good visit. E loves her so much and the feeling is mutual. We drove her halfway back yesterday (boyfriend met us halfway).

M is moving to her dad's this weekend. She's been working a LOT of hours. Like 7:30AM to 6:30PM. She is grooming in the mornings and teching in the afternoon. Her classes start Tues. so she wants to get settled in at Dad's before that. He fixed up a room for her and she got to pick paint colors, etc. so that's fun!

I filled my time this week also with canning tomatoes! And salsa! The salsa turned out killer! A little on the spicy side but very flavorful. I got a recipe from the internet (duh!) and added a little bit of this and a little bit of that... YUM But OMG what a mess!

D smoked some ribs last weekend in his handy dandy smoker. It was so funny, the neighbors were out asking, "what's this contraption?" And then they were hooked and want one of their own. It's like showing off a sports car or something, the guys stand around and talk about the great features! The ribs were to die for! Seriously. He's onto something! We had three couples and kids over for a get-together and he was the RIB KING! I also made these:

Texas Ranger Baked Beans (I doubled this recipe)
INGREDIENTS:
1 (28 ounce) can baked beans
with pork
1 medium onion, diced
1 medium bell pepper, diced
4 links spicy pork sausage, cut
into chunks I use a regular tube of spicy sausage
2 tablespoons chili powder
3 tablespoons Worcestershire
sauce
4 tablespoons vinegar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup ketchup
1 teaspoon garlic powder
salt to taste
1 dash cayenne pepper
(optional)
DIRECTIONS:
1.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2.
In a Dutch oven, combine the baked beans, onion, bell pepper, and sausage. Season with chili powder, Worcestershire sauce, vinegar, brown sugar, ketchup, garlic powder and salt. Add a dash of cayenne if desired.
3.
Cover and bake for one hour in the preheated oven. I've never used the oven, just cook them on the stove (or crock pot)!

Sorry for the YAWN post! Just wanted to catch up!