About Me

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I wear many hats. I am a Wife, Mother, Daughter, Granddaughter, Friend, Dental Assistant, Student, Big Sister, Daughter-in-law, Sister-in-law, Chef, Gardener, Nurse, Maid, Plumber, Seamstress...

Sunday, November 25, 2007

Southwest Cheese Soup

Last night for dinner Larry made the yummiest soup EVER!
Here's the recipe:

Southwest Cheese Soup

2 cans whole kernel corn (Drained)
2 cans ranch style beans (Drained)
1 can stewed tomatoes Mexican style
1 8 oz can tomato sauce
1 can rotel
1 pkg shredded Velveeta cheese

Mix all together and let simmer until cheese is melted. Do not boil. Brown 1 lb ground beef and onion. Add to soup. ENJOY!!

Saturday, November 24, 2007

Christmas Traditions and Store Bought Cookies

Every year we bake homemade chocolate chip cookies and decorate the tree for Christmas. It's become a holiday tradition for our family. Although there is something you need to know about me. I am not the world's best baker. I am a terrible cook but I can bake pretty good most of the time. However, tonight was NOT my night. My chocolate chip cookies turned out to be more like "chocolate chip pancakes". I have no idea what I did wrong and this has happened to me on more than one occasion. So I ended up having to go to the store to buy store bought cookie dough. Oh well, it's better than no cookies right?! Larry handed me $6.00 and said, "Buy as much cookies as you can for $6.00." So I did. I knew that the total was going to be close to $6.00 but I didn't know for sure. So I grabbed the cookie dough and I walked up to the cashier and said, "Well I've got $6.00 and I'm not sure if that'll cover it but we'll find out." She rang them up and I needed 8 more cents. So I rummaged around in my purse for some changed. It figures that the day I need my change is the day I don't have it on me. So I say to the cashier, "Oh well, I'll just go and put one roll back." She says not to put it back because she has a quarter in her pocket. I tell her thank you. Then she says, "Here I'll even let you keep the change." She hands it to me, we laugh, I say thank you and leave. On the way out the door I put the change in the "bell ringers" bucket. When I got home I explained to Larry what happened and we carry on with our Christmas tradition. Later I decided to bake some cookies for the kind cashier. I decided to give her a Christmas card to go with the cookies. In my card I explained our family tradition, said thank you, and taped a quarter on the inside of the card. I then told Larry that I was going to take the cashier some cookies and a card to say thank you. Larry giggled about it and thought I was silly, I guess. Oh well, in my opinion there are too few "Thank You's" being said these days. Tara, the cashier, was VERY SURPRISED! I caught her off guard as she was talking with her co-workers. I handed her the tin of cookies along with the card and explained that they were for her to say thank you for her kindness. She smiled really big and said thank you as her face turned red. Sorry Tara I didn't mean to make you turn red. Oops. I drove by the store as I left the parking lot and saw her still smiling as she read my card aloud to her co-workers. So maybe a simple "thank you" was all that may have been necessary for Tara giving me a quarter but sometimes it feels good to go out of your way just to say thank you. Who knows that may be something that Tara will take to heart and pass along to someone else. Have you ever seen that movie called "Pay It Forward"? It's all about kindness. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it.

Friday, November 23, 2007

Black Friday

Today I went shopping with my mother-in-law. Shopping with her is like shopping with the energizer bunny! No kidding! It's so much fun though. She picked me up at 3:30am! Phew! First stop: JCPenny. It was a mad house! I even saw people there with their children...little children. Yikes! I feel sorry for those people. Up next: Dicks Sporting Goods. That was a quick stop though with no lines. Can you believe it?! Next: Wal-Mart. We drove to Wal-Mart and then turned right around! We decided it wasn't worth going in there...Yikes! 6am. Next: Panera Bread for some breakfast. We each had a Souffle, a hot drink, and split a bagel. Yummy! Then we decided to brave JCPenny again because we discovered I grabbed the wrong sized kitchen item that she wanted. Good thing she checked her receipts. Once we exchanged the right items and pick up a few more items, we decided to brave the rest of the mall. We headed to Dillards. I was surprised to see just how empty it was in there. There was hardly any "crazy shoppers" running around. We stopped in the food court for another hot drink before heading to a few other stores in the mall. On our way home we decided to stop by Michael's Craft Store to check out what they had on sale. We didn't go there with anything in mind but we certainly left with a "few" items. After that we went next door to Slumberland Furniture to check out a table that she had her eye on, but changed her mind in the end. We finally ended up at home around 11:30am or so. Phew! What a day and a lot of fun!

Thursday, November 22, 2007

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today we went to my mother-in-laws house for Thanksgiving. We ate a ton of food that we'll be working off until the end of next year! Oh, I am sooo full! I love to eat though! Yum! Oh and get this, my mother-in-law is trying to "train" me. She actually gave me an assignment! Yeah, an assignment. For a whole year I am supposed to figure out what I want to bring to Thanksgiving next year. She said to cook something that I am good at. Cook?! Me cook?! That word isn't even in my vocabulary! Oh boy, I've got work to do! So the plan is to make potato casserole or corn casserole. I have a plan though, I am going to shock everyone by making both! Yes, I will make two casseroles! I can do this and I have a whole year to perfect it. So...please pray for me. I need all the help I can get. Tomorrow I am going shopping with my-mother-in-law. She is like the energizer bunny. It's hard to keep up with her when she is shopping but it's always fun. I don't have any shopping to do tomorrow so it'll be all her shopping that needs to be done. Wish me luck...she's picking me up at 4am! Yikes!

Saturday, November 17, 2007

That's a lot of leaves!!

Phew! Oh boy is my back is sore. We have a lot of trees in our neighborhood. I mean a lot! Today larry and I raked the front yard. It was completely covered in leaves. We ended up with 16 bags full of leaves! Just as we were finishing up the last bag our neighbor came over and said, "Man you guys are making me tired just watching you. I thought you guys could use a cold drink." That was so nice of her to think of us!

Weekend fun

Last weekend Mylan and I went to the school playground. We also found an outdoor classroom and wandered the trails. We had a good time but poor Larry was stuck at work and couldn't join us.