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NaNaBloPop Recap

Comfort Food. Special outings. Ordinary days. Holidays. Decorations.  Cookies. Preschool activities.  A new kitty. So many reasons to be thankful.  A glimpse into my home, my life, my mind, my heart.

I love NaBloPoMo and I am so happy to have pulled off 30 posts in 30 days again this year.

What's more? These fabulous ladies took (and completed!) the journey with me. 

Alissa of Have Stroller Will Travel

Heather of CafeSmom

Christy of My Super Kaduper Life

Congrats, friends. Looks like we made it.

Here's to more of the same, plus a little something different in the coming months.

Thanks for coming along for the ride this month.

 

Who knew?

I've always liked to write.  I wrote poetry as a young girl, complete with very cheesey rhymes and typical preteen dramatics. I was on the staff for my middle school's newspaper.  I even served a year as President of the Writers' Club in high school.  Over the years, when I didn't know how else to express myself, I turned to my journals, random pieces of paper or, eventually, keyboards. 

Words.  They are powerful.  Sometimes it's easier to peck them out on a computer or scribble them down onto a notepad than to say them.

Sometimes they connect you with just the right people at just the right time.

Sometimes they open up opportunities for work, personal enrichment and community.

Who knew the written word could do so much?

We're almost to the end of NaNaBloPop. I have loved writing each day this month. Thanks for reading my words.

Will Wonders Never Cease?

I have come to a realization.  Ever since this lovely tortie cat entered  our lives, our home has actually been tidier than ever before.  Marcus is obsessive  about cleaning out her litter box (which I appreciate) and about combing the floor for "croutons" as he calls them,  tidbits of food or toys that might choke or hurt her.  I'm constantly checking her food and water and going behind her with the dust-buster.  We're working on picking up toys with Dean, who has gotten SO GOOD about cleaning up what he's playing with before moving on to another activity.  He's really into puzzles these days and is very careful to make sure all the pieces go back into the box when he's done. 

What I'm saying is I think we've turned a corner of cleanliness and I could not be happier. The clutter upsets me.  I do what I can on my own, but I can't keep the whole house neat alone.  My guys are finally pulling their weight.

So thank you, Chutney the kitty cat.  You're already making our home a better place to live.

Whatever, lady. Tell me I'm pretty again.

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like...

CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

When I was a little girl, my dad told me he wrote that song. (He didn't.)  I believed it until we sang it in music class when I was in FOURTH GRADE and I saw the real writer's name on the sheet music.  He lies.

But anyway.

  Dean and Clifford helped decorate the tree this morning. Dean was more excited that EVER because he got to hang ornaments all on his own.  It was so much fun to watch his excitement every time he unwrapped or opened another ornament.  He asked, "Where's this from?" and we told him the story of all our special ornaments.  He mostly liked the ones that were about him, which is understandable.  We also pulled out the little Christmas tree that I've had since the mid-80s. I used to put it in my bedroom when I was growing up. It also travelled to college with me each year.  It now lives in Dean's room. I love that he enjoys it as much as I did as a little kid.

This morning, we made gingerbread cookies.

Believe it or not, this was my first try at gingerbread. I think they turned out pretty cute. Dean LOVED them and purposely decapitated several of the angels so I'd let him eat them.  He conked out for a nap this afternoon and I did some decorating.

The trees turned out to be super cute. 

I took off around noon and did a little shopping.  Our stocking were nowhere to be found in the boxes of decorations, so I sprung for new ones. Target was having a great sale, so I got Dean one with Lightnin' McQueen, Marcus one with a reindeer and me one with a snowlady.  (A snowman wearing a pink scarf is a snowlady, right? Right.)  I also got  us each a Christmas plate to make dinnertime more festive.

This is my absolute favorite time of year.  It was such fun this morning to laze around in my pj's listening to my Pandora Christmas station and learning to make a new holiday treat with my boy.  Marcus did his usual excellent job of making sure we had an even distribution of red and silver ornaments all over the tree. If it ever stops raining. we'll put out our light-up candy canes in the yard.  My silver jingle bell wreath is on the front door, the tree is lit and in the window, my kitchen smells like cookies, and my trunk is already full of gifts.  I watched The Family Stone yesterday (and criiiiiiiiiiied) and Love Actually is on my list of things to watch tonight.

Bring it on , Christmas.  Bring it on.

Comfort Food Saturday: Crawfish Bisque

My husband is a genius in the kitchen.  In the 13 years I've known him, he has only made 2 things I didn't like.  I was worried about tonight's dish, seeing as we'd never made a soup like this before. Marcus loves bisque. I could take it or leave it most of the time, but then I'm lactose intolerant, so there ya go.  He started with the veggies, which Dean and I helped prepare. (I cleaned and helped chop, Dean took things to the trash can.)  Then I went downstairs to watch the Bama game (ROLL TIDE!) while Marcus worked his magic.  He called me up about an hour later for a taste test. OMG.  All it needed was a dash of hot sauce and we were good to go. So happy to have this in our recipe box.

CRAWFISH BISQUE

• 1-12 oz. package frozen crawfish tails (or fresh, if you can find them)
• 1 white onion
• 1 green bell pepper
• 1 leek
• 1 cup cut-cup carrots
• 3 stalks celery
• 1 stick unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons minced garlic
• 5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 2 cups chicken broth (low-sodium variety)
• 3 1/2 cups whole milk (can substitute half and half if you want a thicker base)
• 2 tablespoons Cajun seasoning (Adjust to taste)
• 2 dashes hot sauce (Adjust to taste)
• 2 cups White cooking wine (or any white wine for stronger flavor)

Thaw crawfish tails in cool water. Drain and chop, if desired.  Set aside.  Rough chop vegetables.  In large saucepan, heat cooking wine.  When warm, add vegetables and cook until tender. (not soft)  Scoop vegetables out (leave wine in pan) and strain. Add crawfish to wine.  Place vegetables in food processor.  Process to a fine chop. (However small or large you like)  Remove crawfish from wine and strain.  In stockpot, melt butter on medium heat.  Once melted, slowly stir in flour.  Next, slowly stir in chicken broth.  Stir constantly!!!  Whisk in milk.  Add Cajun seasoning to taste.  Slowly whisk in vegetables. **If any liquid pools while veggies are sitting, remove it.** Add crawfish.  Add hot sauce to taste.  Serve with crusty bread.

Chocolate Pecan Pie

This recipe is courtesy of Paula Deen and it is DIVINE.  I've made the non-chocolate version before, but this one puts it to shame.  If you like the flavor of bourbon, Paula recommends throwing in a couple of tablespoons.  It's a really rich, sweet pie, perfect with a hot cup of coffee.

CHOCOLATE PECAN PIE

• 1- 9inch pie shell (unbaked)
• 2 cups pecan halves
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 3 tablespoons butter, melted
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup dark corn (or Karo) syrup
• 3 ounces (or about 1/2 cup) semi-sweet chocolate, chopped

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Place pie shell in pie pan and cover bottom of crust with pecan halves.  In a mixing bowl, whisk together eggs and melted butter. (Be sure to let the butter cool a bit or you'll have scrambled eggs!)  Add karo syrup, sugar and chocolate.  Mix well, then pour over pecans.    Place pan on heavy-duty cookie sheet and place in oven.

Bake 10 minutes at 375, then lower temperature of oven to 350. Bake 25 minutes, or until pie is set.

 

So Thankful

Dean had a rough night last night. He has some itchy eczema patches that woke him up, but not quite all the way awake. He was ANGRY, which set the kitty to meowing. I was downstairs bumping around with all the lights on for Benadryl and Marcus was upstairs trying to get Dean to stop screaming, or at least wake up enough to tell us what was wrong.

That was at 1:30am.

Dean got up at 7:23.

After a quick cup of coffee, I got to work in the kitchen.  All day long, I cooked and cleaned, cooked and cleaned.  Our guest, Frank arrived a little after 9am and we had a lovely braekfast of cinnamon rolls and bacon before I kicked everyone out of the kitchen so I could work on my side dishes.  I browned sausage for my stuffing, fried bacon to garnish our brussels sprouts, reminded Marcus to baste the bird, and put together our meal, all while trying to keep Dean out of the oven.  It was such fun to cook and organize the day, then to sit and enjoy it with my little family plus one.  Once the initial food coma wore off, Dean pulled us outside for a mock campout in the driveway, complete with sleeping bags and marshmallows on sticks. He then found himself a "Sword" (locally known as a stick) and reinacted the Power Rangers' performance on the Macy's parade.

When it got dark, we headed in and I put together a chocolate pecan pie that'll knock your socks off.

I am so thankful to have had the energy and means to produce this ridiculously large meal, complete with splurges like fresh OJ, Dunkin Donuts coffee and our family's favorite appetizer (Celery with secret ingredient cream cheese spread).   I'm thrilled to have been able to open our home to a friend and to have finally shared a real Thanksgiving meal with my son. (He ate SIX BITES of turkey, people! We're calling that a win.)

It was exactly the Thanksgiving we wanted.

I hope yours was just as perfect.  Thanks for reading, y'all.

Chutney

Casey has good ideas a lot of the time.  She just rescued two sweet kitties. (Go look at her pictures. Your heart will melt.)  She keeps talking about them. It makes me want to pet them.

Every time Marcus takes Benadryl, we somehow end up talking about getting a cat. He's been talking about it a lot lately while NOT on Benadryl, so I finally figured out that OH. He's serious.  Dean's getting to the age where he is perfectly capable of helping care for a pet.  It seemed like just the thing our home might be missing.

Today we swung by Pet Smart, like ya do, where they house shelter kitties for adoption.  There were two gorgeous 7 month old torties, Tasha and Tisha. While we were standing there, Tisha got adopted. We talked to Tasha through the glass and she was responsive to us.  Marcus got very quiet. We looked at some other stuff, then left the store. 

We thought about her all afternoon.  Finally, after about 2 hours, Marcus said, "Her name is Chutney." And with that, she was ours. We loaded Dean into the car, drove back to the store and adopted ourselves a kitty.

This sort of crummy phone picture does not do her justice. She has the most gorgeous red highlights in her coat and one adorable khaki-colored paw.  She's a little nervous right now--she's had a big day, after all.  But we're all giving her space and taking our time getting to know her.  I think after a while she'll fit right in.

In My Ears

My iPhone has a Pandora app that I loooooove.  Lately, I'm stuck on the Adele station.  I know.  I tried to resist her for a LONG TIME. Then "Someone Like You" came out.  Holy cow. That VOICE.  The song is gorgeous. It does not even remotely relate to anything I am experiencing in my life right now, but MAN do I love that song. 

Marcus has a soft spot for The Proclaimers of "500 Miles" fame.  Their album "Sunshine on Leith" is currently in my car's CD player. Dean loves them, too.

When I'm cooking, I listen to what I call my Bad Kitchen Music Mix, which is a playlist full of Pat Benetar, Erasure, The Cure and other fabulous 80s acts.  I also like to listen to "Don't Change" by INXS on loop when I bake. I don't know why. It just works for baking.

When I'm working, I have several travel playlists that include some awesome power ballads and some other songs that would likely make anyone who's not me cringe. ("Leather and Lace" by Stevie Nicks and Don Henley, anyone?  Yeah, didn't think so.)  (Also? NELSON.) (I used to want to marry one of the Nelson brothers. Can you imagine? I'd be Jen Nelson Nelson.)

So, what I'm saying is, I have kind of eclectic taste in music. And it makes me happy. And I subject others to my bad mix tapes.  Speaking of which, I used to make EPIC mix tapes.  During my freshman year of college, my friend Gina and I were talking about our horrible mix tapes from our middle school days and we vowed to bring back examples after a break.  We subjected our poor guy friends to them.  On our next road trip, our friend Jonathan made us his own version, which he cleverly entitled "The Michael Bolton Music Mix*"  (*this mix contains NO songs by Michael Bolton).  It had classics like "Islands In The Stream" and "I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar."

What are your guilty pleasure songs?

Who Are We?

Today has been one of those days that makse me think my little family unit could have hope. Hope, that is, of becoming real live productive people all the time.  We were fairly slovenly yesterday, save a trip to the urgent care clinic for me. I have  an ingrown fingernail of all things, and was about a day away from a staph infection, I fear.  I got some ginormous antibiotics, some greasy ointment and the nice doctor removed the offending piece of fingernail (rather painlessly!), so I'm much better, thanks.

Marcus got up before Dean and me this morning, unloaded the dishwasher and made coffee.  Dean woke me up at 7:51 (OMG ALMOST 8 O'CLOCK!!!!!!!!) and we went down for our milk and coffee. We browsed the sale ads on the computer, our morning routine of late, then got dressed. Marcus left for work, Dean and I went to Chick-Fil-A for a little breakfast and playtime.  We then headed to the grocery store to buy the ever-important Thanksgiving turkey bird and ingredients for all that other stuff I've decided to make.  Dean actually sat in the cart today, making it a much easier trip. (That may or may not have had something to do with the fact that I promised him a Cars 2 balloon if he was a good shopper.  Whatever it takes, people.)

We got home, put up our food, played outside, did 2 loads of laundry, made some tomato sauce, painted a picture, made some snowflakes, then enjoyed a simple but tasty spaghetti lunch, all before 12:30.

And now, I shall collapse.

 

EDITED TO ADD:  I totally cursed myself by writing this.  Not 20 minutes after I hit "publish," a horrific wave of nausea hit me. I can only imagine it is a result of the ginormous antibiotics. Know who doesn't understand the phrase, "Mommy's sick at her stomach?" The 3 year old who keeps trying to sit on my head.