Chicken and noodles

Tammy asked about my recipe for chicken and noodles. I'm so thrilled someone actually wants to know! Bless your heart, Tammy!

It's such a simple recipe, but it really is delicious. My husband grew up eating these and used to make them. I just started making them, but my last pot was superbly delicious.

It's my mother-in-law's invention. She is notorious for never having a recipe. She's also the queen of simple, but absolutely delicious food. As a farmer's wife with 7 children, she has tons of cooking experience.

Here are the ingredients:

chicken
No Yolks Egg noodles
chicken broth
butter
salt
pepper
onion, optional

I like to use breast meat on the bone. I salt and pepper the chicken and cook it in my crockpot and after it's all tender and wonderful, I shred it, making sure to get it nice and bone free! I keep about two cups of chicken stock to cook my noodles in.

I cook the noodles with the chicken stock, some water, and usually one can of chicken broth. I can't be specific about the amounts, but remember you won't be draining the noodles. We don't like the chicken and noodles real soupy. It's best if you have enough liquid remaining to keep them moist, but not soupy.

If you want to add some chopped onion, you can add it as you are boiling the noodles. I forgot to add it last time and it came out just fine.

After the noodles are cooked, I add the chicken and put butter in and stir it around, so it gets all melted and lovely. You could skip the butter too. You could, but I can't. I think there would be a mutiny on my hands. I add 3/4 of a stick of butter. When my husband fixes it, he puts in the whole stick.

Then I salt and pepper to taste. It always tastes better the second day. And since I have a small family of three, we always have leftovers for at least one more meal.

Embarrassingly simple, but it really is fantastic!

Menu Plan (is it already) Monday!?!

The weekend is over and I feel so unprepared! Emotionally, anyway.

My cupboards, however, are full!

Lots of simple meals this week because I did absolutely no housework this weekend and I have a lot of catch up to do. Plus the usual baseball games/practices, guitar lesson, schoolwork, interacting with family...

Monday

Hot dogs with homemade chili
chips

Tuesday

Leftovers

Wednesday

Chicken and noodles (made it last week and it was requested again --- so soon!)

Thursday

Leftover chicken and noodles (it makes a HUGE pot!)

Friday

Hamburger Helper something
roasted veggies


Simple and easy!

Christians and politics

I always forget how ugly election years can get. Now I remember why every four years I get a really bad headache.

I have a friend who hasn't spoken to me about politics for years, because she knows I voted for George Bush in the last election. When he got re-elected she told me she didn't know how she was going to make it for the next four years.

I remember thinking how strange it was that a woman with a husband and three kids would look at the next four years as some kind of trial she has to endure because of who was in control of the White House.

Then another election year comes and it looks like "my candidate" seriously might lose and for a few weeks I have thought the same thoughts. How am I going to handle having Barack Obama as president for four --- or possibly more --- years?

This post is my attempt to slap some sense into myself.

You can really drive yourself crazy listening to all this political talk. I would classify myself as a Republican and, like a good little Republican, I get the majority of my national news from Fox News. But I also like to see what others are saying. (Yeah, yeah, I know Fox is "fair and balanced" but who are we kidding?) I'll watch some news from CNN and have even watched Bill Maher. I guess it's really Bill Maher that triggered many of the ideas that will come out in this post.

Boy, he seriously doesn't like Christians. I think it was on his show that I first heard someone say (and I'm sorry I can't be more specific about the source) that Jesus was a community organizer, in reference I'm sure to Obama's service as a community organizer.

I was offended about it for a few minutes and then it made me sad. Anyone who knows the Bible knows that Jesus was not a community organizer, as I understand the meaning of the phrase. His sole purpose was to glorify God and He had no interest in politics. Remember that the disciples were disappointed because they expected the Messiah to restore the Jews to power on earth. They didn't understand His purpose.

With all of this election craziness, I wonder if some of us Christians are kind of missing the point too.

Listening to Bill Maher was kind of an education to me. I think it's good to hear someone say horrible things about your beliefs because it can really help you think more clearly and act more purposefully in your beliefs.

As I said before, after hearing Bill Maher rail against Christians, I was more sad than angry because I saw the big picture, which is Bill Maher doesn't know Christ. I think that's what we forget sometimes. These people, who we only see as political opponents, are lost in the worst possible sense of the word. And what are we doing to bring them the message of the Gospel by waving our Bibles at them like maniacs and shoving Sarah Palin down their throats?

**I know it sounds like I'm saying only non-Christians would vote for Obama. I don't believe that. My friend, who I talked about at the beginning of the post, is both a Christian and a Democrat. The phrase "these people" is specifically referring to people who don't like Christians and see conservative Christians as controlling the Republican party. If I was less clumsy as a writer, I could word that better.**

A couple of years ago, the leaders of the church we used to go to urged us to boycott Wal-mart. It was a pretty extensive campaign. I remember getting the email from the Christian political action group. I thought it was strange and I honestly couldn't figure out the reasoning behind it, no matter how many times I read the email.

My husband and I participated in it for a while, but we had two dogs and a cat at the time and, frankly, pet food and cat litter is so much cheaper at Wal-mart. So, we went back to Wal-mart and I think most Christians followed shortly after. I don't think the "boycott" had an effect at all on the low price super giant.

I wonder what effect it had on homosexuals. I wonder if they think that Christians hate them so much they don't want them to have access to low prices. And I wonder if, as Christians, that is the kind of message we want going out to people who don't know Christ.

(I'm also reminded of a youth minister I spoke to once about a Christian bookstore I like to go to. He told me that newly opened bookstore wouldn't stay in business long because they were open on Sundays and Christians wouldn't shop at a Christian book store that was open on Sundays. This gave me pause because we had this conversation in a crowded restaurant after Sunday morning service.)

Frankly, I'm afraid that a lot of this stuff makes us look stupid. It also makes us look like we don't read the Bible. Either way our witness to unbelievers is shot.

Bill Maher said another thing that I can't stop thinking about. He mentioned that you can't get elected as president in this country without claiming to be a Christian.

I don't want my president to fake salvation, because salvation is something that non-Christians need. If they believe that fake Christianity can win them my vote, they might believe that faking it can also get them to heaven.

Honestly, I don't know exactly where I am going with this post. I am thankful that I can vote in the election, and I'll use the vote as best I can. I don't, however, think that Christ was real concerned about personal liberties. When you read about Paul, and all the other persecuted Christians in the New Testament, you never hear him talk to anybody about his right to speak publicly about Christ. Please, correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't remember him saying "You can't lock me up! I have a right to speak my beliefs!" He took those opportunities to speak about Christ, not to rail for his personal freedom.

So ends my ramblings on an early Sunday morning.

Menu Plan Monday Week #2

Okay. Last week did not work out that great, because we didn't stick to the menu every night. We did eat most of our meals at home, however, which was kind of the point.

This week I'm only planning dinner and breakfast/lunch will be whatever is in the house. That works, right?

Monday

Eating out

Tuesday

Chicken and noodles

Wednesday

Chicken fajitas

Thursday

Leftovers

Friday

chicken and pasta


There was a really good sale on chicken this week. Can you tell?

Menu Plan Monday

I'm participating in Menu Plan Monday for the first time this week!

While going over the family budget this weekend, I was faced with the proof that my family eats out way too much! I won't say how much we spent on eating out just in the past month, but it is an embarrassing amount. So I'm trying to change that by being better about planning meals and shopping more frugally.

Here is my first attempt at a weekly meal plan:

Monday

Breakfast - cereal or oatmeal, toast, and fruit
Lunch - sandwiches, soup, and veggies with dip
Dinner - Chili casserole, veggies

Tuesday

Breakfast - Biscuits, oatmeal or cereal, and fruit
Lunch - sandwiches, soup, and veggies with dip
Dinner - Leftover chili casserole (ballgame night, so leftovers will be easiest)

Wednesday

Breakfast - Pancakes and fruit or leftover biscuits
Lunch - sandwiches, soup, and veggies with dip (I'm sensing a theme here)
Dinner - Homemade cheese pizza

Thursday
Breakfast - eggs and leftover biscuits or pancakes
Lunch - Leftover pizza (Husband will eat out)
Dinner - Pasta bake, veggies, and garlic bread

Friday

Breakfast - Whatever is left in the house
Lunch - Whatever we can forage to eat
Dinner - bean burritos


Okay, I'm only doing a five day menu, because this is my first shot at this and because I have some things I need to use up before they go bad. I'm not planning on shopping this week. I'll see how it goes. My cabinets are stocked full of pasta and pasta sauce, dried beans, canned goods, instant oatmeal, tuna, plenty of canned soup, ingredients to make homemade tomato soup, really just a lot of stuff that I need to use up before I go shopping again. I also have a lot of frozen veggies in the freezer and some frozen fish filets. My husband will not eat fish, but my son and I eat it sometimes for lunch. I also have plenty of flour and yeast, so if I run out of bread I can make some instead of buying it at the store. I'm going to see how far what I already have will take us this week.

The only thing I can really see needing at the store this week is milk. My husband and son are both big milk drinkers and they won't be happy if we run out. My husband drives by Aldi on his way to/from work, so I'll probably have him drop by to get the milk that is $2.59 a gallon.

Not shopping this week will really help our budget. Gas prices are back up again because of the hurricane (was it Ike?). Anyway we had no weather complications, but there has been a bit of a gas shortage in the Atlanta area since the hurricane. On the way to the ball field, for instance, I drive by roughly six gas stations. For the past two weeks most of those stations have been out of gas and when they do get gas, the lines to buy are stretched out into the road and they run out of gas very quickly. My husband had to fill up and found a station with gas earlier this week, but had to wait in line over 20 minutes to get gas!

Well, excuse that tangent, but what I was trying to say is the price of gas is up again and the price of food is still up and seems to be getting higher. My recent shopping trip last Thursday was $81.20. Here's what I got, in case you are interested:

1/4 lb. Provolone cheese $1.97
1/2 lb. roast beef 5.50
1/2 lb. tavern ham 4.54
2 pkgs. of Eat Smart fresh broccoli and carrots 5.00
wheat bread 2.87 (for one loaf of bread! can you believe it?)
1/2 lb. fresh green beans .82
4 pk. cottage cheese 2.99
ketchup 2.79
2% milk 3.59
chili beans .89
chili beans .89
bananas 1.32
kidney beans .89
kidney beans .89
pure vanilla extract 8.49 (gulp!)
chocolate syrup 1.99
4 pk. tomato soup 3.00
Simply Orange orange juice 3.79 (that's expensive!)
French's mustard 1.59
baked beans 1.39
baked beans 1.39
American sliced cheese 4.99
bag of red delicious apples 3.99
ranch dressing 3.63
ground chuck 2.44
ground chuck 2.84
strawberry milk (single serving for me!) 1.67
chocolate milk (single serving for E!) 1.67
Krispy Kreme donut holes cup (for E, no really!) 1.79

I made a huge pot of chili on Friday. I figured up the cost of the huge pot of chili was $10.34. It's a very simple chili, not spicy at all because my guys do not like spicy foods. That chili has been used for 2 dinners so far and I will use the rest to make chili casserole Monday night. I'm just going to put the chili in a casserole dish and mix up some cornbread and add cheddar cheese to it, spread that mixture on top of the chili and bake it until the cornbread is done. I'm making up the recipe, but I'm sure it will taste good.

I think one of my money waster problems is that I am very brand loyal. That's going to be hard for me to give up. Take the pure vanilla extract, for example. I buy McCormick's. The store brand was about a dollar cheaper, but I still bought McCormick's. I thought about buying the store brand. I have actually bought the store brand before and it was fine, but still I bought McCormick's. That's a problem, I think.

Also, I ALWAYS shop at Publix. I could probably get better prices somewhere else. I think I might have heard of a low price superstore called Wal-mart. Yeah, it rings a bell. Still, I shop almost exclusively at Publix.

There are ways to justify shopping at Publix. While I am brand loyal, there are some Publix brand items I have become loyal to. That's cheaper. Plus Walmart is not always on my way, but I pass Publix three times on week on my way to/from the ballfield. Saving gas, right?

I do buy things like dog food, laundry detergent, toilet paper, paper towels and cleaning stuff from Walmart. I guess I could do the food thing there too. I don't think I could buy fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, or fresh meat from Walmart, though. The fruit and veggies at my Walmart never look very appealing and I got some tough hamburger from there once and have never forgotten the experience.

I'll work on it.

So, there's my plan for the week. I'll report back about how it all goes.

HT: Blooming Where We're Planted

Thank God for fall!

Fall is my favorite time of year! I am so glad it's here again!

We've had a busy few weeks with school work and baseball. Plus E is still taking guitar lessons, which keeps him busy with practice about 45 minutes every day.

Math really has me scratching my head lately. That's kind of bad, I know, when 5th grade math is throwing you for a loop, but we're learning something my husband and I were never taught. Casting out 9's to check arithmetic, multiplication, and division.

I looked at this method and studied it in the curriculum and had my husband look it over and explain it to me. Ha ha. Both my husband and I were a little perplexed by the whole thing. We had never heard of this method and were struggling with the reasoning behind it and the usefulness of it. My husband (Mr. Cool, Calm, and Collected) said to just teach the method to my son and get on with life. We could do as much or as little of it as I was wanted.

Wouldn't you know that I introduced the concept to E and he LOVES using casting out 9's as a way to check his work?!? It is easier than doing the work again or (in the case of division) multiplying the divisor and quotient to come up with the dividend. And, after some research, it does seem to be a pretty popular method. Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks? Did I just call myself an old dog?

Anyway, we conquered that challenge. Today we did some extensive study about fall and the seasons in general. I got some help with that from EnchantedLearning.com. I have been a member of that site before, but let my subscription run out. You don't have to have a subscription to the site, but paying the fee does gain you access to items you can't use without the membership. I might have to budget in an extra $20 to join again.

I'm doing much better with lesson plans this year. Although I use ABeka curriculum for Math, Language Arts, Spelling, and Penmanship, when dealing with Social Studies and Science, we tend to go with our interests or seasonal studies. The lesson planning has really helped keep me on track so far this year. It takes some extra prep work on my part, but I use some time on Sunday evenings to plan out two weeks at a time.

I also keep a few sheets stapled to the inside of my lesson plan folder with ideas for things I want to do in the future. For instance, in late October I plan to spend some time discussing the upcoming presidential election. We are also going to do a unit study on Ben Franklin (my son's research paper might also focus on Mr. Franklin). I have been looking up websites for research and books that are available at our library. My son has been watching Liberty's Kids, so we're looking forward to delving into more about that time period and Ben Franklin, specifically.

I'm also hoping to read A Christmas Carol this year. We watch many renditions of that movie every year at Christmas and I would really like to read it as a family for once. We'll see how that goes for my husband and son, who are more visually inclined!

So the beginning of another fall! I'm looking forward to all the good things coming up!

We've already ditched school!

I homeschool my 10 year old son. Our county started school on Aug. 4th. I know. I know. Too early!

Well, I normally don't start our school that early, but last year was a rough year for us. My father-in-law was ill for several months and passed away in December. The travel really threw us off schedule and, honestly, the last thing you care about when that happens is getting all your school days in.

We did get them in, but it was throwing more stress on an already stressful time. So, this year we started our lessons on Aug. 4, much earlier than I originally planned. The idea being it would give us more opportunities to miss school if we needed to.

Today we needed to ditch school. We've had many dreary days of rain (thanks to remnants of Tropical Storm Fay) and today it was only partly cloudy with a mere 10 percent chance of rain. Reason to celebrate!

We dumped the books and headed for a state park that is very close to us and I spent some time this afternoon watching my son swim in the lake. It was really what we needed and a good start for Labor Day weekend. We'll do school tomorrow and take Monday off too!

Then we'll put our noses to the grindstone again, I promise.

School has been going remarkably well this year. Granted it has only just begun, but we've had some very productive days. E's guitar lessons have been going really well too. His guitar teacher says he is doing great! And I've gotten no arguments about practice! Fantastic!

Fall baseball season has started (the practices anyway, games start next weekend). E's team looks really good and I hope they have a great season. I'm ready to cheer them on!

We're approaching my favorite time of year --- fall! I'm so excited about the wonderful things ahead for us!

And I see a few more days of ditching school in our future. :)