1.  Marshalls…. and Napoleon’s Deli.  Emelia and I ran errands today… bought groceries… but first stopped by Napoleon’s Deli after I read on FB that one of my friends would drive like two hours and it was their fav. place.  I had driven by many times and never stopped so I did today and it was delish!  I will be going back.  The owners are french and have strong accents.  The sandwich was really good.  Emelia got soup and loved it.  She finished my sandwich and wanted to stop on our way home for another.  (we didn’t).  Anyway, I heart Marshall’s too.  Just a great place to find a good deal or something neat.  Today I found Ralph lauren polo nightshirts on the sale rack for $5 each.  A six pack of polo socks for $3.  Emelia got a hot pink hat for $2 and a pack of day of the week mudd brand undies for $2.  Good stuff!

2.  Blackberry messenger.  When I was at lunch with Miki she showed me how to put her pin code in and link to her… it’s cool and a lot more convenient than texting.  Now everyone needs to get blackberries!

3.  Coming home to a clean kitchen.  Amanda so very sweetly without being asked cleaned the kitchen after dinner this week!  Very sweet.  I especially love a DRY sink.  dry=clean

4. TIVO.  I heart tivo so much.  We have it in our bedroom now so I can watch Reba reruns anytime of the day !

5.  Our church.  We had so much fun at the dinner last night.  We played a fun game where some of us were given cards to write one false thing and two true things on and we were to read it to the group for them to determine which wasn’t true.  My facts were…  1. born in oklahoma.  2. over 6′ tall.  3.  loves to blog.  Which do you think was the un-true one?

I would like to ask for prayer for Luke.  His mom Suzi and I got acquainted because her little Luke was a near drowning around the same time as Isabelle.  He has been sick for a few weeks and is going to the hospital.  If you could pray for Luke and his family it would be so appreciated!

I subscribe to imommies on bloglines.  She offers lots of coupons etc.  I followed this link and ordered six photo valentines for free.  As in zero money!  Check it out. 

I also got an email from Oldnavy that they are offering 50% additional off clearance online again.  Just enter HALFOFF at the checkout.  J.Crew is offering 30% more off too.   Just enter EXTRA30 at checkout.

Walgreens has 50 prints for $5 with the code JAN50 through the end of the month.  If you’re like me you don’t print many pics, but I really need to print them!!!

This isn’t a p$id post or anything, just sharing the saving love…

Have a great Friday.

Techinically I’m not iced in… but, the kids are out of school again today!  I am thinking they will have school tomorrow because it appears to be melting a lot today. 

It’s been a pretty good day.  I had lunch at Cheesecake Factory.  YUM!  I had baja chicken tacos and brought home cheesecake for dessert.  Izzy loves sharing it with me (and Bailey too).

Tonight is our leadership dinner for church at Chequers.  I like that place.  I also like the thought of not cooking dinner!

I made bean and beef enchiladas last night.  They were SO good!  Amanda made guacamole… we had veggies too.  I cooked lean ground beef with a few cloves of pressed garlic, salt & pepper… added in taco seasoning and a little water.  I spread a little ff refried beans on a large flour tortilla and then the meat mixture.  Rolled them up and put them in a pan.  I first put a little green enchilada sauce in the bottom of the pan and poured the rest over the top.  I grated about half a pound of medium cheddar cheese and covered them with it … baked at 375 for about 45 minutes.  Delish… with black olives, sc, guac, salsa etc. 

Bailey just came and took the remaining cheesecake! I guess I’ll go put izzy in the kid walk and fold some clothes!

p.s. Izzy is doing great with the foot orthotics.  She is sleeping in them without getting upset and her feet are looking better by the day.  Very exciting.

Isn’t it pretty?

I ♥ it.

Judi did a great job!

If you need a facelift, a bloggy facelift that is… you should visit judi’s doodlebug designs. (I think she has a giveaway going on right now!)

I put Izzy in the kid walk.  Emelia tried enticing her to move her feet by offering a lick of her mint if she did.  I walked in the other room for something and came back to find emelia letting izzy lick her mint (a fresh one).  She said iz had moved her feet.  I did see some moving feet with my own eyes a little later.  She seemed to tolerate it better today.  She did great with her therapy program at home tonight with mom too.

The roads are crazy!  I ran some errands this afternoon and passed car after car stuck on the road.  I was thankful for 4WD today.  What a mess.  It is supposed to melt some tomorrow.  For now school is not in session again tomorrow.  We will have another day at home.

So sweet Judi did my bloggy design.  When she loaded it up comments wouldn’t work. We couldn’t figure out what the problem was!  Tonight she emailed telling me that I hadn’t upgraded my wp files.  So I did.  I loaded the new version onto my ftp.  This is almost all greek to me (like that magazine you sent me Irene from Greece).  Anyway, I could not access my admin panel so I was locked out of my blog.  I looked on google and forums for ways to resolve and was hitting dead end after dead end.  So… I saw on one forum that you could login to your cpanel and with one click upgrade on a fantastico icon.  I did that and got a worse error and my blog was gone.  Yikes!  There was an error about a plug in and line 321 or something so I went back to the ftp and just deleted that plug in.  Voila!!!!   My blog is back and I’m in admin typing this post and I am so relieved.  Seriously! 

I was browsing the taste of home mag that mom has sent me and saw an advertisement page for stove top stuffing and a recipe with chicken.  I knew I had most of the items listed and decided to try it only to find out I had no cream of “” soup.   I decided to improvise.  Here’s what I did…

Amanda mixed up the stove top dressing mix.  (it was supposed to be chicken but mine was turkey)

I sauteed some boneless skinless chicken breasts in a little evoo.

I removed them to chop them into bite sized pieces and put in frozen corn, green beans and baby carrots.

I put the chicken back in and let it all cook covered.

In a new pan I melted butter and added flour… then milk to create a white sauce to replace the soup and sour cream.

Added salt, pepper, garlic salt & onion powder to chicken and veggies and salt & pepper to taste to sauce.

I poured the sauce over the chicken and veggies and then put it in the 9X13 pan.

Spread out the dressing over the top and baked at 375 for about an hour. 

It was delicious.  Really really good! 

I used the leftover mashed potatoes from last night and stirred in a little sour cream and parm cheese and baked them.  Yummy!  We even had hot rolls from last night that mom made.  It was a feast. 

Did you watch “biggest loser?”  I was sad to see *him* (not to spoil it for fellow dvr-ers) go home!  I really liked him.  Oh well.  I hope he continues to do well losing weight.

On my bedside table:
The Face… Angela Hunt & my Bible.

On my TV:
Jon & Kate + 8, 7th Heaven, 27 dresses

On the menu for tonight:
Taco chicken, mashed potatoes, hot rolls, cinnamon rolls, and corn.  (Mom cooked dinner for me tonight since I spent the afternoon with them doing their hair!)

On my To Do List:
clean out purse; work on chore checklist; help Amanda with FAFSA; mom & dad’s hair…

New Recipe I tried last week:
Nothing new really… just some old ones.

Looking forward to:
Dinner out Thursday night; a good night’s sleep.
Homemaking Tip for this week:
I buy mr. clean (the blue one that smells really good) and fill a spray cleaning bottle about 1/4 to 1/3 full and add water.  I use it daily to clean counter tops etc. and it smells so fresh and clean and lasts a long time too!

Favorite Blog Post of the week (mine or other):
Probably this one.  Nancy always makes me laugh… her daughter Lauren does too!

Favorite photo from last week:

Lesson learned the past few days:
That worry is imagining that bad things happen in the future and that by replacing those bad thoughts of the future with good things happening worry can be counteracted with good plans and thoughts. 

On my Prayer List:
Izzy.
Devotionals, Scripture Reading, Key Verses:

Key Verse: (our class memory verse for this week) The LORD is my shepherd; I have everything I need. He lets me rest in green meadows; he leads me beside peaceful streams. He renews my strength. He guides me along right paths, bringing honor to his name. Ps. 23:1-3 NLT

I made a huge full crockpot of stew last night… it cooked all night and we had it for Sunday lunch.  I sauteed a big sirloin steak along with a roughly chopped onion in some olive oil… meanwhile I started loading the crock pot up with lots of good stuff like a big can of diced tomatoes, a can of mild rotel, two cans of beef broth, a package of baby carrots, 5-6 chopped potatoes, frozen green beans, frozen corn, frozen peas, salt & pepper, a package of williams chili seasoning… then I put in the onion and steak and pushed it under the juice… I let it cook on high all night and this morning the steak was easily seperated with a fork.  It was really delicious.  Thankfully, there is enough left for a couple more meals. 

We had small red beans for dinner Sat. night and had leftovers, and I made turkey chili with some leftover beans for lunch Saturday that was very healthy!

Monday we’ll have the soup again…

Tuesday I’m making homemade pizzas.

Wednesday we’ll have fat free kosher hot dogs with turkey chili and baked chips.

Thursday Matt and I are attending a teacher/leader appreciation dinner at one of our favorite restaurants! Yay! no cooking.

I’m leaving friday open… who knows, something exciting could come up???? ya’ right

 one

My first fave from this week is the kid walk!  I have to say that Isabelle is not completely thrilled… she is tolerating it at best and only for a certain amount of time.  Last night I put her into the kid walk and sat on the floor.  I rolled her back and forth over and over helping her take steps while counting and encouraging her to take steps on her own.  IT had been a long day and she was pooped.  She wasn’t having any of that… but it was fun and I know she’ll get the hang of it eventually!

two

Orthotics!  I measured Izzy’s feet last night and her right foot is now completely flat or can stretch to a 90 degree angle! We started with that foot at 25 degrees off.   I was pretty excited!  Her left foot was about 10-12 degrees.  It’s kinda hard to be exact, but we are very very close to ordering new standing and walking orthotics!  So exciting.  Her left foot was at 45 degrees when we started a couple of months ago!

three

MOM… who comes every day to do therapy with izzy.

four

Dad!  I got to have lunch with my daddy yesterday and it was really fun.  We enjoyed chatting and running errands.

five

Pringles stix!  My favorite is the cheese flavor.  There are 10 packages in the box and they are less than 100 calories!  A great snack.

Breakfast
How would you describe your life right now…a Three Ring Circus, the Indy 500, the Boston Marathon, or a day at the beach?Three ring circus. For sure!

Lunch
If you were a crayon, what color would you be? pink

Dinner
What is the strangest food you ever ate?alligator!

Snack
Have you ever seen a broadway musical? If so, which ones?Jesus Christ Superstar, Annie, Rent, Lion King, West Side Story (I can’t remember what others right now…)

Recipe for the Week (instead of your recipe for life, what is it just for this week?) It’s what’s in your heart that’s important.  God knows my heart.

1. Did daily bible reading first. 
2. Posted on Internet Cafe Devotions.
3. Had ugly incident with kindergarten teacher while dropping Izzy off… had to be nice.  She thought she could tell me I couldn’t stop in the handicapped drop off area.  She’ll learn. 
4. Put izzy in her kid walk twice. 
5. Watched Princess try to leave with Emelia on the school bus.  She made it up the bus steps while the kids cheered her on… Emelia brought a sad puppy back in the house.  No school for Princess.
6. Read a few pages of American History book to Amanda because her eyes were tired. Then my eyes were tired too so I stopped. 
7. Checked off all the chores on the daily chore list…
8. Made a quick trip to Walmart.  We have a love/hate relationship.  Got Amanda restocked in smart ones and skinny dippers (for weight watchers… she lost 6.6 pounds last week!)
9. Made a delicious pot of spaghetti & sauce.  Started with chicken breasts, green peppers, mushrooms, garlic and italian sausage… sauteed in olive oil with italian seasonings and then added jar of prego and large can of petite diced tomatoes.  Added freshly grated parm at the end.  It was delish over ww pasta.
10. watched American Idol.
11. Got beat by Gail (again) on fb scramble! ugh
12. picked up new books at library to read.  First in line… the face by Angela Hunt. Read it anyone? Uncharted was really good and one of those books that sticks with you after you read it.  I can see why Gail recommended it.
13. Chatted with Julie on the phone.