The joys of working separate shifts and getting a house ready to sell

We've decided to take up the linoleum and put down the same color laminate from the living room and hallway in the kitchen/dining room. I walk in there this morning and find Jimmy had ripped up the current linoleum, then I find this note:

Hey baby!!
When I got ready to start putting the laminate, I realized what a fool I would be to cover up such a beautiful pattern. I'll be taking the flooring (back) first thing today. Don't you fret your pretty face area, I'll be sure to get all our moneys back. I maybe jumping ahead of myself here, but I'm thinking the vintage look should bring us enough equity to afford a Cherokee, Chevelle, and many inflight sick bags to keep us comfy until we can escape the horror of cooking and eating over vomit-colored vinyl.
Anywho! Love you Baby!

Christmas Break 2010

This has been the most eventful Christmas break of my entire life.

Friday, December 18th was the last day of school and day of our staff Christmas party. A friend of mine at school had just gotten an Australian Shepherd puppy. I thought she had gotten it from a breeder, but when we started talking, I found out she had gotten the puppy from the animal shelter. I told a few people about the puppies and obviously I don't have a poker face, because they said, "You are going to get one of those puppies!" I left the Christmas party early to take some truffles to Jimmy, told him about the puppies, and he agreed to let me get one! We got Lola the next day. She was really sick for about a week and a half with kennel cough. Now she is all puppy--bounding around the house, chasing Remus, annoying Sadie and Katie, and sleeping on Mommy's lap.

I had two Duke appointments the week before Christmas--my Monday treatment and a sit-down with Dr. M on Wednesday. Tuesday I took Lola to the vet. Wednesday we also went to an inspection on the house we were considering buying. On Thursday, Jimmy and I headed to Rocky Mount.

We had a wonderful Christmas with Jackie, Jennifer, Shane, Grandma, Mary Ellen, and Mike. Jen had to work on Christmas, so we spent time with them Christmas Eve and did presents. Lola did a great job chasing wrapping paper. Late Christmas, it started snowing and didn't stop until Sunday afternoon! The snow was really amazing and we got about a foot in Nashville. I still had to go to Duke on Monday, so Jimmy drove me. The main roads weren't bad, but the secondary roads were pretty snowy and icy. We waited until Tuesday to drive back home.

After a quick turn around--Jimmy went in to work for half a day and I unpacked and repacked the car--we headed to see my parents. We got in early Wednesday morning. We did a few errands on Wednesday, then I cooked enchiladas for Mom, Nanny, Jimmy, Pat, and his friend Josh. Thursday we did some shopping and headed over to Dad's. We spent New Year's there. Jimmy got to go to Dad's beer/wine making at home store, and loved seeing all the stuff they had. Saturday we went to Hendersonville to visit Cat, a close family friend. She likes to instigate stuff and before I knew it, Jimmy and I were on the way to Cherokee to go to the casino and have a romantic night away--Love you Cat! So glad you planted the idea! It was so neat! We learned that the dogs do okay in a hotel. Neither of us really like to gamble and waste money though. Paula Deen has a restaurant there, and Sunday morning we ate breakfast there. Yes, there was lots of butter on the table!

On our way back to Hendersonville, I received some bad news. I knew I had to be at school Monday morning with my students. Instead of spending the night with Mom and going to Duke Monday, I rode back with Jimmy late Sunday evening. I was able to be with my students, then went to Duke around 12. It was a really late night, but I got to have dinner with Mom and have "Duke time" with her.

It was a wonderful break. Jimmy and I had a great time visiting everyone and spending time together.

Camping!

This past Monday was mine and Jimmy's 2nd anniversary.  To celebrate, we took a camping trip.  We have been talking about getting a tent and going camping for months now.  After the great tent fiasco and subsequent trading, we have a tent we are really happy with.

We couldn't really decide where to go.  We wanted it to be special since it was our anniversary, but due to time constraints and commitments, we couldn't go very far.  Googling "eastern NC campgrounds" eventually led us to the Bay River Campground's website, which you can check out here.  Google mapping the location, we found out the campground is on Swindell Bay.  Needless to say, we were sold.

Jimmy went out to pitch the tent before he went to work and sent me a picture from his phone:

This was the primitive campsite that didn't have electric or water hookups.  However, this was the only campsite right on the water.  There was a small dock on a channel to the side of our site:

 We definitely tried to catch some things in the casting net and go fishing.  The casting net only caught some bait-sized fish.  Sadie and Katie enjoyed getting on the dock.  When we walked out the front of our tent site, this is what we saw:

 Even though it was a primitive site, there was a shower house just a quick walk away.  These were the best bathrooms at a campground I have ever seen!  There were only 2, but they had a full shower, toilet, and sink, with little benches. It was like being at home!  When we got to the campsite around 11:30 Friday night, the people who ran the campground had already started a fire for us in the firepit.

This was only the first nice thing we experienced here.  There was a dock with crab pots owned by the campground and they told us we could have as much crab as we wanted if we would just put some bait back into the crab pots.  Since fishing did not turn out as well as expected, we got a few crabs.  I had already fixed up some ribeyes for Saturday night, thanks to this recipe.  Saturday night, we ate like kings!

 2 guesses as to who the beer belongs to, and if you need a hint, I don't drink beer!  Earlier in the day Saturday, we drove down to Oriental.  It is GORGEOUS, but there is nothing to do there if you are not a boater.  We drove over to Bayboro looking for a grocery store, but didn't find one.  Pamlico county is beautiful, yet sparsely populated.

We had a really awesome time.  I found out I am no spring chicken--2 nights on the ground just isn't fun on the hips and back!--but I can't wait until we do it again!

Refried Beans...renovated

     My tagline at any Mexican restaurant while growing up was, "Just rice, no beans."  Refried beans have always been so bland and therefore unappetizing to me.  However, at least once a week we had burritos, and the side dish was always refried beans.  Dad would brown some beef, throw in a pack of taco seasoning mixed with water, and a can of pintos. I think the refrieds may have been more like glue to hold the burrito together.  Now my husband loves these burritos and we make them about once a month or so.  But I still didn't like refried beans.

This was until I met Pioneer Woman.

     Now, I like Pioneer Woman's recipes.  I've never made anything bad from her website.  She does get on my nerves a little bit because she is so cutesy and I can't stand to hear her talk.  I guess she would fall into the category of someone I wouldn't mind hanging out with, but in small doses.

     I never would have thought about changing up a can of refried beans, but she has convinced me.  There is no going back.  In this recipe, she uses the beans in burritos, but I stole her idea for just cooking the beans: Beef and Bean Burritos.  Throwing a handful of shredded cheese in a can of beans totally changes them.  It adds salt and flavor.  I usually get fat free refrieds, so I'm sure the fat grams even out between the cheese and beans (and if not, I'll keep telling myself that).  Today I also threw in about half a tablespoon of Valentina's sauce.  It's in the Mexican food section and, instead of just being hot, adds a nice smokey flavor.  YUM.

Chicken chili

So, about a month and a half ago, I checked out the new South Beach Diet cookbook. I got the stuff to make one of the recipes (You might know I make a weekly meal plan, then shop exclusively based on that) a few weeks ago, but I accidentally turned the book in before I made the chicken chili. Thankfully it was all canned goods, so nothing went bad. So today, I took out all the ingredients and made my own chicken chili, loosely based on a recipe from Kalyn's Kitchen.

Ingredients:
1 lb. chicken breasts
4 tsp. EVOO
2 tsp. cumin (heaping, cumin is my favorite spice!)
2 tsp. oregano
3/4 tsp. cayenne
1 onion, roughly chopped
1 Tbsp. butter
3 cups broth
2 cans of white beans
1 can diced tomatoes (no salt added)
1 can tomato paste
Tabasco brand Jalapeno sauce

While heating 2 teaspoons of oil in a frying pan on medium high, I mixed all the spices in a small sauce cup. I sprinkled each chicken breast with some spice mix, approximately 1 1/2 teaspoons total. Next, I browned the chicken on each side. When the chicken was done and removed to an extra plate, I put the rest of the EVOO and butter in the pan. Then, in went the onions, and I sprinkled those with the spice mixture (about 2 tsp.) When they were soft enough to pass the Jimmy test, I poured them in my soup pot. I deglazed the frying pan with a cup of broth, then poured the broth in with the onions, with the other 2 cups of broth. I poured in the beans, tomatoes, tomato paste, and remaining spices, and sprinkled about 6 drops of Tabasco Jalapeno sauce. While it warmed over medium high heat, I shredded the chicken and threw in the chicken. I let it simmer for a bit, but I was hungry so I took out a bowl and began eating. I sprinkled a little cheddar on top, and crumbled some tortilla chips on top. YUM.

Next time, I will probably drain and rinse the beans to reduce the sodium content. This chili wasn't too spicy, but had plenty of flavor. You could definitely increase the heat if you wanted.

One Year Later....

One year later and I'm updating again. There's something about the summer...oh wait, my days aren't consumed with work!

This was quite possibly the most difficult EOG season so far. On top of giving EOGs, my team managed to place 11 children. ELEVEN. The Exceptional Children's program in North Carolina requires a litany of evaluations to be given--educationals, IQs, social histories, the list goes on and on. So when you factor in that, on top of preparing for EOGs, middle school transition meetings, giving EOGs, attempting to do homebound, and regularly scheduled meetings, it has been a hard 2 and a half months. And when you come home, you don't want to cook, much less have to think about what to cook, so you wind up making whatever's easiest and has the most carbohydrates. Ironic how those two things go together.

Jimmy has started night shift. He really loves it. I don't mind it, in fact I like it better for the summer than regular 7-3:30 shift. I do feel a little guilty, as this incredible malaise has settled in and I feel very unmotivated and lazy, but he is working hard: cleaning out the garage and working on his projects.

I'd really like to blog more. I don't know that I can really call myself a "blogger," as I have had quite a lapse in postings! But I have "Stumble!d" onto some really awesome websites and I would like to try my hand at it.

Nanny's Pimento Cheese

Traveling with an aunt, uncle, and two cousins to Florida one summer, we stopped for lunch. Only, we didn't stop at a McDonalds or other fast food joint. My aunt made sandwiches from the pimento cheese my grandmother (Nanny) had made. I knew pimento cheese was that orange crap in the grocery store, but this wasn't orange, had a creamy consistency, and I thought I might be able to manage eating it, since it didn't look like a Happy Meal was in my near future. After one bite, I was hooked. Since then, I have loooooved to go to my nanny's and find it in her refrigerator. The week before my wedding, she brought me some and I had it for lunch every day.

I have searched and searched for the proper methodology to make pimento cheese. Google is no help. Nanny told me the ingredients were Velveeta, mayonnaise, and pimentos, but I didn't think I could just stir in a brick of Velveeta and a jar of pimentos into a jar of mayo and be done. This past weekend, I asked her EXACTLY what she did (my grandma is also one of those "a pinch of this, a dab of that" cooks if that explains anything) and she told me. I just made my own, and it is great! I also lightened it up a bit...I don't know how South Beach Friendly it is, but I would think it is Phase 2 friendly on a sandwich, and possibly Phase 1 friendly as a dip for veggies.

Pimento Cheese--the 3 P recipe
1 Pint of Duke's Light Mayonnaise (I shun any other kind)
1 Pound of 2% Velveeta
1 jar of Pimentos (diced)

1) Melt the Velveeta in a double boiler
2) Meanwhile, put Duke's and pimentos in the bowl you plan to store the pimento cheese in.
3) When the Velveeta is completely melted, mix it into the Duke's and pimentos.
4) Refrigerate and enjoy on sandwiches or with crackers or veggies