Happy Homemaker Monday!

<a href="http://familycorner.blogspot.com" title="hhm by jasnicmommy, on Flickr"><img width="150" alt="hhm" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3362/3608789834_4d1bac04e0.jpg" height="150" /></a>

The weather in my neck of the woods:
Well I wish I could say something different but I'm sure you all know it's HOT, HOT, HOT!


One of my simple pleasures:
Buying a bag of Nestle Caramel Treasures just for me, and then sneaking in a few while I watch a movie on TV. *snicker*
It's the ONE little pleasure that is all mine.


On my bedside table:
Little Heathens - almost done, it's been such a good read.


On my TV:
The Hurt Locker
Little House on the Prairie Season 3


On the menu for tonight:
Pork Chops and Cream Corn Casserole.


On my To Do List:
Laundry
Last minute shopping for school supplies


New Recipe I tried last week:
Easy Butter Cookies, hadn't made them in a while and they just hit the spot.


In the craft basket:
Just the same old yarn, no project in sight, maybe once the kids are back to school next week I'll finally start something.


Looking forward to:
Getting my car fixed and running again, I've really missed having my own vehicle and with school starting next week, I really need to have it back.


Homemaking Tip for this week:
I have these handy plastic fridge stack beverage containers. They don't take up a lot of room in the refrigerator and I always have one with koolaid, one with water and one with iced tea. On the kitchen table I have a basket with utensils, straws, napkins and paper plastic cups.
I've showed the kids how to get their own drinks so when they're thirsty, they just grab a cup and get their own drinks from the fridge. It saves me having to constantly do it for them and they like knowing they can do it themselves.


Favorite Blog Post of the week (mine or other):
Absolutely NO blog reading for me last week, this we've been enjoying the last two weeks of our summer and I've been away from the computer.


Favorite photo from last week:

My kitchen window when the sun starts setting, it's one of my favorite places in the house.

Lesson learned the past few days:
It was actually a lesson learned from my book "Blue Like Play Dough", and that is, that you don't need to doll yourself up to go to God. He loves you for who you are and how you are and as a mother there's nothing better than realizing that even when I'm in the middle of the living room surrounded by what seems to be a tornado of toys, my hair is messed up, I have a stain on my t-shirt from lunch preparations and I'm flushed because of the annoying heat......I'm still acceptable and wanted and loved by God. What a beautiful thing it is!


On my Prayer List:
**My brother Bruno, he is just getting over Pneumonia
**My grandmother Odete, she's still slowly getting back to normal after her stay in the hospital
**My grandmother Jacinta, she has osteoporosis and her poor spine is curved. It seems that she pulled something or did something to her ribs and has been in a lot of pain lately.


Devotionals, Scripture Reading, Key Verses:

Courageous in Christ

My blessings are so many, my troubles are so few, how can I feel discouraged when I know that I have You. - Helen Steiner

"Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go." - Joshua 1:9

Coming up to breathe......

I've been busy and running around and sorta kinda crazy lately.

See school starts on my birthday, August 10th, my kids seem to think it's a great thing because they want to come home to some birthday cake, me on the other hand, I'm a little sad, I wanted them home with ME. Oh well, can't always have what we want right?

So I've been a little MIA, if you've noticed, maybe you haven't and now that I'm mentioning it you're probably sitting there thinking "oh well, she was gone?" LOL

There's a lot going on, from the hustle of getting everything ready for back to school, which includes shopping for endless supplies and buying new clothes and backpacks and shoes and hair accessories and whatnot.

It's by far, my least favorite time of the year, just trying to get through the school aisles at any store is enough to make the most patient person on earth, cringe. But that's a whole other post.

After spending the whole day gone yesterday for errands and groceries, school stuff and car parts to finally get my Durango going......today was spent at home, doing......well......let me show you.



Car things.....like trying to change out the water pump which let me tell you, is very fascinating, at least for me, I got right in there with my hubby and got my hands dirty and handed him tools and peeked here and there, and asked questions, oh many questions.



Thankfully I have a wonderful patient hubby who actually gets a kick out of having me all up in his business, bugging and asking stuff and sticking my hands in that grease.



See, I have to tell you how wonderful he is because he's sick, he's got the summer cold we had and he was feeling miserable but he still went out there and worked on my car for 5 hours.



I don't know if he was concentrating or praying at this point, he was having the hardest time getting some of the bolts and nuts to come loose.



We may have at some point gotten a wrench stuck in the neighbors thingamagig *snort*

I know that sounds dirty, but I don't know the name, it's this really long metal thing that you use to help you with the torque, you know....(just pretend you know what I'm talking about).



Took us a while to get the wrench loose, we pulled and prodded and laughed until our sides hurt and still ended up messing the thing up, I'm sure we'll have to buy him a new one LOL

All this time the kids were in and out of the house, playing outside and then going back inside and at one point they went in and were gone for a while, so I cleaned my hands up as best I could and came in to see what the deal was and was met with this............



"We decided to beat each other up" was their answer. I honestly thought it was real at first and got a little freaked out, then they started laughing and I just had to take some pictures. LOL



I have children with a very vivid imagination and sometimes it just cracks me up to see the things they come up with.





I cleaned them up, made them popcorn and got them all snugly in front of the tv watching a movie, then went outside to let hubby know that I was done for the day, I even acted like I had done a lot LOL

I found him around the driveway at the gate to the backyard, having a little chat with Lola.



And that was it, that was our Sunday.

I would love at this point to say that my car is fixed, but it's not, we got everything loose but we were too darn tired to even begin install the new water pump.

It will get done sometime this week or next weekend before hubby has to leave on a short little deployment.

I joked with him and said, it's no rush fixing the car, the minute he leaves to go anywhere it will just break again Hahahahahah

Anyway, I better skidaddle on off to bed, I have to get my body used to getting up early again, it's going to take me longer than a week that's for sure.

Have a great night everyone, I'll see you bright and early for the Happy Homemaker Monday.

Slow Cooking Thursday

Don't forget to add your name to Mr Linky and a link back to your SCT post so others can come by and see your recipe too.

Here's what I have planned for next week, the recipe comes from Dinners for a Year and Beyond. I can't wait to try it.

The Great Goulash with Potato Dumplings

The potato dumplings are a delicious addition to this tasty goulash. If you are pressed for time, serve goulash on top of wide noodles or mashed potatoes.

adapted from a recipe in The 150 Best Slow Cooker Recipes

serves 5
for the goulash,
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 1/2 pounds stew meat, cut in large chunks
2 cups onions, diced
4 garlic cloves, chopped
2 tablespoons paprika
1 teaspoon oregano, dried
1 teaspoon pepper
1/4 cup flour
1/4 cup tomato paste
1 1/2 cups beef stock
juice of 1/2 lemon
1/3 cup sour cream

for the potato dumplings,
4 medium potatoes, peeled and cubes
1/2 cup plain bread crumbs
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon salt
fresh parsley, chopped for garnish

In a large saute pan over medium high heat add the olive oil and brown the stew meat in batches. Transfer to slow cooker.

In the same pan, reduce the heat to medium and add onions and garlic and saute for 3 - 4 minutes. Add paprika, oregano, pepper, and flour and cook for an additional minute. Add tomato paste and stir well. The mixture will be thick. Add beef broth and lemon juice and cook, stirring, for a minute or two.

Transfer mixture to slow cooker. Cover and cook on LOW for 8 hours or on HIGH for 4 - 5 hours. The beef will be very tender and shred easily.

About 45 minutes before dinner time, make the potato dumplings. Cook potato chunks in a large pot of water until tender. Drain and mash until smooth. Add bread crumbs, egg, and salt and mix well. Form into 2 inch balls. Set aside.

Stir sour cream into goulash. Top with potato dumplings, spooning some of the sauce over them. Cover and cook on HIGH for about 15 minutes.

To serve, spoon goulash and dumplings into shallow bowls and sprinkle with parsley.




I'm trying out the new McLinky, we'll see how it goes today if anyone has any problems or it doesn't work right, then I'll switch back to Mr Linky.

Blue like Play Dough Review & Giveaway

The Shape of Motherhood in the Grip of God
by Tricia Goyer

About the book: In the everyday stretch and squeeze of motherhood, Tricia Goyer often feels smooshed by the demands of life. In Blue Like Play Dough, she shares her unlikely journey from rebellious, pregnant teen to busy wife and mom with big dreams of her own. As her story unfolds, Tricia realizes that God has more in store for her than she has ever imagined possible.

*************************

Tricia Goyer delivers an outstanding book that quite honestly I think every woman should have. It spoke to my heart, it made me smile and nod and laugh and feel like if there ever was a book that should have been written by me or about me, this would be it.

You can read an excerpt here.

Right in the first few pages Tricia Goyer said something that made me go "Wow!".

That made me stop and think, wait a minute she's onto something here and it peeked my curiosity.


"Even though seeking God is worthy, that doesn't mean it's easy or natural. In fact, it almost seems wrong to squeeze God into the middle of a busy, ordinary life. God is BIG. My pursuits are small. God is GLORIOUS. Scrubbing sinks and changing poopy diapers is not. Nor is pushing a shopping cart filled with teetering toiletries, humming "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" as the song plays through the store speakers.

It doesn't matter to Him that I can hardly see my desk under the piles of mail and bills and kid's craft projects. He doesn't care that I'm twenty pounds overweight (or maybe thirty, no matter what my driver's licence says). He loves me just as I am."

One thing I quickly learned with this amazing book is that I have this weird expectation of what my relationship with God should be, like it's supposed to be this perfect glittery and shiny example.

WRONG!

He wants a relationship with me, He wants me just as I am, belonging to Him is enough. What a realization, it certainly put a lot of things into perspective for me.

I've found myself changing my attitude completely since I first opened the book, starting with the fact that when I first picked it up my thought was "I have laundry that has to be done, I should clean up a bit before I sit down to read".

Again, it was my sense of having to be something that I'm not.

Tricia Goyer says something else in the first few pages that knocked the wind right out of me and made me nod empathically.

"It was not as if God says "I was going to visit you today, but I think I'll wait until you balance that checkbook, clean out your fridge, and start that Bible study you've been meaning to get around to."

Now tell me honestly how many of you giggled with that little quote? How many of you, just like me, have this crazy notion that we need to be all sparkly and clean and almost perfect before we approach God? I'm raising my hand here, I'm not ashamed to admit it.

This book has changed me and it's not often that I say that and it's not just because I'm doing a review. It's because it's the truth. Plain and Simple.

I know I suggest a lot of books in my blog, but if you can only take one of those suggestions today, I hope it's this one. This book will change your life, it will change the way you see yourself and the best part? It will strengthen your relationship with God!

You can purchase the book at Random House, or click right here.

But guess what? One of you is going to win a copy of this amazing book.

That's right and all you need to do is leave me a comment, include an email to contact you if you don't have a blog and just let me know if you think this is a book you would enjoy and why.

I'm going to open this giveaway to everyone and when I say that, I mean EVERYONE, not just US and Canada. Why? Because I feel this strongly about the book!

Good Luck, the contest will run until next week Wednesday August 5th, 2009!

And be sure to tell all your friends about it.

One of my favorite times of day........

That is my kitchen window and it's bathed in sunlight, beautiful orange and pinkish light from the setting sun.

Every evening around 7pm, I get to walk into the kitchen and just smile. Usually around this time, the dinner is long finished, the dishes are done, the kitchen is clean and the candles are burning. It's by far one of my favorite times of the day.

Let me show you yesterday's sunset, I think it's the one thing about Arizona that I'll miss when we move, whenever that is *snicker*

I love the sun hitting the walls outside.

There's just something about the Arizona sunsets!

But apart from the sunsets, this time of the day is when everything starts slowing down, the noise outside begins diminishing, the kids are sitting back and relaxing and winding down getting ready for bed.

So this is pretty much what you'll see laying around the house.........

He's 6 years old but he still has the baby toes which I adore, I can't resist baby toes all cute and chubby.

My beautiful girl, she's growing so fast and entering into a new phase of her life, the one that includes training bras and such *snicker*

I can't believe it, I just want to grab her and keep her little but alas I can't so I have to just watch and prepare myself for this chapter in her life.

These two little ones bring so much joy to my life and I keep thinking that I haven't really been taking photos of them as much as before, I may just have to remedy that because I know the family back home wants to see them more.

Do you have a favorite time of the day too?

Well dinner time awaits, I best get on out of here and start on that pizza dough. Oh and if you're in the mood for some great quick and easy butter cookies, be sure to check out my food blog "Full Bellies, Happy Kids".