Taco Soup (recipe)

I made this for dinner last night and a few people have asked me for the recipe. Here it is. :)

Taco Soup

1 ½ lbs hamburger (I’ve made it with 1 pound just fine. Just not as meaty)
1 onion, chopped
16 oz can tomato sauce (I used diced tomatoes instead)
8 oz can tomato sauce
3 cups water
2 cans whole kernel corn, don’t drain
2 cans kidney beans, don’t drain (I usually do 1 can black beans, 1 can kidney beans)
1 pkg taco seasoning
1 (4.5 oz) can green chilies
1 pkg Hidden Valley Ranch original buttermilk dressing
Garlic Powder to taste

Brown the hamburger and onion. Season the meat as you wish. I usually toss in pepper, garlic powder, season-all, and onion powder.

Add the other ingredients and bring to a boil. Simmer for at least ½ hour, stirring frequently.

Serve with a dollop of sour cream, shredded cheese, and chips or Fritos. I usually skip the chips and just use sour cream and shredded cheese.

You can also make this with chicken and it’s really good too.

Password Protecting

I haven't updated a lot here lately.  Part of the reason is that I haven't felt like publizing what is going on in my life.  In the past I have always been fairly good about being open and honest.  Sharing what I want to share on my blog since it is mine.  But lately I haven't been.  Part of that is because I don't want to upset anyone by sharing my thoughts and feelings.  I've always felt like I could do that in all places of my blog.  I've toyed with starting a private journal, even a handwritten one, since I love paper, and books and such so much.  But I just can't see myself sitting down to write in it by hand.  So here I am.   I've finally decided to password protect my blog.   If you are interested in reading it, please contact me via Facebook, Twitter, or email.  gamerbabe360 (at) yahoo .com

Apartment

I'm getting ready to move into an apartment, in fact I started to move in today!  I signed the papers and got the keys yesterday!  I'm so darn excited. :)   I just love the apartment and can't wait to make it mine.

Today I did something I have never done before.  I went and picked out and bought furniture!!

I figured I should start with something in the living room since I have no living room furniture at all.   I was going to get a couch and loveseat, and possibly an oversized chair, but I seen this and loved it.   It looks much better in person than in this picture, but oh well!  Since all of the walls are white, I opted for a rich, dark brown that I loved.  It's called Cafe.  I was thinking that I could accent with a teal or turquoise.  I'm not sure though, we will see what I love!

Then I was going to move the daybed and the matress that I had when I was back home....but I kinda wanted something bigger.  I was going to go for a full sized bed, and bed frame, but the mattress that I found was a queen, and it was actually cheaper than a full in the other bed I was thinking about, since it was on special.  Plus I liked the one that I got a little bit better, and it wasn't just because of the price.

ANYWAY, I found this bed that I fell in love with.  

And the the least fun of all of them is the mattress, but I look forward to sleeping on it, and not getting poked with springs like the current mattress.

Now I just need to find queen sheets somewhere for cheap.

I'm looking forward to this new adventure in my life. :)

Grandpa Nelson

ETA:  Grandpa passed away this morning, shortly before noon, if I am understanding everything correctly. :(

{First, I have to comment on the photo.  This is typical Grandpa.  Sitting down talking, coffee cup in hand, and by the candy dish.)

I recently realized that I haven't talked too much about Grandpa here on my blog, other than perhaps a couple random memory posts. Grandpa had a lung removed due to cancer 17 years ago. Most people don't survive lung cancer, so that is a miracle in itself. During those 17 years, he still has managed to do many of the things that he loves. Hunting, fishing, and building things. He is currently in the hospital due to a fall and is not expected to live much longer than a week. Things were looking up at one point, but now they are grim. As mom said during one of her phone calls to me, they are planning a funeral. Even if he survives this, his quality of life simply won't be there. Anyway, due to this, I'v been reminiscing a bit and thought it would be a good idea to get some of my memories down.

I lived with Grandma and Grandpa until I was 7 years old, and I remember not wanting to move out.  I pitched many fits, because I didn't want to leave Grandma and Grandpa's house.   I mean, who would want to leave, when you had a Grandma and Grandpa that spoiled you?

Some of my earliest memories include Grandpa.   When I was younger we would go camping way up north, out in the middle of nowhere.   You either bathed in the lake, or used a sun shower.   All meals were cooked over the fire, or occasionally using the small stove in the camper.  For bathrooms, we used a port-a-potty that we brought with.

I believe it was when Grandpa was up re-building or remodeling Hungry Jack Lodge after a fire.  I remember there being a huge long dock, and Grandpa and I sitting at the end of it, casting my pole with a worm on the hook, and catching sunfish after sunfish.  I used to love going on boat rides in Grandpa's old Lund finishing boat.

During the summer Grandma and Grandpa had a HUGE garden.  Grandma made freezer jam, canned, froze, and gave away the goods from the garden.  Nothing ever went to waste.   One of my favorite things when I was younger, was once the pumpkins started to grow, Grandpa would take each grandkid out there, and have them pick out a pumpkin and with his pocketknife he would either carve our name or initial in them.  Then each Halloween we got the pumpkin.  Either to carve, or display as is.

Another summer activity at Grandma and Grandpa's house was the sawmill.  Just thinking about it brings me back there...the scent of sawdust, the sound of the trees being cut down to slabs to be made into something.  Grandpa was out there as much as he would be, typically overseeing everything, as after his surgery, he wasn't able to help out much at the sawmill.

Even after I moved out of Grandma and Grandpa's house, I still went back and visited them often, spending the night.  Whenever I would get there, Grandpa would say, "Come on over and give me a squeeze."  He never called hugs, hugs, only squeezes, as far as I remember.

One of my favorite things was each morning when Grandma and I woke up, Grandpa would bring us coffee in bed.  Cream and sugar in mine of course.  Then Grandma would get up and cook breakfast.  She usually had cream of wheat.  I still love that.   Grandpa would have bacon, eggs, and toast, and of course, I had to be like Grandpa and have the same thing.   There was an occasional bowl of Wheaties with a bit of sugar and cut up banana on it.

Grandpa also used to go into the Duquette General Store and have coffee with some guys in the back room.  When I stayed over, he would buy me a lottery ticket to scratch off.  If I won, he gave me the cash, and let me keep the quarter that I scratched it with.  I always managed to con Grandpa out of quarters and dollar bills when I was younger.

Sometime before Grandpa's lung surgery, he always laid on the floor and would ask me to give him backrubs.  Back then I wanted to be a masseuse, and Grandpa said I would be a good one.  He also taught me how to play blackjack back then too.

I loved it when there were family weddings or places that we could go to dance.  I remember Grandpa letting me stand on his feet and he would dance with me.   I always knew that Grandpa would walk me down the aisle on my wedding day.   I'm so happy that he was able to do that.

Grandma taught me how to sew buttons on, and before long I was charging Grandpa to sew buttons on his shirts.  Back when he was doing construction, he always wore button down shirts, and the buttons would come off.

Grandpa loved to be out in the shop and build things.  When he made each of the Granddaughters a hope chest one year for Christmas, I cried. It is gorgeous.  I will cherish that hope chest forever.  Grandpa would love to show me the shop and what he was working on.   As he got older, the less he did in the shop, but he still carved his canes and build bird houses.   He loved carpentry and building things.

On the weekends Grandpa loved to watch Hee Haw and of course the hunting and fishing shows.  Then every night at 6:30 p.m. we all had to sit down and watch Wheel of Fortune.   Dinner and dishes had to be done by them, so the show could be watched.

I remember being younger and Grandpa convinced me that Boxcar Willie (an old country music singer, if you didn't know) would make the deer come out in the field.  He would turn the music on, and sure enough the deer would come out to the field to eat.   I didn't realize until years later that he played the music at the same time every night, as the deer came out at the same time.

Song mix up

I don't know what made me think of this today, but this is one of those things that I have to blog so I don't forget about it. :)

The Scene:  Mama Jenny's Kitchen.

Who:  Mama Jenny, Justin (her son), Jessi, and I.  (I think Megan or Mandi were there too...they are Mama Jenny's daughters.)

The story:

Mama Jenny: Do you know this song?  She starts singing, "Sweet Cherry Pie bom, bom bom"

*Jessi, Justin and I all look at each other a bit puzzled, then it dawns on us.*

Jessi:  I think it's "Sweet Caronline."

*Cue hysterical laughter from all of us, and going on a long time.*

For your listening pleasure:

Sweet Caroline:

Sweet Cherry Pie:


Now whenever I hear one of these songs, I get a chuckle. :) Makes my day. :)

I sewed!!!!

I'm not the best sewer, more like a wanna-be sewer.  But Jessi was talking on Twitter about checkbook covers on Etsy.  I started browsing them and realized the ones that I really liked looked fairly easy to make and thought I could make them instead.   Now, I say this often.  I can totally make that.  But do I ever follow through?  Nope.  That's why I'm a wanna-be sewer.  I've been itching to sew after catching up on a ton of blogs.  I went searching online and found a pattern on this blog to make a checkbook cover.  I will totally be checking back on her blog since it looks so neat and fully of inspiration!!

Anyway, I started printing the directions at 3 p.m...waiting for all 8 pages to print since I'm lame and didn't want to bring my laptop into my craft room.  I dug around in my room looking for fabric and fusible interfacing to use, but I couldn't find any interfacing, so I ran to a sewing store down the street and came back.  I had to clear off my table in the craft room in order to make room to sew and cut, lol.  I really gotta clean that soon.  I spent a good 15 minutes trying to find my foot pedal for my sewing machine too.  Anyway, by about 4:25 I was done with my little checkbook cover!!!  I was shocked as I didn't think it would be that easy, but it really was!!  I was hoping to finish it before I left for work at 6:30.  I surprised myself!!

Here are the pictures I took of it.  Now, keep in mind that it's totally not perfect, but I am loving it so far.  Though if I make it again, I'm going to increase the width to about 7.5 inches or pay a bit more attention to my seams as it ended up being a bit too snug for my liking, but it works!

Here is the checkbook cover open:

And here is the outside view:

Not a bad first try, I don't think!  And isn't that fabric bright and fun?  I love it! :D

The Life Audit

While wandering around my local library a couple weeks ago, I happened upon a book called "The Life Audit."  I'll be honest, I didn't read the synopsis or anything before checking it out, it sounded interesting enough to me.

The book sat neglected in my library book bag, while I flipped through some sewing books I got and finished reading some fiction books that I got.  Last week I pulled out "The Life Audit" and started to flip through and read skim a few pages, and read the introduction.   Wow, it sounded fascinating.  I took Saturday to make photocopies of the charts in the back of the book.  (Yes, I debated going through and re-creating these in Word or Excel, but decided that was too time consuming and I was too cheap to spend the $15 on just the charts on the website.)

Today is the first time that I'm actually going through and starting to write my information down on the charts.  Granted, I haven't gotten very far yet, I've only filled out two pages, and already need to make another copy, but I have a feeling that this is going to be a fabulous thing to go through.

Examine me.  Examine life.   Get some direction back in my life, hopefully.   I am just feeling so hopeful.

Now I need to go and renew the book from the library as I know I won't be done with it, by the time it is due back on the 21st.  

I know that I'm not going to post lots of my answers here on my blog, but I'm hoping to do a few posts as I'm going through this.  

I would love to hear your thoughts on doing a "Life Audit" (even if you didn't use this book, or any book for that matter.)  Does anyone care to join me in this adventure?

Baby

Many of you know of the struggle that Jason and I have gone through trying to get pregnant. We have tried for years and haven't been able to succeed. A couple of years ago we sold all of the baby stuff that we had bought on clearance, at garage sales, etc. since we needed the money. I had thought that I had put it in God's hands, and handed the issue over to him. And that I was fine with that, and that if it was His will, then I would get pregnant. I have even told people that...and that if it happens, it happens. Sure it was still hard to hear news that people were pregnant, but I was genuinely happy for them, and still am. But this brings me to today...

Today while running errands, I had in one of my Glee CD's and since I don't know what songs are on what yet, I just let the CD run. Then on came this song.

I had heard this song before, on Glee in even, and it didn't effect me. But today this song did. I immediately started to cry as the song played. Stopped a red light. Literally sobbing. I was a mess. I had one of those deep down gut feelings that I would never get to experience being pregnant. Having a baby. Being a mom. That no one would ever say those words to me.

Now I'm sure that someone is going to say something to the effect of "You don't know that." or perhaps, "You could get pregnant." And you are right, I don't know for sure. But it was one of those deep down feelings that I would never get to experience this wondrous event.

Happiness

I found this somewhere in my online travels and made it my itouch background. I need to live by this. Need to remember it.

Layout Share!

Way back in January or February I took a few of pictures of my scrapbook layouts to share here on my blog. Well it's now May and have I shared them yet? Nope, of course not! Here they are, I hope you enjoy!


This layout was made using the January Kit from Jen's House of Scrap. (Link in my sidebar) I have never seen the corrugated letters before! I fell in love with them. Gorgeous. Ink them for a bit of added texture or leave them plain. Love them!!! So fun!

Another layout using contents from Jen's House of Scrap January kit. It's hard to see it in the picture, but I sewed around each of the color circles on the page. I have been loving the look of sewing on my pages lately.

Very simple page, made using Cosmo Cricket paper and one of the Making Memories Vintage Findings packets. Those are so fun!!! They include so much stuff for only $3.99.

I have been loving doing the 8 1/2 x 11 pages lately. I don't know why, but they are just a fun size to do. Using all American Crafts paper and Flair. Oh how I love American Crafts. Yum.

Another page using the January kit from Jen's House of Scrap!

The Beautiful Besties page was a challenge page at RSC! We were given the dotted patterned paper and had to make a layout using the paper. Then the croppers chose a winner. I think we had an hour or less to put this together. Those of you that know me, know I take that long to choose my pictures!!! I do like how this page turned out and then the croppers chose me a winner! I was shocked as there were so many great layouts that people made up!

Oh how I love this little shelf. I picked it up at the $1 store and didn't know what I would do with it. I cut apart and cut down the element cards from Jen's House of Scrap kit and made this fun little thing! I want to go back to the $1 store and pick up a couple more of these. I envision making these for holiday's and having them displayed through the season.

Kittehs!

No matter how old Cullen is I still call him a Kitteh. He will have his 2 year birthday in June. I can't believe we have had him over a year now! He is part of the family. Now you noticed that my post was titled Kittehs! with an s. Cullen has a friend called Noodle that is staying with us for a while. Both cats have been adjusting great together and it's so fun to see them interact, especially when they think no one is watching. There have been so many cute things that I haven't managed to capture on my camera. Here are a few cute pictures.

If you want to see any of the pictures larger, you can view them on my Flickr account.

Descriptions are going to be directly below the pictures. :)

Time for treats! Both cats love the treats. Though we had some Pounce ones and Noodle wouldn't eat them, but Cullen used to. Now that Noodle won't, Cullen won't either. It's too funny!

Jason has them eating out of both hands!

Window Buddies! They both LOVE looking out the windows, watching the birds and the people. Now they share the window together. Or should I say that Cullen hogs 90% of the window sill and lets Noodle sit on a small piece of it? Still so cute though!

Cullen saying, "Talk to the paw!"

This was the first time that we had seen them curled up next to one another! Isn't it precious? Now they sleep next to each other often. I still think it's so adorable!

Noodle sniffing the treat bag. He would put his paw and nose in the bag to try and get the treats out. I thought it was so adorable!

Don't mind the mess in the picture, my scrapbook room needs lots of helping getting clean right now...want to come over and help? Pretty please? Ok, fine...anyway one day we couldn't find Noodle, he wasn't in any of his usual hiding spots. Here he was in my scrapbook room, sleeping on top of my backdrops in a bag! He loves it there for some odd reason!

Another close up of Noodle sleeping on the backdrop bag...

Cullen: "REALLY? You gotta take my picture when I look like this?"

Noodle sleeping in the window. When he sleeps in the window, this is how he sleeps. Head in the corner and everything. Oh and that is one of Noodle's favorite toys there. He carries that toy with him all over the place!

Cullen watching the birds.

I had Jason set up the Kitty City again. It was a great idea as both cats love it and play with it! Cullen loves to be in that little compartment there.

Cullen watching everything going on outside.

Noodle being all cute and laying in a sun spot!

This picture cracks me up. First you have to know that Cullen has his claws and Noodle is de-clawed on his front paws. Noodle goes up everything and rubs his paws on it, like he is sharpening them. On the couch, the laundry basket, the scratching post, everything. He doesn't leave any marks though as he is de-clawed. It's so funny to Jason and I, because Cullen doesn't do that at all! On anything! Cullen has never used the scratching posts on the Kitty City, but man Noodle loves them! I think Cullen is looking at Noodle in the picture and thinking, "What in the world are you doing?!"

Poem

While I was cleaning out the spare bedroom upstairs, I found a box of papers and such from my school years. There were school papers, poems, notes, slam books, etc in there. I started to go through them, but then decided that it would take too much time and I would go through them later. But with the few that I did go through, I found this poem that I wrote. Based on my writing, it was sometime in high school....I'm guessing somewhere between 1999-2000, but I don't know for sure. I never was a good writer, and don't know why I'm sharing it now, but I'm going to. Who knows, I might end up removing this post.

(untitled)

Death so close

People rushing around

Loud voices

Sirens

Frantic Screams

I whisper in a breaking voice I love you

To the one who holds my lifeless hand

I take a deep breath while tears stream down my face

Visions float through my head

Playing with laughing cousins

Christmas at home

Good times in school

Sleepovers with my friends

You

My wedding

A loud muffled voice interrupts these visions

Repeating I love you, don't leave me here alone

I am torn

Where do I go?

Someone gently guides me

Angels appear

Everything is white

Silent

But loving

Comforting

BANG

I whisper in a terrified voice

What was that?

I feel a cold hand on my shoulder, shaking me

I slowly, mechanically turn around

I see a smiling face

We embrace

He says we will be together forever

I smile and we walk away

Hand in hand on the clouds

Watching over the world

Ma and Work

Man, it's been forever since I have posted here. I'm so sorry! I'm hoping to be able to post again more regularly. Every just had a post brewing inside you and you had to get it out? That's what this one is doing to me, and I feel that I just have to get it out.

Growing up, Ma worked many jobs. One of the earliest jobs I remember her working at was a small town cafe as a waitress. (Side note, that is actually how she met dad. Not that that matters or anything in this story...) As I continued to grow up she worked as a Pharmacist Technician, a waitress, bartender, cleaner, Pizza Putter Togetherer, secretary, and I'm sure many more jobs that I'm forgetting. She would work all day, and come home and clean the house, and do all the stores that are required on a hobby farm. Feeding and watering the animals, tending the garden in summer, splitting and hauling work in the winter, and many, many other things. My point is that she is one damn hard working woman. She can have a to-do list a mile long and get it all done. The house was always clean and company ready. Desserts for when people stopped by where in the freezer just in case someone dropped by unannounced.

No matter what job Ma was working, even if it was less than minimum wage, she put her all into it. It didn't matter what the job was, she always went above and beyond doing things, even if she didn't get paid for it. Now, I'm sure that Ma would never tell you any of this, and she would brush it off and say "It's just what I do" or perhaps "It just needed to be done and I had time so I did it." No work was beneath her or above her. She did it all. And then some. Then come home and do it all again. And then some. No lying, I still swear that she is SuperWoman. She can still run circles around me.

In this day and age, I have come to realize that there aren't many people out there who work like that. They get out of bed, do the bare minimum to scrape by and nothing else. I'll be the first to admit that I've been one of them. They just want the paycheck and won't do anything other than what is in their job description and required of them to get that paycheck.

I'm honored that Ma was able to instill her hardworking morals into me. It doesn't matter if it's my slightly above minimum wage job or my job that pays me 3-4 times minimum age. I work my ass off at both jobs. No matter what job I'm at, I find something to do. Cleaning isn't "below" me or not in my job description. If it needs to be done I do it. If I'm so busy I don't get my breaks, I'm not going to whine and cry about it. Stuff needs to be done so I do it.

I have recently realized that there aren't many people like that left anymore that are willing to go above and beyond. So many people feel entitled to that paycheck and aren't going to do more than the bare minimum to get it. I'm happy to say that I have realized that I'm not one of them. I work my ass off for my paycheck. There is a great sense of accomplishment in working your ass off and seeing all that you have accomplished.

Thanks Ma for instilling your hardworking morals into me. I don't want to know what I would be like otherwise.

Now if only I could be so hard working at home too...I'll get better at that. I promise.

February Food and Drink Challenge

Andrew has inspired me by this blog entry to join in his food and drink challenge for February. Andrew and his girlfriend are giving up coffee, tea, cheese, brown & tomato sauce, vegan mayo, and booze. Now my list isn't going to be that long. And giving up cheese and tea? WOW! They are amazing.

For the past few months, Jason and I (more so me, than him if I want to be honest) have slipped back into eating out way too much. We have even slipped back into having fast food again. Ugh! I want to break us from this habit, so in February we are going to give up going out to eat! With the exception of when I go to the cities with the Bellywings in February and when we are up north in February. So maybe I should just say that we are limiting it...but if I said that, I know I would use that to my advantage of eating out and I don't want to do that.

I have also decided that I am going to give up pop again as well. Once again, I did this before, and was great, but it has slowly crept back in my diet, mainly when we eat fast food, or when I am scrapbooking. I know it's not good for me, so I am giving that up completely. No exceptions to this one. I have no excuse to drink pop and I'm hoping to get rid of this one completely from my diet for years to come.

Consider joining in to the challenge! If you do, feel free to post a comment on my blog or Andrew's.

Day 22. Cake. YUM!

The Bellywings are the best!! We were cropping tonight and they brought some snacks and this beautiful cake to celebrate my birthday!! Isn't it pretty? Sprinkles and pink. My fav.

Larger image can be found here.

Day 21

Waiting in the car for the ice to melt off the windows a bit and for the car to warm up. Wouldn't you pass the time taking pictures of yourself too?

Larger image here.

Quote

I seen this quote on Ella Publishing and knew I had to blog it. I just love it. I think I might even need to scrapbook it.

Day 20

All of this came out of my purse. Interesting huh?



A list of a few things:
Battery charger for my Rebel camera, which I don't carry with me.
Cash! I never have cast on me!
An empty bottle of Excedrin, how it got empty, I don't know.
A coloring book picture, all colored in from Haley
Many pouches
Bling and stamps that I bought at RSC. (Doesn't everyone have this in their purse?)
Receipts from Target, RSC, and various other places.
A leatherman type tool, that doesn't have a knife. (I actually use this at work quite often.)
Remote for the ipod thing we got for hte car
Camera cord
Notebooks
Wine corks (I'm collecting these for a friend of mine)
USB drive
Aromatherapy Headache stuff.

Larger image can be found here.

Day 19 Hoar Frost?

Day 19

I believe this is hoar frost. Different than any kind of frost I have seen before. I wish I could have snapped a picture with my nice, new camera, but I didn't have it with me. I could have gotten a much better capture, I feel. Not very happy with how this one turned out.

(Shot with my point and shoot camera)



Larger image can be found here.

Day 18

My desk at work, when I am not in class. It's one tiny office. :) Yup, I like having lots of beverages handy.

(Shot with my point and shoot camera)