Yummy!!

We've been trying to use at least 1 new recipe a week from Recipezaar - one that we found either from Gayle at the Grocery Cart Challenge, assuming it will be fairly cheap, or one that I found while searching around through popular recipes. Well, this week's recipe, Crock Pot Chicken, was a hit!! It was super simple to make, not horrible on the nutrition scale, makes a ton and it's pretty versatile.

Aaron came home for lunch and threw the chicken breasts, salsa, black beans and corn in the crock pot on high. When we came home from work, we threw the cream cheese on, turned it to low, and took a walk for 45 minutes. When we came home, we realized the chicken was really 'fally-aparty' (a very technical term) so we shredded the chicken, stirred everything together and threw some rice in the steamer. We ate the chicken mixture over rice and it was very tasty!!

After we ate, there was still about 6 cups of the mixture left, so we froze half of it and kept the other half out for another dinner and a lunch. Others who have reviewed the recipe have suggested using the leftovers to make wraps, which we might try out with what we froze. (We don't currently have tortillas or have any need for them for any upcoming recipes.)

Next time we make this, I think we might try using less chicken, doubling the black beans and corn and using the fat-free cream cheese (we used 1/3 less fat this time). We weren't really sure how the cream cheese was incorporated or how the fat-free would work out texture wise, but since we just mixed everything together, there's no reason not to use the fat-free.

Blame the Dog - for seriously!!

I'm sure I'll be sharing baby poop stories soon. For now, just a dog poop story.

When I let Steve the dog out of his cage on Monday night, he'd left a little 'surprise' for me. I could tell he must have an upset stomach, because it was totally unlike him to go to the bathroom in his cage.

Then all night last night, Tuesday, you could hear his stomach growling and gurgling from across the room so we could tell things still weren't right. We gave him a Pepto Bismol pill and he seemed to quiet down a little.

Tonight, Aaron let him out of his cage. I could hear some cries of disgust coming from their room, so after I let the boys outside, I asked if everything was okay. Aaron said everything was clear, but their room was stink-tastic. We thought one of them must just be gassy, as they often are, which is why we commonly "Blame the Dog." Then Aaron let the dogs in and I almost fell over from the stink. I'll just say 2 things - Steve has longer-ish hair and he must have gone #2 before we left for work today. So...the stink had been literally been hanging around with him all day.

Aaron gave him a bath, was truly grateful that we put in a fancy shower head with a hose, and Steve is no longer stinky. The entire basement still stinks though...hopefully the Febreze Air Freshener kicks in soon!! And I'll love our daughter no matter what, but I hope she's not as stinky as the dogs...

25 things about the two of us

This is kind of like the 25 things from Facebook - except there are pre-decided questions and it's about you and your spouse. Come on, play along - inquiring minds want to know!

♥ What are your middle names? Michael and JaDeane
♥ How long have you been together? About 4 1/2, married for 2 1/2.
♥ How long did you know each other before you started dating? About 8 months - we spent pretty much every Saturday together at work.
♥ Who asked who out? Aaron asked me over as friends, but then tricked me and romanced me - it was a date by the end of dinner :-D
♥ How old are each of you? I'm 23 and he's 36.
♥ Whose siblings do/did you see the most? My older brother lives in town, but we probably see his sister almost as much.
♥ Any pets? We have our 2 boys, Steve and Nick, and their 'cousin' Max lives with us right now too.
♥ Which situation is the hardest on you as a couple? Finances - Chloe will be here in a couple months and I'm basically unemployed. Not how we planned it!!
♥ Did you go to the same school? No, which is good, because he graduated when I was in kindergarten and that's just weird to think about!!
♥ Are you from the same home town? Nope.
♥ Who is the smartest? Well, I'm always right (hee-hee) but he did score a point higher on his ACT's.
♥ Who is the most sensitive? We deal with our emotions differently, and I'm definitely more vocal about my emotions.
♥ Where do you eat out most as a couple? We don't go out much, but when we do, there's a good chance it's Panchero's.
♥ Who has the worst temper? Again, we deal with it differently.
♥ Who does the cooking? Well, since Aaron doesn't like Hamburger Helper or Chicken Patties every night, he does!!
♥ Who is more social? Probably me.
♥ Who is the neat-freak? Neither of us are really neat freaks. I'm more of an organizer than he is though.
♥ Who is the more stubborn? Ooh...that's tough. Probably me.
♥ Who hogs the bed? Currently, I do. Me and my Snoogle take up a lot of space. I've promised Aaron a bigger job if/when I'm gainfully employed again!!
♥ Who wakes up earlier? We get up at the same time for work, but I'm a better "sleeper-inner" on weekends.
♥ Where was your first date? At his house. He made me dinner, charmed me with his dog, and we watched "Finding Nemo" together.
♥ Who has the bigger family? We each have 2 siblings, but both my immediate family and extended family are bigger, I think.
♥ Do you get flowers often? No, but he does send me flowers occasionally and it's always a nice surprise!!
♥ How do you spend the holidays? With our families. We're lucky to have them all nearby, so we don't have to decide.
♥ Who eats more? We're about same-same right now, but it used to be Aaron.
♥ Who does/did the laundry? We both do.
♥ Who drives when you are together? 99% of the time it's Aaron.

We've lived here how long?!?

For whatever reason, Aaron and I are both into light fixtures - they were the first thing we changed out when we moved in. Our bedroom just had a cheap $5 light fixture and we decided to change it out for a ceiling fan. It came with a remote, which we thought was fantastic, and were happy that we could change the fan speed in the middle of the night without getting out of bed. But...the light was super dim. It uses a halogen, so we tried buying a new bulb to see if it would improve. It didn't. We had accepted the lack of lighting and were thinking about putting some track lighting in/by our closet so we could at least see our clothes.

Saturday, we were looking at light fixture for Chloe's room. Again, there's just a cheap $5 fixture and we want to put a ceiling fan in. Right now, the light is on a dimmer switch and we like the idea of having a 'dim-able' light for middle of the night feedings and diaper changes. While looking for a ceiling fan where the light could be dimmed, we discovered that a remote just like the one with our ceiling fan can dim the lights. We thought, Wierd, wonder if our remote does this somehow?!? We got home and did a little experimenting. Turns out, if you hold the light button down, it changes the intensity of the light!! We felt a little silly that we'd had this fixture for ~7 months and just discovered this, but there wasn't anything in the manual about it, so we were just thankful to have finally found out!!

Then came Sunday... I was wiping down all the cabinets in the kitchen. Next to the oven, there's a plain wood panel that's maybe 4-5 inches wide. As I was wiping it down, it seemed like it was really loose, so I pulled on the bottom just to see how loose it was. To my surprise, it pulled out completely. It wasn't just a panel between the oven and our lazy susan, it's a drawer!! It has 3 shelves that are wide enough and tall enough to hold, for example, a box of Mac & Cheese.

How crazy - we discovered a new-and-improved light in our bedroom and another cabinet/drawer in our kitchen within 24 hours after living here for over 7 months!!