My Famous Chicken Chili

Yesterday, we had 30+ people (including kids) at our house for food, fellowship, and {Bama} football. We had a blast catching up with friends we haven't seen in a while, the food was awesome, Bama won, Notre Dame won (Hubs' team), and the weather was perfect. We have a TV mounted on our upper deck, and it was awesome to sit outside to enjoy the games. 

Check out the new pillow....

Isn't it the cutest?

I had to run some errands in the morning, so that left Hubs to do the grocery shopping. Using my new iPhone and the Evernote app, I was able to email him the recipe for my famous chicken chili so he could get the ingredients and start cooking. Thank you, technology!

Nif's Famous Chicken Chili

You don't have to be a Bama fan to enjoy this chili. :) It's perfect for football weekends, crockpot dinners, family gatherings, and cool weather. I hope you enjoy!

Ingredients:

3-4 chicken breasts, boneless, skinless

1 pkg Chili-O Seasoning Mix

1 can chili beans, undrained  (I use Bush’s brand for all my beans)

1 can navy beans, drained

2 cans black beans, drained

1 can corn

3 cans diced tomatoes , undrained

(I used 2 cans Hunt's Diced Tomatoes With Green Peppers, Celery  and  Onion &  1 can Hunt’s Diced Tomatoes Fire Roasted)

1. Boil Chicken breasts.

2. Chop/Shred chicken, place in large soup pot or dutch oven

3. Add remaining ingredients, stir.

4. Bring to a boil while stirring. Reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Stir occasionally.

5. Serve with tortilla chips, cheese, sour cream, etc. (Or just serve plain!)

Easy peasy, right?

Let me know how you like it!

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Sweet Potato Fries... Jack-O-Lantern Style

Today is Day 3 of my monthly 10-Day challenge. Facebook friends join me each month to make a commitment to eat a green veggie every day, exercise every day, avoid sugar, and "check in" via facebook, email, or texts. 

I reaallly needed it this month. I've got a knee injury that has bummed me out, and I had been slacking on my exercise. With group accountability, I make sure to exercise every day, and already I can tell a difference in how I feel. This challenge also makes me think about food. (Which I do very well, by the way.) :) 

I love when creativity and food come together. Like the Purple People Eater Marshmallow Pops that I WILL be making after the challenge is over.

But while on the challenge, I think I'll try these babies....

 

Wouldn't these be perfect for a Saturday football get-together?

 

Happy Friday!

There is Something in October....

A Vagabond Song Bliss Carmen Source: awelltraveledwoman.tumblr.com via ceceliagirr on Pinterest

THERE is something in the autumn that is native to my blood—
Touch of manner, hint of mood;
And my heart is like a rhyme,
With the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time.
The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry
Of bugles going by.
And my lonely spirit thrills
To see the frosty asters like a smoke upon the hills.
There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir;
We must rise and follow her,
When from every hill of flame
She calls and calls each vagabond by name.

Halloween Mantel 2012

Does anyone else have trouble decorating mantels? 

I see all the beautiful and creative mantels out in blogland, and I realize that it is just not one of the gifts that God has given me. I wish it were, and I will keep practicing, but I can admit my shortcomings. The mantel itself is great. A rock fireplace surround and a rough cedar beam for the mantel. However, I strongly detest decorating our mantel.

For this Halloween, since we're on a tight budget, I threw together some things from the Dollar Tree as well as our stash of Halloween decorations. 

I actually like it at night with the candles lit. 

We had the candlesticks on the ends of the mantel, along with the "glitter skull," black crow, orange garland, and the gravestone.

The candelabra cutouts are from the Dollar Tree, and the mesh netting was $1 at Dollar General. The boards were leftover wood that Hubs nailed together for a summer project that I never got to. I think they're perfect for the Halloween mantel.

The skeleton garland is from the Dollar Tree, and the witches school picture was printed off the Internet. Since I work in a school, I thought it was cool. It gives Hubs the creeps. LOL!

What do you think of my mantel?

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Purple People Eater Marshmallow Pop and Song

The tipping point.

I'm seriously into these.


You gotta check out the awesome tutorial over at See Vanessa Craft.

And now the song is stuck in my head.

Happy Monday!

Dollar Tree Halloween Wreath

I finally changed out my summer wreath on my front door. 

How often do you change out your door decorations? Am I crazy to decide that I want to change out my wreath each month? At least for the rest of the year, I know that I will be changing it... after Halloween a nice fall wreath for Thanksgiving, then a Christmas wreath for December. No brainer. I guess it's spring and summer where I'm ignoring my door...

Anywho, back to my new Halloween wreath. I wish it were cute like Jamie's over at That's My Letter....

Adorable, right?

The steps to making my wreath are not complicated, so I don't have fancy how-to pictures like Marji at Fabulessly Frugal....

(Marji had a girls' night while they made wreaths. Jealous!)

But I DO have a finished wreath on my door. I felt silly having my starfish and burlap on my door when the temperature had dropped and the leaves had started to fall. :) I had to make my wreath on the cheap, so off to Dollar Tree I went for supplies.

I already had a wreath from my daughter's country-western birthday party in July.

Ooooh. This picture makes me miss warm weather already!

To cover the plaid ribbon without having to buy new fabric, I used an old black t-shirt that I cut into 3-inch wide strips, wrapped around the wreath, and hot-glued in place.

Next step, use just a little bit of fake spider web purchased at Dollar Tree to stretch across wreath.

Notice the black wire spider web and spider? It was purchased at Dollar Tree. I used fishing line to attach it to the wreath. 

Here's the wreath hanging from the door.  Step 1 of front porch decor done.

(Ignore the kids' fingerprints in the bottom left corner. Not part of the decor!)

I'm thinking it needs a little orange, though. What do you think?

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Halloween Pumpkin Ideas

Let me start by saying....My FAVORITE pumpkin idea is 3-ingredients muffins! :)

But I am looking for new ideas for Halloween, and I'm just starting on my decorations. Here are five cute ideas for pumpkins.

1. Canning Ring Pumpkins

2. How to make Ombre Pumpkins

3. Polka Dot Pumpkins

4. Damask Pumpkin How-To

5. Chevron pumpkins

Which one is your favorite?

Advice from a Tree

In October, we usually go to a family reunion in L.A. (Lower Alabama) to a little town near Dothan called Hartford. It's my dad's mom's side of the family, and I always love going because everyone is always so friendly and easy-going. I also love seeing all the farmland and reminiscing about my days as a young girl when I would visit my dad's parents.

This year, the day was changed from a Sunday afternoon to a Saturday, and my oldest daughter will be playing in a volleyball tournament so we won't be able to go to the reunion. It makes me sad that we can't go... so I started looking at the pictures I took last year. Here are some of them.

Have you seen such beautiful cotton? I wonder how many kids today have seen it growing in the ground like this.

A windmill on my Uncle Billy's land. My dad remembers it from when he was a boy.

More of the good stuff.

In all her full glory.

The trees and land make me think of the "poem," Advice from a Tree.

source

Happy Fall!

Healthy Chicken Tortelloni Soup

Yesterday I shared with you that I'm ready to get back to blogging. October is one of my favorite months, so it is only fitting that I whet my blogging appetite this month! :)

Why haven't I been cleaning house, exercising, blogging? (The other two are for another day!)

Here's one reason. Check out my kitchen table. It literally looked like that for about 1-1/2 weeks. Seriously. I had to do a project for work that took up most of my free time. Believe me, I'm no masochist. I love when people want to help me. The job was really a one-person job. 

So, bye-bye, blogging. and exercising. and cleaning house. and laundry. (and etc.)

Thank you, Hubs, for taking up my slack. 

In the meantime, the weather started hinting at getting cooler, and I wanted a good, easy, healthy soup recipe. 

So I created my own. 

Here's the recipe. If you don't love it, call me crazy.

Chicken Tortelloni Soup

1 can navy beans

1 large can chicken (or use chopped, cooked, chicken)

1 pkg frozen spinach

2 cans chicken broth

1 C tortelloni

Bring chicken broth and spinach to a boil. Reduce to a simmer, cook spinach 10 minutes.

Add tortelloni, cook 10 minutes.

Add white beans and chicken, cook about 5 minutes.

Easy peasy.

Do you have a favorite fall recipe?

Back to Blogging.... Of Course it's a Post about Chocolate!

Well, I'm determined to get back to blogging... I mean, I probably only have about 6 readers of my blog, and I usually have to wake up with the chickens to get the blogging done... But there's something about blogging that lights a fire in me. Maybe it's because I actually get projects done around my house. Or maybe I like the chuckle I get from Hubs. I'd like to think I'm a little creative, and blogging about my DIY projects lets me create and share my passion. 

Whatever the reason, I'm going to try to do it everyday in October. I downloaded the Blogger app to my iPad and started this post at the public library while my daughter met with her math tutor. (Shameless Mom Bragging here: youngest daughter has a 97 in math right now! Yay!) 

With the new app, I wasn't sure how this post was going to turn out. It actually was NOT very user friendly. I mean, if I was going to just post some words and stick some pictures at the end of the post.... maybe.  But, for my first post back, I couldn't give it a try. So now we're home and I'm typing from my laptop...**sigh**

Aaaand, for my first post back, I thought I'd share a recipe for some yummy 3-ingredient chocolate muffins. I found this recipe over at Nomadic Nom Nom. It's a blog by another Jennifer... her blog is filled with her "recipes from the road" as she, her husband, and two boys travel the country in an RV.

Here are my chocolate cupcakes. I tried to make the picture look cool using my PicStitch app on my iPad. (Then I used the awesome picmonkey website to "decorate.")

3-Ingredient Chocolate Cupcakes (adapted from Nomadic Nom Nom) 

1 boxed chocolate cake mix (I use Devil's Food)
1 can pumpkin puree (15 oz)
1 handful chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Mix together cake mix and canned pumpkin. Use electric mixer on medium speed for about 2 minutes.
Fold in a handful of chocolate chips. (Use more or less to your taste)

Line muffin tins with liners. Fill almost to top with mix. Add a few chips to the top of each.
Bake 22-25 minutes until toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Makes about 12-15 regular-sized muffins.



Thank you, other Jennifer, for this recipe!

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