Yummy Chicken Tacos

I have absolutely fallen in love with Pinterest! Why it took me so long to join, I have no idea.  But so far, everything I have tried has either tasted great or worked out perfcetly!

This recipe for Chicken Tacos was about the easiest recipe I have tried in quite a while. 

4-5 Chicken Breasts
1 jar of salsa (whatever heat you prefer)
1 packet of taco seasoning
Whatever taco toppings you prefer
Whatever type of taco shell you prefer....I used soft tortillas.

Put the chicken in the crock pot.
Sprinkle the taco seasoning on them.
Cover with the entire jar of salsa.
Cook on low 4-6 hours.

The chicken comes out juicy, flavorful, and shredable.

Throw it in your tortilla or taco shell, top with the toppings of your choice, and ENJOY!

Not only was it SUPER EASY, but it tasted SUPER GREAT!

The original website from my Pinterest pin can be found here.

Jacob's First Haircut

Yesterday, we took Jacob to get his first hair cut. 

It was not the torture-fest that Quinn endured, yet I did not get any pictures of Jacob sitting all by himself on the stool. His little curls were all sweetly saved by Ms. Shelly, who also gave Quinn his first hair cut.

My sweet baby boy had another first-time milestone, and I had another "last".   It's bittersweet watching Jacob grow up, knowing that for all practical purposes (unless the Lord has a different plan), this will be our last little baby.  He's walking really well now....running, pretty much, to keep up with his big brother. He even started signing "please", especially when there is food involved!

Today, after church, we had to go by the fire station, and since Jacob was in such a sweet mood, I was able to get some really precious pictures of him with his new haircut.

Jacob was watching the cars go by. This is Buddy's helmet....red because he is a Lieutenant!

Sweet Jacob!

Planting Our Veggies

Today we planted the vegetables for our garden.

This is the tomatoes (far left) and the peppers.  The buckets are to catch rainwater, which we will later water the garden with.

 

This is our watering system.  We took soaker hose and wrapped it loosely around each plant. We didn't want any extra water spraying the ground, as this part of our yard is really prone to growing weeds.

 

 

Each plant will get its own personal supply of water.

 

 

Then we put a layer of pine straw over the soaker hose, in hopes of keeping the water in the dirt longer.

 

Here is Quinn, showing off "his" garden....which houses the squash (left), zucchini (middle), and cucumbers (right).   And in true VeggieTales fashion, Quinn insists that we are growing peppers, squash, zucchini, Bob and Larry!

Quinn lost his first tooth!

Over the past few weeks, we have noticed that Quinn has had a couple loose teeth.  He's been wiggling them a lot and tonight we decided it was time for one of them to come out.

It actually wasn't quite as loose as we thought, but we did some extra wiggling, said a lot of prayers, offered tons of reassurance and finally......

If you build it.....they will come.....

....and by "they" I mean vegetables!

Yes, we are going to attempt to grow a garden this year!

I've considered it several times over the years, but for whatever reason it didn't work out, or it was too hot, too dry, etc.

We don't have the yard for a garden, but we did have a spot that would work pretty well for raised beds. Buddy got a plan in his mind, we went to Lowes and bought the supplies, and it went from this

to this

to this!

He even built a little fenced area around the raised beds (mostly to keep Dixie out of them). We underestimated how much dirt we would need, so we will get some more next weekend and plant our vegetables then.  We are going to try to grow tomatoes, squash, zucchini, cucumbers, and peppers.

Jacob's Current Favorite Thing

Jacob's current hobby is this.

Every.
Single.
Day.
Multiple. Times. A. Day.

Pulling out EVERY. SINGLE. PLASTIC. CONTAINER.

Over.

And Over.

And over again.

But I love every single second of it! Quinn did this too.  And I know there will come a day in the not so near future, that Jacob will no longer find it fun to destroy his Mommy's kitchen. And that will be another last time that I'm not looking forward to.

Thank you Lord, for the blessing of busy boys!

Counting the Days

About a week ago, my parents came up for the day so we could all celebrate my birthday.  They brought a little something for Quinn and Jacob, and we put Quinn in charge of it, seeing as how he is the older brother.

 

I'm sure you are saying, "What's the big deal? It's just a calendar."

Well, to Quinn (and Jacob if he understood), it's a very big deal.  This calendar counts down the days until the boys go to SC for their week of "Camp Grandma and Grandpa"!! 

This tradition started the summer Quinn was 18 months old, the summer of 2009. (You can re-read the fun here.  And here.  And here.)  What I remember the most is he got sick and I had to pick him up early. He had a double ear infection, which was the last one before the doctors FINALLY decided to put tubes in.  He also went in the summer of 2010, and the summer of 2011.  He did not go down last summer because Mom used her two big breaks from work to come stay with Quinn while I was in the hospital having Jacob, and then again when I had to go back to work.

So it's been two years since Quinn has gone for his stay at his grandparents. Needless to say he is really excited about going to their house for "the big sleepover" as he calls it.

So we are counting the days and marking them off.

Only 17 more days!!

Make Ahead Breakfast Sandwiches

I love reading MoneySavingMom's blog. She has linked to this recipe several times and I always have wanted to try it. It looked interesting enough, easy enough, and I needed something to make for Big Breakfast at church.

Here is my version of a certain restaurant's "Ham/Egg/Cheese/Muffin Sandwich"....you know the one I mean!

You need
12 English Muffins
12 slices of cheese (American or Cheddar)
12 eggs
12 slices of ham (optional, but I prefer it this way.)
1 muffin tin

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Lightly spray each muffin tin. Crack an egg into each muffin tin. Put in oven and bake 15-20 minutes; slightly less time if you don't mind a runny egg.
3. Slice open each English muffin; lay out on pan to toast. You can toast these the while the eggs are cooking.

When these steps are done, it should look like this.

 

 

4. Place a slice or two of ham on the bottom of a muffin.  Add the egg, with the slice of cheese on top.

 

 

 

5. Eat and enjoy! Or you can wrap them in wax paper and freeze individually. I've not done this step yet but the original link says not to microwave for reheating, but to use the oven.

 

PS.....these went over very well at Big Breakfast. I cut them all in half, so out of 24 servings, I came home with 3.  Not bad!