This recipe is derived from my grandmother’s and my mother-in-law’s recipes for vegetable beef soup. I never actually saw my grandmother’s recipe, but I know what she put in it. My mother–in-law actually helped put together a cookbook for her Woman’s Club and included her vegetable beef soup as well as other family favorites. My own version is a combination of the two with a little extra zing thrown in.. 1 package of stew beef from your...
Seriously.
Moo would eat this recipe EVERY SINGLE DAY if I would cook this… and the thing is, this recipe is ridiculously easy AND very economical if you buy chicken when it’s on sale.
I originally got this recipe from Once a Month Mom but I’ve altered it slightly. You can try my version or go with hers… mine is UNBELIEVABLY delicious and for those of us watching our carbs, it’s pretty healthy.
Chicken Tacos in a Bag
- 1-1/2 pounds of chicken breast – diced, sliced like fajita strips or just cut into bite size pieces.
- Package of taco seasoning – this is on sale at my Kroger almost all the time 10 for $10… your mileage may vary
- 3 tablespoons of Lime Juice
- 2 Tablespoons vegetable or olive oil
- Tortillas
- Taco toppings of your choice like tomatoes, sauce, salsa, cheese, rice, etc.
- Zip top bag
Procedure
- Cut up the chicken and put into bag
- Pour lime juice and taco seasoning into bag and mush around to coat chicken
- Now you can either let this marinate for at least two hours (overnight is better) before cooking or you can freeze it. If you freeze it, thaw it out before the next step.
- Warm a large skillet with
the oil and sauté the chicken. Cook about 15 minutes or until cooked thoroughly. I cook it until it is almost dry and actually starts charring a little bit. Those little burnt bits add a lot of flavor! - Serve hot with your taco toppings. This is also delicious in a taco salad.
Seriously. That’s it. You’ll thank me when you eat this. And we almost NEVER have leftovers of this because it is THAT good.
I buy chicken cheap and package up 4-6 of these things at a time and freeze them. Since I also freeze tortillas and cheese, I pretty much always have everything I need for a quick and easy and DELICIOUS meal.
To maximize your freezing space, mush the chicken and marinade down into the bottom of the bag and roll the bag up. Then use tape or a label to keep the chicken rolled. It saves a ton of space in your 
freezer and you have all these delightful little rolls of chickeny goodness in your freezer.
As I discussed a few weeks ago, I intend to have a full freezer and pantry by the time Nugget makes his arrival. As I have the Gestational Diabetes and will also have another c-section, the date of Nugget’s arrival will be sometime around the 18th of February which is the beginning of the 38th week. So that means that there’s only about 11 weeks to get everything ready. The loss of my part time gig will greatly impact my plans but...
Trimester that is… I should have posted this yesterday, but I was having a meltdown. Since August, I’ve been working a job with a contractor for a MAJOR website. For the most part, it has been an ok job. I can’t share most of what I did because of a non-disclosure agreement, but I can say that I’ve looked at the internet way more than I should have. The job is mentally very challenging. There are complex rules and quotas for...
Dear Amanda: Your perfectionism is making people crazy. Oh you don’t expect your husband or daughter to be perfect, but you expect an awful lot out of yourself. Will you stop and look at all the wonderful things you do? Will you stop looking in the mirror and seeing everything you used to be instead of what you are or instead of what you COULD be? You are the strongest person you’ve ever known. You’ve been through stuff that would...
ACK!!! This one didn’t get posted yesterday on the 29th!!! I still had it sitting in drafts!!! SORRY! I could list a whole ton of stuff here. I could list silly things like getting my nose fixed – it has a hump, which Moo insists is NOT a hump – or I could get a tummy tuck after the baby is born. I could list stuff like being a better wife or mom – which is all pretty vague. I could also tell you how I need to...
DUH!! I’m pregnant now. What I did at first was freak out. Then I was happy. Very happy. And now in the 6th month of my second and last pregnancy, I can say that I’m excited. Excited to have two kids. Excited to have a boy! ---------------------------------------------------- If you want to play along with this list, here’s the list of topics: Day 1: Something you hate about yourself Day 2: Something you love about yourself...
No. I was in the middle of a pretty good depressive episode in the year after Mom died. But I never considered giving up on life. I just didn’t know when life would get better again and that was depressing. But it did get better and I got better. ---------------------------------------------------- If you want to play along with this list, here’s the list of topics: Day 1: Something you hate about yourself Day 2: Something you love about...
I don’t like the way this is worded. I’ve never had a life threatening situation where someone or something saved me. So I don’t really like this one. Instead, since this is posting on Thanksgiving, I will say what I’m thankful for. I’m thankful for my wonderful husband. I’m thankful for my funny and gorgeous daughter. I’m thankful for the little baby boy kicking my bladder. I’m thankful that I have wonderful in-laws. I’m thankful that I...
My play list is just a general list of some favorite songs and not really directed at anyone… Mamma Cried – Alison Kraus and Union Station I just love this song. I love to sing with it. It taps into bluegrass which is something I’ve have a love/hate relationship with over the years. I Gotta Feeling – Black Eyed Peas This song NEVER fails to make me happy. I use it as a BUTT KICKER to get me moving sometimes. ...
I wish I’d learned how to budget before now. Before I was married, I still lived at home with my folks and I mostly did what I wanted with my money. I had a car payment and a couple of credit cards but no other real bills. After Mom and Dad separated, Mom and I split bills until I got married and then Moo and I split bills. It wasn’t until we bought our house three years into our marriage that we even had a joint bank account. But even...
GAH!! This one didn’t get saved properly so didn’t post yesterday!! SORRY!! I wish I hadn’t listened to my parents and got the education I wanted instead of what THEY wanted. Don’t get me wrong. While I was doing HR, I really enjoyed it. And I don’t regret the education itself. But I really wanted to be either a history teacher or a music teacher. My father wanted me to be a nurse. My mother wanted me to...
I get my ass on an airplane to Vegas – which is where my best friend lives. End of story. ---------------------------------------------------- If you want to play along with this list, here’s the list of topics: Day 1: Something you hate about yourself Day 2: Something you love about yourself Day 3:Something you have to forgive yourself for Day 4: Something you have to forgive someone else for Day 5: Something you hope to do in...
I believe in the legalization of drugs. I believe we are fighting a useless and expensive war on drugs much like the Prohibition. It is cheaper and more effective to create drug rehab program for those unfortunate people who become addicted. I also believe that people with addictive personalities are going to get addicted to something whether that substance is illegal or not. Additionally, if recreational drugs are legalized,...
As I’ve already mentioned, I was an agnostic in my youth. It wasn’t always that way. I was raised as a Baptist. Southern Baptist even. But here’s the thing, organized religion often pisses me off. One of the reasons I decided I didn’t need religion was because I couldn’t stand the hypocritical folks who thought it was their job to tell everyone else how to live. I figured between them and the atrocities done in the name of God, I just...
My thoughts are precisely this. Who the Hell am I to tell you who to love? I was blessed with meeting Moo, who I fell in love with at first sight. I honestly believe that he and I were destined by God to be together. I honestly believe that we were meant for one another. Who the Hell am I to tell two guys or two girls that they aren’t meant for one another cuz they have the same parts? If you listen carefully, you’ll figure out that...
When I was in my early 20’s, in a fit of logic, I decided I was agnostic. I’d been through some hellish days and had decided that there couldn’t possibly be a God that cared for us right here and now. Maybe there had been in the past, but not at that moment. I showed complete contempt for religious types and mocked them behind their back. I was in college so I was in pretty good company as others were going through their own philosophical...
I love Coca-Cola. Really. It’s like the best thing in the world to me. But I need to learn to live without it. When I was pregnant with Phoebe and got the Gestational Diabetes diagnosis, I cut back from a 3 coke a day habit to a 1 coke a day. I was drinking so much water that I didn’t really miss it. I’d get my one coke and enjoy it with my evening snack and just really ENJOY it. After she was born, I didn’t really start back...
Didn’t we already answer this one? Oh well.. something I couldn’t live without… Laughter. Last night, during a fit of incredibly painful pregnancy induced leg cramps, I got through one bout by making myself laugh. The story is that my dad had arthritis in his feet. This in itself is not funny. It also isn’t funny that when he would first stand up after sitting or sleeping, his feet would hurt. What IS funny is that he wouldn’t...
Yet another tough one. I am most disappointed with our President Barak Obama. Several months before he started running for president, I read his book. I’d seen him speak at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and that just made me want to read his book, a href="Dreams from My Father">Dreams from My Father'>Dreams of My Father and I thought it was brilliant. I later read his next book, a href="The Audacity of Hope " target="_blank">The...
Man these questions just keep getting weirder and harder!!
When I was 12 years old, I discovered a band called Duran Duran. Their music was catchy and their videos were cutting edge and they were all delicious. Delicious to my budding hormones at least.
I was a diehard Durannie (what Duran Duran female fans are called) for a solid 5 years.
At first, I was passionately in love with Simon Le Bon.. he was roguish and fun!
Then it was the dreamy Nick Rhodes – who wore more makeup than I did.
Then it was the brooding John Taylor, the tall dark and handsome one…
This is the poster I had in my room during these years.. DREAMY!!!
I can’t say that they got me through rough times, but they had a good bit of influence in my life. Those years were years of a lot upheaval in my life – family and personal illnesses, family disagreements, my parents in the nasty part of their marriage, etc.
They were a kind of stabilizing force in my life. I could be having a bad day and I could go in my room, turn on some music and get away from the crap.
I don’t know why I stopped being a Durannie.. maybe because that’s about the time the guys in the group started going off on solo projects?
Maybe I moved on to something else? Like the luscious Trent Rezor… mmmmm… I’ve had a “thing” for tall, dark and handsome for a long time… LOL
----------------------------------------------------
If you want to play along with this list, here’s the list of topics:
Day 1: Something you hate about yourself
Day 2: Something you love about yourself
Day 3:Something you have to forgive yourself for
Day 4: Something you have to forgive someone else for
Day 5: Something you hope to do in your life
Day 6: Something you hope you never have to do
Day 7: Someone who has made your life worth living
Day 8: Someone who has made your life hell or treated you badly
Day 9: Someone you didn't want to let go, but who drifted
Day 10: Someone you need to let go, or wish you didn't know
Day 11: Something people seem to compliment you the most on
Day 12: Something you never get compliments on
Day 13: A band or artist that has gotten you through some tough times
Day 14: A hero that has let you down
Day 15: Something or someone you couldn't live without
Day 16: Something or someone you could definitely live without
Day 17: A book you've read that changed your view on something
Day 18: Your views on gay marriage
Day 19: What is your opinion of religion?
Day 20: Your views on drugs and alcohol.
Day 21: (Scenario) Your best friend is in a car accident and you got into a fight a couple of hours before. What do you do?
Day 22: Something you wish you hadn't done in your life
Day 23: Something you wish you had done in your life
Day 24: Make a playlist to someone and explain why you chose those songs
Day 25: The reason you believe you're still alive today
Day 26: Have you ever thought about giving up on life?
Day 27: What's the best thing you've got going for you right now?
Day 28: What would you do if you got pregnant (or got someone pregnant) right now?
Day 29: Something you hope to change about yourself
Day 30: A letter to yourself
Purses and sunglasses! I am always complimented on my purse or my sunglasses. I have this little knack for picking out cute purses. Since Phoebe was born, I don’t have a lot of opportunities to carry a purse since I hate carrying a purse AND a diaper bag. But I LOVE purses. And since I am near-sighted, I really need glasses to drive. Since I mostly drive during the day, I’m always sure to have a pair of cute prescription sunglasses...
Another tough one.. and this one, I have no idea. There are plenty of people that I need to forgive (see day 4) but I can’t really seeing myself completely letting them go. Afterall, they ARE family, whether they acknowledge me or not. Maybe I do need to let them go. Maybe when I can finally forgive them for what they did to me, I can just let them go. It’s something to think about…...
This was a difficult topic for me.. mainly because I’m the one who drifted. I don’t keep up with old friends nearly as well as I should. I have realized that I’m one of those people who will think of people and want to talk to them but always figure they have better things to do than to listen to me ramble. Folks tell me all the time “call me if you want to talk” and I almost never do. It’s not that I don’t want to talk, I do. The...
I could refer back to day 4, but I decided that that I didn’t want to give them any more energy. This going to sound stupid.. but there was this girl in middle school and high school… I was never a really popular kid. Oh I had plenty of friends, but I wasn’t in “The In Group” of pretty, popular girls with designer jeans and makeup – none of which I was allowed by my parents to partake of. I had friends in the group but I wasn’t part of the group…...
My daughter has brought so much joy to my life. She came to us after several years of bad mojo and after actively pursuing pregnancy. From the day she was born, she has been a complete joy. Before she was born, or even before I was pregnant, I was entering a phase in my life where I just didn’t know what to do. I was in a job I wasn’t particularly happy in, that I didn’t get a great deal of satisfaction from. I was at a point...
I never want to live without my husband. He has been with me through some of the most painful moments of my life and has stuck with me like GLUE. I have given him so many chances to get away from me and my drama but he has stuck with me. How do you express how much you love another human being without sounding hokey? I don’t love to breathe, but I can’t live without it. So I have nothing to compare it with. I love everything about this...
I eventually want to go back to school for my master’s degree and possibly one day a PhD. In what you ask? Either history or religious studies. Yep, I said that. I have no idea what I want to do with this education. I am not real sure what you can do with with a master’s degree in history besides get into education… Here’s the list of topics again if you are interested: Day 1: Something you hate about yourself ...
So yesterday, at 22 weeks, 6 days pregnant, I found out the gender of my unborn child.
The afternoon started with a trip to my OBGYN and a meeting with midwife April. She’s a sweet thing. She was very informative, immediately found the baby’s heart beat and noted that I have consistently been losing weight since starting my care with this pregnancy. This led to a discussion of diet and gestational diabetes.
Friends, my glucose readings suck. HARD. Fasting goal is 70-95. I haven’t been below 112 since I started taking readings a few weeks ago.
We also discussed c-sections again and she said that a GD (gestational diabetes) diagnosis makes it more likely that we’ll schedule at 38 weeks instead of 39. Basically, as soon as we get a good amniocentesis, the OB’s are gonna wanna get Nugget out of there.
It was a good visit with great blood pressure readings (118/60) and I came away feeling pretty good.
Then I had an hour before my next appointment. Since both offices are in the same building and are, in fact, on the same floor, I went to the car and lay down for 45 minutes. It was quite refreshing.
10 minutes before my next appointment time, I go to the perinatologist’s office and plunk down cash for my co-pay. They do not have change, so I have to go down to the first floor pharmacy to break a $20. They will not make change unless you buy something, so I buy a bottle of water. A $2.00 bottle of water. This is not making me happy.
So I go back up, settle my account and wait. 10 minutes later, a very sweet young lady comes to get me. She gets my weight and sits me down for a blood pressure reading. This time, it’s 122/72 – still perfect.
She asks me about my foot. I explained that I had surgery and give them a list of the pain medication that I’m still taking and the cream I’m putting on it nightly. No comments about the pain pill, but they want to look up the cream.
Then it’s off to the ultrasound room for the BIG SCAN. The SCAN that tells you everything from if the heart looks good to if your baby has kidneys.
The tech has some trouble with baby. Baby is butt down but facing my back and not interested in turning around. It emphatically waves it’s arms and kicks when she uses a giant vibrator to see if we can get it to move. I get up, sit back down, turn onto both sides trying to get the little booger to move a little bit so we can see it’s face.
Nugget is not having any of it.
It’s noted that my amniotic fluid is low. Not dangerously low, but low enough that they want me to be sure that I DRINK A GALLON OF WATER EVERY DAY. Yes, I said gallon. I’m also supposed to rest, but not bedrest. Just rest. I’m also supposed to lay on my left side as much as possible instead of my right to give the Nugget as much flow as possible.
And then, they showed me the goodies. My child’s goodies that is. Nugget was in just the right position after I turned over 23 times that we could clearly see the gender.
Y’all, I am having a BOY. A boy! Me! Soon to be mother to a BOY!
What in the world am I going to do with a boy? Besides the fact that everything I have is pink or a pretty shade of purple, I’ve only got about 4 things that would be suitable.
Luckily, I hit a yard sale that one of my friends in my Mom’s Club a couple weeks ago and got a good number of gender neutral things. So the kid won’t be completely naked.
BUT IT’S GOT A WOO WOO! NOT A HOO-HA. I know how hoo-ha’s work. I don’t know how woo-woo’s work.
Oh, and did you know that little boys regularly get erections while in utero? And that their little penises (penii?) float?
Floating weiners maybe something you know about, but it was completely new information to me.
When my father passed away a few years ago, I was basically disowned by his whole family. I won’t go into details because I don’t know all of them, I only know my side. As far as I can tell, my offense was disagreeing with them. Being his daughter, they should have expected me to ask questions. Being his daughter, they should have expected me to raise doubts and want more information. The result is that they cut the ties with...
Back on day one, I talked about things I hate about myself and it’s the fact that I dwell on things. One of the things I dwell on sometimes is an argument I had with my father about a year before he died. At the time, my grandmother (mom’s mother) was ill and she was fighting tooth and nail to survive. She was an insulin dependent diabetic and was slowly going into kidney failure. Over the course of about 2 years, she was in and out of the...
I love my life. I have the best husband, the best daughter, the best in-laws, the best friends anyone could ask for. I’m not satisfied with where I am, but I’m really very happy. I love my optimism. When irritating stuff happens, I just figure it’s a short irritation and move on with my life. I love my sense of humor. I routinely make myself laugh and can usually get someone else to laugh. I would far rather be the person...
This is a tough subject. We’re all so hard on ourselves and can usually pick out a hundred things wrong with us. But how do you choose just one? I decided that the thing I hate the most about myself is that I tend to dwell on things and bring them up over and over and over again. Most times, I need to let it go and let God take care of the problem or I need to forgive someone or myself. I’ll be talking more about this in a couple of...
I am going to use this little meme going around to tear apart my soul for the month of November. Here’s the list of topics: Day 1: Something you hate about yourself Day 2: Something you love about yourself Day 3:Something you have to forgive yourself for Day 4: Something you have to forgive someone else for Day 5: Something you hope to do in your life Day 6: Something you hope you never have to do Day 7: Someone who has made your...
So I go a week ago Tuesday to get this frickin’ wart removed.
Having surgery requiring anesthesia is tricky business when you are pregnant. For one thing, most of the anesthesia passes through the placenta and will dope up the kid too… this is not a good thing.
So I get to the hospital, get registered and get taken to pre-op to strip off and put on a hospital gown. I made a point of telling everyone I ran into that I was pregnant so that if it was relevant to what they were doing, they would know.
Nurse Rita put in an IV and then used a handheld doppler to find the baby’s heartbeat. Found it pretty quickly and the baby kicked her – Miss Rita thought that was fun.
Then the anesthesia came in to discuss options for anesthesia and agreed that a block was the best thing. He originally wanted to do a spinal I think but my podiatrist suggested a block of just the leg from the knee down on. When you get this, it’s called a popliteal sciatic block. I was also given a little “get happy” juice in my IV to relax me while they placed the block. It wasn’t entirely unpleasant. I do remember singing Chantilly Lace at one point – a song which neither my doctor nor my nurse knew until I started singing it. It’s supposed to take 20-30 minutes for the block to work fully at this point.
And then we were on our way to the OR… and the LASER. I cannot help but say laser like Dr Evil in the Austin Powers movies so please think it that way as you read.
Anyway, we get in there, I get set-up the rest of the way and then the podiatrist realizes that I am not fully numb when he attempts to put a little local anesthesia in to finish off the needed numbing. IT HURT LIKE HELL!! I finally said some very bad things and they gave me a little pain meds in the IV to assist.
Y’all they gave my Propanol. YES THAT PROPANOL. The drug that basically killed Michael Jackson.
And then I wondered why he would ever want to use it. When it would go into the IV in my hand, my hand would start hurting very badly – at one point, I asked if my hand was falling off because HOLY MOLY it hurt that bad.
Did you know that if you have laser surgery, that everyone in the room, including the patient, has to wear protective eye wear? Yeah, we were all sporting what looked like Oakley sunglasses for the entire procedure.
So they finish up, wrap my foot in about 32 feet of gauze and roll me off to Recovery where the fun really started.
For one thing, it completely freaked them out that I was pregnant. They kept asking me how far along and I kept tellin’ em 20 weeks and they kept saying they had to get fetal heart tones before I left. They also were freaked that I have gestational diabetes. That would require a glucose check and they had to go find a monitor.
So they find the glucose monitor and my sugar is 116 – not too bad considering I’m stressed. (Yes, stress affects your glucose level) and then I get a cup of ice with my beloved cran-grape juice. GAWD, I love that stuff!!
The really fun part comes when they try to get the fetal heart tones. Baby is AWAKE AND MOVING at this point. The little handheld doppler has to have 10 seconds to register the heartbeat and the little booger just kept moving and then they’d have to search again. They weren’t used to doing fetal heart tones so by the time it was over, I was completely covered in the gel they use to make the doppler slide across your skin better. And Nugget kept KICKING THEM!!! At first, they were kinda freaking out, but then it became a game of “will the baby kick again and then move?”
We finally get heart tones (147) and blood pressure (134/82) and then I’m off to discharge to get my prescription for pain meds, instructions for care, the IV removed and I get to get my clothes back on and go home!
I was given a pain med (Perc*cet) before we left the hospital. I forgot that if I take that stuff with an empty or nearly empty stomach that it makes me wickedly sick. Ugh, I almost had to have Moo pull over so I could hang my head out the door like a dog.
We left the house at 9 that morning and got back at 3. I was hoping to get back around 2 but everything with doctors and hospitals always seems to take longer than you think.
When we got home, I could not feel my foot or lower leg at all so it was fun to get into the house. And then Moo and I thanked his sister who stayed with Phoebe (YOU ROCK SIS!!) and had some lunch and then I took a little nap.
The pain/feeling came back around 3 am. I am thankful that I followed the doc’s instructions and took a pain pill before it came back. Otherwise, it would have likely been a lot worse.
So for the last week, I’ve been wearing some lovely footwear, hobbling around the house (can’t drive because of my foot and the pain meds), but mostly I’ve been ok. Strange what you can adapt to when you need to.
Moo has taken REALLY good care of me. He has been cooking some, taking care of the house some and just being incredibly supportive. He’s also helped me soak and wrap my foot twice a day. He became a wrap expert with his toe last year so his expertise has been invaluable.
So I guess the moral of this story is: if you go to a public locker room, WEAR SOME FRICKEN SHOES, because warts are not fun.
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