Cheesy Enchiladas!

I was thinking a few weeks ago about blogging some of my cooking adventures. I always forget or get distracted and never do. I started a new board on Pinterest to repin the things that I tried, changed up, etc. But that's not nearly as fun.

Some times my baking and cooking is amazing. Other times, not so much. My son is my biggest critic. Basically, he hates everything. I cannot make that kid happy. That's another story, for another day.

I'm new at all this, I don't know what the hell i'm doing half the time. I began this blog for me, to write about the shenannigans that is my life. Hoping that putting this out there would encourage me to be healthier and actually GET out there. I hoped that other people would find it maybe entertaining, fun, follow me?

Crickets? I thought so.

Anyway, this entire week I've had a wild hair to try random recipes. My family has put up with me, thankfully. I only think to document my creations after the meal has been chowed down and no one wants pictures of that.

Tonights dinner i've made a million times. Enchiladas. I love me some enchiladas. I make them differently every time. I was inspired to try a different recipe I saw that called for greek yogurt. I was intrigued and bought some. Only to realize that it was probably a healthier solution for sour cream? I'm slow. Give me a break.

My hub will NOT eat sour cream. Ketchup. Alfredo. Cream Cheese. Various other cheeses. It makes things difficult.

So I reverted back to my good ol enchiladas, and here is how it goes.

Ta da!

For reals though. Bear with me here. Or is it bare? Whatever.

You will need:
1 lb ground meat, beef, chicken, turkey....
Spices, cumin, garlic, onion
1 20 oz can red enchilada sauce
Cheese, I used cheddar and colby jack
Package of tortillas, corn or flour
Salsa

• First, brown a pound of whatever ground meat your little soul desires. We had ground beef. That fatty kind. I add in some minced onion, garlic, a little cumin.
• Drain, add in some salsa. I don't measure. I spoon in it, stir it up until it's coated.
• From my 20 oz can of red enchilada sauce, pour enough to coat the bottom of the pan. I'd say about 1/4 inch.
• This time I used corn tortillas, generally I use flour tortillas because corn ones always fall apart and i'm lazy. But I found on the package, it's best to warm them first, and wadyaknow. They didn't break. Wabam.
• Spoon filling into tortillas. I use 1/4 cup meat mixture, 1/4 cheese. Roll up. Place in pan like so.
• Whatever fillings fall out as you're rolling, add on top when you're done. I also add any leftover meat, the rest of the can of sauce and top with cheese.
• Cover with foil, bake at 375 for an hour or until cheese is melted, sauce is bubble and delicious. We like things sauce up in herr.

I'm sure everyone and their dogs Mother has a better recipe than I do, but I love them, so I wanted to share. I will never write a cook book. But I do promise my recipe skills will improve with time.

And this melts my heart.


Happy Friday! TGFW!

Stop Making Excuses and DO IT

So I was sitting around on my ass yesterday crocheting like an old lady, really thinking about myself. WHY am I constantly sabotaging myself? Why do I do that? I'm ready to move forward and there is absolutely no reason for me to not get this shiz in gear. I have the best intentions and there is no excuse.
Except it's cold and rainy. And food is delicious. And I love wine. And beer. And chocolate. And cheese.

Whatev. See? Its pathetic. I'm awesome all day and then bedtime comes along and then I think, oooh we have ice cream! The hormones have definitely gotten the best of me this week. Then I'm ashamed and realize how unattractive my husband must find me, dipping oreos into my peanut butter chocolate ice cream (it was delicious). Muffin top in all its glory.

But then I remember that I'm sexy, awesome, and hilarious, and he adores me. It's not my fault he can eat whatever the hell he wants and remain a bean pole. Someday he'll get chubby, and it'll even itself out.

Anyway, our anniversary is coming up in a month and its a great opportunity to start setting short term goals. Instead of, "I wanna be 120 pounds and i'm just gonna bitch and complain until it happens." Cause seriously, that's not working...

Really, it's not. It turns out, bitching does not burn calories. If it did, i'd be anorexic.

A better goal is, I will look awesome in my lil nightie, not ashamed. A girl can dream right?

So my own little personal goals, and I really need to be accountable here, are...

• Drink at least 100 oz of water per day. I drink a LOT of water so this is easy. I started tracking that yesterday, setting my goal at a gallon. And I peed, every half hour. As if I didn't pee enough already.
• If I'm going to have an unhealthy snack, mix it up with a healthy one. Like dipping celery in peanut butter and pouring chocolate all over it. I kid... but I'm a major snacker and that's gotta stop. 
• Smaller portions. This isn't an eating competition.
• Eat breakfast. This is hard because I'm all about coffee, nothing else. Don't talk to me til noon.
• Continue counting my calories, eating smaller meals throughout the day
• Do any exercise whenever possible. Something is always better than nothing!
• And, I will not take things away from myself. I think if someone says "I will NEVER eat chocolate again" they're just asking for it...

This is all stuff I'm always working on, but I needed to throw it out there, spell it out and see it.

Happy Hump Day!

That's A Whole Lot of Inches Nobody Needs

I've been telling myself I need to work on a post and there ain't nothin to write about. Just the same ol feeling sorry for myself, still just trying to figure out my groove here at the house, cleaning routines and stuff. It's been so cold i don't want to do anything! It's not rainy, its not sunny, its just foggy, dreary, cold yuck. Today the sun is actually shining and if it gets above freezing I might actually go OUTSIDE!

I told my husband I want a treadmill and he thinks I'm crazy. He says, just wait for it to get warmer and go. Yes. Let's sit here 3-4 more months, get plumper, and see how that works out.

Mama don't think so. 

Seriously that is my whooole problem. I sit at home with my daughter, looking at pinterest (damn you pinterest) and get ideas for things to cook and I cook and eat. Not exercise as much as I should. Weekends are the worst because I love hanging out with my family, eating crap, drinking crap, trying new recipes. Eating is way more fun than exercising. 

But I AM counting calories again. Doing the little things I have been doing. I know I FEEL a hell of a lot better when I watch what I eat, move my body. We'll see what happens. Probably nothing but I'll give it a shot and maybe hope I can bribe the hubby into getting that treadmill!

I got a wild hair and decided instead of looking at this number on the scale that never changes, to actually take my measurements and write them down. Seeing those numbers really put things into perspective. I remember what my measurements were, not long after I had my daughter, when I was at the smallest I had been in a LONG time. And those numbers were smaller for sure. Something has got to change up in here. If each area of my body is 2 inches bigger, that's a LOT of inches! A lot of extra shit to be carrying around that's slowing me down, making me feel like crap, making me an angry and bitter person. Who needs that?!

On a happier note, I did get to go see an old friend of mine from elementary school last week. It was so fun to find out she lives out here now as well, to see a familiar face and meet her 3 adorable girls. Getting out definitely makes me happy!

So here's to a better week and I will keep making positive changes! 

OMG Boobs!

Yesterday we went to my sons' new school to get him all registered now that winter break is over. He is in 5th grade, still elementary school everywhere we've ever lived. Here, it's middle school. This morning his sister and I dropped him off right after school started so there wouldn't be as much chaos. He got his schedule and other paperwork, another boy in his class came to the office to get him and he was off.

I'm dying.

He tries so hard to be all grown up, play the big kid video games (I refuse to let him play M games and we do our best to make sure other games are appropriate, just FYI), etc. Sometimes I wish he were more into sports and video games weren't such an issue, not that I would ever want him to change, he is who he is. He does want to get into basketball so we are going to look into that. When I look at him he's still so little and innocent. If he heard me say that he'd be so pissed.

Yesterday I found some "questionable" youtube history in our computer and was furious. I've always trusted him to an extent, I'm always kinda eyes and ears open while he's playing games or on the computer. He generally watches other people playing Minecraft or other video games to figure out how to do things. I'll never understand it. In "my day" we just played the damn game until we figured it out. But this was something about Rihanna topless. Seriously, why Rihanna? If I wanted to check out boobs, i'd look up a VS model or something. I'm not her biggest fan. Don't hate, I get it, she's "talented" whatev. I'm not a guy. I'll never understand it.

It's just boobs but it's also, OMG boobs!

He's 10, he's curious. I get that. I remember being around that age and seein the chicks in lingerie in the JC Penney catalog and being like, I wanna look like that when I grow up (HA!) But really, how did he grow up SO fast? I think of 10 and I think of kids still playing with toys, playing night games like we did, just being KIDS. Now they all have freaking iPhones and all this grown up shit I never imagined having until I was a GROWN up. I don't even have an iPhone!

Anyway, I immediately made Bryan adjust all the parental settings and on his tablet he got for Christmas we restricted a bunch of stuff. I'm totally inadequate in handling these types of situations. I always said i'd be the open parent who would be willing to talk about anything and be comfortable about it so my kids would talk to ME and trust me to tell me what they were really doing. Be a cool Mom but they'd also know I meant business. I could never really talk to my parents and it bugged me. My teenage years were also a major shit storm. Now he asks me questions about sex or why I was a young parent and I cringe and tell him "when you're older."

Fail.

Boobs aside, this whole middle school situation makes me uneasy. The kid has some ADHD issues and I can't even get him to stop talking and pay attention or sit still at the dinner table, let alone make it to a class on time. From what I understand the 5th grade is "contained" and I don't think it's like going from period to period except for lunch, choir, and computers. I only hope he won't be talking about Rihanna's boobs in class. That'd be awkward parent teacher conference.

Merry Christmas Happy New Year We Made It!

Well, I don't think I've written a post in like, 2 weeks? Christmas flew by, but we had a great one. We had our own little family dinner on Christmas eve, the kids got to open a few presents, Christmas morning Santa came, they opened the rest of their haul and we headed over to my husbands aunt and uncles house. It was nice to get out and spend time with family.  

Our 7 month lease is over and we made it out just in time. We signed Thursday, got keys Friday and moved Saturday. I had hoped this would all be wrapped up a few weeks ago and we would have more time to clean, have things more organized but hey, it's a shitstorm around here and We. LOVE. It. 

It's actually more bittersweet than I thought it'd be. I get comfortable where I'm at, adjusting to a new place is never easy. But so far I love our home.
I called my sons school to figure out what I needed to do to withdraw him to switch schools after winter break, his teacher had him gather all his things and when he got home that day he was kinda sad. He's excited to have a home. He's only gone to this school a few months but obviously he will miss the friends he has made. I'm always disappointed when his best friends don't do their share keeping in touch. But kids grow up, move on. I can only hope we are doing the right thing. We didn't move far and I want him to keep in touch with these kids. The poor kid has been to as many elementary schools as grades. It's depressing. I am SO over moving.

So my super hero husband and I loaded up a uhaul with the stuff from our apartment Saturday morning. Brayden was sleeping over at a friends and Ally was curled up on the couch watching movies. It was actually a perfect December day for moving. Kids were quiet, it wasn't too cold, it wasn't raining which is a major bonus in Oregon, so we got that all loaded up pretty quickly.
Cleaning the apartment was another story. Brayden got home. The kids "play" which means "try to kill each other". I'm sure part of it was stress. Confusion over what the hell was going on, so they f-ed things up as I went, a bucket of water got knocked over on the carpet. Shit storm. But that's over. We unloaded the apartment stuff at the house and were just too exhausted to get the storage stuff that day. Which ended up being a great thing because we got some kitchen stuff unpacked, beds set up and made and were able to sleep comfortably. Sunday we headed to our storage unit aka Bryan's warehouse, and got the rest of our stuff. 
After drinking copious amounts of wine over our long 4 day weekend, celebrating New Years and getting mostly unpacked, I am so happy to be in our home. I have many goals for this year, though I am not making a resolution. I am determined to get healthy and enjoy more things with my family. To not stress eat, to yell less, love more. I have been so lazy and using this move as an excuse to not exercise, to eat and drink whatever I want. Fat Emily no more. I am excited to see where this year takes us. I will not however, move again in a year. It was a miracle to buy and sell our first house in a year, I don't expect that to ever happen again.


Happy 2013 everyone!