Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Fauxtisserie Chicken

Now this is a recipe I have needed for awhile now. It seems like a perfect one for those busy nights and also one that lends itself to creative leftovers or helping to get the hard part of dinner preparations done ahead of time. Check this recipe out for Fauxtisserie Chicken. My mom shared a cookbook with me that she had checked out of the library. We both tend to check out a lot of cookbooks from the library. When I get to the point that I simply drool over each and every recipe, it is time to buy the cookbook. However, I realized that there was a blog that was mentioned in the cookbook that was also written by the authors of this cookbook. I think I'll check out their blog for awhile and see if that will hold me over or if I really need to buy the cookbook. Be warned there seem to be a lot of yummy recipes listed on this website and on this blog as well.

I made this recipe for our monthly meal swap. I made a slight variation of the recipe that I linked to this post. I simply used a whole chicken,gave it a good rinse, then patted it dry with paper towels. I loosened the skin all over the chicken and then stuffed three tablespoons of cilantro and 4 cloves of garlic under the loosened skin. I then made a dry rub of 1 1/2 teaspoons of chili powder, 1 teaspoon of cumin, and 1 teaspoon of season salt and applied that all over the outside of the chicken. The recipe then calls for the juice of one lime to be squeezed all over the outside of the chicken and then for the lime halves to be baked inside the cavity of the chicken during the cooking time in the crock pot.

I definitely think this recipe is a keeper and will be used often in our house.

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Our Summer List

Our summer list is now complete! We partially made the list early this month once school ended. We've been adding to it a little since then but I think it is now complete.

We've been operating by these lists as a family for awhile now. I won't go into the details of how we started using them right now... I will say that lists like this work really well when you have really different personalities, strong ones at that, in one family. We have been successful at understanding what is really important to each individual in our family. We each have a say in what matters to us individually and we are more accepting of things if that certain something is important to someone else. It's a winning plan for us...for now at least.

An added plus is that I love lists and being organized. I am learning to be less structured and more flexible with planning, but I still think having a framework to work within is really important. A loose plan if you will.

I'm looking forward to checking each activity off one by one as we go through the summer. We have some great things on our list. Here's hoping it is a NOT SO BUMMER SUMMER for our family.

Do you have a summer list? If so, what is on your list?

Monday, June 20, 2011

Folly Beach- More Pauses

Have you ever read a fiction book and while you were fully getting lost in the story there were also moments where you read a few lines that truly connected you to your own life and caused you to pause and just take it all in?

It has been happening to me more and more in recent years. I truly love the library. At the rate that we read books in our family, we would never be able to afford to purchase every book that we read. However, I have found that when I really like a book, there's nothing I like more than the opportunity to write in the book, underline passages, highlight passages, and jot notes in the side margins. Of course, this does not allow me to then share the book with others because I think this type of note taking makes it hard to read if you are not the notetaker.

Folly Beach is a library book and I am having a hard time not writing in this book.
Ahh...

Here are my latest moments of pause with this book.
The ocean is the same as it has been of old; the events of today are its waves and its rivers.
Sayyid Haydar Amuli

"Do you know why coyotes are found in almost every state now? Because they adapt. They find that what they really wanted isn't what they need, that there's something just as good someplace else. It's how they survive."

"Sometimes, just when we think we can see our lives on course and we can settle back and get comfortable, a new path opens. Some people just keep going, too scared to veer off the familiar path. But others, well, they step off into the unknown, and find that maybe that was where they were supposed to be all along."


A great man once wrote, "Absence diminishes small loves and increases great ones, as the wind blows out the candle and blows up the bonfire."

Friday, June 17, 2011

The Suitcase

I am really enjoying the book Folly Beach by Karen White. It's like a breath of fresh air to have finally found a good book, one where I can get lost in the story.

There is a character Emmy who early in the book becomes a young widow when her husband Ben is killed in action in the war.

The author writes about Emmy's grief following the death of her husband. Grief is a feeling that encompasses your whole soul. It is intriguing to me to see the many ways others express those feelings of grief with writing. The words are carefully chosen by the author to describe a very personal feeling, but yet with each one, I can fully understand and relate to the feelings shared.

Not far into the story I came across this paragraph:
Her grief was a silent thing-an invisible virus that gnawed at her from the inside but somehow managed to leave the rest of her unscathed. Her reflection was a surprise each time she saw it, expecting to see something withered and gray, or a black hole where her face had once been. Grief became to her like breathing; she couldn't rise or go to sleep without the pressing feel of it against her heart, the weight of it like a suitcase she didn't know how to unpack. Her sleep was dreamless, yet upon waking she'd be sure she'd heard fading footsteps in her bedroom, unsure if they were returning or go away. And each dawn she'd force herself to lie in bed with her eyes closed, hoping to see Ben one last time; hoping he'd tell her which way the footsteps were leading.

I especially connected to the phrase about grief being illustrated as the weight of a suitcase that you don't know how to unpack. One is left to carry that suitcase of grief forever. It is heavy indeed. I have learned in times like last week the case opens itself whether you want it opened or not, and the pain just spills out leaving you exposed to the raw emotions that result. For me personally, I have found such an experience to be rather exhausting. I have also found that this exhaustion takes days if not a full week or so to fully begin to recover from. Yet on other days, even the ok days, the suitcase is with you too. One must carry it everyday for the rest of their lives. It is there that there is such a common misconception among those who love a grieving soul. We carry this suitcase with us all the time and it has become who we are as a person. Speaking about our child (or other loved one specific to each case) doesn't make us remember our loss and cause us to feel sad. You see, the suitcase is already with us. We loved well and therefore, that love for our loved one is with us always, not just when someone brings up the subject of our loss.

It has been three years for me now. Three years since I last held my youngest son in my arms. Most days, time seems like something that makes no sense to me anymore. At times, it feels just like yesterday that my life was changed in such a profound way. In many ways my heart is still very much there in 2008. My senses are still fully awakened to that time if my life with even the smallest of things evoking vivid memories of those days spent in the PICU. Strangely I am also living, and trying to live fully, in 2011. Admittedly, I am still unable to quite figure out how to live in both places at once.

Early in my grief journey I made the mistake of thinking there was some way to get out of carrying this suitcase. I said things to myself like "If only I worked hard enough, looked hard enough at the grief, and spent enough time staring it in the face and not looking away, maybe then it will go away." I mistakingly thought there was a way once and for all to unpack this suitcase, put the suitcase down, put the suitcase away, and walk away- forever. "I don't like this suitcase and I don't have a use for something like this is my life" seemed like a statement that would so often play over and over in mind.

Time...heals all wounds. I heard this over and over until I wanted to vomit. I wanted so badly for someone to tell me WHEN it would stop hurting, almost like it would be bearable if I just knew and could visualize a stopping point. It hurts so badly that I would and probably would still do ANYTHING to make it stop. Now, three years later, that very same pain is very much still there, the difference now is that I have just begun to accept that I will carry this suitcase for the rest of my life, like it or not. Acceptance. I am succeeding more and more each day with the ability not to spend too much of my precious energy fighting what cannot be changed. Against my will, I have learned the skills needed to carry this suitcase. It is heavy and sometimes, like at the present time, I will just sit down with the suitcase and rest for awhile. Sometimes the suitcase is open and raw emotion is exposed and sometimes the case is closed and the emotion resides privately within my soul. However, like it or not, the suitcase is with me for the duration of my life here on earth. I still don't know how to unpack this suitcase and I'm not sure if I ever will. Maybe I don't want to.

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Pretty Ice Cubes


Ahh another simple joy of summer, pretty ice cubes!
I love to add a little Zazz to my ice in the summer when the mint in my yard is growing and summer fruits are readily available. I slice up a lemon into thin slices and then cut them in smaller pieces. I chop up the mint coarsely or sometimes I leave the leaves whole. You can customize the ice cubes to your liking. Mix it up and do what you like...

lemon ice
mint ice
lemon mint ice
lemon blueberry ice
lemon blueberry mint ice
peach and mint
you get the idea

The water is refreshing and looks pretty too!
Enjoy.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Summer Reading

It's no secret that I LOVE to read. I have been itching for a good story to sink into for awhile now. I finally had the oppotunity to read The Help a few months ago and enjoyed every word, except the ending. I didn't want to finish reading the story. You see while I was enjoying the story so much, the ending snuck up on me and I wasn't prepared for it to end. Perhaps it may have had something to do with the fact that the majority of this book was read late at night or in the wee hours of the morning. This winter I gave up sleep in exchange for giving my son his treatments for his asthma. After the treaments I was either unable to fall asleep right away or I was filled with a wee bit of Mama's worry and couldn't sleep. The moments passed a little more peacefully with a good book in hand...

So here I am a few months later and I am itching for another good book to read. A few summers back you may remember I had asked for your suggestions but also listed several criteria to follow. I was fragile.

Fast forward three years...I am still fragile. However, I have lightened up a little on my reading criteria. I have recently picked up a few books that I thought I would like but ended up not liking them at all. It was painful to do but I actually returned them to the library without finishing them.

I think I may have finally found a book that I will enjoy. Sweet joy...Simple Joy...

One my nightstand at the present time:
Folly Beach by Karen White and
The Fitting Room by Kelly Minter

What is on your nightstand? Do you have a summer reading list? If so, please share!

A Letter to Our Forest Friends

Dear Deer and Friends,

The sunflower seeds have been planted this year. We politely request that you leave them alone. You may not realize this but they are actually quite meaningful to our family. We have prepared to place nets around our garden to keep you out. Please find your food, snacks, and other treats elsewhere. Thank you!

With Grateful Hearts,
Our Family

Friday, June 3, 2011

endings

Pausing today to think about many of the endings that are present in my life this week. Some come with warning and some do not. Some are welcomed and some are not.(I am sounding a bit like Seuss...insert lighthearted pause into heavy thoughts)

This week two more children finished school for the year. Ahh, the official start of summer, never mind what the seasonal calendar says. If you'll indulge me, the last child, the youngest, well he graduated LIFE with honors. Major life events have and always will trigger powerful emotions within my soul as I continue to grieve what could have/would have been for Jeremy. They each signify another event that we will never experience with Jeremy. Each individual event beckons our full attention to the current place in time, but my heart can't help but to wander to a place in my imagination where I wonder for just a moment...what if??? What would our family snapshot look like now if he were here on this earth?

This school year was challenging and yet because of that, yielded great rewards. We couldn't be more happy with the school that our children attend and happen to think that their school experience is unique in many ways and unparalleled to other educational options. All of our children have had amazing teachers that have each left their mark of influence over my children for the rest of their lives. It was a blessing to have each of them become a part of my children's lives. So when the tears flowed on Friday of this week and Wednesday of last week, they were mostly evidence of the emotions of pride, love, gratitude, and joy. Honestly last week's tears at the Closing Chapel of our third child, evoked many more emotions but some of those feelings I will keep in my personal vault for now. It was overall a school year that was filled with academic, emotional, and spiritual growth for all.

Little one graduating life with honor, well that happened this week in history too. What a range of emotion for one Mama's heart. More on that another time, maybe...

If you have been reading here for awhile, you know that I have been watching and enjoying the television series Friday Night Lights for some now. There is just but ONE episode left remaining in the final season. I almost can't bear to watch it. Compared to my life story, this ending really pales in comparison. None the less, I really have enjoyed watching this show and it has allowed me to check out from my real life dramas and offered a desired and valued distraction.

On that note, there are some other much more serious endings happening in my life as well. Endings to things that are very personal to me and also to others that are near and dear to me. They have taken the form of many things. Some are even endings to things in which good things will result, thus perhaps sounding better as CHANGE. When endings are near, maybe certain, maybe not, maybe planned, maybe not, one thing is for certain. It is scary to think of where we might put our next foot down. What will life look like when we pass through this next phase, climb over this mountain, or when this current storm passes? Don't we all crave that sense of perceived control and the security that control provides? Well, guess what? We lack that very sense of control over every aspect of our lives that we so deeply desire. We don't always get what we want. Good things do happen in life, but bad things also happen. Bad things sometimes happen to good people, they happen for no reason at all. Bad things that have no explanation on this side of heaven.

The endings in their sheer number and profound emotion weight this week have caused my stomach to ache a bit and my heart to ache alot. I have allowed the circumstances and not my faith to be in the drivers seat of my feelings in response to these events. Haven't I learned anything?

I took some deep breaths and remembered this quote that has meant something to me for some time now. It is a good one to keep close at heart for now.

“When you get to the end of all the light you know and it's time to step into the darkness of the unknown, faith is knowing that one of two things shall happen: either you will be given something solid to stand on, or you will be taught how to fly.”
-Edward Teller

So I will close tonight knowing that while it might hurt like **** I will find new ground to stand on or new wings with which to fly.

Life is filled with changes. That is a fact of life. Today will not be today tomorrow. Eventually, I will get used to it.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Margarita Grilled Shrimp

I am way behind. Swapped meals awhile ago and wanted to share the recipe I made this month. Can you tell someone was dreaming of summer?

Margarita Grilled Shrimp:


Ingredients:


1/4 cup tequila


2 tablespoons of lime juice


zest of one lime


1/4 cup thinly sliced green onion


1/4 cup finely chopped cilantro


1 small jalapeno, minced


1 teaspoon of salt


2 tablespoons canola oil


2 pounds shrimp peeled and deveined



Directions:

Place ingredients for marinating the shrimp in a bowl or plastic bag. Add shrimp and stir or shake to coat. Refrigerate and marinade for at least 30 minutes.

Preheat grill or broiler. If using skewers soak them in cool water until needed.

Thread shrimp onto skewers not packing them too tightly so they will cook evenly.

Place shrimp on the grill or under the broiler and cook for a total of 5 to 6 minutes or until pink and firm, turning at least once. Remove from heat.
Discard marinade.

Prepare a bed of greens and tomatoes on each plate. Whisk together 4 tablespoons of good olive oil, 1 tablespoon of lime juice, and 1 tablespoon of tequila to make a yummy salad dressing which will compliment the shrimp. (ADULTS only for sure) Pour the dressing over the greens and tomatoes to lightly coat the salad. Plate the shrimp skewers on top of the salad.

Serves 4-6 or 25 appetizers.

I am thinking I will serve this meal with margaritas for sure!

I am hungry and dreaming of a fun night just writing this post.
Recipe from The Outer Banks Cookbook by Elizabeth Weigand

Happy Summer!