Cheesy Chipotle Chicken and Rice

I promise that I really do cook things other than chicken and meals that are a little more fancy pants, but for some reason I only remember to take pictures of quick, chicken meals. Oh, well.

Tonight, we were going to have stuffed cabbage rolls! That is until I took a marathon nap and read the recipe when I woke up and realized that they have to cook for 2 hours, which at that point meant that we would have eaten at 8:30. So, we had to turn to Plan B. Luckily, I had almost everything for this recipe from Yammie's Noshery for Cheesy Chipotle Chicken and Rice. I did have to adjust some things, because I was missing a couple of ingredients.

The original recipe calls for black beans, but shockingly I didn't have any! Luckily, the rice we cook at home has beans and barley mixed in it so I used that and it worked out great. I also didn't find chipotle seasoning, so I added some Mexican seasoning and a little cayenne pepper and I thought it worked well. I mixed the cheese and sour cream right in with the rice. I kind of love one pot recipes like this. I guess I used two: one to boil chicken and one for the rice. I also didn't have a red bell pepper, but I had a bag of small sweet peppers so I chopped up a few of those and they were delicious.

We ate ours with some tortilla chips. The kids and my husband all loved it. Our 11 month old son ate two bowls of it. If you want you can add some hot sauce on top. I think it would work well as a side dish to fajitas or tacos or even as a dip. It was definitely not the fanciest of meals, but was a really good lazy Sunday dinner.

My picture leaves a lot to be desired...again: lazy Sunday! So, I didn't plate it nicely or sprinkle cilantro on top. Go to Yammie's Noshery for pretty pictures.

Try it out! Don't be dissuaded by my less than impressive picture!

Teacher Appreciation Week

I have a lot of respect for teachers. I think their commitment and dedication to teaching our kids is so admirable. Sister #4 is a teacher and so is our Mom, so that just adds to the respect I have for teachers! This was our oldest son's first year in school, so I was excited to do something for Teacher Appreciation Week. On Monday I sent in two boxes of donuts with a note that said "Donut we'd do with out you."

I found a really great idea on Build it Sew it Love it that can be found: here. She gave teachers the book, Hooray for Diffendoofer Day. I loved the book. You can order it on Amazon: here for $10. It's a book that Dr. Seuss started before he passed away and was finished by some people who found the notes he was keeping. It's about a teacher who inspires her kids and thinks outside of the box. Build it Sew it Love it has a file you can download with the tag. Unfortunately my ink cartridge is running low so it wasn't as bright as it could have been. I bought some flower clips and raffia at Michaels and this is how mine turned out:

The PTA also asked the parents to send in some desserts for a catered lunch they had for the teachers today and I have seen some really cute cupcakes decorated to look like apples so I thought I'd try it out.  I just used a box cake mix and then frosted them with white frosting and dipped them in red sugar crystals. Then I got some colored edible dough from Michaels and made stems and leaves. I think that next time I will just use tootsie rolls for the stems, but I think they still turned out pretty cute!

Tomorrow is the last day of Teacher Appreciation Week, so make sure you thank a teacher!

Nando's

My husband likes to try new restaurants, which makes me nervous sometimes. Well last year he really wanted me to try Nando's. I was hesitant and I think a little moody that day so I was not a big fan. I kind of stuck with this.."Nando's is not good" attitude until a few months ago when I decided to try it again. I'm so glad I did! I love it! I like how you can customize how spicy you want your meat to be. I usually get the steak sandwich. Last time I got the chicken caesar wrap and it was delicious. The hummus appetizer is to die for! If you're going with kids, their meals are free on Mondays and Tuesdays. The kids get a bowl of frozen yogurt, which is also really good. If that wasn't enough they also have one of those coke machines so I can get raspberry Coke zero. Delicious. Oh! Make sure you get the chips (fries) with peri-peri mayo.

This is the hummus with the peri-peri drizzle. Amazing.

 

Go check it out! You'll love it.

 

I LOVE earrings ... unfortunately for me I have been unable to wear earrings, sometime in High School (which was a long, long time ago) I gave up!  For reasons I can't explain, within hours of putting earrings in, my ears would get red and itchy.  After a couple of days they would begin to hurt.  It was quite annoying.

About a month ago, I had a thought - with all the information in the world at my finger tips, why have I not tried Googling my earring problem?  Apparently I am not the only person in the world with this problem.  I came across a women who said she tried Neosporin and it worked.  What did I have to lose?

So, one morning, I put a small dab of Neosporin on my forefinger and rubbed it on my ears - back and front.  Then whatever was left on my fingers I rubbed onto the post of the earring, put the earrings in my ears and hoped for the best. Amazingly enough, my ears were fine, what's more ... they were fine all day.  Now a month later my ears are still fine!

I wish I had had the ability to Google in High School, just think of all the money I could have spent on earrings!

Happy May Day!

Happy spring everyone! I love spring! 

This is a super simple post, but I just wanted to share something I made this morning. 

I saw this wreath on Pinterest the other day. It didn't lead to a link so I don't know who to give credit to! 

I loved it and I don't have a good May wreath for my front door! I went to Michaels today, without kids! It was like Heaven. Anyway, I bought one bunch of tulips that was 50% off of $7 and a grapevine wreath that was on sale for $4.99. So the whole thing cost less than $10! I just pulled the tulips off of the bunch and pushed them in all around the wreath. I cut a few of the stems so that they would fit a little better and I made sure to alternate between tulips with leaves and tulips without leaves. It took me maybe 5 minutes to do. I might go back and hot glue them on, but I can never use a hot glue gun without burning myself...so probably not!

Here's how mine turned out:

If you want it to be a little more full like the one on Pinterest then you should probably buy two bunches of tulips. 

Sister #2 used more tulips and this is how hers turned out. I'm a little jealous. 

If you decide to make one hurry and go to Michaels while everything is on sale! Good luck!