A nice Good Friday

So what a nice day today! Hubby let me sleep in and took O out for a while.. When I woke up I had them come back and we decided to go do something as a family... So we went for a hike on a bike trail, while doing some geo-caching... O loves going and it was definitely a family day... Greg got some pictures and I just enjoyed my family... On our way home we were discussing supper and Greg mentioned a new recipe I tried the other day saying that he wouldn't mind it again tonight... So we stopped for a can of refrigerated biscuits... we had to alter the recipe slightly as it was a little too sweet the first time but boy was it good!

So here is my 25 min?meal (as soon as I'm on my computer I'll link to the place I originally got this) Keep in mind I did not make this meal up, I just followed the recipe!
A can of refrigerated biscuits
1 pound ground beef
1/2 cup barbecue sauce
Shredded Cheddar Cheese

Preheat oven to 375°. Brown ground beef. Spray a muffin tin with non-stick spray and place a biscuit in each space, pressing into a cup shape (I only had 8 biscuits so I left 4 spaces empty). Mix barbecue sauce into browned beef. (Because I had original Sweet Baby Ray's and not the Sweet and Spicy that I highly recommend, I added some chili powder to give it a savory and spicy kick). Spoon beef into cups. Bake for 10 minutes. Remove and add cheese on top, finish baking for another 3-5 minutes. (I put the steam-able broccoli into the microwave at this time, when the microwave dings supper is done!)

Now it is off to bed as we have 2 Easter Egg Hunts tomorrow, the Easter Service Sunday followed by 2 Easter Dinners...
So thankful the He died for my sins and that He rose again!!

Our fun "pinking" (painting)

O wanted 2 "pink" Mickey Mouse (aka paint Minnie Mouse)...

and when he was done with Minnie, he "pinked" Lightning McQueen!

So I decided 2 work on an Eagle paint-by-number... This is how far I got when I worked 20 minutes longer than O

On our walk/ caching adventure

It was such a beautiful day today, so Aunt and I took O out on the bike trail to blow off some cabin fever steam (and of course get some caches on the way)... This nice little rest took our fancy, and O just loved the stone :) Wish I could have gotten the picture that Aunt got of O sitting on the bench! (I'll try to get it from her later)

Praise the Lord!

So I have to share this story!
Saturday, we decided to head to one of our big cities (about 90 mins away) to do some geocaching and take pictures... We found a series that was dediated to churches and thought it would be fun, called my aunt that got us into caching and we decided we would go in her car... She will drive but if someone else is willing she will gladly let them! I was going to, but the very light flurries was making everything look wavy with my disease, so we decided Greg would drive... We got on the road and was about half way when a car went to pass us on the freeway, we were doing the speed limit and he was doing maybe 5 or so over... He lost control and did a 360 in front of us, hit the guardrail then continued to bounce off the guardrail while doing another 180! after the first spin his tire came bouncing across the road in front of us and went over the rail down into the embankment... Greg was able to use his SMITH training and somehow (I can only guess that it was God) kept us from hitting the guy... We also expected the guy to go over the rail and he didn’t! In fact he had no injuries at all! We stayed there because he was facing the wrong way in a travel lane (it was the shoulder being used for travel because of the construction) and the guys lights weren’t working... So we had our hazards on and Greg kept “pumping the brakes” to show approaching vehicles to get out of the lane... There were several times that we were worried we would be hit, we can only imagine how much worse it would have been if we hadn’t been there to warn other drivers! PRAISE THE LORD for keeping all of us safe!!

No details, and don't know what to say...

So I really don't have many details, but I am again in shock! Mom called me to tell me that Shawn's school was evacuated for a bomb threat! They took all the High School students to the "next door" Junior High building... They escorted all of the driving students to their cars and they had to leave right then, no going back into the building... Then they escorted all the walkers/pick-ups (they no longer bus the High School kids, no matter their distance) to the parking lot and they had to get into their ride's vehicle and leave, again no going back into the building... I am hoping that they let the kids get their coats before doing all this outside stuff, since they aren't allowed to get them now! Please pray for these students and the people that are doing these threats! This town needs God more than I could even possibly think they do!

Matthew 9:11-13: When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Greg's Birthday Dessert means finding our new favorite frosting!

I stumbled across the best frosting recipe ever by accident… and best part is that when I was searching for a frosting recipe, I had forgot that powdered sugar is a main ingredient in frosting and I don’t have any… so here’s what happened: Greg’s birthday is Wed, we celebrated last night since he was off because of the holiday and he has a meeting right after work on Wed that will keep him out until 9 or 10pm… He said “since we are celebrating tonight, will you make this sugar cookie mix that Rick gave us?” I said “I was thinking about that since I can’t get you a cake ” (money too tight)… so I started looking for a frosting recipe and found "that's the best frosting I've ever had" on the Tasty Kitchen Blog… looked at it and thought “you don’t put flour in frosting?” (I keep telling y’all that I am not a Susie Homemaker lol) so anyway, you use 5 Tbs. flour, 1 c. milk, 1 tsp. vanilla, 1 c. sugar and 1 c. butter (can do half butter and half shortening which I did to conserve my butter supply hehe)... Whisk the milk and flour together and place over medium heat, stir constantly until it becomes thick (mine wasn't thickening for a long time, then suddenly it did!), let it cool completely! add vanilla and stir together. In a bowl, combine sugar and butter (in my case 1/2 c. butter and 1/2 c. shortening) and whip until fluffy and well mixed. Make sure your flour/milk mixture is completely cooled, add to sugar/butter and mix on medium-high until completely mixed and resembles whipped cream (I beat it for about 3 minutes)... frost your cooled dessert... Oh My!! it is delicious Greg was in love with it as well as O and I! (yes, we taste tested it before frosting the cookies)... So I frosted the cookies, and I stuck a candle in the middle cookie and we surprised Greg by singing Happy Birthday.. we all enjoyed even though it isn’t a sugar cookie frosting (apparently it’s best on chocolate or red velvet cake )... Oh by the way, the frosting was the perfect mix between a buttercream and a whipped frosting! Delicious!

My Crockpot Italian Sausage

So Wed night I need to have an easy Italian Sausage sandwich, that doesn't require a stove... My first thought was a crock pot with some peppers and a little broth, but of course I don't have peppers in my house :( So I went online to look up recipes and most of them required peppers and some even had onions (which sadly I do not cook with hehe)... Then I found one that uses spaghetti sauce and tomato paste and tomato sauce, but I used the last of my spaghetti sauce 2 nights ago- shoot! So I went into my kitchen and came up with this concoction:

8 Italian Sausages (I plan for left-overs for lunch the next day)
1 can tomato paste
1 can tomato sauce
1 can diced tomatoes with chilies
1 can diced tomatoes
approx (I didn't measure this at all) 3-4 cups Chicken broth (would have used beef if my chicken broth didn't need used up right away)

1. simmer sausages in some water (not enough to cover, but enough that it could boil- in fact I accidentally boiled mine for a minute) for about 7 mins (long enough for me to fiddle with figuring out what I wanted to put in the crockpot and put it in)
2. mix together in crock pot the rest of the ingredients
3. add in sausages and make sure they are coated
4. cook on low 4-6 hours, my crock pot seems to cook hotter than most so I will cook mine on low for about 4 hours
5. Serve on Hot dog or Hoagie buns

I'm thinking (and thought while I was adding it) that I added too much broth... so you really can't use the mixture as a "sauce" on your sandwiches, so maybe a little less broth would be better... I didn't take pictures, but the family seemed to like it! Will definitely try again :-)