Chicken Enchilada

  Chicken Enchiladas:

Baking Dish- 13 x 11

Chicken - I used about 3/4 lb boneless skinless breast
Tortillas
Enchilada Sauce (I use red)
Monterey Jack Cheese
Cumin
Salt
Pepper
Garlic Powder
Ortega Taco Sauce (This is optional) 


                      PreHeat Oven to 350 -


                      Cube the chicken 


                      Cook over medium heat until no longer pink. 


                     Season with cumin, garlic powder, a few pinches of salt and pepper, and approx 1/4 cup of Taco Sauce (I don't      measure spices.. everyone's tastes are different, season to your family's taste level) 


                       Cook on low for an additional few minutes. 


                        Spoon mixture into tortilla shells and roll.  (You can also add cheese in the shell and roll for extra cheesiness)


                        Place seam side down on the pan


                        Pour enchilada sauce generously to coat


                       Cover with cheese generously


                       Place aluminum foil over baking dish


                       Bake approx 20-25 minutes until cheese is bubbly


                       Let stand a few minutes to cool


                      Serve with your choice of toppings. We use sour cream, and my husband adds some hot pepper flakes to taste






This is a family favorite of ours that is so simple to make. They sell kits to make this, but the sodium is so much higher, and they include MSG. Once you learn to season to your taste, you'll never want to buy a taco kit again! 

Monkey Wrench in the Plans

So, David wasn't able to ship out this time. This changed my entire food list. I've had to go back and re-work everything. So, here's my first week plan. Things are a little crazy with a tight budget, and I've got a fussy toddler who only eats certain things now, so there isn't a large variety, especially with breakfast and lunch. This will change over the next few weeks. I like to think of this as an evolving work in progress. These are some really simple dishes, making my oven work over time this week. None of these involve anything special or complicated. Next week, when things settle down I'm planning on putting a few of my favorites, such as homemade baked potato soup. This is also really simple, and sooo much better than from a can, so please check me out again next week.

Some tips for making your own food plan:

1. Start on the day you go shopping. I shop on Wednesdays or Thursdays, so my list will always start there.
2. Use the freshest food first. This applies to meats AND veggies. My chicken and beef dishes are in the beginning of the week, and my fish toward the end, as I'm using a frozen variety this week. For the veggies, I use the salad first, then my root veggies, before going to the frozen veggies at the end of the week.
3. Give yourself a no cooking day. Mine is Friday this week. Cereal for breakfast, Peanut Butter and Jelly for lunch, and then ordering out for dinner. Mom's work 24/7, I like having a day out of the kitchen once and awhile.
4. Waffles are my quick go to for a hot breakfast for mornings after I've been up doing homework late (or watching Grey's Anatomy, hence Friday being no cooking day!)
5. Normally I don't do so many pre-made lunch meals in a row, but its been a crazy few weeks, and sometimes we just need a break!
6. When you put something on the list, you can type out a shopping list at the same time. Mine are usually on the same spreadsheet.
7. If you want to save paper and ink, you can skip printing it, and keep your food list in a folder or save it as your background picture.
8. If you run out of ideas, breakfast for dinner is ALWAYS a hit!

Here's a quick idea of how I do mine without further ado.

Any questions or suggestions please email me at Melissa.Brook@hotmail.com

If anyone wants the recipes for how I prepare things please feel free to email me! Eventually I'll work up to adding them all on here as a database sort of thing. (For examples, my pop tarts are homemade, and easily done! as are my mashed potatoes, and baked carrots. 

Getting Ready To be a Married Single Parent.

I know I haven't been updating this as much as I should, but since my husband is leaving in 6 DAYS, I'll have a lot more time...

So, now I'm in the process of getting everything ready for him to leave. My first order of business was making a playroom. Since I only have a two bedroom apartment, how did I accomplish that? I moved K's "big boy" bed into our bedroom. This solves plenty of dilemmas for me. The first one is that I'm a hard sleeper, and I'm worried about K getting out of the apartment when I'm sleeping. The second dilemma that this solved was how to put two kids to bed at the same time. Since I still co-sleep with P, I lay with her in our bed until she falls asleep. We can all snuggle up together and read our good-night books until its lights out time. K can hop over to his bed and know I'm still in the room with him while he's falling asleep.

The playroom now holds their clothing, toys, and diapers. I have a small plastic table and chair set that should be here today(!). We can spend most of the day in there, and if I let them, they can even eat in there. I'm not sure about that quite yet..

I'm working on finalizing my weekly meal plan, and it should be done by this weekend. One of the cool things I added to my meal plan, is a shopping list on the next page of my spread sheet. When I add a meal to my planner, I can just scroll down and add the ingredients I need to buy during my weekly shopping trip. Right now I have my meal plan set up for Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner; I'm thinking of making one that includes snacks too, but I'm not sure yet.

Right now in my notebook, I have a master list of things I like to cook organized by main ingredient, (Chicken, Beef, Pork, Pasta, Egg.. etc) So I can go through my list and plug things in there depending on what's on sale, and make sure I still vary their diet. While my cooking isn't the healthiest yet, I like to think of it as a work in progress. Every day I'm finding new recipes to add to my collection, and new healthier options. I anticipate by the time David comes home, I'll have added an entire new diet to our list!

I look forward to seeing where this adventure takes my family!

5 Weeks and Counting...

So today marks 5 weeks until David leaves for Basic Training. We have a million things to do in the mean time, and one of them on the schedule is potty training.

We've prepared with Gerber Training Pants, and a training ring

I've been doing my best to get Kep excited for potty training. I really hope he'll do well with it. We're planning on starting Thursday or Friday depending on which days he goes to school this week.

What we've done so far:

Purchased- Seat, training pants

Talked about - Potties, What happens with potties, flushing toilets, washing hands, BIG BOY underpants!, and saying "Bye bye diapers!"

Wish us luck!

Co-Sleeping

There is a pile of babies in my bed. Well, a baby and a toddler. They're spread out and so comfortable that I don't even have room to get into bed. My 1 year old daughter is snuggled up to my husband. She's right under his arm, where she's slept since she was 2 weeks old. My son is spread across his feet, he slept in a crib until he was 15 months old, and then decided to join us in bed. This is an issue that will cause debate and arguments. Luckily, we had a doctor who believed in co-sleeping. As long as its done as safe as possible. No comforters at night, one pillow each, using the "H" position. Now that she's over a year, we feel more comfortable with a comforter and pillows. 

They're restless some nights, other nights they sleep soundly. I find myself waking up in a pile of the ones I love, cherishing ever moment of this. When they're older they'll sleep in their own beds (which are more just a decoration at the moment) and I'll miss these days. Its such a gift to have them snuggled so closely, knowing how wonderful it must be for them to feel that safe. 

There are nights they drive me crazy. There are nights I fantasize about them sleeping in their own beds. But for the  most part, I love this and wish these days would stop going by so quickly...