At Home My Way

There is a very special someone in my life who is sick.  He is very, very sick and we are praying for God to give him hope, strength, AND healing.  What he needs is a miracle and each night I pray and have faith that God does grant miracles.  The special someone in my life is a doctor.  He gives sight to the blind.  He is a father, a husband, a son, a brother, a brother-in-law, son-in-law, friend and mentor.  He is valiantly fighting to live and is teaching us much about strength, perseverance, and love. When someone you care about is sick, you want to help.  You want to help the sick person feel better and also try to provide some comfort and lessen the workload on the person's family.  I love making homemade meals and since cooking is something I can do, I wanted to make a meal for my special someone and his family. To me, first and foremost, I wanted to make something that they all loved.  It's easy to whip up a tuna casserole but...

This is one of five apples that  I grew on my little apple tree this year!  Woo-hoo! This dip and I go WAY BACK.  I cannot remember when I first started making it.  It is delicious  and is the perfect summer BBQ potluck dish or addition to any holiday dinner.  I even make it as a little special something to serve with lunch.  I serve it with almost any fresh fruit, but our favorites are apples, strawberries, and grapes.  One day last week, I even brought the marshmallow fluff and cream cheese to work with me.  By lunch, the cream cheese was soft and I stirred it all together for a treat to go with my apple.  I've kept it in the fridge at work eating a little bit each day.  It would also be perfect for sending to school in a lunchbox! I remember that I helped my aunt prepare food for my cousin's wedding many "moons ago" and we bought big blocks of cream cheese from Sam's (as big as blocks of Velveeta) and made tons of th...

This past weekend I made tacos, Mexican Slaw , homemade refried beans from the freezer (recipe coming soon), and this recipe for Homemade Mexican Rice. I grew up eating something my mother called "Spanish Rice."  I don't honestly know how she made it.  I know she would never have made anything from a box, but it could have just been rice, tomatoes, and chili powder for all I know LOL.  We loved it but I don't know how she made it.  She rarely used a recipe. I found this recipe at Lynn's Cooking Adventures .  She always has the BEST recipes and they are always dependable.  Since my girls both like Mexican Rice, I wanted to find something I could make at home without buying one of those "little boxes".  We ditched the box and haven't looked back.  I actually prefer using canned chicken broth when I make this.  I'm not sure why that is.  My homemade chicken broth/stock is just very concentrated and I like a more tomato-y/smokey rice...

We have some friends who have an annual Firework Frenzy each year around July 4th.  It's a great chance to visit with my husband's friends from high school.  They gather together and enjoy each other's company more than just about any high school class I have ever heard about. In addition to old classmates, the party is filled with family, friends, friends of friends, work friends, and LOTS of delicious food!  This much anticipated party offers the best side dishes you will ever find.  What a bunch of great cooks!  Our friends have it down to a science!  They set up big tables labeled "desserts" and "sides" so that you know immediately where to put your dish.  Love that idea! I go to this party excited to see my friends, excited to try the food, and we ALWAYS bring home lots of good memories and at least one recipe that we can't get enough of.  This recipe for Mexican Coleslaw was THAT RECIPE this year.  I love the combination of blac...

I wanted to post the recipe and directions for this casserole, which I have posted before (it included instructions for using real potatoes) and this time include the instructions for using instant mashed potatoes.  Sometimes I just roll like that and for some reason my husband will eat leftover instant mashed potatoes better than he will eat leftover real mashed potatoes (really, he won't eat real leftover mashed potatoes at all).  If we intend to eat this casserole leftover, then I only use instant.  It's pretty easy to mix up and get into the oven.  I'm betting you could even make an extra for the freezer for reheating on busy days but I haven't tried that just yet so I'll let you know. This casserole is really super delicious!  We served it with BBQ chicken. YUM!  I also think it would make a great potluck dish and would reheat in the microwave if you use a micro-proof dish for those carry-ins when you just don't know what to make and are tired of...

My daughter and her boyfriend came home from college this weekend.  We've had a great visit and it is so good having a few more mouths to feed.  We were perusing the grocery store yesterday and Rachel and her boyfriend were admiring the raisin bread in the bread aisle.  I told them not to get it, so I could try making some.  I've been wanting to try making homemade raisin bread for quite some time.  I love toast made with raisin bread.  I have a special love of food and farm blogs and lately I've been loving a blog called Chickens in the Road .  Suzanne has a post on raisin bread and her picture of raisin toast just made me CRAVE it.  Suzanne's post is found HERE .  I used my own sandwich bread recipe, added one egg, a half of a cup of raisins and one teaspoon of cinnamon to the liquid ingredients in my bread recipe.  I used my bread machine for the dough but you could do it by hand just as well.  It turn...

Each winter I sit around looking at farm/gardening magazines, newspapers, and reading blogs dreaming about canning and gardening. Oh the things I will do!  Then, as summer arrives, life gets busy. I work all day coming home dead beat and my stuff just sits in the garden or on my counter, waiting for me.  Eventually it gets to the compost pile and I get no canning done!  Then, winter comes again and I think, "Next year!"   It occurred to me the other day while reading one of my favorite blogs ( Hickery Holler Farm Blog ) that most people who work on canning projects are working on it when they are also dead tired, that typically days aren't set aside for these projects but they are fit into already busy days.  Families work together to get the summer's bounty preserved at the end of already long days.  The fact is, that I am NO DIFFERENT THAN ANYONE ELSE!  I'm tired and I still have stuff to do!  There are never enough hours in the day for me...