recipe of the week - chili

i've been looking for a good chili recipe for years.  Mom made great chili, but i don't know whatever happened to her recipe...i sure don't have it.  But, this is a good basic chili recipe i found this year that i think i'm going to stick to for awhile!  Enjoy!

2 medium onions, chopped
1 medium green pepper, chopped
1/2 cup chopped celery
1 tbsp vegetable oil
2 lbs ground beef
2 cans (28 ounces each) diced tomatoes, undrained
1 can (8 ounces) tomato sauce
1 cup water
2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 to 2 tbsp chili powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
2 cans (16 ounces each) kidney beans, rinsed and drained

In a soup kettle or Dutch oven, saute onions, green pepper and celery in oil until tender, about 5 minutes.  Add beef and cook until browned; drain.  Stir in tomatoes, tomato sauce, water, Worcestershire sauce and seasonings.  Bring to a boil; reduce heat.  Cover and simmer for 1-1/2 hours, stirring occasionally.  Add kidney beans.  Simmer, uncovered, 10 minutes longer.  Yields 10-12 servings.

*i did mine a little differently.  i sauteed the onions, pepper and celery in a separate pan.  It was easier to drain the fat from the beef that way, then i mixed them all together.

*i like to top off my bowl of chili with some cheese and a dollop of sour cream :)

thought for the day

Today, i am in a funk.  Actually, it started last night but it's still here.  There are several reasons that i am in a funk...i know this...and i don't like it but that is the hand i have been dealt this week.  Ah, well.

One, this weather really affects me. i am tired of all of these cloudy days.  Where is the sunshine?  yes, we have had a few nice days of springlike weather recently and that, i think, did more damage more than good.  It was just a tease of how i want the weather to be.  Now, we're back to overcast and cloudy and it really affects my mood.

Two, this week is the anniversary of Mom's death.  i always know it is coming and it always affects me differently.  i'm trying not to get depressed about it, but for some reason this year, i am. Maybe it is because i turned 40 this year and that is the age when things started to go downhill for Mom.  Maybe it is the fear that i will be following in her footsteps and i still have so many things left to do on my bucket list.  i don't know.  i do know that i miss her and some days are just harder than others.

Third, school is stressing me out.  i enjoy it, don't doubt that.  It is a wonderful environment and my professors are great.  i am just having a harder time with classes this semester.  Things are not clicking for me like they did last year.  Math based classes are a different kind of thinking that i have not had to do for a long time and i just have not caught up yet.  And i am so bad about procrastinating that i get behind so easily.  i really do need to work on that because it will make things go more smoothly in the long run.

And i have a few more personal issues to work thru that seem to rear their ugly heads when i get depressed and in a funk.  i know that i just have to suck it up and change things and get things done.  It will be a huge burden lifted if/when i do that.  And after 40 years, i think i deserve to treat myself to some happiness.  Happiness is so much easier to obtain than i let it be.  i am tired of making things so difficult.  Period.

Cheers

thought for the day

i'm just not a spur of the moment kind of person.  i wish i was.  Mainly i wish i was because i keep forgetting that i'm not and then i get disappointed when i try to do things spontaneously and they don't work out.  i just do better when things are planned out in advance.  Yes, that's more boring, but that is the hand life has dealt me.

i sometimes wonder when i stopped doing things like that.  Just calling someone up and doing something. Or having someone call me and doing something.  It just doesn't happen really anymore.  i think once i had to start paying bills on my own, that carefree part of me, what little there was, just disappeared.  i do miss taking impromptu trips, or just going to see a movie or have dinner, just because it was something to do.  Oh well LOL

Recipe of the week - Cherry salad (gelatin)

Congealed salads were definitely a staple at our dinner table growing up.  Especially Sunday lunches after church.  Aunt Sara would bring one every time she came to have lunch at Grandmother's house.  She had a specific basket that she carried it in and it sat in the foot of the passenger side front seat of her car on her short trip from Wingate to Monroe.  Every time.  They were always delicious.  i have several of her recipes for congealed salads and i love them.  This recipe, though, Mom got from a dear family friend, Bobbi Yandle, who worked with Mom and lived just a few houses down from us.  It's a very pretty salad and looks good on any table...especially at Christmas :)  i don't make them as often as i use to because, frankly, Michael does not care for them so i wait until we have company over before i make one.  Otherwise, i would end up eating the entire thing by myself...which i have no trouble doing :)  Enjoy!

2 3oz packages of cherry jello
2 cups boiling water
1 can of cherry pie filling
1 20oz can of crushed pineapple, drained
1 cup chopped nuts

Dissolve jello in boiling water and cool.  Add pie filling, nuts and pineapple.  Stir once the gelatin begins to mound to evenly distribute the fruit.  Chill until ready to serve.

thought for the day

As the sun comes up on this third day of February, i find myself just ok LOL  i am just not as excited about school this semester as i was last semester.  i know that part of it is that the newness of it all has worn off.  But, also the classes i am taking this semester seem to be more complicated and that is making it tougher for me.  It is really going to be a test of my management skills to get through it all.  i know i can do it, i just do not feel very motivated at this time!  So, i have to get myself motivated.

Some days i think that i should lean on my acting training.  Hell, i should at least benefit from all of the learning i did back in the day.  Maybe i just need to play a character that is excited about school.  Do my packing (John Gulley term) and figure out what kind of person i want to play.  If i do it enough, maybe it will start to sink in and infuse those characteristics into my daily life.  Who knows, but at least it is worth a shot.

i will get there, one way or another.  i just have to accept the frustrations i am dealing with and make sure that i also give myself time.  Looking at the big picture helps.  i have a goal, now i must obtain it.  In the past, i have been so bad about giving up half way through something...a repeated pattern in my life....that it is time for me to finally break this pattern.  i have obligations and promises to keep.  i know i can do this.

Time to get excited now!

Cheers!

thought for the day

This year, i am trying to do more writing.  So far, i am on my way to achieving my goal.  Last month, i managed to squeeze out about 13 blog entries.  That may not sound like a lot, but it is already more than a quarter of what i wrote in 2014.  It is good for me to just force myself to sit down and write whatever i am feeling.  Sometimes, i am inspired and have a topic or issue i want to talk about.  Sometimes not, and i just try to fill the space.  Granted, those entries are not very exciting, but it is good practice for me!

Also, i have been doing more letter writing.  i wrote about twelve letters and cards last month.  Which, compared to the two or three i got out the year before, is pretty damn extraordinary.  i still think it is a nicer way to communicate.  There is just something about going to the mail box and getting something that isn't a bill or junk mail.  Something that someone has taken the time to handwrite and let you know that you have been on their mind.  i know these have been appreciated, because i have seen posts about them on Facebook.  i have not yet received a reply to any of my letters, but it is still early in the process and i am not discouraged.  Either way, it is not going to keep me from writing!

Well, it is time to get myself ready for class.  Can't wait to make the walk to school on this rainy, cloudy morning. And i have to stop by the post office box around the corner and drop off a few letters!

Cheers!

thought for the day

And now February is here.  Where did January go?  It seems like just yesterday it was Christmas!  Time really does fly the older i get, it seems.  And since the older i get, the more i come to accept how precious time truly is...i hate that it goes by so quickly.

This time of year, with the anniversary of Mom's passing coming up, i tend to think more about time...about my time...about how i spend my time.  Sometimes i regret the way the i spend my time currently.  i know i definitely regret some of the ways i have spent my time in the past, but there is no need to dwell on that now as i cannot change it.  But currently, sometimes i think to myself "Why do i spend all this time doing homework, trying to clean the house....daily things like that, when i could be doing something fun?"  The truth is, those things are fun to me...at least as an adult...but just fun in a different way.  i find an odd sense of accomplishment in those few moments when i feel like i have balanced the different areas of my life.  It doesn't happen often, but i relish in it when it does!

Now, on the other hand, i am ready to use my time in some other ways.  i am ready for some new discoveries, some new experiences.  i have realized lately that i am at a point in life where things are comfortable.  There is totally nothing wrong with being comfortable.  But, to me, being comfortable all of the time means that nothing is changing.  There is nothing new in my life.  That is not the depressing statement that it sounds like though.  i love my life.  i am just ready to add to it.  i definitely have my daily, weekly, monthly routines...but it is time to make room for something new to enhance my life.  i will not get a second chance at this life so i need to make the most of it. 

Cheers