Oops, I did it again.

http://diariesofascatterbrain.blogspot.com/

Crockpot Potato Soup {mmmmm good}

You know you want some of this.  Just don't tell anyone that you threw a bunch of cans together.  You made it from SCRATCH, ok?


7ish medium potatoes, peeled and cubed (my least favorite part of this soup.  peeling all of these suckers)
2 onions - diced (I don't do onions so I just sprinkle in some of those onion flakes.  it works.)
2 cans chicken broth
1 can cream of celery soup
1 cup water
2 medium carrots, chopped
1 can evaporated milk

Combine all ingredients except for milk in slow cooker.  Leave cooking on low for 9-10 hours, until veggies are tender.  About an hour before serving, stir in milk.  Let heat thru and serve.

Seriously??

O.M.G.

This has been the week from HELL.

First, I sprained my foot over the weekend and have been hobbling around - but really that's been the least of my worries.

Justin had a procedure called a Discogram done on Tuesday.  Long story short, he has chronic back pain and has tried about everything over the years.  Epidurals, cortisone shots, hydrocodine(?), morphine pills - none of it touches it.  So, he's been going to some pain specialists the last few months trying to see if they could figure out something to do.  No one can seem to find out the exact cause of the pain.  He has degenerative spine disease or something (you know it's bad when every doc that sees his MRIs tells him he's got the back of a 70 year old man...) which is like an arthritic thing... he has a bulging disc.  But because of the degenerative spine whatever they can't do surgery on the disc - there's no good vertebra to attach anything to in that area.

Now everything I just typed up there may be totally inaccurate.  He's seen so many specialists at this point I'm lost.

So back to the story - I've seen him in pain many times.  He's a tough dude, and he doesn't complain much.  Tuesday after we got home from the test, he progressively got worse all day.  It was taking him FOREVER to move small movements.  I have never seen him like that.  Never.  I've taken care of this man after brain surgery and having his ACL on BOTH legs repaired.  This was BAD.  He was groaning in his sleep, so at 2 AM I got up and paged his dr.  The dr. who told us nothing about this even being a possible side effect.

I'm going to avoid talking about that dr. so I don't cuss.

At 3 am he was in so much pain he could barely lift himself out of bed.  He said he was going to take a hot shower to let the water run on his back.  I said HELL NO you aren't - because if you can hardly make it to the shower, what am I going to do with your 6' 6" ass when you can't get OUT of the shower.  So I instructed him to put shoes on and called my parents.  I started packing up sleepy, grumpy children in the car.  It took him 20 minutes to get to the car from our bedroom. 

At the ER they drugged him up hardcore and he slept.  He even slept through the MRI they did to make sure there wasn't a bleed.  Hard core IV drugs and 7 hours of sleep later they released us with another Rx and he is now MUCH better.

Seeing someone you love hurt like that really SUCKS.  The scary part of not being able to help them sucks.  I was super proud that my normally anxious-self held it together so the kids were not scared at all.  They were just excited to go to their grandparents - I'm not sure they even realized the whole reason WHY.

On a less terrible note, my long haired cat had digestive issues today - and the resulting bath I had to give her left me scarred for life.  I will be bleaching, lysoling, scrubbing bubbles then bleaching AGAIN that bathtub before any of my children go into it.  Then I took the hottest shower of my life.  It was just wrong on so many levels, and once her fur dries I will be cutting it so I don't have to experience again.  Aren't you glad I shared this with you?

So TGIF.  We're going to try to get out tonight and go to a live nativity.  Tomorrow we are going to go see Buddy the Dinosaur (!!!) from dinosaur train.  We feel like old people, and hope we hold up for the rest of December without any more visits to Urgent Care or the ER - but we won't count on it.  Especially since I just said that, I'm sure I just jinxed it on many levels.

*Sigh*

Hope your week was MUCH better, and I'm already anticipating a much better week NEXT week ;)

xo
amy

Handmade is better.

Oh my word we're already almost through the 7th day of December.  ACK.

I had glorious plans to make all kinds of homemade gifts and so far I've made a big fat zero.

Well, technically I made one, but I couldn't stand waiting to give it to her.  I gave it to her at lunch last week...

I have ALL OF THESE IDEAS swarming through my head and when I get a free second to actually make one of them happen - I go blank.  I'm going to do a link dump.  Then I can come back here and (hopefully) work through my list... and if I don't, maybe you will get some inspiration out of it for yourself.

Ideas for my nieces
I need to go to Harbor Frieght and pick up a metal stamping alphabet so I can make my nieces (and my daughter. maybe my mom.  and mother in law) each one of these:
Washer Necklace

My cousin in Iraq
I need things that ship well for him.
These almonds look easy enough

MOM DONT READ THE RED TEXT.

Ideas for myself (heh.), my mom, my mother in law, my grandma
This clear ornament with a photo in it - I love it so much it hurts.
It would be so awesome to make one every year with the kid's yearly Christmas Card photo to watch them change!!
That same link also has an idea for a dry erase board using vinyl and a $3 plate.  Too.  CUTE. (link to buy the vinyl on etsy here) or if you hurry you can get it on groopdealz for 1/2 price... i ordered 2.

I've already made a few photo necklaces/magnets... I just need to finish them up.

Ideas for teachers
I have a photo clip tutorial I *should* do for you with one of these - lets see if it happens!  It's my mom's idea, and it's really CUTE.

monogrammed soap/hand sanitizer

fabric keychains

I'll keep updating this as I have time... hope you find something useful to you!

it's the most wonderful time of the year

I LOVE CHRISTMAS.

Especially as a mom - seeing Christmas through my kids eyes makes it that much more amazing.  They find joy in every single aspect of it... the trees, the lights, the presents (of course), the movies and tv shows - and to my delight - the traditions.

This year they all three remember what we did in previous years, and want to do it again.  This is so awesome to me, because I am a creature of habit in many ways.  (Except when it comes to blogs, which I regret to tell you I am dying to change the name of mine again.  I'm trying to resist.  Trying very hard.)

I love shopping for bargins, and that is fun for me this time of year, too.  For instance, look what I just got for a lovely 25% off AND free shipping:

They are from the Children's Place- they're listed as monster slippers but give me a break.  Those are totally dinosaur feet.

I'm also working along on an advent calendar with Homemade by Jill and I'm not sure if I'll EVER finish, let alone on time.  I have all of my little pockets embroidered.  I'm going to try to at least get a few ornaments done and see if I can keep up with the kids... 

I'll take photos when I get it hung.  Maybe. ;)

Amy's Creamy Wild Rice Crockpot Soup...

I wanted to try a recipe - and when I went to the bookmark it wouldn't pull up.  I searched the internet and found so many different versions of creamy wild rice soup that I decided to combine ingredients and try my own version.

I'm proud of how yummy it is.
The goods:

1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can cream of celery soup
2 cups chicken broth
1 cup water
1 can chicken breast chunks, rinsed and drained
2 boxes rice-a-roni wild rice (including seasoning packets in the box)
2 cups chopped carrots
1 can evaporated milk

Mix everything but the evaporated milk in the crockpot.  Set on low and allow to cook for about 6 hours.  Stir in the evaporated milk, let warm another 30 or so minutes.  Serve and eat your face off.

If it winds up being not soupy enough for you after adding the evaporated milk, add a little more water to your desired consistancy.

Spinach Artichoke Dip - in the crockpot!

This is my friend Adrianne's recipe - and it's awesome.

While preparing the other ingredients, melt 1/2 a stick of butter in the crockpot.  I usually add dry onions and let them soften in the butter - you could show me up and actually chop onions if you're like that.

The rest of the ingredients - just toss them in and walk away for 2 hours or so!

1 cup shredded mozzarella
1 8-oz package of cream cheese, cubed
1/4 cup parmesan  cheese
1 minced clove of garlic
1/4 tsp ground pepper
1 can (14 oz) artichokes - drained, rinsed and chopped finely
1 pkg frozen spinach - thawed, rinsed and drained

Serve with chips and don't think about the calories you're consuming.  :)

What's going on...

Still here.  Juggling three kids and life :)  Still doing projects when I can squeeze them in.  Still not having the energy to photograph them. 

I have tentatively opened an etsy shop.  I've been told that it takes a very long time to get a shop going, so advice given to me has been to just post a few items and gradually increase as things sell.  That way you're not paying listing fees on a whole slew of items that expire and have to be reposted. 

Here it is, but there's way more stuff I'd like to add.  I'm kind of testing the waters with some stuff that made it home with me from the craft sale.

Squishy

I'll put a widget in the side bar as well. 

I'm going to attempt a quilt.  I always thought quilts were such an old lady thing - my great grandmother made some BEAUTIFUL ones that I loved snuggling up under as a kid... so I associated her with them.  And quilting bees and all the other cute/quaint things that I have now come to appreciate.  I sure wish I was living in "simpler" times like they were.

Here's the tutorial I'm going to use - but - I'm going to make it larger.

Quilting Made Simple

Basting tips I'm going to need

Binding tips unless I find someone who will do it for me...

If you haven't heard, the price of raw cotton has skyrocketed.  I'm curious how much that is going to make fabric go up.  One can only assume quite a lot - and I am not sure how much of my stash I want to mess up if this quilt goes wrong.  Ha ;)  So, if I start hoarding fabric - please call A&E on me, ok?

xoxo

{show & tell} poppy dress

I just ordered this for Miss Thang.

I love it.  It's for next summer, and I'm going to die waiting for her to get to wear it.

Because I love you...

Please.  Listen to me.

In all of my diaper changing years I have only washed one diaper.  It was one of the ladybug's - and it didn't even fall apart.  After that I got really careful about watching what went into the washer.

I've never washed a pull up until today.

The Moo is basically potty trained.  At night we still put him in a Pull Up.  He sleeps in our bed 99.9% of the time and I prefer waking up dry.  His routine in the morning is to take his (usually) dry Pull Up off and stick it in the trash.

Yesterday we went to the zoo, and I decided to be lazy and put him in a Pull Up.  He's not tall enough to stand to go, and those bathrooms are nasty.  I was hoping he'd just take the opportunity to go in his Pull Up and I could change him if he had one on.

Quit judging me.  I am telling you - the bathrooms are nasty.  He still told me everytime he had to go, so it was a moot point. 

After his bath last night, I scooped up his clothes and threw them in a basket with a load I was going to wash.  Usually, there would be underwear in his pants.  This time there was a dry Pull Up - which means it added no weight to the pants - which means I didn't notice it.

Fast forward to me removing the load and finding little balls of gel EVERYWHERE.  I don't know how all of that fit inside that Pull Up to begin with.  Holy crap.  I don't even know where to start to clean it up.  Which is why I'm sitting here avoiding it.  If I can save you from going through this same thing, please let me.

Never.  Ever.  Wash a Pull Up.