Gosh! I can't believe it's been so long since I've posted anything. I can be lazy sometimes LOL. Well,alot has been going on since my last post. We have a new addition to the family. We had been talking a while about getting TinkerBelle a little friend,but I really didn't think seriously about it. I didn't think that I could handle more than one dog PLUS everything else around the house and our homeschooling. Having a new puppy is very much like having a new baby...One Sunday,the husband just up and said "do you want to get another dog or not?". Talk about out of the blue! I said "I guess so.". We tried to find the phone number to the lady that we got TinkerBelle from,but couldn't find her in the phone book or online. I checked the CKC website and found a list of people who had MinPin pups. We hopped in the truck and drove to CARTHAGE,MS-an hour and a half drive from where we live. We found a sweet,little girl MinPin and of course we brought her home. I had a name picked out in advance-I wanted something that either rhymed or fit well with TinkerBelle. JezzaBelle is almost 4 months old and is probably close to 5pounds now.Our vet says she probably won't get bigger than about 8pounds. At first,the husband laughed that I wanted to name her JezzaBelle,but has come to realize that it fits her perfectly. She's a sassy,little thing. I told him that if you're,little you have to have a little spice and spunk! TinkerBelle spent the first couple of days hiding from her under the bed. They still have their spats,but they are getting along better every day. TinkerBelle has started playing and running around more. Jezzie has helped to bring back her puppy spirit,I guess. Jezzie is a little "mama's baby". She loves to sit or sleep in my lap. The husband was holding her the other day and I went out to run errands. He said that as soon as she heard the front door shut,she went to howling and crying like he's never heard! I guess she's spoiled-just a little bit.
We also started a new year of homeschooling,so I am going to be busy with that.

Miss JezzaBelle on our ride home

Jezzie and Tinkie getting to know each other

JezzaBelle

My newest obsession....

Iced Coffees........................

Mocha Nut Fudge K-Cup

Mocha Coconut K-Cup

Mudslide K-Cup

I have some coffee I picked up to try Pioneer Woman's recipe but just haven't done it yet. I'm enjoying my K-cups too much right now,but will definately try it soon and report back to everyone.

a little something sweet.......

When you're eating healthy,sometimes it can be hard to satisfy that sweet tooth. These brownies are both low fat and low sugar--a win win in my book! Instead of making the brownies totally from scratch,I used a sugar free cake mix. I made a double batch so I could stash some in the freezer and pull out when I'm having a chocolate attack.


Low Fat Brownies (Dr OZ)
Ingredients
1 cup flour
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup 1% milk
1 egg white, slightly beaten
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp powdered sugar

Directions
Pre-heat oven to 350°F. Lightly coat pan with cooking spray; set aside.

In large bowl, sift together flour, cocoa, salt, baking powder, baking soda and cinnamon; set aside.

In medium bowl, beat the sugar, brown sugar, milk, egg white, applesauce and vanilla with a spoon until well combined. Stir wet mixture into dry mixture, mixing just until moistened.

Spread evenly in prepared pan. Bake 22 to 23 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool on wire rack. Dust with powdered sugar.

Eating Healthier......

I've been on my husband for YEARS about eating healthier and exercising more. Ever since we got back from visiting his "long lost" family,I've started to see a few changes in him. He has drasticly cut back on how much sugary sodas he drinks. Instead of the usual case of regular sized cans or the tall bottles of soda,I have been buying the mini-size bottles. Usually where he could easily go through a case or more a week,he's still working on the pack I bought him 2 weeks ago. He's been drinking water and "diet" citrus green tea. I found a green tea blend that I can make iced tea with and I've been drinking more of that. I've also been eating less bread--I prefer wraps anyway and always go for the healthiest ones-low carb/no fat. He has been eating more whole wheat/whole grain bread whenever he has his fave pbj sandwiches. His sister's family for the most part eats very healthy meals. While we were there she made a pasta dish using whole wheat (dreamfield's) pasta. Now whenever I'd make something with whole wheat pasta,he would complain about having to eat it. I've made 3 pasta dishes in the past few weeks,and he hasn't said ONE WORD about it. That is until last night,he commented on the last spaghetti I made for him. He said "you know,that whole wheat pasta isn't that bad"! Yeah,I know,honey,it's not. LOL We have eaten more fish too. Usually,the fish here isn't all that good--at least most of the frozen ones that I've tried. I don't think it's the same brand that his sister uses at their fish market,but I am pretty sure it's the same "cut". We've been having TILAPIA at least twice a week. Before,we would have salmon or fancy fish sticks maybe once a month or so. Now I crave fish. I even made a shrimp boil last Friday,and aside from it being too HOT,it was fabulous! I am definately going to try that again--this time without so much spice! He went to the E/R over the weekend for an eye infection and they weighed him and he was 201. He went to his regular dr today for a follow-up about the infection, and he's down another 3 pounds. I did a cleanse last week and am this week starting a diet. Not really a DIET per say,but I am starting to consciously make better food and drink choices. Hopefully,I will begin to see a change, too. I hope to get us all into the routine of getting up early and walking the dog around the neighborhood. I know all of us could use the extra exercise. It's funny how meeting his family and finding a part of his life that he didn't really know was missing has caused these changes in him. It's not like he was sitting around moping or lamenting the situation,but he mentioned to me that he feels different since this whole thing has come about. It's amazing that even though my husband and his sister grew up very differently--they have similar personalities. He told me that he can't understand it-that even though they have only known each other a few weeks,that it feels like they have known each other FOREVER. I'm so glad it's worked out this way.I'm glad that he's finally taking a look at his health and hopefully these good changes will become new habits. The only other thing I wish he would try and STOP for his health is the tobacco-he's a "dipper". It really grosses my son out that he does it and he is really on him to stop it. (remember those REJECT ALL TOBACCO commercials--RAT!) I told him that it's something that his dad has to want to do. The last time I picked it up for him,I picked up some mint tobacco and mint "packets" that are supposed to help him stop. I hope he gets the hint.

Kofta with tahinni and jasmin rice with dates




Well,last week,we went to South Carolina to visit my husband's "long lost family". It was an amazing adventure. It still seems surreal. His sister's husband is Egyptian and made some awsome foods for us during our stay. They run a seafood market/restraunt-so needless to say,they can cook! One night during our stay,Waleed cooked KOFTA KEBABS for us. They were delicious! I made them tonight and the husband didn't have any complaints. I hope to learn more about the food culture of Egypt--and try many more delicious dishes.




Kofta Kebabs
ground meat
kosher sea salt
minced garlic
grated onion
ground coriander
ground cumin
ground cinnamon
ground allspice
ground ginger
ground nutmeg
chopped fresh parsley
chopped fresh mint
ground black pepper
**bamboo skewers

mash the salt and garlic into a paste-place the garlic paste into a large bowl-add in your meat and spices--mix well by hand-form into balls-place onto skewer--you can either cook on grill or in the oven.

**I baked ours for convenience.

Jasmin Rice with dates
add chopped dates to the rice as it is cooking-cook on medium/low until all the liquid is gone-serve warm.

Tahini Sauce
Tahini paste
honey
salt
minced garlic mashed into a paste with salt
lemon juice
HOT water

Add equal parts of tahini paste with hot water and stir until smooth--add in the salt,garlic,lemon juice,and honey--may have to add more or less salt depending on your tastes (I didn't measure-I just added until we liked it)--stir until smooth--when satisfied with the taste,squeeze a little lemon juice on top and sprinkle a little cumin on top for presentation also.

The tahini sauce was served over both the rice and the kofta. I'm going to have to play around with my tahini sauce recipe. It was my first time making it at home,and it was good but I'm not satisfied.

My husband and son with my husband's mother Sallie

Supper Sandwiches.......

Sometimes we all need something quick and easy to make for supper. While I was at the allergy clinic getting my shots this week,I flipped through a few magazines and found THIS sandwich recipe. I used "texas toast" bread and a mix of turkey and honey ham with gouda cheese. It turned out fabulous.It's definately a keeper recipe.I made these for a late lunch yesterday. My husband ate 1/2 with his lunch and then took the other whole sandwich that was leftover to work with him. This is a recipe that you can really customize to your family's different tastes. You can easily use your fave deli meats or use different cheeses.

After almost 11 years of marriage--I have a Mother-in-law......

Mom,Sallie.......

"Little" sister Robin... Now that it's happened and turned out well,I can talk about it. I won't go into all the gory details,but to make a long story short,my husband's parents divorced when he was about 2. He grew up thinking that his dad's other wife was his mother. He found out the truth at about 17 or 18 years old. The story he was told was that she "didn't want him". You can imagine how that hit him and played with his mind/psyche. He had a rough time for a while and even when we met he still had the idea in his head that every woman he got close to would "leave him". Lucky for him I'm stubborn. And I loved him--he still can make that difficult sometimes. About 5 years ago I started digging into my family's family tree on ancestry.com. I was helping a neice find information on someone in our tree that she had been stumped with for a while. If any of my readers has ever worked in genealogy,you know what I mean. Sometimes the information trail just hits a dead end. So every now and then,I would put in what little info I had on my husband's side of the family. It was slow going for a while and neither one of us was sure we had the right people. Now,Fast-Forward to last year. His mom calls out of the blue. It was a shock to say the least and he wasn't ready to deal with her or the past,so he didn't talk to her. I wrote the number down knowing that sooner or later he would be curious,but I lost it. Fast-Forward again to a few months ago,I was talking with a good girlfriend and she brought it up that maybe she was calling because she was sick or dying and was trying to make amends. I seriously started looking for her then. I tried several different phone number finder/people finder sites. Let me tell you,you never really know how many people out there have the same name till you go looking for one of them. It's worse than that needle in a haystack. We didn't know exactly what last name to look for.We just had her maiden name,a little info on her family,and where she was born. Fast-Forward again to a few weeks ago,he finally told me that he wanted me to find his mom for him and to find out if he had any brothers or sisters-and see if she would "come clean" and say why she left him. I was so excited that he was ready to deal with these issues. I really got busy. I'm not sure what made me think of this now,but I thought about the obituaries. Now for someone reasearching family history old newspaper archives and online data collections can be your best friend. I can't tell you how many hours I spent scrolling through old South Carolina newspapers looking for any familiar names. That can be frustrating too. I happened upon an obit from when one of her father's sister-in-laws had died. It of course listed the info about her but it also listed the surviving relatives. I went through each name and tried the online search resources again. I found one of the lady's granddaughters and I found an address and phone number. I'm not big on telephone calls so first I checked to see if she had a FACEBOOK account. Doesn't everyone? Bingo-she did. I "stalked" her down and sent her a text asking if I had the right family and if she had ever heard of this "missing" family member. It was the right family,but she hadn't heard of the relative.She said she would get back to me after she had talked to her dad. OK. I was excited. I got a little impatient waiting so I went to another obit from her mother's side of the family. This time I couldn't find a facebook account that matched any of the names. I tried the name of an aunt in the search engines again and found one and I knew it was the right one because once I pulled her up,it listed a few other people and had her late husband's name too. PAY DIRT!!! I was sooo excited. I got my girlfriend to call and see if she knew where our "missing" relative was. And she did. OH,MAN! I can't tell you-I was on cloud 9! (The reason I had my friend call was because we were trying to keep the peace in the house and we weren't sure how my husband's dad would re-act to the news. And if I called and either noone was at home or they called back I didn't want a South Carolina phone number showing up just yet.) I could barely contain myself,but I texted my husband at work and told him to CALL HOME! It seemed like it took forever for him to get a break. I told him to sit down. He thought the house was on fire or something. I told him that I had found his mother and that he had 3 sisters and that there was more to the story of why she left than he was told. Talk about dead silence. I think I took his breath away. Later when he got home that night,I told him more about what I found out. I could tell he was more open to maybe talking to her. The next morning,I had to get him out of the house so I could talk to her. I made him a list and sent him to the grocery store. Once he was out of the driveway,I took a deep breath and dialed her number. Did I tell you how much I HATE to talk on the phone? Long story short,they had been looking for him too. He thought I was on the phone with my girlfriend when he came back in because I was laughing so much. His mom is such fun to talk to-she's like a kid! I got him to sit down in the recliner and asked if he wanted to talk to her yet. I wasn't sure if he was ready. I think he was still in shock that I had found her and was actually talking to her on the phone. He nodded,so I handed him the phone. It was so amazing to watch and listen to him talking to her. They have talked for hours every day since. With 40+ years to catch up on,I guess so. He has talked to his mom and one sister. We are already looking at schedules and counting up how much vacation time he has and trying to see when we can make a trip to South Carolina. I'm thinking around Labor Day,which also happens to be our 11th wedding anniversary,but we'll have to see. But we will definately take a vacation to see them relatively soon. So after almost 11 years of marriage,I have a mother-in-law and sisters-in-law,and the husband has found out that he is married to a "Nancy Drew/Sherlock Holmes" ABSOLUTE GENIUS of a wife. Life-it's an amazing adventure!