PEANUT BUTTER FUDGE DROPS

PEANUT BUTTER FUDGE DROPS
2/3 cup Hot water
10 ounces Land of Lakes cocoa mix
2 cups JIF creamy peanut butter
1/2 cup light corn syrup
3 cups C&H powdered sugar, divided 2cups + 1 cup
2 cups crushed vanilla wafers
2 cups crushed ginger snaps
72 Hershey Kisses (I like the cherry cordials)

  • Whisk together the hot water and cocoa mix until smooth.
  • Add peanut butter and corn syrup. Blend until smooth.
  • Add 2 cups powdered sugar and stir until well blended.
  • Stir in cookie crumbs until well blended.
  • Spray wax paper with PURE (these will be sticky so don’t forget this step).
  • Drop heaping teaspoonfuls of dough onto the wax paper.
  • Place the remaining 1 cup of powdered sugar in a shallow bowl.
  • Roll each piece of dough into a ball and dredge in powdered sugar.
  • Press your thumb into the center and fill with a Hershey’s kiss.

DAY 15 – BLOGMAS 2017 – STOCKING STUFFERS

Stuffing stockings is one of my favorite things to do.  I’m always on the look out for special little items that I tuck away all year long waiting for just this day. Since the kids are grown hubby gets my full attention and he hates it (sort of) because he isn’t as good at it, but he tries hard and is getting better every year.
This was a couple of years ago but gives you the idea:
  • 2 new Wii U games (Amazon had an awesome Black Friday sale I could do from home in my PJ’s)
  • fun snacks – M&Ms, cashews, pistachios and DILL peanuts.
  • some camo carbiners
  • some camo notepads
  • an Army magnet
  • new winter gloves
  • Mason jar shot glasses so he’ll quit using my REAL mason jars
  • a couple of additional watchband choices to accessorize one of his gifts from mom
  • .50 caliber pocket knife
  • lottery tickets
This year I already stuffed his stocking, but forgot to take a picture, but his will be full of ALL sorts of fun stuff again including some of his new favorite flavors of Dr. McGullicuddys!

SEA SALT & CARAMEL RICE KRISPY TREATS

SEA SALT & CARAMEL RICE KRISPY TREATS
8 cups Rice Krispies
50 Kraft caramels
1 can sweetened condensed milk
1/4 cup + 1/4 cup unsalted butter
1 bag mini marshmallows
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 teaspoons sea salt flakes

  • In a medium sauce pan over a low-medium heat stir together the sweetened condensed milk, the caramels and 1/4 cup of the unsalted butter until smooth.
  • Remove from heat.

 

  • Line a 9×13 baking dish with foil, extending over the edge.
  • Spray with non-stick PURE or PAM.
  • Melt remaining butter in large sauce pan.
  • Add marshmallows and stir  until just melted.
  • Add vanilla, 1 teaspoon of salt and 1 cup of caramel sauce and stir until smooth.
  • Remove from heat.
  • Stir in rice krispies until evenly coated.
  • Press into pan**.
  • Cool completely.

 

  • Pour remaining caramel over the COOLED rice krispy treats and spread even with a spatula.
  • Sprinkle sea salt flakes over top.
  • Enjoy!
  • Store in an airtight container.

**I use a stainless steel spatula that has been sprayed with PURE to keep it from sticking.  It helps to press down firmly to get an even level.

DAY 14 – BLOGMAS 2017 – FAVORITE CHRISTMAS FOODS

This is another easy topic.  The one thing I am noticing as I type each entry is that by doing this, I am remembering so many silly stories and anecdotes about aunts, uncles, cousins and such that keep bringing a smile to my face.  These memories are part of what this season is all about to me.
I’d like to say that our table looked just like the one in the picture. Well Christmas day was close, but Christmas Eve was ALWAYS much more casual.

One of my earlier memories is of a very warm Christmas Day, a backed up sink/garbage disposal (I don’t think we ever had a holiday in that house where the garbage disposal didn’t have an issue of some sort) and having to transport all the prepared food from my parent’s house to my granparent’s house via my grandmother’s RED (kind of like a Christmas sleigh) Chevy station wagon (remember those?) while my uncle and I sat in the back keeping the food from toppling over.

CHRISTMAS EVE – Served Buffet style since this was the night we did most of the present opening and the adults didn’t want to spend all their time in the kitchen – in later years we would have it catered (so to speak – they prepared the food, we picked it up and displayed it) from Rattler’s BBQ.  We also began to use “FINE CHINA” as hubs calls it aka as decorated paper.

  • Sandwich makings – roast beef, ham, cheeses
  • Potato Salad
  • See’s Candy boxes
  • Wintergreen ribbon candy
  • Chocolate covered cherries

CHRISTMAS DAY – This is where we dug out the REAL fine china and crystal as well as the silver.  I loved setting the table for this meal. There were always enough people that we had a KID’S table too.  I hated the kid’s table – all the good stuff was sitting at the grown-up’s table.

  • Roast Turkey, Baked Ham or Roast Beef
  • Daddy’s Stuffing – now recreated from scratch to taste virtually the same as my Oatnut Sourdough Herb Dressing
  • Mashed Potatoes from scratch – it was these potato peels that were one of the biggest garbage disposal problems
  • Giblet Gravy
  • Cranberry Sauce – they used Ocean Spray from a can but we now use one of these 2 homemade recipes – Cranberry or Cranberry Pomegranate Tangerine
  • Baked Ham – in later years it was always HONEYBAKED HAM and I loved making Split Pea soup with the left over bone.
  • Glazed Carrots
  • Green Bean Casserole
  • Gran’s cranberry salad – she’d make two, one for mom and aunt Liz and one for everyone else.
  • Rolls and butter
  • Traditional pies like pumpkin, Cherry and as well as Cherry Pineapple Dump Cake.
  • See’s Candies

When we go to my SIL’s family for Christmas (or any other big family get together)  we do Hor’deouvres style.   The family is so big that over the years we have found that if each person brings an hor’deouvres to feed 10+ people that we can make a HUGE feast.  We just serve it buffet style and mingle and play – it is ALWAYS the best time.

TATER TOT GRILLED CHEESE & BACON WAFFLE SANDWICH

TATER TOT GRILLED CHEESE & BACON WAFFLE SANDWICH
1 bag frozen tater tots, thawed (give or take depending on your waffle maker size)
4 – 6 slices bacon, cooked crisp
4 – 6 slices of cheddar or ½ cup shredded cheddar cheese
2 green onions, thinly sliced or thin red onion slices

  • Preheat waffle iron on high.
  • Place thawed tater tots closely together in an even layer on the waffle iron.
  • Close the lid and press it down tightly.
  • Cook until the tater tot waffle is crisp, about 5 – 10 minutes.
  • Remove the waffle from the waffle iron and allow it to cool on a wire rack.
  • Repeat the process to make a second tater tot waffle.
  • When the second waffle is crisp, top it with half of the cheese, the cooked bacon, and the sliced green onions.
  • Using the bottom plate of the waffle iron, heat the sandwich until the cheese has melted on the bottom waffle.
  • When the cheese has melted, carefully flip the sandwich over and allow the cheese to melt on the other side before removing the sandwich from the iron.
  • Cut it into quarters and serve.

SHARING with FOODIE FRIDAY and FULL PLATE THURSDAY.

DAY 7 of a RECOVERY IN PROGRESS

You know the old Yiddish proverb, Man Plans, God Laughs? If not, you should learn it just to keep yourself sane.

So, as many of you know I have been suffering from some health issues the past few years, especially this last year. To give you a quick background when I was 24 I was diagnosed with Systemic Lupus and not doing well. Several months into the disease I went to my rhuematlogist, held out my hand with 32 pills in it and said “I can’t live this way”. She agreed and we moved into treating the disease and it side affects like Fibromyalgia with BETTER diet.  I immediately gave up ALL steroid medications, preservatives, splendas, aspartames, diet food of any kind, non GMO food, canned “food”, boxed “food”, fast food as a whole and started perimeter shopping and scratch cooking with “REAL” foods. My life improved almost immediately.

Fast forward many years to 2011 and my oncologist claiming this change in food prep and eating for all those years saved my life when she was able to lift out a twice torsioned (wrapped around the ovary 2 times) volleyball sized ovarian tumor from my body intact and I have been NED (no evidence of disease) for almost 7 years since.  She decided it was because the cancer had nothing else to feed on in my body except itself. I knew I was extremely blessed when after 6 more months of testing everything and everywhere to make sure it was the only tumor, that they found none. I follow up regularly with blood work and testing.

Fast forward another year and I’m having problems with the hiatal hernia that my cancer doctor found, but left alone. Enter a new gastroenterologist who was able to fix the hiatal hernia and shredded esophogaus with a Nissen Fundoplication (2012). This didn’t alter what I ate except in the beginning 2 months, but did alter how much and how often I ate.  I also gave up 90% of bread – just filled me up too fast.

Fast forward 9 months (2013) and the mesh from the Nissen Fundoplication failed requiring a revision surgery and another period of liquid food adjustment.

Fast forward to 2016 and the E.Coli bacterial infection that landed me in the hospital with a concussion because I lost consciousness and fell after becoming violently ill.  For the next 13 months I was tested by neurology and cardiology for my symptoms before they finally handed me off to gastroenterology which had a HUGE wait time so my wonderful primary doctor got tired of waiting and began doing logical testing on her own. She was the one who founda new hiatal hernia (again) from mesh failure and referred me to the surgeon.  His testing was further delayed another 6 weeks past their normal backlog by Hurricane Harvey.

I love my surgeon and his immediate staff as well as my hospital nurses Ericah and Lexi.  Other than that the hospital will be getting a not so favorable review from me.  The recovery nurse should NEVER have contact with human beings and the respiratory therapist is negligent with he lack of follow through and the nurse’s aides need to be trained in patient care and helping.

We went into last Wednesday believing he was going to be able to fix the fix on the revision surgery.  Unfortunately this is where the Yiddish proverb enters.  I had planned food and EVERYTHING on the fix of the fix, but he was unable to correct the issue and had to make a drastic decision to do a bypass. This is a HUGE DRASTIC LIFE CHANGE for anybody, but for me there is very little information written on it because it isn’t for someone who isn’t doing it for weight loss.  I mean EVERYTHING written about the subject is for people who need to lose significant amounts of weight. The diet is strict because of the bypass in general and I can live with that, but the recovery time has now doubled!

And once recovery time is over the way you eat and how often, etc.. is a lifetime change! I can live with the long term lifetime diet and special vitamins as it is high protein, low fat and REALLY healthy which is right up my alley anyway.

So here we are on day 6 of 90-120 days of nothingness except keeping a food and medicine journal.  I cannot tell you how much ALL of your thoughts and prayers have meant to me and are seeing seen me through this ordeal. There is 1 good thing. I did want to lose about 15 pounds and now that is already a given. 😀

I’m starting to research getting the highest protein, nutrients and minerals into the most flavorful recipes compactly. So I will obviously be revamping some old recipes and looking into some flavor packed Japanese Ramen and/or Thai recipes where I’m making my own noodles with high protein. At the end of the recovery time above an average day for the rest of my life will be small nibbles of small meals that total 4-8 ounces per meal three times a day with 2-2 to 4 ounce high protein snacks, up to 64 ounces of water or tea and 5 mandatory vitamins.

The bottom line is that I need to learn to live with a NEW normal.  You know what they say, LIFE is 10% what happens and 90% how you’ll deal with it. I’m up for the challenge and looking forward to better health.

DAY 12 ~ BLOGMAS 2017 ~ WINTER TAG


✨Top 2 Winter Beauty Essentials

  • A NICE HOT SHOWER to relax and clean out the pores.
  • A super moisturizer to keep away dry skin!

✨Top 2 Winter Fashion Essentials

  • I wait ALL year for it to be cold enough to bring out the boots! I can’t wait until we move – I HATE the  lack of winter living here!
  • Scarves and gloves.  I have color combos to match anything.

✨ Favorite Winter Accessory

  • HATS & SCARVES!!!!

✨ Favorite Winter Nail Polish

  • Red for Christmas, but normally a pinky mauve. I just have too much red in my complexion to pull off many colors though this year I am wearing TEAL for Ovarian cancer awareness.

✨ Hot Cocoa or Apple Cider?

  • Homemade hot cocoa and MUST have marshmallows!

✨ Favorite Winter Candle?

  • Apple and Cinnamon

✨ Does it snow where you live?

  • Not here at all. I can’t wait to be back somewhere it does though.

✨Have you ever made a snowman?

  • Absolutely! And a snow woman and snow kids!

✨What is Your Favorite Holiday Movie?

  • Home Alone, Miracle on 34th Street and they never get old.  

✨What is Your Favorite Christmas Color?

  • Red and silver. 

✨Stay in Your PJs Or Dress Up For Christmas?

  • I always dress up.

✨If You Could Only Buy One Person a Present This Year Who Would It Be?

  • WOW, can “one” person just be one age group, all the kids in my life? This is a hard one.  I love buying presents for everyone. 

✨Do You Open Your Present Christmas Eve Or Christmas Morning?

  • It used to be Christmas Eve when I was a kid though we saved the Santa presents for Christmas morning. Now we open them Christmas morning.

✨What Do You Like To Do On Your Christmas Break?

  • Wait, there’s a Christmas Break? I don’t seem to get an actual break, but I do allow myself a holiday movie or two throughout my day as I’m working.

✨Any Christmas Wishes?

  • To have my house done so we can actually enjoy it for awhile before we sell it.  Safe travels for everyone over the holidays and world peace.  Was that too Miss America?  I really do want peace for EVERYONE!

✨Favorite Christmas Smell?

  • A fresh cut tree, baking cookies full of spices (cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and cloves)

✨Favorite Christmas Meal Or Treat?

  • Prime Rib
  • Fudge
  • Corn flake wreaths

✨What are you doing for the holidays this year?

  • Staying home and recuperating

✨What’s your favorite holiday drink?

  • Coffee
  • Hot Cocoa
  • Hot toddies

✨Candy cane or Gingerbread men?

  • I like the chalk style peppermint, but I’m not real keen on actual candy canes and I like soft gingerbread men.

✨What’s your favorite holiday/Christmas song?

  • That’s a tough call – depends on my mood… White Christmas, Silent Night and I’ll Be Home for Christmas

✨What is most important to you about the holidays? 

  • That it is genuine and homemade for the most part.  It is not a commercial holiday for me.  I believe in trying to remember the real reason for the season and keep the Christmas spirit in my heart and life ALL year long.

HAPPY HOMEMAKER & MENU PLAN MONDAY week 50 of 2017 DAY 5 of RECOVERY

I hope everyone had a wonderful week and are having a wonderful holiday season. I’m home from the hospital, but will address that in the Things On My Mind section.  The weekend was quiet and VERY uneventful thankfully.

OUTSIDE MY WINDOW & THE WEATHER OUTSIDE

Temperatures are FINALLY down into the tolerable range. We even had to turn the heat on when we got home from the hospital on Friday. Friday was an ironic day here in southeast Texas.  7 years ago when I had my cancer surgery, we had a rare ice storm in the area.  Then we moved away for several years, but came back to work on my grandparent’s house and are here again for this surgery.  Ironically, we had SNOW last Thursday and Friday. yep I said snow! What a shock that was to wake up to in the middle of the night! I don’t get to go outside for another week give or take so am not yet enjoying the change in temperatures though.

ON THE BREAKFAST PLATE

3 ounces of peach high protein drink.

AS I LOOK AROUND THE HOUSE / WEEKLY TO DO LIST & HOUSE PROJECTS

Unfortunately for the next 90-120 days this is hubby’s category. I am not allowed to do anything or lift anything heavier than a bag of flour.  Hubby is being a GREAT sport though and tending to my every need. Because of the risk of infection we are still having to wash every day.  He’s just not used to doing it, the vacuuming, cleaning up after the cat and dog, etc…

  • LAUNDRY... quite a few loads this week, towels, bedding and clothing
  • LIVING AREAS... I did a serious deep clean just before surgery so am hoping this will get hubby through until March LOL NOT
  • KITCHEN… pretty clean
  • STUDIO… is mainly storage these days so nothing going on there
  • YARD… nothing much
  • BLOG… some recipe updating, future post planning and holiday post planning

CURRENTLY READING & TELEVISION / DVR

I haven’t done any reading since last Tuesday, but am hoping to do some later today and get back into a routine. I’m still trying to finish Ava Miles book #9 Calendar of New Beginnings.

  • BIG BANG THEORY and YOUNG SHELDON
  • NCIS, NCIS NEW ORLEANS and NCIS LA, CRIMINAL MINDS, S.W.A.T.
  • MADAM SECRETARY, SCANDAL, DESIGNATED SURVIVOR
  • CHICAGO FIRE, CHICAGO PD, CHICAGO MED later this season
  • BRAVE, VALOR, SEAL TEAM
  • LAW & ORDER SVU, BLUE BLOODS, HAWAII 5-0
  • MACGYVER, SCORPION, BLINDSPOT, ORVILLE, WISDOM OF THE CROWD
  • Z NATION, WALKING DEAD, FLASH, DC LEGENDS, INHUMANS
  • THE GOOD PLACE, AMERICAN HOUSEWIFE, SPEECHLESS, GREAT NEWS
  • THIS IS US, ONCE UPON A TIME, THE GOOD DOCTOR
  • GUY’S GROCERY GAMES, BEAT BOBBY FLAY, BOBBY AND DAMARIS

CRAFTS / PROJECTS

Probably nothing this week, but am hoping to start sketching the door series and tree of life next week.

MENU PLANS FOR THE WEEK

This category is a sad and sore subject for me until about March.  My surgery did not go as planned which is changing so much about food, but sure beats the alternative of being 6 foot under. Hubby is loving being able to eat what he calls bachelor food – S.O.S., chili, hot dogs, hamburger helper, etc… I told him NOT to get used to it though, as soon as I can cook again we will be eating healthier than ever.

MONDAY
TUESDAY
WEDNESDAY
THURSDAY
FRIDAY
SATURDAY
SUNDAY
2 times a day
3 ounces PROTEIN drink and GREEN Tea
3 ounces PROTEIN drink and GREEN Tea
3 ounces PROTEIN drink and GREEN Tea
3 ounces PROTEIN drink and GREEN Tea
3 ounces PROTEIN drink and GREEN Tea
3 ounces PROTEIN drink and GREEN Tea
3 ounces PROTEIN drink and GREEN Tea
2-4 times a day
4 ounces strained pureed soup
4 ounces strained pureed soup
4 ounces strained pureed soup
4 ounces strained pureed soup
4 ounces strained pureed soup
4 ounces strained pureed soup
4 ounces strained pureed soup
2 times a day
4 ounces vanilla yogurt
4 ounces vanilla yogurt
4 ounces vanilla yogurt
4 ounces vanilla yogurt
 4 ounces vanilla yogurt
4 ounces vanilla yogurt
4 ounces vanilla yogurt
2 times a day  4 ounces jell-o 4 ounces jell-o 4 ounces jell-o 4 ounces jell-o 4 ounces jell-o 4 ounces jell-o  4 ounces jell-o

SUCCESSFUL RECIPE LINKS FROM LAST WEEK

These are recipes that have been waiting in cue to post, I’m definitely NOT back to cooking yet.

HEALTH & BEAUTY TIPS

HOMEMAKING/COOKING TIP

ON MY MIND / THINGS THAT ARE MAKING ME HAPPY

You know the old Yiddish proverb, Man Plans, God Laughs? If not, you should learn it just to keep yourself sane.

So, as many of you know I have been suffering from some health issues the past few years, especially this last year. To give you a quick background when I was 24 I was diagnosed with Systemic Lupus and not doing well. Several months into the disease I went to my rhuematlogist, held out my hand with 32 pills in it and said “I can’t live this way”. She agreed and we moved into treating the disease and it side affects like Fibromyalgia with diet or better said, lack of diet.  I immediately gave up ALL steroids, preservatives, splendas, aspartames, diet food of any kind, non GMO food, canned “food”, boxed “food”fast food as a whole and started perimeter shopping and scratch cooking with “REAL” foods. My life immediately improved.

Fast forward many years to 2011 and my oncologist claiming this change in food prep and eating for all those years saved my life when she was able to lift out a twice torsioned (wrapped around the ovary 2 times) volleyball sized ovarian tumor from my body intact and I have been NED (no evidence of disease) for almost 7 years since.  She decided it was because the cancer had nothing else to feed on in my body except itself. I knew I was extremely blessed when after 6 more months of testing everything and everywhere to make sure it was the only tumor, that they found none.

Fast forward another year and I’m having problems with the hiatal hernia that my cancer doctor found, but left alone. Enter a new gastroenterologist who was able to fix the hiatal hernia and shredded esophogaus with a Nissen Fundoplication (2012). This didn’t alter what I ate except in the beginning 2 months, but did alter how much and how often I ate.  I also gave up 90% of bread – just filled me up too fast.

Fast forward 9 months (2013) and the mesh from the Nissen Fundoplication failed requiring a revision surgery and another period of liquid food adjustment.

Fast forward to 2016 and the E.Coli bacterial infection that landed me in the hospital with a concussion because I lost consciousness and fell after becoming violently ill.  For the next 13 months I was tested by neurology and cardiology for my symptoms before they finally handed me off to gastroenterology which had a HUGE wait time so my wonderful primary doctor got tired of waiting and began doing logical testing on her own. She was the one who found the hiatal hernia (again) and referred me to the surgeon.  His testing was further delayed another 6 weeks past their normal backlog by Hurricane Harvey.  I love my surgeon and his immediate staff as well as my hospital nurses Ericah and Lexi.  Other than that the hospital will be getting a not so favorable review from me.  The recovery nurse should NEVER have contact with human beings and the respiratory therapist is negligent with he lack of follow through and the nurse’s aides need to be trained in patient care and helping.

We went into last Wednesday believing he was going to be able to fix the fix on the revision surgery.  Unfortunately this is where the Yiddish proverb enters.  I had planned food and EVERYTHING on the fix of the fix, but he was unable to correct the issue and had to make a drastic decision to do a bypass. This is a HUGE DRASTIC LIFE CHANGE for anybody, but for me there is very little information written on it for someone who isn’t doing it for weight loss.  I mean EVERYTHING written about the subject is for people who need to lose significant amounts of weight. The diet is strict and I can live with that, but the recovery time has now doubled!  Once recovery time is over I can live with the longterm lifetime diet and special vitamins as it is high protein, lowfat and REALLY healthy which is right up my alley anyway.

So here we are on day 5 of 90-120 days of nothingness except keeping a food and medicine journal.  I cannot tell you how much ALL of your thoughts and prayers have meant to me and are seeing seen me through this ordeal. There is 1 good thing. I did want to lose about 15 pounds and now that is going to be a given. 😀

FAVORITE PHOTO FROM THE CAMERA

I was able to get most of my elf on the shelf photos taken before surgery and definitely have a few favorites. 😀

INSPIRATION

Be sure to link up with Sandra at Diary of a Stay at Home Mom for Happy homemaker Monday, Terri at Darling Downs Diaries and with Laura at I’m an Organizing Junkie for Menu Plan Monday.