Weekend Reflection # 18

Time for another run down of a week in the life of us! I know you are all excited but please, try to contain yourself!

Monday: This is becoming a habit. I'll let you guess what I did first thing Monday morning....go ahead. YOU GUESSED IT! Another cat had to go to the vet. Tell me again why we "saved" all these poor kitties? Oh, right, because we love animals. Ok, back to the cat story. This time it was a different cat, my favorite cat, Mr. Tumnus. We call him Tum. He came home Sunday night with a banged up leg and couldn't put any weight on it. Jeff and I ran him down to the vet and were told that it was just bruised and swollen. The poor thing got two shots and we came home with two more shots of antibiotics. Thankfully, this vet is an older gentleman (just turned 80) and runs his business out of his house. He provides low cost care and is funny as all get out! He only charged us $15 for everything! That included his exam of Tumnus, a shot of an antibiotic, a shot of pain medication, and two shots for us to bring home. I love this man! In case anyone forgot, our dog had an allergic reaction to shrimp and it was $95 to fix her up.....different vet, closer to home, it seemed more serious and we needed immediate attention for our doggie.

Tuesday: Ballet for Caroline and then the girls and I were able to go to Bible study. Jeff has bagpipe practice every Tuesday night so it was just us girls.

Wednesday: Both girls went to my MIL's house after lunch. She was working with them on some embroidery projects because we want them to learn. I don't know anything about embroidery so she was kind enough to work with the girls for about six hours. Hopefully they will be able to start their own projects soon. Jeff is taking private bagpipe lessons and will do this each week on Wednesday nights. The man is a bagpipe freak!

Our deck also got finished! All we have to do now is lay outdoor carpet in the covered part and clean things up a bit. We are already enjoying it although the heat has been NUTS!!! It's been in the upper 80s and low 90s for a few weeks. We finally did get a few days of rain and we really needed it. It hadn't rained in over a month here! Our grass looks terrible! Wednesday night, Jeff and I watched Deja Vu'. It was pretty good, which is saying alot since we are not huge Denzel fans.

Thursday: Ballet and piano for Caroline. Jeff worked really late and didn't get home until around 10pm. The girls and I made pizza and enjoyed eating it on the deck.

Friday: Logan went to babysit all day and came home around 6pm. I took a nice long nap in the evening and was just lazy! Made an awesome meatloaf for supper and then took it easy the rest of the evening. Jeff and I watched The Painted Veil and by the time we got to bed, it was almost 3am. Oh, Caroline insisted that I tell you she removed two splinters from her hand on this day. She's scared of needles and does not like it when I hold her down and prick the skin in order to remove a splinter :-) It is a huge deal to her that she was able to remove these all by herself. How's that for exciting! LOL!

Saturday: Caroline and I took off to do some "shopping" (which translates into looking around!). We were hoping to make a trip to the Amish store about an hour from our house to buy some dried fruit, spices, lecithin, and some homemade sweet breads. We didn't make it. We had a few stops beforehand and I just couldn't bring myself to drive any further. Hopefully I'll get to the Amish store next week. They have wonderful dried pineapples that are very cheap! I love to get several bags of them for snacks. This is probably my favorite snack!

My BIL, FIL, and hubby laid the outdoor carpet on the deck. Now we are all ready for new furniture! That will come soon my friends! The girls and I intend to start doing some of our schooling out there before the heat runs us back inside. Made another yummy dish tonight. It is called Mile-High Salsa Pie and was pretty tasty. I'll include the recipe below. The only thing I would change is that I would use black beans in place of the kidney beans. I didn't have black beans to use this time but it tasted good with the kidney beans. I simply served chips and queso with it since it was a heavy dish. Yummy!

Shawna made my day by sending me Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers! I was so excited to go to the mailbox and find it! Thanks Shawna! I can't wait to start reading it, which will hopefully be next week after I finish Even Now by Karen Kingsbury.

Mile-High Salsa Pie (An Old El Paso recipe)

1 lb. ground beef or chicken breast (we used beef)

1 Old El Paso Soft Taco Bake dinner kit

1 cup water

1 can (16oz) kidney beans, drained and rinsed

1 jar (16oz) Old El Paso Salsa (any salsa will do)

1 cup (4oz)shredded Monterey Jack cheese (I used 8oz because we LOVE cheese)

1.Heat oven to 400. Brown beef in skillet; drain. Stir in seasoning mix, water, and half the cheese sauce (from the dinner kit). Heat to boiling, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to medium and simmer for 4 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add kidney beans and remaining cheese sauce; heat until hot.

2. In ungreased 2-quart (8x8) casserole dish, place 1 tortilla. Layer with 1/2 of the salsa, beef mixture, then cheese. Repeat layers, using up ingredients and ending with cheese.

3. Cover and bake 17-22 minutes or until cheese is melted. Let stand 5 minutes.

Makes 6 servings

I hope you had a good week. I look forward to reading about your week so head over to Judi's place to join in!