One of my mainstay recipes!

Perfect for company and sooo quick and easy to make!  Thought I'd share my Pepperocini roast recipe.

Pepperocini Roast

1 chuck or arm roast 

1 small jar of pepperocinis (whole or sliced for an even quicker process)

1 pkg Good Seasons Italian dressing

I pkg. Au Jus Seasoning

Place meat, ½ juice from pepper jar, ½ of peppers chopped and package of the Good Seasons Italian dressing in crock pot.  Cook on low all day or overnight.  (8-11 hours)  Fork and shred meat and place back in crock pot.  Add pkg of Au Jus and heat in slow cooker additional 30 minutes.  Serve on hoagie rolls. Bon Appetit!

Season Reflections...

Ya, I know, I'm a little late to be posting this but here it goes anyway.

I had a great Christmas filled with family and friends and presents.  Andrew and I have multiple families to visit since both of our parents are divorced and each family does Christmas a little differently.  I love all of our families but am only going to talk about one today. It's a longstanding tradition that Andrew's mom and their family usually hand out Christmas gifts after they eat Thanksgiving dinner at Andrew's grandma's house. Since it's a lot of people, rather than everybody giving everybody a gift we pick a name out of a box and give just that person one gift.  This has been the tradition for quite a while, even before I married Andrew.  This year, we did something different.  Since we usually get so many presents elsewhere, we decided to still pick someone's name out of a box but this year we made a donation (amounts remain unknown) to our favorite charity in their name.  We then had to write a description of that charity and why it means so much to us.  I am loving it, it has been so much fun.  I am learning so much more about my new family's deep passions and what they care about, which is so much more meaningful to me.  It was really special because the person that got me made a donation to a sex trafficking organization, which I just sent my person a donation to a sex trafficking organization too!  Such a surprising coincidence! From their letter I got to see the person's heart and pray that the person that receives my letter gets to do the same.  I feel great that I have gotten to share a piece of myself with Andrew's (and now mine) family and get to see their inner hearts as well.  It's also helped me to refocus my reason for the season which is My Jesus, who cares for the orphans, the widows, the poor and those who are hurting. A great reminder as I frequently get distracted and side tracked.

Anyways, I thought I'd share...we may do something different next year...but maybe you can start this in your family for one Christmas or even as a new tradition....I can promise you won't regret it.

Silly Putty

Sorry about the funny mix up with this post earlier, I tried to post this from my phone and not being a techno chick well it did not post well.

Anyways, I've made silly putty a few times this week and thought I'd share the recipe.  For those of you with kids this is a super easy and fun activity to do!  There are a few ways to do it but here is the recipe I used.

Two parts Elmers multi-purpose glue (not school glue)
One part Sta-Flo liquid starch
Food Dye

Mix elmers, liquid starch and about 5-6 drops of food dye with a spoon for a few minutes, let sit for ten-fifteen minutes, then pick goo up and roll into ball and shape for about four minutes or so.  Silly Putty stretches when you pull it slow, breaks when you pull it fast, picks up ink writings and bounces!  Enjoy this craft, I did!  :)

By His Wounds...

So I was at the CrossWalk the other nite, which is another church's youth center in town.  Andrew and I were volunteering for the night and I was put in charge of steering the conversation for eighth grade girls, which may I also say is nearly impossible..


Anyways, we watched one of Rob Bell's Nooma videos, "Luggage", which has a shocker of a ending. Then the discussion questions were all in regards to forgiveness; their ability to forgive others and God's forgiveness. The point the group was supposed to come to was "Forgive others as your Heavenly Father forgives you". I thought it was an interesting contradiction that at one point the girls thought everyone should go to heaven and then the rest of the conversation they refused to forgive people that have severely wronged them in the past.  They tried to convince me how horrible these people were and how horrible the things they did were.  As if I had no idea. It's sad to see how the devil wants you to hang on to hatred when you are wronged. Its was horrible but easy to see this in the comments these girls made but I wonder how many times I had made similar comments growing up and never realized their meaning and impact.


On one point, I have to agree, horrible are the things that happened.  As I get older though and now work in Remedial Services, I see more and more that this realm of "horribleness" is much larger than I previously thought.  1 in 3 are now sexually abused, emotional abuse is so common it's thought of as typical, showcased in popular songs and movies.  And as for physical abuse, well it's everywhere.  So is the alcohol.  


Contrary to what may be popular belief, I did not have a cookie cutter childhood.       My family and I experienced different types of abuse growing up (and yes at the time I thought it was normal).  Leaving high school and going through college I began to realize how not normal this was and began to resent and harbor hatred towards people.  A couple years ago during a God Session I finally came to grips with this and took steps towards resolution.  And it's true what they say, forgiveness often benefits you more than the other person. 


I guess all this to say, that it's AMAZING how God can heal wounds that were previously the size of mountains to pebbles, seeds, specks when you let him. 
Many people go through life consumed with the yoke of depression, the scar from a traumatic childhood or whatever so much so that it's hard to see anything else or even live/cope at a normal baseline. But its amazing that God can make scars disappear or no longer hold the importance they used to in your life if you let him.  I'm glad I did, Christ has freed me and I am healed.

To Catch Up.....

Ah...my first blog....finally accomplished and I didn't even wait till New Years!  Well I want to catch you up all on our life so that any following blogs do not leave you confused and wondering who? where? what? So here's the vocab list....

Turbo - our amazing, sixteen pound, gorgeous, eccentric cat who enjoys water, sleeping on my face, sitting on our barstools and attacking people when they are unaware.

Sawyer Brown - our "winter dog".  The weiner dog now living with us that we have watched for the last two winters for Andrew's parents.  Can we say hyperfocused?  His life is the ball....I'm not sure if he knows we exist...

The Lot - where Andrew (my husband) works.  Conveniently located on the downtown square, the church created it as a neutral non-Christiany territory for kids to come hang out.  Andrew works there on weekends and the goal is to build relationships that will lead the kids to Jesus. :)

Remedial Services - What I do.  I work with kids (and their parents) that are on Title 19 and have a mental health diagnosis.  I teach them anger management, anxiety control, coping skills, dealing with depression, impulse control and more.  I work with them in their homes typically and then teach the parents how to appropriately interact with the children as well.  So not exactly counseling, but very close, definitely behavioral management.

On a side note.....our Christmas tree is up and BEAUTIFUL!!  And I am trying really really hard to play Christmas music as much as I can (not a big fan usually)..now to buy presents....I have Turbo's but I still need to find Andrew something!!!