Go Pioneers!

B and I attended our first Malone game today. The Pioneers played Anna Maria (MA) and won their first game of the season, 69-0. Jeff said the team set several offensive school records today.
B did pretty good. We sat in the bleachers for the entire first half and he did very well. He really liked the marching band at the first part of the game and as long as he had snacks he was a happy camper. We went up into one of the suites for the 3rd quarter and ended up walking around the stadium complex for the 4th quarter. It went smoother than I thought it would. He wasn't mobile at all last year, so I didn't know what to expect this season. I'm very thankful that we have options though.








*Awkward...as we were walking around the stadium in the 4th, we stumbled upon a certain moose who appeared to be winding down his/her gig for the day. I had to snap a shot...

Ever Try Wordle?

If you are looking for a fun project using words in an artistic way head on over to and play around a little in their create area. Pretty neat stuff! I'm thinking of a couple of verses that would be great paired up with some new projects.

Uncle Andy

We had a nice visit from Uncle Andy this weekend. We....

watched some movies...


trimmed some bushes and worked on a couple of other projects outside...


B backed into Uncle Andy's car when he wasn't lookin'...whoops!


we had some good laughs...


and we played "try to catch the blinds"


Thanks for visiting Uncle Andy! We hope you can come back soon!

World's Best Homemade Enchiladas...IMO

I made the following recipe this week with some shredded chicken ($5 Rotisserie bird from Sams). It was awesome! And as a bonus it also said that it could be doubled and frozen if you would like to make an extra meal for later. I was a little worried if B would like it since it had a little spice to it but he gobbled it up.

Shredded Beef or Chicken Enchiladas

Ingredients:

1 T butter or margarine
2 medium onions, chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
2 T all-purpose flour
1 cup chicken broth
1 cup milk
2 (4 oz) cans chopped green chilies
1/4 t salt
1/4 t ground cumin
8-9 flour or corn tortillas
2 1/2 cups cooked, shredded beef chuck roast or shredded chicken
1 1/2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese
1 1/2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese
2 green onions with tops, thinly sliced (optional)
Sour cream
Salsa

*I also added one can of red enchilada sauce and 1 can of rinsed and drained black beans

Directions:

1. Prepare your meat however you would like. I used leftovers from a rotisserie chicken and shredded it. I then stirred in a can of red enchilada sauce and can of rinsed and drained black beans. You could probably add sweet corn or other ingredients as well. Set aside.

2. In a saucepan, melt butter over medium heat. Saute onion and garlic until onion is tender. Mix the flour in the broth, stir into pan. Stir in milk, chilies, salt, and cumin. Cook and stir until thickened and bubbly. Reduce heat; simmer 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Set aside.

3. Grease a 13x9 inch baking dish. Spoon a little sauce in the center of each tortilla; spread to the edges. Place meat mixture down the center of each tortilla. Combine cheeses (I just used a bag of the Mexican blend); sprinkle on top of meat mixture. Roll up tortillas and place in baking dish, seam-side down.

4. Pour remaining sauce and some enchilada sauce sauce over tortillas, if you like a wet enchilada use more sauce. Sprinkle with green onions and remaining cheese. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees F for 20-30 minutes or until hot and bubbly. Serve with sour cream and salsa.

If making ahead and freezing just prepare and cover the pan with foil and freeze. Make sure that you write the cooking instructions on the foil. When you are ready to bake, let it thaw completely in the fridge and bake the same way. You will probably want to take it out the night before you plan to make it. Make sure it is cooked all the way through. Enjoy!

Sunday Morning Styles

The Past 24 Hours

Tests. Tests of patience. Tests of strength. Tests of all kinds. That is what our last 24 hours have been like. Thank you all for your prayers for B, he is doing better today but still exhibiting symptoms. Hopefully, his medication over the next week will squash those. Here is a recap of what happened yesterday...
Ben woke up coughing yesterday morning. We didn't think anything really of it other than his allergies must be acting up again so we gave him some nasal spray and dropped him off at daycare. I received a phone call from his daycare around 4 pm saying that he was having some issues with his breathing. He was "belly breathing". When I got to daycare I saw that he was breathing really hard using his abdomen. I took him to StatCare and they got us in to see a nurse really fast. They took his O2 levels and breathing and saw that he was breathing about 60x a minute (should be 40) and his oxygen levels were lower than normal. They gave him one breathing treatment there and told me that they were going to need to transport us by ambulance to one of the hospital ERs...that is when I started to try to not freak out. Whenever an ambulance is used, that is pretty serious, right? I asked the Dr. how serious this was, and he said the ambulance was a precaution because sometimes the little guys will just stop breathing. At that point I was just praying that he would be okay and that Jeff would get there soon. He had called and said that he had gotten my message and was on his way from practice. He finally got there and that helped calm us both down.
After the breathing treatment, I rode with Ben in the ambulance to the ER where we were until he was discharged at 12:40 am last night. Over the course of those 6 hours, he was given 6 more breathing treatments, a dose of steroids and a couple of chest x-rays. He did really well with the breathing treatments after the first couple and once they would just let him leave his thumb in his mouth while he did them. We were all really tired by the end of the night and they were talking about having us stay the night unless his O2 levels did not stay consistently higher than 93 (they should be around 100). After his final treatment, his levels finally stayed high so we got to go home.
This is probably the first part of a long journey ahead of him and us. We will need to schedule more appointments with his Dr. and perhaps specialists to figure this out. They are thinking that it is asthma but we don't know what triggered this attack or anything else. Please pray that those appointments will provide answers and ultimately, a treatment that works for B. Please pray for B's safety and for any possible flare-ups in the future. We are so grateful for the care that he has received and for everyone's concern for our son. Thank you all. We are truly blessed.

Football Practice

Preseason practice has been going on for the past week but B and I finally got to attend practice for the first time today. We went to pretty much the entire morning practice and after nap, got to be at the afternoon practice for the last half hour.



We decided to start B's training a little early so we ran through some light exercises today. We ran back and forth across the field, hit the sled a couple of times, and rolled the big weight ball around. Not too much, just enough to break a sweat ya know.