The Christmas Season, Part 2: What are my goals?

Welcome to Part 2 of my Christmas Season prep.  Join in!  If you missed Part 1, it’s easy to find!

You know, I’m really happy I took a few minutes to brainstorm what is really important.  Already, I can see a few things that will be trimmed from my list of activities this year because, well, they don’t really matter to me.  I see that now.  But, more about activities later….for now let’s set some goals.

I’m going to look at it like this:  By the time Christmas is over, I want to look back over the month of December and know that we (or I) were able to ________________.

What would you fill in here?  Try to make it something you can measure so you’ll know if you meet the goal.  Here’s an example of a measurable goal that would fit in the above blank would be:

Have three small and simple get-togethers in December.

I don’t know if this is one of my goals yet or not, but I chose it because it reflects several of my values.  Likewise, it does not highlight anything that is not important to me.  Your goals can be anything ranging from handmade Christmas cards to at least 1/3 of the list, to using gift wrapping time as family time at least 2 times to reaching out to others in service or gift 3 times. I especially like goals that reflect more than two or three of my values.

Assignment 2: Set goals to ensure that your values are met this Christmas Season. Make them measurable.  One to three goals should be sufficient; we’re not going for overwhelmed, remember!

Here goes:

My Goals for the 2009 Christmas Season

1.  Create a piece of memorabilia (like a simple digital scrapbook) that showcases what we did this month.

2.  Have two small, simple get-togethers with friends and their families that have been on the “want-to-hang-out-with” list.

3.  Trim down my Christmastime activities to only those that reflect at least two of my family’s values.

Ok, it’s your turn!  What did you come up with?

Part three will help us get a plan so everything that is important can fit into our lives without becoming overwhelmed.

–Jen

P.S.  Sorry for all the Christmas images BEFORE Thanksgiving!  I’m a believer in waiting until after T-day to enjoy Christmas but since this was “planning” and all…I thought I could break my own rule.  After all, we’re not really celebrating yet.  :o)

The Christmas Season, Part 1: What’s really important?

I am committed to enjoying this Christmas Season thoroughly.  For me, this means I need to give some real thought to what is most important during this time.  I’ve learned that cramming in lots of great Christmas-y things (even if I am organized in doing so) results in a me feeling tasked and pooped out each day with very little ‘white space’ in my life to simply ‘soak it all in’.

So, I’m not doing that anymore.

I’m making cuts.  Not because I don’t enjoy (in theory) all the things I normally do this time of year but because I want to extract more joy out of each thing we choose to take part in.

In order to know what to cut (or what to add), I need to first evaluate what is really important.  What are my values?  What do I treasure?

I’m going on a three-part blog journey.  Please come along.  Let’s share our ideas in the comment section.  It will be like “putting our heads together!”  What you see here from me is literally my working draft.  Why use notebook paper when I have a blog? :o)  If you blog about this, link up!

Assignment 1:  During Christmastime, what are your values? What do you treasure?  Write a list.

Here goes (in random order):

• Quality Family Time
• Reflecting on God’s gift of Jesus to us
• Gift giving
• Serving others
• Quality time with with Family and friends
• Traditions and Memories
• Being Creative
• Sights and smells of Christmas
• Hospitality
• Teaching my kids

Up next:  Goal setting.

December will be here in one week! Let’s get a move on!

(I’m taking part in an online digital scrapbooking class that has inspired this process. Do you remember me telling you about it a couple of weeks ago? The instructor gifted this class to all and it has been such a wonderful introspection and creative outlet for me. I cannot wait to take a PAID class.  Such great marketing, don’t you think?! ;o)

–Jen

Thursdays are for Jenny Craig weigh-ins!

I lost 1.8 lbs. this week!! Yay!  Total so far on the program:  32.8 (this does not count 13 addl. pounds I managed to lose before then=45.8)

I am very excited about this because I have been on an up/down journey since this summer.  Today marks the lowest I’ve been since I started this program.  It’s funny, you’d think I would be at the lowest every time I lost weight but between today and July, it has been a love/hate relationship with the Jenny Craig scale.  Speaking of that, i think it would be really cool to do a chart of my progress from the beginning….I’ll have to get in touch with my consultant for the actuals…don’t you love that “my consultant”!

Goals for this week are:

1. Begin exercising (again!).  I kinda fell of the workout wagon at the end of the summer=nice weather.  So, my goal is to exercise for 30 min. chunks 2x a week between now and the end of the year.  Then, it will go up to 3x.
2. Maintain (or, heck, even lose!) weight for the week of Thanksgiving!  Pray for me.

Assignments:

• Establish reasonable measures for the goal of #1 above and determine what it means to maintain a sense of “control” or “pride” or “empowerment” over my diet.  (These were Jenny’s words, not mine.)
• Establish a reward to earn after December if I meet these goals.

So far I’ve come up with as reward options:

• Buy/order my passport so I can go see my BFF in Europe.
• Buy new bras at Victoria Secret–not that I want to promote their pornographic marketing but it is cool to finally fit into sexy nice-looking bras again.  If I still require bras, then, that is! sheesh.
• New clothes.  Um, need places to go first.  I have 2 outfits I can rotate around in the mean time.
• New stuff for my kitchen such as what’s listed on my Christmas wish list!  I just started it, I’m sure it will grow as the days go by.

I’m always up for ideas on the reward thing!  Put ’em in the comment box below!

Well, truth be told (my BFF always says this, can you tell I’m thinking about her?), I wrote this post more for me to record these things than for your entertainment pleasure.  I’ll likely do it as a regular Thursday thing since that’s the day I weigh in. Makes sense to me. And, hey–I think I’ll include a visual of some kind to illustrate how close to my goal I am.  And maybe another to map out the journey.  (I’ll put my husband on that right away!)  –Jen

Cod Liver Oil–eew.

I cannot escape it.  It is everywhere.  So far I’ve nearly puked three times.  In the last hour.  Why?  Because I had the great idea to give my kids cod liver oil this afternoon.

First off, this is a great idea–one YOU should do, too. I’ll get to that in a minute…it’s just more fun to be dramatic about how much I feel like puking right now.  And the real problem today is that I gave it to them in the afternoon.  This stuff takes time to wear off of their lips and breath!  When I give it at night, I didn’t realize this was the case.  Lesson learned.

Of course I had to be the model mother and take my teaspoon, too.  I nearly puked right then and there despite the fact that I drank water from a straw at the exact same time. I am extremely sensitive to scents, textures, etc. I have a well-honed culinary palette.  :o)   Plus, some oil dribbled to the outside of the bottle and it is all over my hands.  Two rounds of soap and it’s still there.  The best I could do was mask it with scented lotion.  Not sure if that was a good idea yet or not.  No one else had any problem with it at all except Samson.  He splattered it out of his mouth  .2 seconds after it entered.  Come to think of it, maybe that’s why I cannot get rid of the smell…it’s probably on my shirt (mom juice, that is).  (Ok, now that the shirt is gone we’ll see if I can manage any better. Ha!) And the funniest…er, worst thing is that I have some insane compulsion to keep smelling my hands to check if the smell is still there.  No doubt this added to the nausea.  I even stop typing this post from time to time to sniff my hands.  Seriously, I wish I could stop.  My main prayer at this point is that I do not begin burping.  OMG, the thought of that makes me almost puke.

I may have taken my last dose of this stuff for awhile but here’s the real deal:  This stuff is loaded with Vitamin D and has a proven ability to strengthen our immune systems and increase our overall health. For some time I have been in a suspended state of discontentment with protocol immunizations and medications for my family at every sign of sickness but not really knowing what to do about it or even where to start. And I’m not a health-food nut…….yet.  It is a process.  You know, like losing weight.  Some days I’m into the idea and other days I’d rather have McDonald’s french fries.  Maybe some day I’ll be skinny and maybe someday I’ll be a health-food nut.  We’ll see.

Meanwhile, I’m convinced that there are some simple things I can do as the nurturer of the family to boost our immune systems and increase my family’s overall health.  This particular post was so inspiring to me that I loaded the kids up and trekked 20 minutes to Whole Foods!  It was just what I needed.  A short-ish list with simple things I can do starting right now.  From there I spent about 90 minutes hopping from link to link to link.  And speaking of links…here is another reference for what to do for sickness in your house completely void of medication.  I subscribe to these blogs (along with a “few” others :o) and get a lot of mileage out of what they share as I begin leaning in a new direction concerning health and healthcare for our family.

By the way, cod liver oil also comes in capsules.  It’s on my shopping list–as of today.  –Jen

UPDATE: 30 minutes has passed since I wrote this.  I just went to the mailbox only to discover that a book has arrived (that I won at  Keeper of the Home).  It is called:  Healthy Homemaking:   One Step at a Time. A 52 week jouney of baby steps to help you move towards more natural, nutritious and sustainable living. Are you kidding me, right now?  Seriously.

My First Once a Month Cooking Adventure (OAMC)

Oh.  My.  Goodness.

Cooking this much food requires a bit more stamina than I was prepared for.  I think I nearly died.  That said, I still ended up with this:

And, yes, it all fit in my deep freeze………ers.  Barely.

You may be wondering how this all went down.  I’ll tell you that, but I’m also gonna dish a bit on what I’d do differently and what I’d recommend YOU to do if you want the convenience of all these dinners in your freezer.

How it went down–from the beginning.

I’ve known about Once A Month Cooking since I was pregnant with the twins.  In fact, I was nearly mad that no one told me about this concept after I finally discovered it for myself.  I was at a homeschool meeting/curriculum share night where everyone brought crates of the stuff on their bookshelves and we spread it all out on the floor and had a tour of everyone’s collections.  The 20-year-old book I stumbled upon had an iteresting title about Cooking for Month or something.  (I’m not quoting it because I don’t know the title anymore and when I looked into buying it at the time, it was out of print anyway.) That is where my browsing ended that night.  I think I skimmed/read the whole thing then and there.  I raced home to add it to my cart at amazon.com but when I found that it wasn’t available, I spent hours amazed at how many books there were out there on a topic–of my own profession, no less–that I’d NEVER heard of. Even my mom later told me she knew of people who did it years ago but it always seemed impractical to her. Weird.

As a mom of three at the time (the youngest six months old) and pregnant with twins, I was tearing into the topic.  Then I remembered that I was pregnant with twins.  Right.  There was no way I could endure a project of this magnitude.  (I was also dealing with a hip injury/condition that caused tremendous pain and complicated everything.  I’ve since recovered about 90%–PRAISE THE LORD!!!–a post for another day.)  So, over the next two years I occasionally cooked double of some things and froze off one or two extra meals for the same amount of work.  In that, I got to experiment with freezing…which is a good thing to know something about if you are going freeze $300 worth of food!  Meanwhile, the hip thing kept me from being productive (in all areas of my life) until recently.  And now that Eric and I are on Jenny Craig, I’m cooking *very* differently. No more cream of what-cha-ma-call-it soup and cheese and butter and sour cream and everything else good fattening.  (read:  no experience freezing low fat stuff.)

Fast forward to last month when I discovered a blogger who creates monthly menus for you to freezer-cook with a friend that come with shopping lists, instructions, a podcast that details why she picked these items, and even labels to print to stick right on your foil packages! So intriguing, so marketable, so great!  I spent much time thinking about her business, actually.  (Jen, focus)  I decided I wanted to give it a whirl but I really couldn’t take advantage of her pre-packaged menu because of our diet restrictions and because…well, I cook differently.  I needed to blend my passion for the culinary arts with the convenience of dinner in a flash.  Therefore, I wanted to forge my own way. So typical of me.  And so annoying, too. You should NOT be like me.

Since I was re-inventing the meal…ah-hem, wheel, I should have taken more than a few days to prepare.  Enter stress.  On Tuesday, I started thinking of my menu which meant revisiting some of my old standbys and making them over as lower fat yumm-o-licious meals.  Is that even possible?  I’ll let you know when I thaw them!  Ha!  And, a few hours blog-hopping to find some new ideas.  (Ideas are aplenty when you start blog hopping.)  Then, I patterned my plan from Tricia’s plans with regard to three meals a day vs. just dinner, and planning out who’s doing what and when on cooking day.

This is getting really long…..

I went to Walmart the day before only because it was difficult to cash flow a month’s worth of food for a family of seven unless it was payday, at least.  I also picked up a humongous 13 qt. stainless bowl (you’ll see it in the pictures below) from the restaurant supply store that day.  So glad I did.  Best $8 I’ve spent in a long time.

My 24 year old sister, Chalee, volunteered to help me.  This was super great because she required no payment of 1/2 the food!  Nice to have no pressure for my maiden voyage but still have the help.

We initially crossed off the menu items as we completed them but that didn’t last long because by the time we got the end middle of the list, we were exhausted! The 2nd picture outlines why were so pooped out!  This was 13 hours of cooking for two people, plus prep work a few hours the day before.  The clipboard has my recipes and references in plastic sleeves.  I referred to these a lot and I was really happy I had them all in one place–and protected from the elements :o).  I’m glad that I wrote out our process.  It was a mental dress rehearsal.  We were more efficient because I did this. Typing it out wasn’t necessary but it was convenient that I didn’t have to tell her what to do next all the time.

Here’s a slideshow to fill in some blanks.  (Btw, it’s hard to photograph a day like this…)

Vodpod videos no longer available.

(if you’d like to see the captions, go here)

What I’d do differently.

1.  Accept the fact that I don’t have to be perfect at every thing, every time.

2.  Start with a smaller menu.

3.  Use the pre-packaged plans from blog’s like Tricia’s or from books/websites like this one for the first time, at least. (This, by the way, is the first book I bought on the topic of freezer cooking.  Another great use of my husband’s hard-earned cash :o)

4.  Ensure I’m well rested.

5.  That my cooking day would begin, exist, and end all on the same day.  (refer to #2)  Ok, maybe a few hours the night before boiling pasta or making rice would be ok.  It sure helped us out on cooking day.

6.  Cook at my own house.  I hauled everything except the kitchen sink to my mom’s house because–well, she doesn’t have 5 kids, for one.  But also because she has 2 ovens, 6 burners, more counter space, better lighting, you get the picture.  What wasn’t there was the familiarity of cooking in my own kitchen.  Oh, and let’s not forget, the pressure involved in making sure it was cleaned up to meet her impossible expectations.  Ok, it wasn’t that bad, but there was a lot of pressure.  :o)  Love you, mom.

What I recommend you do.

1.  Believe that this is possible to do this without croaking.

2.  Start small.

3.  Team up with a no-stress friend or do it alone the first time to get your groove.

4.  Maybe get a group of friends together and cook for a new mom as a gift from everyone as an opportunity to cut your teeth.  (lots of friends=fun=low pressure=blessing to the new mom)

5.  Spread the word about OAMC because because it’s a bummer that you (or me) haven’t done this sooner!

6.  Subscribe to my blog! A girl likes to know she’s not writing for nuthin’ :o). See the orange button above my head up there?  Click it!  (I’d recommend selecting Google Reader)

7.  Comment (see #6) :o)

Thanks for reading!  –Jen

Recipe: Black Bean and Corn Quesadillas

Today was one of those days where lunch time is supposed to be in 5 minutes, the kids have been clamoring for it for the last 15, and my kitchen has no available counter or sink space to speak of.  As background I’ll tell you the reason I let this happen is because I was so engrossed in planning  my 30-meal-cooking-weekend that I have planned for this weekend that I hardly paid attention to my kids!  Ug–a tale for another day. (Btw, stay tuned for posts relating to my upcoming cooking adventure! :o)

All this because you may be wondering why I made Black Bean and Corn Quesadillas for lunch instead of a can of soup!  Well……I was just getting so inspired by the other bloggers out there who had posted great recipes and ideas from their own BIG cooking days.  I wanted to know if this lunchtime favorite would freeze well, thus landing on the upcoming menu.  Phew, now that that is out of the way….

Here’s something you can do with all those black beans you made!  And, these quesadillas do freeze well so make tons of filling, load some tortillas and you’ll have lunch (or dinner) on hand for future days like…well, like the one I just had!

This is a great time to mention that I CREATE while I cook.  I do, however, keep track of what I did in case it turns out great!  I think there is such joy in cooking this way Therefore, I’m going to present my recipes and cooking methods to you in this format.  If you’re a “direction’s follower” or just don’t like creating food (but still like to eat), check back soon because I’ll post an actual recipe page where you can print off a standard looking format that corresponds to each “teaching session”.

First off, chop up an onion while a blob of oil heats in the pan. (I have a posting in the works on how to chop onions very efficiently–stay tuned.) Saute until the onions reach the level of crunchiness you like because this is all the cooking they get.

It is important to generously salt them when they go in the pan because this draws out the moisture which has sugar in it=caramelizing=FLAVOR.

Then add in 1 or 2 cups/1 can of black beans, depending on what you have on hand.  Next, frozen corn.  As much as your little heart desires.

Now for seasoning.  I am a Penzey’s Spices freak!  It is all I use.  Even the generic bottles are filled with Penzey’s bulk spices.  That said, go to Penzey’s or order online immediately! :0) Grocery store spices will NOT taste as good.  You might make this and say, “Hmph, this wasn’t as great as she said.”  That=spice’s fault, not mine :o)  All in fun, right? Spice to taste.  I used about 1 T each of cumin and chili powder.  This all depends on how much onion, beans, and corn you used, though.  Also, freshly ground black pepper is standard for me so that went in, too. If you’re not sure, taste it. Oh, and salt if necessary. Since this lunch was for my kids, I didn’t add cayenne pepper or extra chili powder but both would have been great.

Side note: What is the role of salt in a dish?  To bring out the flavors of the ingredients.  If it ever tastes salty, you’ve added too much.  Salt as you go along  to build the flavors. At the end, here’s what I do to see if I’m good: a bit of salt…take a bite, a bit of salt…take a bite.  You’ll see what I mean.  The flavor will just get better and better.

I added about 3/4 cup of water to the hot pan right after the spices (sort of like you would with taco meat spice packets).  This helped everything blend together and coat the ingredients.  Once the moisture evaporates, you’re all done with the filling.

Use the same pan here.  Run some warm water on to clean it, wipe with a paper towel and you’re up and running again.  Spray one side of 2 tortillas with non-stick cooking spray and place them in the pan like this.  Remember cheese is the glue so the order is CHEESE–FILLING–CHEESE. Use as much filling and cheese as you prefer. Then close it up and toast on both sides. Cool and cut on the same cutting board and knife you used earlier.

Mmmmm.

If you freeze, I suggest freezing the triangles individually (like IQF chicken nuggets, Individually Quick Frozen) then toss them in a large freezer bag.  Take out as many triangles as you need at a time and bake them at 400 until hot for a crispy crust OR microwave them if you’re in a hurry but willing to settle for soft crust.

Thanks for reading.  What’s your idea?  Try this recipe and leave a comment on what you did!

–Jen

A week in review…in pictures!

I love having MOSTLY white space on my calendar.  I love it because I have learned over time that I NEED it to survive.  The week our family just lived through was probably the most event-ed week of our lives.  (read:  explanation for my being absent from this blog.) Plus, we had normal living like laundry, meals, tidying/cleaning, baths, homeschooling, etc. The following are some highlights of the extras…

**Mouse over the pictures to see the captions!

Sunday

• evening out with Rachel after the kids go to bed.  A spontaneous event! (see picture from previous posting)

Monday

• prep for the week
• catch up on chores
• lunch and shopping with my mom=sitter for kids.

Tuesday

• So You Think You Can Dance LIVE on stage (we took Macy and Ella)=sitter for little ones.

Wednesday

• Eric and I leading our weekly “journey” group about Leadership=sitter for the kids, again.
• Larry (family friend) comes to town visiting from Dallas=late night visit after the kids go to bed.

Thursday

• AM visit to Angela’s to make homemade pull ups for bed wetters :o)

• piano lessons and drive through lunch…Yay!  for Burger King!
• PM haircut for me.

• Eric goes with Larry to the airport to get Larry’s girlfriend=I fly solo on bedtime routine.

Friday

• kids getting a bit under the weather (fussy, stuffy, cough-y, snot-rockets…you get the picture–no need for one, right?!)
• dinner out with friends from out of town=sitter for kids
• then back to our house for games and dessert and LATE night.  Gotta love college buddies!

Saturday

• Play practice for the big girls at church.
• Game Day!!  =sitter for the kids most of the day.

Larry treated Eric and me to tickets to the Oklahoma vs. Nebraska football game.  And a treat it was!  I haven’t been to see the Huskers play since I was about 19 or 20…and preparations for going look very different today.  If you can imagine having 5 kids and a household to pass off to someone from 2pm to midnight, you’d have a pretty good idea!  Since Eric and all his buddies are OU band alum, I was the only Husker fan.  You wouldn’t believe how nice the fans were to all of us “out of town-ers”!  At least a dozen times we heard, “Welcome to Nebraska!”  How funny that I live 50 min. away from the stadium! :o) We were even invited to tailgate with a group of people that Larry knew through a collegue.  We were connected by 3 degrees of separation and you would have thought we were family!  It really blessed me to receive such generosity.  I almost couldn’t contain all the love! ha!  Anyway, the day was so nostalgic for me (having gone to several games a child) and I was having so much fun before we even went into the stadium (tailgating, band pre-game warm up concert, touring the area) that it was hard to imagine that more fun was to come.  Take a look!

Sunday

• Stayed home from church (can you say, POOPED?)
• Eric goes to teach a Sunday school class and returns to a mess and kids and wife still in PJ’s.  Ha!
• Lunch out with the out-of-town-ers.
• Afternoon guests of Larry and his girlfriend (Tara), my sister, my cousin, and my sister’s childhood friend.
• 8pm=I’m accidentally asleep on the chair.

Monday (today)

• Phew! New week…
• AM nap with babies
• messy house, no motivation to do anything!
• tired!
• pooped!
• what’s for dinner at 6:00? hmm.
• my exhausted husband to the rescue!
• early bedtime! Tomorrow is a NEW day!

Some of this over booking couldn’t be avoided (ie. the game, the SYTYCD tix, the out of town guests, etc.) but I do not think I can handle another week of this for a loooooong time!  I’m starting to wonder if this exhaustion will ever go away!

If I counted correctly, that was FOUR sitters in one week!  I haven’t had FOUR sitters in one month before!  Wow…and, the behaviors of my children definitely reflect that!  Ug.  I have some work ahead of me in the training and discipline department this week!

Subscribe to my blog!  Comment!  Say hello!  Thanks for coming by my blog.  See you again soon.  –Jen

Just gotta laugh…right?

This picture of my son, Samson really says it all!

Yup.  That’s JUICE.  The sticky kind.  Is there really any other kind? <sigh>

Don’t you just love how he poses and smiles for the camera?

Oh, and you can only see 25% of the mess in the picture.

Mom Juice.

You can pick your friends…

Here we are about 5 seconds before going out for some girl time.  This is Rachel, isn’t she adorable?  (The worst picture of me of the 7 we took but she looked like a million bucks so…I mean, what are friends for?)

And then, here’s one with my mom and me.  It’s funny how I look 12 all of a sudden.  Like I reverted to my child self for this photo.  Weird.  It didn’t feel like that, but, who knows!  Maybe it’s because my 50 year old Mom looks 30!  Could that be? :o)  Just had to share.

All this said to say that I really have great friends and great family!  I think my family hangs out together because we all get each other’s weirdness.  Well, come to think of it, some of my friends are weird, too.  Birds of a feather, I guess…. :o)

*********

Ok, and now for some FREE STUFF!!

First up.  Click here for a free audio book!  Desiring God by John Piper.  Add it to your shopping cart and when you check out the code is:  Nov2009

The price will change to FREE from $16.95 and immediately ready to download.  I haven’t read/listened it yet but it’s goin’ on my iPod soon.

Next.  FREE online digital scrapbooking class.  What is this, exactly?  I’m not certain, but I signed up and I’ll find out soon enough.  Spend some time on her blog/website and you’ll be in the know!

Don’t just thank me, I found out about this here!  Her blog is great!  Gotta love blog hoppin’.

–Jen

Beans, beans the musical fruit, the more you eat the more you toot!

I’m not really inspired to write anything of value today but, I do have some fun kitchen adventures up my sleeve!  Here I’m going to show you how it is so simple (and fun!) to prepare your own beans!  It’s not scary.

VS.

It costs nearly $1 for the canned beans and I got this 4 lb. bag for under $4.  It made the equivalent of  14 cans.  Now that is good math!

First of all, don’t fret, the instructions are normally right on the back of the bag, see:

Ok, next, follow the instructions!  For 1/2 the bag (2 lb.) I need about 12 cups of water.  Pour it over the beans and swirl it around looking for odd things to float to the surface to remove.   Oh, and don’t forget to generously salt at this point, it will make your beans taste great!

Here’s where you decide how much time you have.  You can soak all night then simmer for 1-2 hours but I wanted this project checked off my list quickly.  Alas, there was an option for me!  Boil for 2 minutes, Soak for 1 hour, Simmer for 1 hour. (All right from the back of the bag–no magic formula to remember.) Perfect.

You know they’re done when they are soft enough.  Pretty easy.  Then drain them in a colander and portion them into freezer bags.

Boy, I really bagged it! :o)  I measured 2 cups of cooked beans into each bag (which is more than a can contains), labeled and froze.  Easy peezy.

What on earth would you do with all these beans?  Chili.  Black Bean Quesadillas. Black Bean and Corn Salsa.  Meatless tacos.  Refried beans. Variety of soups. Use your imagination.  I do the same for pinto beans, kidney beans, white beans, and chick peas (can you say hummus? :o)

As always, thanks for reading my blog.  I’d LOVE LOVE LOVE if you’d comment back on your own opinions or experience on the topic.  Or, just say Hi!  Oh, and SUBSCRIBE to my blog; that way, you can receive a notice when I update this blog.  See you!  –Jen