Cha - Cha - Cha - Chicken

What do you make in a hurry?  We all have them.  The nights when the chicken is almost past its prime, when you need to eat quickly, when you have an extra jar of salsa hanging around in pantry.  What?  You don't always have an extra jar of salsa hanging around in your pantry?   My mistake - after trying this recipe you will want to.  :)

Here is a FAST and EASY recipe perfect for a yummy meal on an evening when time is short. I call it...

Salsa Chicken

To make this you need:

Chicken breasts - as many as you can fit in your pan and/or as many as you need
salsa, 12 oz. - any type you like, bottle, jar, container, whatever
salt
pepper
olive oil - or whatever oil you like to use

That's it.

Here is how you make Salsa Chicken.

Dry the chicken breasts with paper towels.  (This helps with the browning.)  Season the chicken breasts with salt and pepper.

Heat the oil in a frying pan until shimmering.  Brown the chicken breasts on both sides.

Turn down the heat to medium low, add the salsa, cover, and simmer until the chicken breasts are cooked through (about 10 minutes). 

add the salsa

cover the pan

lower the heat to medium-low

Here is the finished pan!  Can't you just smell it?  No? What? Why not?  Oh, yeah right.  Silly me.  Trust me, it smells delicious!

Mmmmmmmmmmm.....

Enjoy!

Salsa chicken, steamed green beans, and tatertots (yup! tatertots)

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Thanks for visiting!

Thank You Teachers!

It is the time to say a great big THANK YOU to all of the teachers in your life!  To thank the great teachers that have touched my children's lives this year I made these:

Pencil Bouquets!

I got the idea here in the blogosphere, but I can't remember where.  Thank you for the inspiration - to anyone who has made something even remotely similar.  You all can take the credit for this!

My daughter was so pleased to give it to her teacher!  She gave one of her huge smile.  That was so cute!

Here is how you can make one too! 

the materials

 I used tin pails, Styrofoam balls cut in half, pencils (LOTS of pencils both color and regular), and 1 1/2" ribbon.

First, cut the Styrofoam balls in half.  I used my Styrofoam cutter.  You know, the one I used here.

Put  one half of a ball in the bottom of a pail.  

 
I put one colored pencil deep into the Styrofoam.

Group the rest of the colored pencils around the first pencil, and group tightly together.  

Yes, this is ponytail holder.  I couldn't find the rubber bands.  I think they are somewhere in my teacher boxes in the garage!

Wrap a rubber band tightly around the erasers of the colored pencils.

Yup, another ponytail holder.

Fill in the area all around the colored pencils with the regular pencils.  Secure them with a second rubber band.  The semicircle of Styrofoam give the pencils a dome-like shape.  

Cute!

 Wrap the pencils with a length of ribbon and tie a tight bow.  Remove the rubber bands. 

Three cute pencil bouquets for three great teachers!

 The project is all done except for the clean- up!

This pile is destined for the recycle bin!

This was  a fun, easy project to make.  Make one for a teacher  you love!  I guarantee, they'll love it!

I would love it if you would "Like" the Greetings From the Asylum page on Facebook.  There is a button on the sidebar!

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Tatertots and Jello

Happy Mother's Day - Now Get to Work!

For Mother's Day I received this:

My children were so proud of their cards, and I LOVE them!

I also received this:

Aaaand something like this:


Oooooo!  Aaaahhh!  :)

Now, before there is any outrage, I really wanted these things.  My husband is a sweet flowers kind of guy.  I love that, but right now I just can't spend money on something that will be gone in a few days.  Instead, we spend our gift money on practical things that we need (or sometimes want).  That precedent was started on our first Christmas together and I asked no BEGGED for a paper shredder.  It was not a romantic gift, not even close, but it was AWESOME!  I was tired of shredding everything by hand.  Every time I used that shredder and now its replacement, I think of that first Christmas.  Just like I think of Valentine's Day when I use my stick vacuum to suck up crumbs or our anniversary when I use the garage door.  Call me crazy, but it makes the everyday things a little more special for me.

Alright, after all of that pontificating...I needed a new iron because my old one had a trick cord.  I was constantly jiggling it to make sure that it was actually heating.  I needed the freezer because of this:

*Insert horror movie scream here*

This is the inside of my freezer.  I am amazed that I could get this picture without anything falling out and skidding across the floor.  What is in there?  Is that chicken, frozen vegetables, definitely orange juice, maybe some butter, um-pork chops, what about an ice pack?  Is there an ice pack anywhere in there?  Sheesh!  What a mess!

A few years ago my freezer organization worked like a well-oiled machine.  I was in a frozen dinner group with several of my friends (that is a post for another day, but it is in the plans).  I kept things neat and tidy so that I would always know what I had and where it was.  Since the frozen dinner group ended, nature has reclaimed the interior of the freezer for its own.  Everything has been getting progressively worse and worse.  I have been putting off cleaning it out for what seems like FOREVER!  So believe me when I tell you I was super excited to get the chest freezer as a gift for Mother's Day!  That meant I could ORGANIZE (picture me saying that it an ultra-happy sing-song voice)!  :)  Click here or on the "Organize" page at the top of the page to check out some of my organizational projects. 

We picked up the freezer, this beautiful freezer, on Saturday!

Hello, lovely!  Thank you for coming to my house!

We added bike reflectors to help us not hit it in the dark.  :)  They were a BEAR to find at the store!

I threw in some things in a haphazard fashion on Sunday afternoon after I searched through the freezer on the hunt for some frozen vegetables.  The freezer came with one hanging basket, but that was simply not enough organizational storage space for my liking.

I went to Walmart on Tuesday morning and carefully perused the shelf aisle.  I got a few of these and one or two of those and came home with a pile of various shelves and bins for use in the freezer.  (I got A TON of stuff.  I have no idea how I thought I could use them all inside this freezer, but I did.)

I first tackled the inside freezer.  Surprisingly there was not that much spoiled food that needed to be thrown out.  I got rid of one pound of ground beef that was freezer burned, two pork chops dated from 2007, and a Frosty Bear ice pack that had a hole in it.  Considering the above jumble I was pretty amazed!  I used two small shelves out of my pile from the store on the inside freezer.  I originally thought that I would have to go back and buy some more (shaking head).  That was pretty silly.

Here is how the inside freezer looks now (minus some chicken breasts that we had for dinner tonight).

The top shelf is for large bags like chicken breasts.

The second shelf is for potatoes, smaller packaged meats,and that awesome bowl of chicken broth.

Fruit bars, frozen fruit, and bread can be found here.

The bottom drawer is ALL frozen vegetables.  (I knew I had some stowed away somewhere in here.)

I found the ice packs too!

After lunch I went out and tackled the chest freezer.  Here is the result:

Here is a good shot of the shelves and bins I added to the inside.

Here is the inside with the basket. 

Here is everything all neatly arranged.  The upper basket is full of lemon juice so that I can make a lot of this.

I am absolutely delighted with my gifts!  And now it will be Mother's Day every time I go reach into this freezer to pull out a Popsicle!

I had an extra shelf left over from all of this I put it on top of my laundry cabinet and got even more love out of this project!

This is a huge improvement!

Happy Mother's Day!

I would love it if you would "Like" the Greetings From the Asylum page on Facebook.  There is a button on my sidebar!

I will be linking to some great link parties! Click here or on the Linky Party page at the top of my blog for a complete list.