Recipes I want to try

I've filed these recipes away to "make at a later date."  I need to go grocery shopping so I'll make sure I get the ingredients to make these.  They make my mouth water looking at them:

Blackened Chicken and Cilantro Lime Quinoa
Ingredients (Serves 2-3)
•    2 Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts
•    ½ Teaspoon of Paprika
•    ¼ Teaspoon of Salt
•    ¼ Teaspoon of Pepper
•    ¼ Teaspoon of Cayenne Pepper
•    ¼ Teaspoon of Onion Powder
•    ¼ Teaspoon of Cumin
•    1 Teaspoon of Olive Oil
•    2 Cups of Low Sodium Chicken Stock
•    1 Cup of Quinoa
•    Juice and Zest from Two Limes
•    A Dash of Salt and Pepper
•    2 Tablespoons of Cilantro, chopped
1.    Combine all the dry seasonings in a small bowl. Mix them together and then season both sides of each chicken breast.
2.    Add the teaspoon of olive oil to a large pan or skillet. Heat the olive oil for a minute over medium/high heat. Add the chicken breasts to the pan. Cook for seven minutes on each side with the lid on.
3.    Add the chicken stock and quinoa to a medium sauce pan. Bring to a simmer over medium/low heat. Reduce the heat to low and simmer for ten to fifteen minutes with the lid on, until all the stock has been absorbed.
4.    After the chicken breasts have cooked all the way through, remove them from the pan and let them rest for seven minutes before slicing them.
5.    Add the warm quinoa to a large bowl. Toss in the lime zest, lime juice, salt and pepper, and chopped cilantro. Mix to combine.
6.    Serve the sliced chicken breast on top of the quinoa. If you find the blackened seasoning too spicy, you can add a quick and easy avocado cream sauce to cool it down.
7.    Just place the flesh from an avocado along with two tablespoons of Greek yogurt in a food processor and puree until smooth.
8.    Things to love about this meal: low sodium, chicken breast is a lean protein, it is gluten-free, and if you keep eating meals like this you will be ready for beach season in no time!!!

Spicy Skilled Honey Chicken

Ingredients
•    3 Boneless skinless Chicken Breasts
•    1/2 tsp chili
•    1/4 tsp cumin
•    1/2 tsp garlic or garlic salt
•    1/4 cup apple cider
•    1/4 cup Honey
•    salt and pepper
Instructions
1.    Filet your boneless chicken breasts (you don't have to do this, but they will cook faster, if you cut them so they are not so thick)
2.    Drizzle about a Tablespoon of olive oil in a big skillet. Heat on medium heat, and add chicken.
3.    Season with salt and pepper. In a small bowl, combine the chili, cumin, and garlic seasonings.
4.    Sprinkle all of the seasoning over chicken.
5.    Turn chicken over once chicken is nice and brown. (Do NOT turn until the one side is brown).
6.    Once the second side has browned nicely, pour apple cider and honey into the skillet
7.    (Tip: spray the measuring spoon with non-stick spray so the honey falls out nicely).
8.    Cover, and reduce heat.
9.    Cook for 10 minutes (flipping the chicken often) or until chicken is done and sauce has thickened.
10.    Serve with your favorite side. (It would be great with potatoes or rice!)





Crockpot Chicken and Zucchini

Ingredients
•    3 boneless skinless chicken breasts
•    1 onion cut into chunks
•    1 can of dice tomatoes
•    1 can of water
•    1 tablespoon of Italian Seasoning
•    Salt and pepper - Garlic Salt (to taste)
•    3 zucchini coarsely chopped
•   
Instructions
1.    Place chicken in crockpot with onions and seasoning.
2.    Pour tomatoes and water on top.
3.    Cook on low for 6-8 hours on low.
4.    In the last 2 hours, mix in zucchini.
5.    Once Zucchini is soft, cut chicken into smaller pieces.
6.    Serve over Pasta.

It happened series

I'm going to start a new series of "It Happened on the way to/during/after the concert".

It happened on the way to:
At that same church, while sitting in our car waiting for someone to let us in, we watched a lady pull her car in the driveway and instead of going In her front door, climbed inside through her window. A little later, she exited the house the same way!

It happened during the concert:
The pastors 6 yr old daughter made her way to the stage during a power ballad sung by the quartet. She remained onstage with them for the duration of the song.

It happened during the concert:
The emcee made Darth Vader noises in the mic while filling time in between the groups.

It happened during the concert:
Blake swallowed a fly while performing outside at a festival

It happened during the concert:
Blake had to sidestep manure while singing in a cattle auction cage.

It happened after the concert:
We were offered cash "so we wouldn't have to pay taxes"

It happened after the concert:
Blake was told that he talked too much and needs to just sing more. Blake said, "well I think I only took about 6 minutes to tell my testimony." the guy looked shocked and said, "oh, it seemed like forever."

In December we added Insulation to our house

In December we added insulation to our attic as a Christmas gift from my parents.  We are such newbies at home stuff, we did it the absolutely hardest way possible.  I should have flaked off individual chunks of the insulation (made from newspaper and plastic bags), but instead I fed handfuls of the stuff in the blower, and it just floated up and blew all over me.  Here are some pictures of the results:

Thank goodness Blake had a mask.

The best picture from the event:

Us Standing on our neighbor's doorstep

Our neighbors took pity on me and blew me off with a compressor:

But guess what, our home is nice and toasty warm now

April in Overall Review

Things are going well.  All our concerts this past month were at the end so we tightened our belts and tried to eat cheaply until our concerts arrived!  We went to all new places and it was incredible the response that Blake received and the response the people made towards the Lord.  Underestimating, we counted at least 3 salvations this month.  I say underestimating because I think more decisions to accept the Lord were made, but at this one particular gospel-sing, there was not a minister present to receive the people who wanted to make decisions.  Blake led the people who raised their hands in the plan of salvation and encouraged them to tell someone immediately and come back to that particular church on Sunday.  We also had the privilege of leading a revival in Carnegie OK this month.  I think we left as encouraged as the people we ministered to were!  Blake got to even share a small children's concert and 109 children from grades 1-5 were present as he sang songs like I Go to the Rock, I Catch 'Em and Moses.  They were GLUED as he sang Moses.  Between each song Blake shared a moment of Truth from God's word and really tried to make each song a visual example of a memory the kids could take with them.  After he sang, the church workers (without our knowing it) had the kids write us thank you notes for singing to them.  We have a whole sack full of thank you notes!  We went through them and were so blessed to see the children had illustrated their notes with items from the songs he sang about---there were a lot of fish drawn, rocks, stick figures singing in a microphone, and snakes from Blake's Moses song.  One girl wrote that because Blake sang and told her about how each person is given a special talent/gift by God that she feels so special now and she didn't feel special before.  We were really blessed by those kids.  Here's a video of them clapping while Blake sang:

Another neat thing we were exposed to is a ministry from Alaska who spoke a day we sang in Branson, Mo.  A lady named Brenda Crim, who has been with the NAMB until just recently because the NAMB made some cuts, spoke about her incredibly difficult ministry in Alaska and how most of the natives are incredibly prejudiced toward White people.  She explained about the astronomical rate of incest, rape, and suicide Alaskan natives battle.  Her ministry is reaching out to them and breaking down racial barriers so she can provide grief counseling and eventually sharing the gospel one by one with them.  She is an incredibly motivated and busy lady!  Our hearts went out to her mission and here is her information: http://akmissions.webs.com/staff.htm  She has no official funding no except for individual donations I believe.

I need to get back to booking, so I hope to document later some of the beautiful experiences we had in the past couple weeks.

Siblings

We've had a new kitty in the house since January.

They're adapting pretty well

Gospel Log March 2012

I have such a bad memory that the recording of important events along the way is going to be "a must" for me.  I can easily remember what time my doctor's appointment next week, exactly where Blake placed his keys, and even the exact email address of a random pastor in Roanoke TX...but I can't remember life events as they come and go.  Special words and stories will be lost for all time if I don't record them.  So here is my attempt to start logging our lives as "Gospel Singers".  If only just for myself.  Since I am sure to forget it by tomorrow.

This month we traveled to churches we have been to before, and some we have not.  This month (March 2012) is a miracle month.  In January, I had not a single event scheduled and we braced ourselves for the impending 31 days of being "sticks in the mud", saying no to hanging out with friends, and eating popcorn for dinner.  But low and behold, 6 events ended up being scheduled for which I can take no credit.  The Lord provided and we were able to pay our necessary bills and even have frivolous fun.  *Gasp!*  This month was a month of sticky situations and unexpected blessings; words of gold and words of great discouragement; feelings of warmth toward children...and feelings of horror!

I will try to keep my recaps as anonymous as possible.  Who knows who will ever discover my little writing pad here.  I have to say, we have been mightily sheltered from the strangeness that populate the Gospel circuit.  Just the other day I saw on Facebook a fellow soloist to his "stalker".  I giggled as I read his post:

Things have been much better with my "stalker" this month. But today, she sent me an email with an attachment about Inflammatory Bowel Disease. "Because you travel so much.... Please take good care of yourself." How thoughtful.

This is especially entertaining to me as we continue to travel and have repeat events.  We will have people come up to us who apparently follow us online and will comment about what we had for dinner two nights previous...it's pretty disconcerting until you realize they only know this since you, yourself, have divulged it. 

Now, for some stories.  The beginning of this month began with a big event: Blake sang with Greater Vision and the Mark Trammell Quartet in Decatur TX!  He was just an opener, but it proved to be a wonderful opportunity.  He gained many fans and also the respect from these groups as a valid performer.  He sang flawlessly and delivered with sincerity and anointing.  One friend, D, from the MTQ did comment though that he was frightened when Blake began to sing "Moses".  As any singer should be when they see another stand full front, grab the microphone and hiss "Oh Mosessssss..." as their opening line.

But some wonderful things that happened this month were the kind words from the original tenor of The Kingsman, Johnny Parrack.  He attended our concert in Van Buren at his home church.  He and his wife after the concert told Blake, looking back over their years of travel and children and singing, that it was "all worth it, every bit of it."  To hear a wife say that after living the "gospel singer wife life" was priceless for me.  That was really neat.  Especially when we are often told we must give up our itinerant lifestyle if/when we decide to have children.  I can easily get caught up in the fact we can't put away as much savings as we'd like and that we can't contribute regularly to a 401k or the like...it can be daunting to look at the future.  But her comment reminds me that the Lord's work is sweet and we are to do what He's told us to do.  Right now, He's told us to travel and sing full time.  Who knows how long it will last, but while it does I will be grateful that we get to do something we love.

I still have to document one event, the jewel of March, our spur of the moment, unadvertised and greatly regretful gospel sing I committed Blake to be a part of.  But, that hopefully will be tomorrow.  I'm sleepy and Jay Leno is calling my name.  And the cats are wrestling in the back bedroom.

But one picture:

This was handed to us right before Blake sang at FBC Jolly TX, drawn by the Pastor's granddaughter I believe.  Note that Blake is the one with the flowing locks of curls.

Goodbye Sticker

Blake and I had a very hard day yesterday.  Our cat Sticker died.  We found her Sunday morning in our garage when we were on our way to church.  I noticed her when we pulled out of the garage.  She was laying up against the side wall and I thought that was odd because I've not ever seen her lay there.  I got out to check on her and discovered she was torn up by some animal attack, probably a coyote.  She was very bloody on her back end and had puncture wounds in her side.  We took her to the Emergency Vet praying she wouldn't die before we got there.  She was very weary but would raise her head to look at me while Blake was driving.  We sped all the way there.  We got there and handed her over to the tech.  They took her and gave her a big dose of pain medicine and then proceeded to examine her.  They came out and said they could sew her up but she had a very badly broken hind leg that they wouldn't know until they x-rayed it if they could cast it or if they'd have to amputate.  They said I could wait to make the decision until her bloodwork was ready from testing and I said I'd wait 10 minutes for those results and then decide.  They came back and told me she was negative for Feline Leukemia Virus, but positive for Cat AIDS.  This meant that her recovery would be very hard since she wouldn't really be able to fight off any infections, and that ultimately she was terminal anyway.  This took the decision out of our hands, really.  We were (and are) so broken up.  They wrapped her in a towel and met us in a private room so we could say goodbye for a while and hold her.  She was crying when they brought her in but calmed immediately when they put her in my arms.  Blake and I petted her and loved on her and we each got to hold her for several minutes.  Then we let the vet give her the shots.  Blake got to hold her as the shots took effect. 

I am so broken hearted about her.  Every time I go outside I'm used to looking for her and checking on her throughout the day.  It feels like a big void right now.  We loved her very much and will miss her so much.

On our roof

Watching Blake rehearse

In my brother's coat

In our tree, getting on to the roof