Chicken Enchiladas in White Sauce Recipe!

I've made this recipe a couple times when we had a large crowd over for dinner at our house, as 1) it makes a ton and 2) you can prepare it a day ahead of time (ie at night once the baby is asleep) then pop in the oven the next day right before company comes over.  Thanks mom for sharing this recipe with us, we love it.  Enjoy!

Chicken Enchiladas in White Sauce

Ingredients:

6 chicken breast halves (boiled 20 minutes; keep 2 cups of the broth from the pot), shredded

2 cups canned chicken broth (or carton)

8 burrito size tortillas

8 T picante sauce

½ cup tightly packed cilantro

½ cup sour cream

1 t cumin (I use more)

3 T flour

½ stick butter (4 T)

4 oz. grated jack cheese (or more if you like cheese)

4 oz. grated cheddar cheese (or more if you like cheese)

1can black beans

Directions:

In blender combine cumin, cilantro, sour cream, 1 cup chicken broth (from can or carton), and 1 cup reserved chicken broth. In skillet or saucepan, heat butter slowly and add flour until smooth. Slowly add 2 remaining cups of chicken broth and stir until smooth and creamy (I usually add more flour to make it thicker). Add sauce in blender to saucepan. This is the “gravy”. 

To make enchiladas: Take each tortilla and fill with ½ cup shredded chicken and 2 T of picante sauce. Add 1-2 T black beans. Roll tortillas, folding ends up first to hold filling in. Place in 9”x13” pan, seam side down. 

 Fill pan with gravy, completely covering the enchiladas. Sprinkle cheeses on top. 

Bake at 350 degrees uncovered for 30 minutes, till bubbly and slightly browned. Serves 8-16 depending on portion size. 

Pop goes home

On Friday morning, January 27th, Pop went home to be with his wife Ging.  He had just celebrated his 99th birthday on the 10th of this month in California with tons of family and friends (we made this video for him since we couldn't be there). 

Kyle and I have spent the weekend talking about the kind of man that Pop was... loving, hilarious, selfless, witty, and hard working were among the characteristics that came to our minds.  He lived a full and long life and we are so thankful he's at peace now with a body that is whole, no longer holding that sharp mind back!

We are so grateful for the time that we had with him, especially the one-on-one time we had with him when he came to visit us in Atlanta. Although Emery never got to meet him in person, we have many happy memories about him to share with her.

Here's to you Poppa.  We love you so much.

Meet Junior!

Meet Junior Mwangangi Kitili, our sponsored child from Kenya! 

Kyle and I have wanted to sponsor a child for so long, and I'm so happy that we finally took the time to do this!  We chose Compassion, a Christian organization that my sister has been involved with for years and had nothing but positive things to say about it.  Their slogan is "Releasing children from poverty in Jesus' name", doesn't get much better than that!

 

Here is some background on Junior:  He was born March 21, 2006, which will make him 6 years old next month.  Junior lives with his mother.  He is responsible for carrying water and running errands.  His mother is sometimes employed as a laborer.  There are 3 children in his family.  Soccer, playing ball games and playing group games are Junior's favorite activities. He does live in an aids infected area, but the most common health problems include malaria and typhoid.  His community needs schools, water and playgrounds.  

Our sponsorship allows the staff of Mbangwani AIC Church Child Development Center to provide Junior with Bible studies, medical services, sports activities, camps and arts and crafts lessons.  The staff will also provide community service opportunities to Junior's mom.

There are so many children on this website that need sponsors, so if this is something you all have been wanting to do as well there is no better time than now!  We cannot wait to start praying for him, write to him and hear back from Junior with what he's been learning and doing!

Wordless Wednesday: Sweet nightly moments

(yes she's still wearing her Halloween pjs... as long as they fit, she'll still be wearing them! ha)

Thursday Randoms

Is this week dragging on for anyone else? Here are some randoms to get us through Thursday.

- A couple months ago, Kyle, Emery and I modeled for a friend who shoots Boba products.  I love the light and sweet moments that she caught!  We are meeting Andrea again on Monday to model some different products, so fun!

- Speaking of "modeling", have y'all checked out the new BA products?  Em made a couple appearances on our homepage!

- We hung Emery's swing from Grammy and Poppa off of our back deck.  It's awesome and she loves it. She squeals almost every time we push her!  Oh to day dream...

- Two weekends ago, Emery and I spent time with my parents and Grandma up in Boone while Kyle was in British Columbia snowboarding with family.  We had a great time visiting with everyone and eating delicious food as always.  I only took ONE picture the entire weekend!

- Well I take that back, I did take one more of the frozen lake at Valley Crusis Park.

 

- Kyle brought a friends helmet cam to Canada with him.  The videos are so cool I can't wait to put them together with his pictures for a blog post.

- Speaking of being behind on blog posts I finally did Emery's 9 month update (haven't even started the 10 month one yet!) and posted it to a December date (the date it really should have been posted!).  If you want to read it click here... still haven't had a chance to do the video yet though :\

- Kyle came back from Canada with a cold, which almost always happens when he travels.  Unfortunately Emery and I have caught it this week too.  I think Emery slept a combined 6 out of her normal 12 hours of sleep last night.  I am thankful for a husband who helps out during the night shift.  It was good team work last night, even if we both somehow fell asleep on Em's nursery floor two separate times.  But who could be mad when this sweet face stares back at you?

- I have an 100% success rate of getting a sinus infection after colds so I bit the bullet and finally bought a Neti pot.  Talk about a WEIRD feeling, purposely giving yourself water up your nose.  We'll see if it works I guess!

- Kyle started playing in a Mens soccer league near our house.  He is having so much fun playing soccer again... even if he did come back with a "rolled ankle, pulled groin, and bruised ego" (his words not mine!)

- I've been to so many baby showers lately and am loving reliving pregnancy through my friends.  I can't believe I know 8 LADIES due around February!  I snapped this photo of Stephanie last weekend!

- Lastly I cannot listen to this song enough.  It's part of the soundtrack to the new Hunger Games movie that comes out in March.  I love the Civil Wars and combined with Taylor Swift it really is beautiful.  I can't wait to see this movie!

Okay I'm sure there are way more randoms I could post but that's all I can think of at the moment.  Happy Thursday everyone! 

Thank you!!

My well planned out Christmas banner this year had one flaw... much to my surprise it wasn't big enough! Thank you to everyone who sent us cards this year, we absolutely loved reading your updates and seeing your pictures!  Since I posted on the banner when I first made it here I wanted to give an updated picture of how it looked once full.  I ended up only hanging the photo cards here, and then the other cards went on the side of our fridge! I guess next year I'll have to come up with a new plan for hanging cards!

So blessed to have such sweet friends and family that include us on their Christmas card lists!  Thank you again!

And here is what our photo card looked like, I wish I could have sent one to all of our blog readers! (A huge thank you to Andrea for snapping this photo for us!).

Tyson to the rescue

I know a lot of people worry about how their animals will handle a new addition to the family, and I was to some extent too.  Even though we think Tyson is a great dog, he does have a couple faults!  He does not like getting pinched anywhere on his face, particularly his ears and gets really excited to go outside to play frisbee that he literally GALLOPS to the door knocking down anything in his path.

But I can now say that he is AWESOME with Emery.  Most of his days are spent laying on the floor right next to her while she plays, and he lets her roll, kick and grab anywhere on his body.  He also moves into the kitchen with us when I feed her baby food, laying right underneath her high chair just in case something were to fall (just wait till next month Tyson, you're going to be in heaven).  He walks up to her all the time and gives her kisses, and he has come to her rescue TWICE in the past month!

Our monitor does not give any warning before it dies, which stinks!  A couple weeks ago Emery woke up around 3 am but we didn't hear her right away, since our monitor was dead.  Next thing I know, Tyson is licking my face to wake me up, letting me know Emery is awake and crying. This has actually happened 2 times-- the only 2 nights our monitor has died from not being plugged in the charger!  So I guess what they say is true... labs are FAMILY DOGS!  What a sweet big brother he is to Emery!

Emery and Merrin together again!

Last weekend, Emery and I headed up to Boone to spend time with my family while Kyle was out of town.  We couldn't pass up the opportunity to stop in and see Lauren and Merrin in Shelby for a couple hours though!

YEAH we got a picture of everyone smiling!

AND then Emery decided to give us no more smiles.  ONE day we'll get one of her smiling with Merrin!  (click here and here to see their other pictures together!)

I just have to include these other candid moments of the girls... too funny!

And about 2 seconds after the last photo was taken.  This picture is so typical... Merrin crawling away and Emery happy as a clam on her back playing with a toy!

Thanks again for letting us stop by.  Love you!

Happy 99th Birthday to Pop!

Kyle's grandpa, Pop, turns 99 TODAY!  Since we couldn't be with him in California to celebrate, we made him a birthday video that Kerry & Brenda will show him for us at his party! Now keep in mind this was made LATE one night last week, and this is our 3rd try because the first two we were laughing to hard to even sing!  Hope it makes him smile!

Happy 99th Birthday Poppa, we love you!

The Many Faces of Emery at 10 Months Old!

Emery is so expressive these days!  I just had to share these pictures, even if some are a little blurry.  What a cutie pie she is!

Emery turns 10 months old!

Emery Katherine turned 10 months old on January 8th!  She is such a sweetie whose cheeks are constantly getting kissed by her mommy and daddy!  We weighed her on our scale and she was right at 19 lbs this month.

PERSONALITY!
Every month her personality shines more and more, and this month it has been so neat to watch her communicate with us.  She has completely grasped the sign "all done" and will do that, along with shake her head "no" when she is full or doesn't enjoy the food we give her (ie green beans!). 


She loves to wave and will do so on command if you say "hi", "bye" or "night night".  Her newest trick is pointing at the things that she wants, which is so cool!  The points started like this (below) but have now developed into actually using her pointer finger.

She also started for real clapping this month when we say "Yeahh", which is so fun! She has been "clapping" for a couple months now, but would only successfully bring her hands together once. Now it's a full on clapping motion over and over again.  You can tell by her face below how proud of herself she is when we say "Yeahhhh Emery".

EATING!
Emery put on a pound this month which tells you that she loves to eat! She really is such a great sport, eating up most everything we give her to try.  She is still nursing from me probably about 4 ounces per feeding, 4 times a day.  At this point I'm confident that I'll be able to nurse her an entire year, which I am really excited about and grateful that it was so easy for us to do.
PLAYTIME!

Emery is still army crawling around, dragging her face on the floor as she goes.  She actually likes playing some on her tummy now which is exciting.  If she sees something that she wants that is out of reach, she'll just dive forward onto her face no big deal.  We are really going to work on arm strength next month!

A new trick of hers this month was learning the word "share" and voluntarily handing us toys that she's been playing with when we say it.  

Emery received so many fun toys from family for Christmas so she's really been enjoying playing with them and learning what each one does.  She's standing more these days too, holding onto her activity table or our coffee table for balance.

This pic is a little blurry but so cute:

SLEEPING!
She's still keeping the same schedule, which we love.  Up at 7:30-8am, eat, play, nap from 9:30-11:30am.  Eat, play, nap at 3:00-4:30pm.  Eat, play, down for bed at 7:00pm.  She did randomly wake up around 4am a couple nights this month, and was starving.  We don't know if it had anything to do with how much food she'd eaten that day or if it was just a growth spurt.  Either way she would nurse and then go right back down to sleep.

 

RANDOMS!
- Emery LOVES to swing, even if it's freezing outside. We put her in her snow suit and out we go to the swing!  We bought an 18 month snow suit so it'll hopefully fit her next winter as well, so it's pretty big on her now but still does the job!

She squeals and talks the whole time!

And one more swing pic from my phone:

- Emery still has NO TEETH!
- She traveled really well to and from Raleigh for Christmas. We slept at 5 different homes that trip and she kept her schedule really well!

- Em is so expressive these days with her faces.  Click here to see that post of pictures!

Here are my iphone pics for the month:

 

 

Happy 10 months sweet Emery Katherine, we love you so much!