Abbie Lynn <3

Weekends are perfect for crockpot meals - they don't take too much time and they always turn out amazing. For this pot roast meal, I decided to combine two recipes - one from The Spuce Eats and one from a Google Search for "Cream of Mushroom Soup Substitute." The reasoning for this was because we had a Lipton Dry Onion Soup Mix that I thought would be good in the roast! We don't typically use regular onions but love the taste of Onion Powder or the soup mix. We also don't like mushrooms but I still enjoy cream of mushroom soup - or, in this case, a substitute. Ingredients: 3-4 pounds chuck roast 10 baby carrots 2 Tbsp butter 1 cup milk 1 1/2 cups water 1 packet Lipton (or any) packet dry onion soup mix 4 oz cream cheese Directions: Center the roast in the slow cooker. Add butter, milk, water, the onion mix and cream cheese. Turn the slow cooker on high. Cook for 4 hours, open the lid and try and shred the roast. Add the carrots. If the roast d

I feel like it's been awhile with blogging - I have the intention of blogging and then things get in the way and life gets back to busy. Even working 16 hours a week, I still feel like my life is way busier than usual. Lately I have been doing product reviews for companies to earn some extra money and I have 14 product reviews written down. So these past few weeks, besides moving and still unpacking, I have been playing catch-up on reviewing and enjoying products. I also finally heard back from unemployment but I had to send them some paperwork in the mail because I think I accidentally inputted wrong information when I filed my claim. So life's been fun LOL. I have been cooking more and I am hoping to put together two blogs today, fingers crossed! This first recipe I made last night and it was Baked Chicken Parmesan with Spaghetti Noodles. This recipe was SUPER easy to make and I only used two large boneless, skinless, chicken breasts. The original recipe was from Skinny Tas

Nothing is more disheartening than waiting 3 months for unemployment to pull through for them to say that if I make $40/week or more, I don't qualify. I wish there was a "gun to head" emoji (not in the literal kill but the "shoot me" quote type-of-way) because of course this would happen to me. With that being said, there goes my dreams of getting out of debt and caught up with all the bills that I haven't been able to pay the past three months.... Anywhoo. The blog. Yesterday I made these simple Honey Soy Garlic Ribs in the crockpot. It took maybe 10 minutes of prep time and then 6-7 hours on low in the crockpot. The original recipe was from Buzz Feed . Ingredients: 3 lb rack of pork ribs, divided 1/2 tablespoon salt 1/2 tablespoon pepper 1/2 tablespoon paprika 1/2 tablespoon chili powder 1 cup honey 1/2 cup soy sauce 2 teaspoon garlic powder Directions: Season ribs with salt, pepper, paprika, and chili powder and rub on all sides. Add th

Do you ever feel like you have those days, months, or even years where things just aren't going the way you want? (Did anyone else sing the "Friends" song in their head, or just me?) The last 2.5 years for me have been super hard and a huge struggle. Not working full time during that time has taken a huge toll and COVID hitting has made things harder. It's been about 3 months and I finally heard from unemployment. Hoping things will start looking up! I went to the store today so hopefully I will have some new recipes for you guys next week. We have been in our new place exactly 2 weeks so we are still trying to get settled. To say we love it here is an understatement. It is amazingly gorgeous. I'll show photos hopefully on my next blog. Last night I made this Cheddar Ranch Chicken. I thought it was super good - the only thing I would have done differently would have been to add more of the mixture on top of the chicken. Also, since we didn't have some of the

With so many enchilada recipes I have blogged about, I'm surprised that none of them are just regular, ground beef, cheesy enchiladas. So here we go. Ingredients: 1lb ground beef 2.5 cups red enchilada sauce 1 packet taco seasoning 5 large flour tortillas 1 1/2 cups cheddar cheese, shredded Directions: Heat oven to 375 degrees. Spray a pan with PAM or spray. Cook beef on the stove until brown, 5-7 minutes. Add taco seasoning with 3/4 cup water. Boil. Turn heat down and cook for about 2.5 minutes. Add 1 cup enchilada sauce and cook for 2.5 minutes more. In a tortilla, pour the meat mixture in the tortilla and add cheese. Roll tortilla up and place in a pan or baking sheet. Do this for all 5 enchiladas. Pour the remainder enchilada sauce on top and top with more cheese. Cook for 25 minutes. Serve with rice and beans. If you are looking for other Enchilada recipes, here are ones I have blogged about: Chicken Enchilada Nachos Slow Cooker Chic

I'm baaaaaaaack. I feel like I haven't blogged forever and let me tell you, things have been so so busy. I know I have semi-caught everyone up but I wanted to go back and just share what has happened this past month. So the beginning of May, Kevin and I went to Barstow and we were set on moving there. He had already gotten a job there and my job is remote so we went down there for about 4 days to see where exactly what we wanted to move to. I didn't really like Barstow or Victorville so we had our hearts set on Hesperia. We found a cute apartment that we both agreed on and decided to apply to. Unfortunately, we were not approved. We had a few other options but they all used the same rental company so we would have also been denied for the same reasons. That pretty much left us with the option to stay on the Central Coast. We had already put in our 30 day notice before we left to Barstow and we didn't really want to stay there so I had spent weeks trying to find a pl

Most of you may be in a situation similar to me - in March of this year I was working two jobs from home. By the end of March, I was down to working 16 hours a week. Even though it is June 7th, I still have not received anything from unemployment so I have been trying to do everything I can to make extra money. All of these suggestions below are programs or apps that I have personally used and would recommend. I also list WHY I would recommend them. I understand that these apps are not going to provide you with a lot of money immediately, but it could help with extra cash here and there. It also varies based on how much time you can put into it and availability of surveys. **Qmee** Qmee is an App that you can download on your phone, or you can try desktop as well, and you can fill out surveys. These surveys actually payout instantly if you want through Paypal, a gift card or you can donate to a charity. If you do at least one survey per day for five days, you receive a 10% inc

Friday night Kevin and I had the house to ourselves so we made this one-pot Cajun Chicken and Sausage Alfredo. We had plenty of leftovers and it was SO good. I hope you love it as much as we did! The original recipe can be found HERE . We did not have olive oil, garlic, or parmesan cheese so we made a few adjustments below. Ingredients: PAM spray 1 pound chicken breast, cut into bite-size pieces 1/2 tsp salt pepper, to taste 14oz smoked sausage, sliced 1/2 tsp garlic salt with parsley 1 small can chicken broth 2 1/2 cups heavy cream 1 pound penne pasta, uncooked 1 1/2 Tbsp Cajun seasoning 2oz mozzarella cheese   Directions: Spray a large pot with PAM or cooking spray and add chicken. Season with salt and pepper and brown over medium high heat.                                                     Since we arent using olive oil or a liquid, brown them for just a few minutes and then add sausage and cook until lightly browned. Stir in garlic salt. Add chicken

Times are changing and I have not yet decided if they are changing for the better or worse. Being in the marketing field for the past 8 years, I can say that this is truly an odd time to be in. Some businesses are thriving while others have closed. Online shopping and grocery delivery have increased, toilet paper has been a hot commodity and some stores have arrows showing you the direction to walk, one-way, to encourage social distancing and eliminating overcrowding. With life in general becoming difficult, you can only imagine how marketing in a time of COVID-19 can be. The past few months I have been able to see how companies have adapted to COVID-19 and wanted to provide some recommendations on how to incorporate COVID into your marketing without pushing a personal agenda. I have decided to put together some of the posts and Ads that I have seen on social media these past few months to display how to market or promote your product or services through COVID-19 - during times