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What Would Your Home Look Like in a Snow Globe?

Type in your address and see your house in a snow globe. Click here

"The best way to spread Christmas cheer, is to sing loud for all to hear" - Elf

FREE KINDLE FREE KINDLE

FREE On Kindle this week through Friday, November 30, Help! Mom's Stuck on Spin Cycle

Help! Mom's Stuck on Spin Cycle is also available now in paperback click here



Baby Saves Christmas by Cheryl Moeller and Melissa Moeller Briggs is FREE Kindle this week until Friday, November 30 on Kindle

FREE this Week on FREE Kindle - Help! Mom's Stuck on Spin Cycle by Cheryl Moeller

My Philosophy of life - for free this week on Kindle.

I'm crazy but I love it!

Help! Mom's Stuck on Spin Cycle by Cheryl Moeller

FREE download until Friday, November 30

Also now Help! Mom's Stuck on Spin Cycle by Cheryl Moeller in paperback on Kindle - Click here

Two Soups Tuesday: What to do with the Tiny Bits of Turkey Leftovers?

Great for Turkey leftovers (all it needs is one to two cups of cut small cooked turkey - white or dark meat.)

A homemaker makes a house a home.




1.  Gladys' Potato Soup  (Gladys is my mom. )

In a soup kettle melt one stick of margarine (which is 1/2 cup)
Into the melted margarine or butter. put 1 clove garlic or sprinkle a little garlic powder,
chopped 3 TB onions or a couple shakes of onion flakes, minced
1 stalk of celery, cut small
1 large carrot, cut small   (optional on the carrot but you need the celery for seasoning)
                                       (You can grate the carrot into the soup.)
Cook (but don't brown or burn on very low about 1 minute.

Then add one cup of flour.
Stir and cook about one minute on low low, but don't burn.

Add two to three quarts of water with 10 chicken bouillon cubes or two boxes of chicken stock. Salt and pepper to taste.  Cut about three large potatoes into very small cubes real small like :).  I like well washed red potatoes and you don't have to peel, just scrub really well.  Cut real small.

Stir well when you pour everything into the crock pot and still several times during the 6 to 8 hours cooking time with cover on.

When you are ready to serve, add 1 cup cream and then allow the soup to heat up again

Salt and pepper, but taste first because the bouillon makes it's kind of salty.

2.  Easy Turkey Taco Soup

Ingredients:

2 cups turkey leftovers, cut small
1/2 cup chopped onion or 3 Tablespoons onion flakes
1 cup frozen peas
1 cups frozen corn
20 oz. diced tomatoes
16 oz. black beans, drained
16 oz. chicken stock or veggie stock
1 1 oz. package taco seasoning

Preparation:

1.  Heat a large frying pan pot and stir in the onion with a touch of oil. 
2.  Add the other ingredients to the crock pot.  
3.  Add in the slightly cooked onion.
4.  Cook for 6-8 hours on low in the crock pot.
5.  Serve with avocado and sour cream on the side.

FREE on Kindle - Baby Saves Christmas

FREE
Baby Saves Christmas by Cheryl Moeller and Melissa Moeller Briggs
Mother Daughter Duo Authors

FREE on Kindle Today, Monday, November 26 through Friday, November 30
A Christmas fiction about family fun and the true meaning of Christmas.


"I sure love this book for my kids.  We read it every Christmas Eve for an easy but important family tradition." - Lisa

Cyber Monday Week, Business Owners: Link up to Sell, Shoppers: Click in Each Link to Shop

I am so proud of my friends who are running small businesses from home.  It's what made and makes America so great.  I look to their pioneering and entrepreneurship for inspiration.

So it's Cyber Monday, but we are going to have Cyber Monday week.

I'm a mom just like you and I have a link I am going to put up, also so you can check out our products:  CDs, DVDs, books, and Kindle books.  

This is a place for business owners to link up their shops for a one stop buying place for shoppers.
Link up your Etsy shops, websites, blog hosts...  Whether you sell one thing or many, this is your
place to sparkle.


The best way to thank a small business owner is to buy something from them today!

Desirous and Desperate for the Christ Child's Glory (A Christmas Devotional)

by Bob and Cheryl Moeller

We'll never forget when an acquaintance proclaimed to us on December 11th of that year; she was going to bake large quantities of 12 unique types of cookies for their family Christmas celebration.

"I don't care what happens. I have to finish all my baking," she said.

And, we were thinking, "Why?"

To do this marathon over-achieving baking goal, she missed church for two Sundays, our church's Christmas concert, her children's performance in our Christmas program, and her children's Sunday school trip to sing Christmas carols at her mom's nursing home and the mall as an outreach.

Tragically, her mother who lived nearby in the nursing home, passed away early Christmas Eve day.

During the funeral eulogy the daughter delivered with sobs, she said "I never saw my mom once in the last two weeks because I was too busy shopping for cookie ingredients and baking for our Christmas celebration. Had I known my mom was going to pass away this week, I would have spent my time with her."

This December in our Christmas Celebration, let's not miss the important, the Glory, because of the mundane.

We are very grateful for God's glory as 2012 draws to a close. We echo the words of the Psalmist, "I will praise you, O Lord, with all my heart...I will sing your praise." Psalm 138

May we be desirous and desperate for the Christ Child's Glory this next month. Let's not trade the Glory of the Christ Child for a box of cookies. www.forkeepsministries.com

All Mom Wants for Thanksgiving

BOGO Our Christian Marriage Conference CDs and DVDs

Special Today  BOGO

Special through midnight Cyber Monday

Buy one of our CD 4-Part sets or DVD 4-Part sets and get an additional set of the same conference (or another conference of your choosing) that you order for free.

1.  FBFWFK Marriage Conference Part I audio (4 CDs)

2.  FBFWFK Marriage Conference Part I video (4 DVDs)

3.  FBFWFK Marriage Conference Part II audio (4 CDs)
(The new Part II has different session topics than the ones listed on the website.  Session #1 - How to Get Your Husband to Talk to You, Session #2 - How to Encourage Your Wife to be Intimate with You, Session #3 - How Two People Become Truly One, Session #4 - How to Prevent an Affair in Your Marriage)
So, if you purchase the Part II of the marriage conference you are going to get the CDs published here not on the products page.) 
4.  The Road to "I Do" Singles Conference audio (4 CDs)
new taping

BOGO (buy one get one) buy one conference set and get one conference set identical or of your choice for free. (Please send us a note with instructions after purchasing the one set you want, as to what you want for your free set.) (Do not purchase the second set.)  You only pay shipping on the first set.  Click here to get started

The Heights are Alive

The Heights are Alive
by the Moeller family

The heights are alive,
With the smell of turkey
Tastes we have eaten
For thirty three years

Fam'ly fills our hearts,
With sound of laughter

Our hearts want to rise
Every word we hear

Our mouths want to taste
Two wings of the turkey
That once flew through farms to small trees

Our hearts wants to sigh
Missing those aren't here
From our sweet clan not a plane

Football in the park field
As we trip and fall
Over grass and dirt on our way
To run through the goal
Like a one
Who is learning to play

We go to the stove
When our bird is toasty
We know we will see
What we've seen before
Our hearts will be blessed,
With the smell of fowl
And we'll serve once more.

Happy Thanksgiving from the Moellers

WOW #1 in a bigger division this morning - #1 in Family Relationships

FREE on Kindle until Saturday, November 24, 2012

Keep Courting:  100 Ways to Keep Courting After Marriage
Overall #154 on kindle free this week!
#1 on amazon kindle free this week under family relationships
http://www.amazon.com/Keep-Courting-After-Marriage-ebook/dp/B005TSV318/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1353595847&sr=8-1&keywords=keep+courting

 

#1 in the Marriage and Family Division on Kindle this Week under FREE Kindle

FREE Kindle download this week Keep Courting:  100 Ways to Keep Courting After Marriage by Bob and Cheryl Moeller

Click Here

A gift book! 50 ways to keep courting your husband and 50 ways to keep courting your wife.

Fifty Ways for Women to Keep Courting Their Husbands,
After Marriage:
- Attend an outdoor sporting exhibition show and look through the brochures, with him.
- Write a list of the "Things I Admire Most About My Husband" and tape it to his closet door.

Fifty Ways for Men to Keep Courting Their Wives,
After Marriage:
- Ask her to tell you two things that would make you an easier husband to live with (then work on them).
- Add "I love you" to her calendar on the day of your anniversary, every month. So, if you were married on June 16 (like the Moellers), write" I love you" on the 16th of every month, on her calendar. She'll remember every month how grateful you are to have her, as your wife.

“But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:15b

To Court Your Husband:

3. Smile throughout the day. It could be contagious!

4. Clean the garage together for an entire morning (with his favorite snacks).

5. Go to his favorite burger place, order a big item, so you can split the sandwich.

6. Order in pizza, sit next to him on the couch, and watch the game.


To Court Your Wife

“…to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the Word.” Ephesians 5:26

56. Sit with your arm around her at church.

57. Kiss her affectionately before you leave in the morning.

58. Go out for dinner and let your knees touch under the table.

59. Put your arm around her waist while you’re standing in a group and talking to friends.

Free Today through Friday on Kindle

Keep Courting:  100 Ways to Keep Courting After Marriage by Bob and Cheryl Moeller
Free today on Kindle Click here
If you don't have a Kindle, here's free apps click here

For Whom the Ding Dong Tolls

My daddy was a preacher, so we could not afford Ding Dongs until I was in high school. 

If we had a sweet, it was one of my mom's homemade soft molasses cookies, best dipped
in cold milk.  So, the cost per treat serving was 2 cents for homemade, instead of 7 cents for
Hostess.  You multiply that by 6 people and then by how many days in the month and the savings was needed.

Or, maybe my mom knew before others it was healthier to prevent preservative baths.

In high school, our "popular with boys" neighbor was named Jodie.  When she broke up with a boyfriend or worse yet a boyfriend broke up with her, she would buy and eat a box of Ding Dongs all in one day.  Rumor had it that Jodie even licked the frosting off each little white cardboard inside the packaging.  

I witnessed this whole phenomena once in person.  I had never seen anything like it.  My sister had described it to me, but I did not truly believe her until I saw it for myself.

When Mark broke up with Jodie in the spring of her junior year, I tagged along when my sister paid Jodie a sympathy visit after school. She handed my sister and me a Ding Dong in between wet sobs.  I was 14 and it was my first one.  It's hard to enjoy your first Ding Dong when your "Hostess" is sobbing and you are supposed to be expressing as much hated for Mark as she was consumed with right then. 

Later in life I learned a cute birthday cake craft that did not require sewing or knitting, which qualified me to participate.  At our daughters' (Melissa, Megan, and MacKenzie) birthday party sleepovers through the years, each girl would decorate a Twinkie.  The Twinkies were supposed to be a small replica of an individual sleeping bag.  Each girl would put theirs on top of the birthday cake and then I would cover all of them except their "heads" with frosting for the blanket. 

I was looking forward to carrying on the Twinkie birthday cake craft tradition with future granddaughters, also.  But, who knows maybe the grandkids will be gluten-free so all is not lost.


Due to the announcement that Hostess is closing down its manufacturing plants forever, I was in line behind a woman buying bag after bag of Hostess products at the grocer's today.  She said she was going to freeze them to last her for a year.  I have a feeling she went home; relived her whole childhood in one day; and is passed out in a sugar coma tonight.

My second stop on my errand run today was the pharmacy.  The space was completely empty where Hostess products were housed only yesterday.  It reminded me of the milk, juice, and bread counters that were laid bare just before the big Chicago Blizzard of 2011.

Even if you have not purchased a Twinkie for twemty years, clearly something has died this week.
The Ding Dongs and Ring Dings are ringing for the last time because we did not pay the toll.

Link Your Mom, Grandma, Women's Blog Here Today

Blog are Replacing Magazines and Newspaper Variety Sections as Seriously Taken Idea Source.
I have two blogs Momlaughs and Writing Mentor

Do you have a blog?  Do you have a friend who writes a blog for women?

Do you have a Christian mom, grandma, or women's blog?  We want to see your blog!  Let's see your blog, website, facebook, linkedin, twitter account, or ?

Two Soups for Thurday

Plan now for your turkey leftovers.  Purchase the ingredients now such as pearl barley or wild rice.  You are sure to use all your turkey leftovers up using one of these soup recipes.  These two soups are healthy and easy to stick into your crockpot the Friday or Saturday after Thanksgiving and by lunch or dinner you'll please any crowd.

1.  Turkey Barley Soup Recipe

Ingredients:

6 cups chicken broth or turkey broth
1 to 2 cups diced cooked turkey
1/2 cup pearl barley
1/2 cup chopped onion
2 celery, stalks, chopped
3 carrots, sliced
1 bay leaf
1 teaspoon dried leaf thyme
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

Preparation:

1.  Combine broth, turkey, barley, onion, celery, carrots, bay leaf, thyme, and black pepper in slow cooker. 2.  Cover and cook on LOW for 6 hours.


2.  Turkey Minnesota Wild Rice Soup 

Boil one small box 4 oz. wild rice which takes about 45 minutes to cook and then drain it. (Save the wild rice because you will add to soup when you add the turkey stock later.)
 ---------------------------------------
In a soup kettle melt one stick of margarine.
Into the melted margarine or butter. put 1 clove garlic, chopped 3 TB onions, minced,
3 stalks of celery, cut small 3 large carrots, cut small
Cook (but don't brown) on very low about 2 minutes.

Then add one cup of flour. Stir and cook about two minutes on low, but don't burn.

Add
1.  Three quarts of water with turkey bouillion cubes OR 2 boxes of turkey broth OR make your own.
2.  The wild rice that has been cooked and drained earlier
3.  Two cups of cooked turkey, diced small.
4.   Salt and pepper to taste.

Stir well and pour into slow cooker Simmer on low for at least 6-8 hours.

When you are ready to serve add 2 cups milk or 1 cup cream and then allow the soup to heat up again for thirty minutes in the slow cooker.

Serve with a few silvered almonds on top for a great texture contrast.

 From my cookbook, Creative Slow-Cooker Meals: Use Two Slow Cookers for Tasty and Easy Dinners by Cheryl Moeller

Cheryl's Homemade Pumpkin Spice Latte

I don't like the new pumpkin spiced coffee creamers that are out this season, but I do like my own homemade Pumpkin Spiced Latte.  

As far as Biggby, Caribou, and Starbucks Pumpkin Spiced Lattes, I love Starbucks the best.  Yes, I sacrificially suffered through taste testing all of them so I could give you this review. :)

                                                            First Place Starbucks

Online deal through Money Saving Mom bogo at Starbucks until the 18th of November

I found this deal online, too.  If you purchase four Starbucks drinks in one visit in November, you get the fifth one free. Click here

 

Cheryl's Homemade Pumpkin Spice Latte

Ingredients:

8 ounces strongly brewed coffee
½ cup milk or unsweetened vanilla almond milk or unsweetened soy milk
3 Tablespoons pumpkin puree (fresh or canned)
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
1-2 teaspoons of sugar or honey or 2-3 drops of liquid stevia
pinch of cinnamon

Instructions:

1. In a small pan on the stove, mix together milk, pumpkin, spices, and sweetener..
2. Cook on medium heat on the stove top for a couple of minutes, stirring the whole time.
3. Remove from heat,  place in your blender and process for 30 seconds or until foamy.
4. Pour coffee into a large mug, add the foamy milk mixture on top. 
5. Add pinch of cinnamon on top.

More of Cheryl's Great Pumpkin Recipes
Pumpkin Wild Rice Soup
Charles Sumner Pumpkin Soup

How to Become an Eternally Romantic Spouse for Real

 Yesterday's Post was some good humor on how to date your spouse. Click here

We have a book, Keep Courting:  100 Ways to Keep Courting After Marriage by Bob and Cheryl Moeller, for husbands and wives who have forgotten how to be fun, romantic, spontaneous...
It will soon be on Amazon as a paperback by the end of next week, but you can purchase it now
on Kindle... click here

HOPELESS ETERNAL ROMANTIC HUSBAND KEEPS COURTING ON FRIDAY DATE DAY: Guest Post by Momlaughs' Husband

HOPELESS ETERNAL ROMANTIC HUSBAND KEEPS COURTING ON FRIDAY DATE DAY:

Seven weeks ago: Rode bikes with Cheryl to get coffee & "Queen's Crown" at Burger King.

Six weeks ago: Drove Cheryl to see the buffalo in Buffalo Grove. (no luck)

Five weeks ago: Took Cheryl to feed the elks in Elk Grove Village. (lucky)

Four weeks ago: Accompanied Cheryl to our bank and got her a free lollipop.

Three weeks ago our date: Escorted Cheryl to vote and we both got free stickers.

Two weeks ago our date: Bought Cheryl new toothbrush and splurged on toothpaste.

One week ago our date: Dumpster dove for Cheryl's requested Thanksgiving front porch decoration. (I was put in charge of curb appeal for our Thanksgiving Dinner and I knew there had to be some "gently used" pumpkins and hay bales from Halloween.) - Bob

Now in Paperback: Help! Mom's Stuck on Spin Cycle

Just in time for holiday shopping!  

Paperback copies of Help! Mom's Stuck on Spin Cycle now available and just in time for mom's Christmas gift. Remember everyone is a mom or has had a mom, for sure we know that. 

For Paperback: on Amazon

Also on Kindle

Free Printable Download for Thanksgiving from Paper Coterie

GRATITUDE JAR FREE PRINTABLE DOWNLOAD!

What are you grateful for? Get ready for Thanksgiving with a printable gratitude jar. Simply print a label for your jar and fill it full of your family's responses to a series of fun and unique gratitude prompts. Want a creative and meaningful Thanksgiving activity? Read through your family's responses before or after Thanksgiving dinner. Are you ready to create a year full of abundance? Keep adding responses to the jar throughout the coming year. Next Thanksgiving, you'll have a full year of blessings to reflect on and be grateful for.

Enjoy,
the Paper Coterie

DOWNLOAD YOURS TODAY!

Free Printable Download http://www.papercoterie.com/blog/a-jar-full-of-gratitude/

Grandma Got Ran Over by a Cell Phone: 2012 The Year Grandma Cheryl Learned How to Text

MY  2012 New Year's Resolution - "I will learn to text." (Even if it's December 31, 2012 at midnight.  Yes, I can do this.)

Megan and MacKenzie, our two youngest daughters, volunteered to be my teachers (in exchange for a trip to Forever Twenty-One.)  Reading my cell phone directions book was not working.

MacKenzie said, "Mom you are going to have to learn texting language. For example, 'C U @ the pole.' It's kind of like 2012 shorthand.  It's a unique language like French or Chinese.  You can't speak British or American English if you want to be in the "texting club."

                                                   
Megan encouraged me, "Mom, you're an intelligent person.  So, take concepts you have already mastered in life and transfer them to texting."

"What like baking a Barbie doll shaped cake, mopping a floor, cleaning up vomit or changing a diaper?  That helps you with texting and how?"

MacKenzie commented, "You're a "try hard" at other things.  I wouldn't give up if I were you, unless you never want to communicate again with any human under the age of 80."

"So, if you can't text, no one will talk to you."

"Truth."

I soon learned that my text lessons needed to be from other 13 year olds, not my own.  Kind of like not taking stick shift driving lessons from your husband.

I lost friends my first month of texting because according to MacKenzie, "Mom you 'Overtexted!!!!!!!!!!"'.

Megan gasped, "Mom, you are making our family look bad.  There's rules, mom, in the world of texting and you are breaking them." 

I only knew how to text to people who had texted me, so that brought me up to a number towering of five. To practice, I kept texting them 92 times throughout the days with things like, "IIIIIIIILIKEORANGEJUUUUICE."

                                My "First Text" Exhibit at the Smithsonian (behind glass)

At first my five texty friends thought I was funny, but then they started ignoring me not just on texts, but also on land lines and at the grocery store.

Finally, a random 22 year old girl in Chipotle showed me how to use friends' phone numbers to text to them.  I felt like a twentysomething, if only for a moment.

Still some of my friends did not answer back.  Why?

MacKenzie said, "Mom you are ruining NASA research, some of the phone numbers you are texting are land lines, not cell phones, and your messages are out near Saturn."


Megs said, "Mom, you still have a lot to learn about texting, but texting has benefits.  If you get kidnapped Christmas shopping, you can text to let us know."

Let the Laughter Begin

How Many Nights a Week Do you Have a Family Dinner with everyone present?  I hope more than five evenings.

Here's an easy meal menu planner that I designed.  I not only give you recipes, but with two slow cookers cooking, I create your menu for dinner (there is one chapter for breakfast, also). When you are all seated at the table; let the laughter begin.

The project began because I became concerned that most families were barely eating two or three dinners together each week.  We are able to have more dinners than most families and I wanted to share our secret.  Two slow cookers make sure there is enough food, an entree and a side dish, or two choices
for picky or allergen-prone family members.

I hope you try my cookbook written to make your life easier.
Perfect for lots of people on your Christmas list, including you!
So order five copies today and solve your gift dilemna. Click here

Two Soups for Thursday

Are you one of those people who can't get enough pumpkin and pumpkin flavor?

Pumpkin Wild Rice Soup

This week two crockpots make one soup.
1.  Crockpot #1 makes the wild rice for the soup.  Wild rice needs to cook a long time, but also needs to have the water drained after cooking, before eating.
2.  Crockpot #2  makes the pumpkin soup.  Add cooked wild rice later.

Crockpot #1

Ingredients:

3 oz. Wild Rice
5 cups Water


 Preparation:

1.  Pour water and wild rice into slow cooker; stir.
2.  Cover slow cooker and cook for 6-8 hours on low.
3.  After soup in crockpot #2 has cooked (and been pureed if you have used fresh pumpkin), drain water off wild rice and pour into other slow cooker.



Crockpot #2 Pumpkin Wild Rice Soup

Ingredients:

1/2 cup celery, chopped
1/4 cup onion, chopped (optional) or some dried onion flakes
1 lb. fresh uncooked pumpkin meat or 1 – 16 oz. pumpkin, canned
4 cups chicken stock
1 bay leaf
2 tsps. parsley, chopped 
1/2 tsp. salt, optional
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup whipping cream, not sweet

Preparation:

1.  In a large slow cooker, place all ingredients.
2.  Cook for about 6 hours on low with cover on.
3.  Discard bay leaf. Cool slightly.
4.  If you have used fresh pumpkin in a blender or food processor, process soup in batches until smooth.
5.  Return pureed pumpkin soup to slow cooker and add 1/2 cup whipping cream (not sweet).
6.  Heat up again for one hour in slow cooker.
7. Add drained wild rice from crockpot #1 
8.  To serve, sprinkle chopped parsley on each bowl.

For more of Cheryl's soup recipes click here

 Click here to order Cheryl's Cookbook