Southwestern Chicken Bake/ Our Week/Good News

This weeks recipe I got from my mom. It's a great recipe that has ingredients that you can store in the cupboard for food storage. Everyone loves this recipe even my picky neighbor asked for the recipe.

Southwestern Chicken Bake
2 c cooked rice
1 ½ c diced cooked chicken
15 oz can Black beans, rinsed and drained
11-15 oz can Mexi style corn
14 ½ oz can diced tomatoes
1 tsp dried cilantro leaves
1 tsp cumin
½ tsp garlic powder
½ tsp oregano
1 T chili powder
¼ - ½ tsp ground red pepper

Mix together in a bowl. In a sauce pan melt 4 T butter. Add 4 T flour. Add ½ c chicken broth and 1 c milk. Add ¼ tsp pepper and ½ tsp salt. Stir until thickened. Pour over mixture in bowl and stir. Spread into 9x13 pan. Bake at 350° for 25-30 minutes. For the last 5 minutes, sprinkle with cheddar cheese. Serve with sour cream and salsa.

You could eat this with some re-fried beans and a salad. If you don't like spicy food then only use the 1/4 tsp ground red pepper. I use the canned chicken from Costco to make this recipe.

Our week was pretty fun. We went to Leavenworth for the Salmon Festival with my Aunt, Uncle, Cousin and Grandpa. It was pretty cool... more fun for the kids I think. Emma loved looking at the fish in the hatchery. They had a Native American tell a story in a big tent shaped like a salmon. Jacob took Emma to that while I looked at the sidewalk art. My Aunt and Uncle's friend Doug was one of the artists drawing on the sidewalk. Everyone used chalk and the art work was pretty impressive.

They also had wild raptors that have problems with their wings or eye sight or whatever so they can't go back into the wild. I thought they were stuffed and had the poo scared out of me when the Falcon turned his head. We all had a good laugh about that. We did some walking around down town Leavenworth which is always fun. Emma had fun with my family and didn't want them to leave.

I emailed my brother Tyler who is on his mission in Switzerland/Germany and asked him if Leavenworth looked anything like where he was (I sent him some pictures). He emailed back and said that it was very much like where he was. That made my trip even cooler to be able to walk down the sidewalks and see pretty much what he sees everyday on his mission. He said the Cascades even reminded him of the Swiss Alps so that was really cool. He comes home in March and I can't wait to see him again. We are really close so it's been hard to have him gone.

Also this week we found out that we are pregnant!!!! We were trying so it wasn't a surprise. I'm not as excited as I thought I would be. I'm happy to be having another baby but I already know how everything is going to go. There are days when I'm really excited and others where I'm asking myself why I am going to put myself through this again. I had a Cesarean with Emma and really want to do a VBAC so hopefully that can happen for me. My first appointment is on the 20th of October. My sister in law Rachel has one of those wheels so she calculated my due date which is May 30th. Let's hope all goes well and that I stay healthy. I was really sick with Emma and I'm not this time around so that's a plus. I don't feel pregnant... I have to fight the urge to take a test everyday!