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I've purchased a domain and moved my blog! Please visit me at www.simplylifeblog.net. All past and future content will be available there. Thank you for all your support--it has allowed me to get this far!

Recipe: Green Salsa

No huge, life-changing insights today. I want to share with you a favorite recipe. I've made it a few times now, and every time I make it I wonder why green salsa is so under-rated. Either that or it's under-created... I know so many people who LOVE green salsa. I know maybe two people who make it. 

People....this is a problem. ;)

I'll cut to the chase. Here's the recipe. I don't know how to do the fancy recipe files, so you'll have to bear with me and just read it like regular blog post content. 

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Green Salsa
Makes 4-6 cups salsa

Ingredients:
8 tomatillos, husked and rinsed
1 small yellow onion, peeled and coarsely chopped
2 teaspoons minced garlic
4 ounces green chiles (one can)
1/4 cup (I use more) fresh cilantro
1 jalapeno, seeded
salt

Broil the tomatillos, onion, and jalapeno in the oven for 5-10 minutes or until blackened. (You don't want to miss out on the awesome flavor this adds to the salsa!)

Place all ingredients in your blender or food processor and process until soupy. 

It will be quite warm from the broiled ingredients. Chill in the refrigerator a few hours until cool. Then serve with tortilla chips and enjoy! 

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If you prefer your salsa quite hot, there are a few things you can do. Leaving the seeds in your jalapeno is probably the easiest option. You could add another jalapeno. Or, as I recently learned, the jalapenos with the spidery brown scars all over them are hot, and the pretty and smooth all-green ones are mild. Who knew!? So if you're not a fan of heat, choose a smooth one, and if you love that heat in your salsa, choose one with a bit of brown on it. 

Moving -- and "Crusty Hospitality"

I read an author/blogger/woman once who wrote of this thing she called crusty hospitality. (I swear I am not trying to withhold credit and I searched her to see if I could link to her article, but I can't find it. If you know the woman of whom I speak, please let me know and I will edit this post to include her!) Basically, as I remember it, her crusty hospitality was the mindset that we should just welcome people into our lives -- without having to "clean up" first. 

I guess it's like we always say that Jesus asks us to come as we are. Growing up I always had it explained to me that you don't take a bath before you jump in the shower. You just shower. This author wanted to invite people to come as they were, so she also came as she was. 

So many times I think we fail to invite people into our lives because we aren't "ready for company." We were raised by well-meaning mothers who taught us to clean-clean-CLEAN and stuff things in closets and scrub and wash and vacuum and make-perfect before company arrived. It was always days of hassle and stress, and then the harried rush to hide away anything that had been missed. 

It really didn't make us want to have guests... But at least the house got cleaned. Mostly. 

I am currently in the process of moving. I live in a small apartment (perhaps large as apartments go, but it is small for a family living space). I have boxes piled floor to ceiling and almost literally coming out my ears. I can't walk in my bedroom (we just had guests for dinner and I needed the table and dining room). 

I was on the phone with my mother and mentioned that I was having dinner guests over for homemade pizza. She had seen the state of my home and congratulated me on being able to invite people into my mess. Thanks, Mom. But really, I wonder if that should deserve congratulations at all. I honestly feel like we should work harder at making people feel welcome instead of working harder on making our home look like a magazine. I feel like we should not expect when we are offered a meal at someone else's table that they will have a home that looks like that magazine either. 

When we allow ourselves to be messy, we are able to welcome people into our real lives. When we allow them to be messy we speak a message that says, "I am not here for the food or the house, I am here because I value you."

I was going to made homemade pizza crust and we were going to have a fine night of great food and good times. But life and moving and my poor sick baby wouldn't allow for that. So, I bought two loaves of Italian bread and we sliced it up and made pizza on that. We ate at a newly cleared table surrounded by filled moving boxes. We placed our used dishes on a counter that already held many others. And the food was good. And the company was good. And the conversation was good. And we were all able to be real because in the space where I really do life I invited my friends in to do life with me too. 

Sometimes we need to share what's left in the fridge. Don't let that stop you from building friendships. 

Sometimes we have to move laundry so that your friend has a place to sit. Don't let that stop you from sharing your home.

Sometimes the food is burned. 
Sometimes you haven't dusted in months. 
Sometimes you have boxes on boxes and there isn't really room to kick them aside. 

Don't allow this to keep you from sharing life with the people you need to be sharing life with.

This is crusty hospitality. 

If you're worried they won't come again after they see how you share, then they were there for the food or the house, not the conversation and the friendship. If they are there for you, the food won't matter, the house won't matter, the baby's attitude won't matter. 

And it will be blessed. 


**Side note: If I waited until I had it all under control, I would never have guests over again. You too?**

Purposeless and Empty

Disclaimer: If you're looking for something to read that will brighten your day, I'm not sure that this is the one. 

Last time I wrote that we are "without excuse" and that I am "trying again." Turns out "trying again" isn't so easy after all. I was all "gung-ho" about it...and then, well, life. 

I think I might start a recipe blog. Or a sewing blog. Or something that requires a little less of "me" and a little more of stuff I do. 

That won't really happen. It's just how I'm feeling. 

Charlie is my best friend, at the moment. I'm not sure what I would do without the little bugger. She's my smiles, she is my purpose. She is my company. She is my friend. It's a big role for such a little person to fill. . . . But she does. Every time she sleeps I miss her. I hardly know what to do with myself. 

Isn't she cute? 

Lately, though, I've been feeling that aside from Charlotte Jayne, I don't have a purpose. I feel like an old, dried husk. Who am I? What am I? I don't even think I know. 

I sew. Sometimes. . . . Actually, what I really do is start things. I start lots of things. And I don't finish many of them. I have a partial skirt. I have a dinosaur toy I never sewed eyes onto. I have the fabric and notions for Charlie's Christmas gift, but I never even drew the pattern. I have 2.5 yards of pink minky and matching thread to make into a blanket for someone. I have 2 partially sewn baby boots that I may or may not finish before the snow melts again. 

I cook. Often, actually. I like to do that. But lately I feel like I have been cooking one huge thing. . . . .and then we eat it left over for days while I don't cook. 

I take photos. Actually, no. I don't really do that. I take photos of Charlie, but business photos don't really seem to be a thing. Someday, maybe. 

I run a facebook group called Buy Nothing. That's pretty cool. It gives me a bit of fulfillment to see that something I am doing is helping others. 

I don't clean much. I don't do the dishes much. I don't often do the laundry. I don't take out the trash. I don't hang out with friends. I don't really do anything but be a mommy to my baby. Now, please, before you all comment saying that being a mother is the best and most fulfilling job in the world and try to help me recognize that. . . .I know. Charlotte is the best thing that has ever happened to me. She is the most fulfilling job I have been given. But I am still not full. 

In the back of my mind I know that God is the only one who can fill me. In the bottom of my heart I know that until I am longing for Him I will still continue to feel empty. Lonely. Purposeless. 

I guess I just can't wrap my mind around it. I don't just want my time to be full. I want it to have meaning. But meaning escapes all that I do. 

I don't want answers. I know all the answers. 

I want friends. I want people to do life with. I want someone to be the one who seeks out a relationship with me. . . .because I'm tired of being the one who has to always do the looking. 

Not too many people read this blog, but if you happen to see this, please don't pity me or write me with the answers. I don't need any more answers. I just need people to do life with.