Turkey Salami Wraps

I realize that it's been ages since I posted a new recipe, and believe me, it has been weighing heavy on my conscience. My excuse, and it is an excuse, is that I'm still just completely irritated with the Mac version of the Creative Memories digiscrapping software, and my jobsy wears me out. Whine, whine.

Never mind about that though, I snagged this amazing recipe from Smashley quite awhile ago, and I think you're going to like it. She brought these decadent little guys to a crop one night, and they were devoured in no time. 

Here are the basic ingredients, although you can change them up however you want: deli turkey (or whatever), hard salami, powdered ranch dressing, roasted red peppers, flour tortillas, cream cheese, and leafy green lettuce.

I know that bag of lettuce is upside down. It's bugging me too. It wouldn't stand up the other way though, so just pretend you're okay with it. I thought about Photoshopping the label out and rotating it, but my heart just wasn't in it. I've let it go.

See me letting it go.

Of course you have to wash and dry your lettuce, but you also have to remove the fibrous ribs. Basically that means remove the hard parts that won't allow the tortilla to roll up without tearing. That pretty much leaves the leafy green parts. Pun not intended.

Smashley's original recipe only calls for 8 ounces of cream cheese, but I ended up doubling that because I just couldn't stretch that amount of cream cheese out amongst ten tortillas. That, and I'm not afraid of cream cheese. Like butter, it's my BFF.

This is sort of time consuming, but it yields a lot so it's totally worth it. Trust me. After the cream cheese is on, start layering the rest of the ingredients. 

Roasted red peppers come next.

Then the pesky lettuce. I say pesky because the lettuce is what makes the rolling up part most difficult.

I'm spatially challenged, so I always have to concentrate when I'm getting ready to roll the tortillas up. You want the tortillas to have all the ingredients in every bite, so you need to start rolling parallel to the rows. It's easiest to watch the peppers because they form the tidiest line.

If all goes well, it should look like this when it's done. 

All the wraps need to be wrapped in plastic to keep the tortillas from drying out. Then they need to be refrigerated for at least a few hours to soften up a bit. Possibly there's another reason, but it sounds good to me.

See what I mean about a lot of wraps? Peanut Head and I take these in our lunches for days when I make them. They keep well. The girls love them too, and they're pretty picky.

If you're making them for an appetizer, you just slice them up (remove the plastic wrap, of course). Do I really need to say that?

Probably.

They are very pretty as an appetizer. You can't call them wraps after you cut them though. Once you cut them, you have to call them Roll-Ups. Smashley says.

She's very bossy.

You must try them.

And finally, a new recipe card. Enjoy!

The Life Cycle of a Spider and Other Zen-Like Ponderings

I've been wanting to get this picture scanned into my computer for months, but for some reason my computer has decided to unfriend my scanner. I would try to scan something and it would say "Scanner not found."

Then I'd yell at it "It's right there! On the desk next to you, you big bonehead. Would you like me to introduce you?!!!!"

It would politely decline thereby causing me to have an aneurysm. Much whining would ensue, Peanut Head would pointedly ignore the whining, and I would mutter under my breath and threaten to buy a new scanner.

I know, I'm such a problem solver. 

Peanut Head is my tech support, and he came through for me, finally. Thank you sweetie. Smooches. 

Something about having to reinstall the driver, blah blah, boring stuff, blah blah.

Anyway, this picture is Stinkerbell's masterpiece entitled "Life Cycle of a Spider." Ironically, this piece was created while sitting in church. Because The Stink is all about the peace and the love when she's supposed to be tranquil and pleasant.

I liked the Life Cycle picture so much that she has been cranking out multiple versions. This one made me smile because we get these creepy looking centipede bugs in our basement, and we always vacuum them up. The last frame is supposed to be a vacuum, but she knew it wasn't super identifiable, so she went ahead and labeled it. She's helpful like that.

Stinkerbell's teacher has the kids fill out these vocabulary charts for their vocabulary words every week, and I get a kick out of some of The Stink's pictures. Sometimes they're funny.

Like this one. I love it. It goes with the word "dispatch," and the stick guy is calling 911 because his house in on fire. The dispatch guy says "On it!"

This one is hard to see, but it's a muscle guy. She labeled the dude "mucle."

This is me. I'm thinking about changing my Facebook Profile picture to this and calling it "Split Personality."

In contrast, here are Zoe Bug's drawings. Drawings of unicorns and rainbows, not death.

Actually, not unicorns, but horses.

Here a horse, there a horse, everywhere a horse-horse.

I could go on and on, but I don't want to get hoarse.

Can you tell I've been working out?

I've been on this new workout routine called "21 Days to a Segmented Insect Body."  I think it's working.

Blue Thunder, The Easter Bunny, and Other Unrelated Tidbits

The girlies came running inside yesterday yelling "MOM! Jo Jo is blue! Jo Jo is blue! Somebody painted Jo Jo blue!"

Well, since I haven't seen any Smurfs since the early eighties, I figured that probably the kids had had too much Easter candy and the sugar was messing with their vision. 

I went outside and sure enough, the cat was blue. Immediately when I saw her I thought-shouted What kind of sicko freak would spray paint a cat?!

Then it quickly dawned on me that the dumb butt cat had rolled her gelatinous body all over Stinkerbell's chalk drawn hopscotch on the sidewalk. She was in loooooooove with that sidewalk chalked hopscotch.

And now she is permanently stained, cannot get it off, blueberry blue. Hence, I did the only thing I could do under the circumstances. I took her picture and promptly bestowed her with a regal name of which she so laughably does not fit--Blue Thunder.

It must be said sort of tongue-in-cheek. Like, ha ha, in your dreams Tom Cruise. You are so not all that that you think you are.

Whoops. I just let one of my movie star peeves out in the open.

Anyway, I do not loathe my cat as I loathe Tom Cruise, but I am a little irritated with her. Any normal cat would have tongue-bathed all that blue off by now, but Jo Jo seems to care less.

Changing the subject, our Easter Bunny messed up again. Yet another Easter we have been woken up by our kids, looking at us with their sad eyes, inquiring "Why didn't the Easter Bunny hide our eggs?"

"What?!!! What the?!!! WHAAAAAT?!!! What time is it?! Go back to bed! You're not even awake! It's a dream! It's too early! If you don't go to bed the Easter Bunny WON'T COME!"

Yes, my kids pretty much accept the fact that by all appearances their mother is crazy. We're all pretty comfortable with it.

Yeah, so anyway, Zoe Bug is more gullible than I am, and she so desperately clings to the magic of Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny. All the while, Stinkerbell, who is almost two years younger than Zoe, stands next to her rolling her eyes and saying "It's not reeeeeeaaaaal. It's Mom and Daaaaaad. Don't you knoooooooo-ow?"

"No it's not, Anni-KA! If you don't believe, he/she/it won't come! You have to believe!"

"What-EV-er."

That Stinker Dink. You can't get anything by her.

The girls left the room as per my freaking out instructions, and they holed up in their room until a more reasonable hour--not 6:30. I calmly called them into our bedroom to straighten the mess out.

"Yeah. So, we talked to the big EB last night, and he asked us if we could hide the eggs for him. He has too much to do and he needs help, so we're going to hide the eggs for you after you get dressed."

Zoe totally bought it. Stinkerbell just looked at us sideways and humphed. I think she's a little suspicious.

Which brings me to my next completely unrelated topic . . . butter. Can you believe what this kid has done to her French Toast?

Here, let me give you a closer look. I think she put a half a stick of butter on that. Before I stopped to take this picture, I had a little freak out fit. Thank goodness I caught this disaster before The Stink had time to eat it. I was very dramatic in my scoldings.

"You cannot eat that much butter. This will go straight to your bloodstream and stop your heart like a freight train. Do you know what that means?!!!! It means it will kill you! I know butter is yummy, but you cannot eat it like this!" Blah, blah, blah. I said a bunch of other stuff, but I've blacked it all out. I think she got the message.

So, did any of your kids eat so much candy yesterday that it caused them to vomit violently? Zoe Bug holds the Easter Candy Purge title in this house. It's not a title anyone is trying to beat though. Just because we're Tough Love Parents, we asked her "Was it as good coming back up as it was going down?"

Ha, ha. I just know we're going to win the Parent of the Year trophy. Bring it.