Christmas Eve - Eve

Here we are on the night before Christmas Eve or Christmas Eve - Eve.  Are you rushing around doing last minute shopping?  Are you hurriedly finishing up craft projects?  I'm not.  I am being particularly lazy plus since it is only me now for immediate family, I don't need to rush as much.  Don't get me wrong, I have been busy but just not craft wise.  

So what have I been  working on?  The kitchen, cleaning, and cooking.  The only part of that trio that is fun was the cooking.  :)  I'll get to that in a minute.  First let's talk about the kitchen.  It is small and never enough space.  Then I discovered that the kitchen sink leaked.  Over the last year and two landlords ago, I've had people looking at the kitchen sink about 4 times.  They always say it was fixed and it was for a short amount of time.  This latest landlord (Mike) doesn't like leaking faucets and has been out a couple of times about it.  He had a person come out and look at it and it seemed fixed.  Then I noticed it was leaking again so he came out.  He tightened up things but it is still leaking.  It's not leaking much and the small pail he put underneath it in case it happened again, which it did hasn't even gotten the bottom covered.  He did put in a call to the plumber again and he will be coming out.  I told him not to pay extra.  Wait until after the holidays if he wants since it is a small leak.  Besides it was a good excuse not to do dishes for a bit.  He did put in the call to the plumber and he will be coming out, just not sure when.  

The other kitchen thing is that I now have a new Whirlpool refrigerator.  The landlord bought the extended warranty so it is covered for 4 years!  I had to take everything out of the fridge/freezer and then put it all back.  I decided that it would be a good time to look at expiration dates and what the freezer food looked like.  A lot of it got thrown out and now I am going through and arranging things better in the kitchen.  It's hard when you don't have cupboards.  The only cupboards are under the kitchen sink (well off to the side of it) so food is on 3 foot high bookcases, etc.  

That led me to going through some boxes that were in the kitchen for years.  I moved them into the sewing area so I could go through them.  I'm down to the last of the boxes and am proud to say that if I haven't looked for what was in them or used what was in them during the last year, they got recycled/thrown out/donated. 

Why is it that whenever we clean in the kitchen that I am ready to dirty it up again by cooking?  Today was no exception.  I looked around my more spacious kitchen (since I took down the card table) and my crockpots and smiled.  What would I make?  I had it.  I would make a recipe that was made at our last work buffet.  It is a crockpot corn casserole.  I tasted it before I knew the ingredients and I'm glad that I did.  It has creamed corn in it and I don't like creamed corn but I really did like this casserole.

Crock Pot Corn Casserole:

1 box Jiffy Corn Muffin Mix

1 can corn - not drained

1 can creamed corn

1/4 cup butter - melted

1 egg (I am using two because these are those brown eggs and smaller I think)

1 1/4 cup sharp cheddar cheese shredded and divided (substitute the type of cheese you want0

1/2 cup sour cream

Pour Jiffy mix, corn, cream corn, butter, egg and 1 cup cheese into crock pot and mix very well.

Dollop sour cream by small spoonfuls and sprinkle rest of cheese on top.

Cook on high 3-4 hours or until a knife inserted in middle comes out clean.

Let sit for 10 minutes then serve.

What I changed:

mix everything together (including sour cream) and then cook it.  It gets the sour cream mixed in better.  I didn't put more cheese on top.because it is just for me and I didn't care.  I can sprinkle more on top if I want when I dish it up to eat.

Like I said I don't like creamed cheese but this was good!

I've had a cold for about 1 1/2 weeks and am now feeling better but am being careful to take naps and rest in between bouts of "I have to get this done".  That means I haven't been quilting much or crafting much.  I am working on a quilt as you go hexies which is about all I want to do right now.  I have to rearrange what I want to do in 2020 but until then I will plug along.

I hope everybody has a joyour holiday and remember:

"Christmas is not so much about opening our presents as opening our hearts" - JaniceMaeditere