My blog busted this evening, Amy worked her amazingness and got it back on-line. There are still some broken links and messed up pages. Oh, and my design is really messed up. I’ve defaulted to this. Perhaps I’ll have them fixed sometime soon.

We’re in Springfield for Thanksgiving! Amy put together this little slide show of our day.

I love my family.

I’ve instituted the “One Taco Test” locally. Since I know you are all equally as interested in this as I am I’ll post my findings here.
“What is the one taco test ?” you ask. Don’t worry I’ll fill you in. First, I google mapped the lovely town of Dumas, TX then searched “nearby” for the word “Taco”. Eight restaurants showed up for Dumas, then I searched for “Mexican restaurant” and found one more local spot that serves tacos. This gives me nine locations to start with. After I finish with those I can start looking at the various other cafes and fast food joints that serve tacos.

So now that we know where we’re going I’ll tell you what we’re doing. We are my friends in search of the perfect taco. Said taco will be judged on taste, size, price, and accompanying condiments. Each restaurateur will be given one shot on one taco. No sides will be ordered and no drink added. While service and ambiance are valuable they will be left out the judging process. Why? Well, because I’m friends with some of the taqueria owners and I wouldn’t want to be biased. So no one tell Adrian I’m doing this, Okay? That being said I’ll still comment on service but I won’t count it in the final crowning.

View Larger Map

Yesterday we began the test. Where did we go?
La Herradura
423 S Dumas Ave
Dumas, TX 79029
(806) 935-3077

(the little D on the map)

Oh, how I wish I’d taken a picture of my little taco, I will in the future I promise.
La Herradura is easy to find it’s a bright yellow little building resting on the east side of HWY 287.
I used the drive through and ordered one taco, no cheese.
The sweet girl’s English was really good, but I think she was concerned that I might not know what I was getting. She made sure I wanted “steak on a corn tortilla” I said yes. She let me know the tacos were pretty little and showed me with her hands the approximate size. I assured her that was fine and I only wanted one for tasting. She smiled knowingly and disappeared into the kitchen.
After a reasonable amount of time she came for my money:
$1.60 +tax

She then returned with a Styrofoam container and a smile.
Upon opening the little square package I found a nicely foil wrapped package, accompanying it was a lime wedge (big points) and three small plastic containers. The first was filled with chopped cilantro (mucho points), the second with finely diced onion, and third with their home made salsa.
Inside the foil I found a soft corn tortilla of about 4 inch diameter. On it was a tasty mixture of carne asada and grilled onions.

After adorning my taco with all its fine accessories I happily scarfed it down.

Flavor Good!
Condiments GOOD!
Size: Small
Price: Ummm I’m not sure.
(Well let’s just say it’d take a minimum of three to stop my stomach from rumbling and more like four to make me happy so I’m not to impressed with the price/size ratio but that being said it’s my first stop, we’ll see as the days go on how it compares.)

One point of the taco test however is to see whether we want to venture a little further into the menu. It is possible that on a “meal” you could get much better value. We can’t take this into consideration thought because after all it is the “One Taco Test”.

Charleigh and I whipped this together last night. Mmmm yum. We were quite
proud of ourselves!
 

5 min prep
SERVES 8
 

1 (15 ounce) can black beans (drained)
2 garlic cloves (crushed or grated)
3 green onions (chopped)
1/4 cup fresh cilantro
1/2 lime, juice of
1 teaspoon cumin
2 tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper
 

Combine first six ingredients in food processor. Mix till well combined.
While mixing add enough olive oil to reach desired consistency. Season with salt
and pepper to taste.
Serve with chips, on pita bread, or on warm tortillas.

wheat free/ dairy free

In honor of this election day I post the traditional Mozzarella Meatball recipe:
Over the years we’ve perfected many other meatball recipes but this is the tried and true traditional recipe for election night. We won’t be having them. We’ll be having a dairy free/wheat free variaty. Some how its just not the same. . .

Oh yeah, and when you vote, vote right!
______________________________________________________________________________________
original post from Oct. 6, 2005

This yummy meal has become our traditional “election night” fare. While some may tease I’ll go ahead and tell you a secret. Each time I eat these meatballs I am taken back to November of 2000. Even now I can here Dan Rather’s voice coming from the living room. “Florida goes to Gore” I listened intently as I simmered my little balls of meat. After supper we had quite a few leftovers. (there were less kids and they didn’t eat so much back then) Kurt went to bed well before Dan said “Turn the lights down, the party just got wilder.” I sat on the couch for hours waiting for the results. The little meatballs called to me from the kitchen. Sometime in between Mr. Rather’s “This race is tight like a too-small bathing suit on a too-long ride home from the beach.” and his “Smelling salts for all Democrats please.” I finished off the meatballs one by one. By 3AM with the fridge empty and the news anchors delirious I finally went to bed.

I thought I’d peruse some of my past posts and put a few links to some of my faves for the last 4 yrs. Naah I decided not to. It would take to much time to pick em. There are some great ones though. I love looking at the pictures of the kids from way back when. It’s great reading the little updates and remembering where we were and what we were doing. That’s why I used to blog so I could google my life. Next year when I scroll back to 07 and 08 I wont find anything here. Kinda sad.

Ok, Ok, I decided to post some, I took the pressure off by not posting the “best of” but by just posting those from the 30th or 31st of October.

October 30, 2005 Reminds me of how good God always is.

October 31, 2006 is a picture of Charleigh and Joshua. Check out those shoes he’s wearing. Have you heard the horror stories about those things getting sucked into escalators and nearly maiming kids? Well it’s true. Thanks God for saving my babies foot.

Oops Seems I was done blogging by this time last year. See what I mean now I’ve got nothing to remember from ‘07
Lets see. . .oh, oh, besides a post endorsing Huckabee I found this one from October 19, 2007 which has a picture of Charleigh’s baptism. I’m not sure when she was actually baptized I just know when I put it on the site. hmm. . .seeing that I don’t scrapbook I really should start putting stuff back up here.

Hello friends, if you haven’t already given up looking for me here I’ll give you a hint. Try facebook. Facebook is the death of my blogging. . .well that and my job. I guess I’ll give you a quick update and by quick I mean grammatically incorrect and incomplete.

We moved, but not too far. We bought a house, love our neighborhood, love our town. I’m the Executive Director of our local Crisis Pregnancy Center (love it!), and the Director of Early Childhood ed at our church. The kids have dance on Mondays, piano and Boy Scouts on Tuesdays. Kurt and I are still leading a small group on Wednesdays. Kurt still works in/near Amarillo (60 miles away). The kids ride 30 miles to school each day, Kaleb is in 5th grade, Charleigh in 3rd and Joshua is in Kindergarten. With all the commuting and bus rides there are those in the family that think we’re a bit crazy for moving here but we know this is where God has us and we are excited to see what’s in store for our family!

I miss you all, leave me a comment or send me an email and let me know how you all are doing.

With Love,
Jami Leigh

Oh, and here’s a quick pic of the kids.