Easy and Delicious Crockpot Chicken Tortilla Soup

Every time I make this soup I tell myself that I need to blog about the recipe...and then I forget to do it. Today as I was heating up last night's leftovers for lunch it struck me again that I really needed to share this recipe with everyone because it's crazy simple and delicious. It's perfect for Sunday football parties because it serves a small crowd but requires literally two minutes of prep time and zero thinking. I've served this at several get-togethers to rave reviews, and even my hubby who generally declares that "Soup is an appetizer not a meal," will happily eat this up for dinner every time I make it.

Enough hype, eh? Alright, here's how you make it...let me first say though that it definitely matters what kind of salsa you use in this, so be sure to choose one with a flavor and heat factor that you enjoy.

Crockpot Chicken Tortilla Soup

• Three boneless skinless chicken breasts, thawed or frozen 
• Two 14 oz. cans of chicken broth
• 1 cup water
• One 14 oz. can of corn
• One 14 oz. can of black beans
• One 16 oz. jar of salsa
• Half of a yellow onion, finely diced
• 1 tsp. garlic powder
• 1 tsp. chili powder
• 1 tsp. cumin
• 1/2 tsp. paprika

• Toppings: shredded cheese, tortilla chips or strips, sour cream (if desired)

Put your chicken breasts into the crockpot and top with the chicken broth, water, corn, beans, salsa and onion. (If time allows, you can lightly caramelize the onions in a small sautee pan before adding them to the soup to kick up the flavor.) Add spices and stir to mix.

Cover and cook on high for 6 hours.

Use a fork to shred the cooked chicken breasts and stir up the soup before serving. Serve with a sprinkle of Mexican blend shredded cheese, crumbled tortilla chips and sour cream if desired. Easy peasy!

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2012 Pumpkin Carving Day

Yesterday our family had our annual pumpkin carving day, and it was a blast as always! We carved eight pumpkins this year, and it took us about six hours of working off-and-on, taking turns as one parent kept Simon entertained, and the other carved and prepared pumpkins with Sawyer and Sutton.

I bought a Pumpkin Gutter tool, and it saved a ton of time this year. We still had to scrape the bottom by hand since it didn't work very well at that angle, but it removed the seeds and strings and thinned the walls at the same time - all in about one minute flat. As a general rule, any time you can mix power tools and pumpkins it's going to be a hit in our house!

Transferring the pumpkin patterns was definitely the most tedious process. Next year I will definitely be investing in some transfer paper because everyone was complaining about hand cramps by the time we'd transferred all eight pumpkin patterns (especially the lady who transferred five of them all by herself!).

We bought two battery operated pumpkin saws at the pumpkin farm this year, and they worked fairly well. By the last two pumpkins the saws were clearly struggling, and we had to replace broken blades twice, but they still sped the process up quite a bit. Sawyer was able to use the saw by himself, and for the first time he was able to carve his own pumpkin without Mom and Dad assisting.

Sutton quietly grabbed my camera at one point, and took this photo of me carving the Bowser pumpkin.

The whole bunch: Jack Skellington, a bat/ghost hybrid creature, Bowser, Mario, Sawyer's smiley face, a skull with spiderweb, and Sutton's "wink and a smile" pumpkin. We also carved a Mickey Mouse pumpkin earlier in the week, but it sadly molded already due to the warm weather we've been having.

Simon was pretty impressed with our final creations!

These guys were so proud of their work. We can't wait to show off our pumpkins on Halloween night! I dipped the finished pumpkins in a bleach solution, so hopefully it will help preserve them until the big night.

P.S. If you're wondering what to do with all those pumpkin seeds, hop on over to Eight By Five where I'm sharing some delicious pumpkin seed recipes today!  

P.P.S. Congratulations to Jenalee who won last week's iPad giveaway!

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Halloween Creepies

With Halloween just around the corner, you only have a handful of days left to play around with PicMonkey's totally awesome spooky Halloween photo effects. I had never used their site before, but now I'm hooked - it's SO easy, and you don't even need to create an account! Sawyer, Sutton and I had a blast making these photos the other day, and they insisted that I share them here and tell everyone that they neeeeed to go make their own. So there you have it...get going!

Zombie Sawyer

Count Von Sutton

Simon the Witchy Warlock

Vampire Parents

Fire Breathing Sutton Monster

Dia de los Muertos Munchkins

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A Fresh New Look

 

You might have noticed that things look a bit different around here - change is good, right!? My old layout wasn't working very well for my needs anymore, so I spent way too many late nights over the past few weeks getting this new site designed. I'm probably the slowest designer in the world, but it's been a lot of fun learning as I go. There are still a lot of kinks and tweeks that need to be addressed, so if you keep seeing things change up over the weekend you'll know why!

I have had a bunch of reader feedback suggesting that I categorize my tutorials and ideas (in case you just discovered this blog today, the old layout only had one general "tutorials" page for almost everything), so I'm super excited to announce that the new and improved Mom's Crafty Space has lots and lots of categories and sub-categories to help you quickly find what you're looking for.

I'm still not 100% committed to the new header and social media icons, so those may change in the future as well, but I'm loving the featured posts slider and the condensed sidebar. The white background really helps my photos to pop, and everything just feels so much tidier. Next up...add my magazine articles to my sidebar and design a new logo button.

So...what do you think of the new design?

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Easy Toddler Halloween Art

I'm working on a huge blog overhaul (including newly categorized tutorials and inspiration - no more messy jumble, yay!) and two writing assignments, so we haven't done as much crafting as normal this week. We did, however, try to make this simple Jack O'Lantern painting with Simon yesterday...and it would have been a huge hit IF he actually liked painting! I'm starting to think that this kid can't possibly be one of mine - what toddler doesn't enjoy messy painting?!? I started off with a sheet of smooth bristol paper and taped off a pumpkin face with green painters tape.
 

We got out the orange tempera paint and started painting...

 ...very, very slowly. If your kiddo is like mine, this might take quite awhile! In the end I painted the entire page orange for him and then let him go back and dab and paint over the top. I'm pretty patient when it comes to my kids' art and expression, but this was taking forrr-evvv-errr, and Simon was already declaring "all done," and trying to put the lid back on the paint container. Sometimes it's okay for Mom to help out, right?

 We let the paint dry and then peeled off the green tape.

Cut the paper into a pumpkin shape and use the green painter's tape to add a stem. Easy peasy! 

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Book Review: Artful Halloween

 

 

We were out of town for a big chunk of time at the beginning of October, and I found myself a little less than enthusiastic about decorating for Halloween since it felt like it was already too late in the game. I ended up putting up our indoor decorations anyway (of course!), but those same old decorations just aren't cutting it anymore. Now that my big boys are older and can handle a bit more spookiness around the house, those cutesy decorations are definitely less appealing. 

I was so excited when I received a copy of Artful Halloween: 31 Frightfully Elegant Projects by Susan Wasinger from Lark Crafts in the mail, and I immediately fell in love with all of the unique holiday decorating ideas. The projects are spooky, but not too scary, and all of them have a sophisticated style that is a refreshing change of pace.

This book page banner is at the top of my to-make list. It requires very little time or effort, but will certainly capture everyone's attention. 
 

I love these black lace votive candle holders! Again, a super simple, but totally dramatic project!

These studded and laced pumpkins are super cool! I picked up a few extra pumpkins at the pumpkin patch to give this one a try. I love the black and white versions, but I think that a traditional orange pumpkin with dark brown lacing would carry through nicely into Thanksgiving too.

If you were inspired by any of these ideas, be sure to check out Artful Halloween for 28 more innovative Halloween projects and decorating ideas!

 

I received this book at no cost from Lark Crafts to review; however, all opinions expressed are entirely my own. 

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Who Wants an iPad?!? {Giveaway}

Yep, you read that correctly! Though I think a better question might be "who doesn't want an iPad?" This is one giveaway that you'll definitely be crossing all of your fingers and toes for!

We had so much fun with our Silhouette giveaway a few weeks ago that I've teamed up again with the fabulous ladies of Mindy Mae's Market, The Pinterest Project, That's What Che Said and Unique By U {At Home} to bring you this fantastic giveaway. Like last time, this is not a sponsored post, but something that we all pitched in from our own pocketbooks to help bring to our readers - because we {love} and appreciate you all!  

Here's a little bit more about my lovely co-sponsors:

Hi!  I’m Cheryl!  It’s so nice to meet you!  I am a stay at home mom of 2 boys and wife to a husband who is always travelling!  I am a chemical engineer by degree but have been enjoying every single minute of using my creative side of my brain while at home and then showing you all how I did it!  It gives me something to do during naptime…otherwise I’d just be napping myself J   I think ranch dressing is a food group and I can bend my thumb all the way backwards…anyone else weird like me? 

Hi, I'm Ursie! Since childhood I have always been knee deep in some sort of project . I love to tackle things from crafts with the kiddos to building our home. One of my favorite tools is the air nailer!!! I love thrift store shopping, going to rummage sales and scouring the clearance racks for amazing sales. I usually have more paint under my nails then on them!! I am a stay at home momma to 2 wonderful kiddos {and 1 chihuahua} and have a 3rd babe on the way. I have been happily married for 9 years and enjoy having a husband who fuels my creative mind and goes along with whatever crazy idea is brewing in my mind. Recentally I've turned a hobby of making home decor into a small business and am loving every minute of it.  Organizing life, making it beautiful and having fun along the way is my goal.

 

Hi!  We are Jamie & Miranda!  We have been friends for years - through marriages, moves, job losses, and kids - we've helped each other through it all with a little sarcasm, a lot of coffee (and I mean a LOT) and lately a lot of Pinterest.  

Jamie is married to Allen, a Civil Engineer who is in charge of the water planning model for the city of Charlotte. Jamie has one daughter, Macie who is 21 months old and they are expecting their second child in early April.  Miranda is married to Todd, lead pastor and consultant.  Miranda has 2 boys, Logan who is almost 12 and Beckett who is 17 months and a daughter, Lilia who is in heaven.  Miranda also has 2 stepsons, Justin & Jonathan.

Nikki is a master mom {literally, she has a masters degree and is a mom} she has 4 beautiful children and a handyman for a husband. Courtney is a wife and a control freak, she is married to a protector of the law {aka Police Officer}. Nikki and Courtney met in the strangest of events, which is quite fitting considering we're both pretty strange ;) We have a really unique relationship, and love {most} everything we've gone through together! We consider ourselves to be "partners" in every sense, except the one you're thinking of ;) {Business partners, partners in crime, you know..} We LOVE Mindy Mae's Market and what it has become, we hope to continue to grow it, stay in touch with our fabulous fan base, and giveaway awesome things all the time!

 

Enough about us...go take a minute to enter the giveaway! Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

  Winner will be announced on Monday, October 29th!

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Eight By Five: What You've Been Missing

If you haven't yet checked out Eight By Five, the "real mom" blog that I write with my sisters and my cousins, here's what you've been missing out on lately!

I've got TONS of yummy slow cooker recipes featuring some fall favorites!

Making Waves: Kari's is sharing a tutorial on how to get these lovely wavy locks!

Zoey's Mermaid 1st Birthday Party - Kelley gives you all the details including costs and where to shop!

Lesley has some great ideas to organize your important items and get your purse and clutter off of the counter tops!

There's still time to make your kiddo's Halloween costume, and I've got 30+ fun and unique ideas and tutorials to share with you!

Jessica is sharing a fun and easy tutorial for making these adorable pumpkins out of flower pots!

 There's LOTS more over at Eight By Five, so be sure to stop on by and say hello! 

(I apologize to anyone who got notice of this post earlier after I'd only typed out the first little section...that would be the curious toddler who was sitting on my lap who pushed "publish" before I was done!) :)

 

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