Review for "Jungle Warfare: A Basic Field Manual for Christians in Sales" by Christopher A. Cunningham

"A 22 day power-packed battle plan"

I joined Booksneeze last month and ordered this book (free of charge) in exchange for doing a review on it. It's the only book they had available at the time but I was eager to get started and I love any Christian-based book I can get my learning-little hands on. (Always learning, never-ending!)

Mr. Cunningham uses the field manual his grandfather had from the U. S. Army, and combines its messages with the ways to be a Christian sales person.

Even as a home-based sales person, this helped me. I've been in sales all my life, from behind a counter, to selling housewares in a department store, to direct sales like Avon. You are always selling something, or trying to add something to the sale to make it bigger.

This book will make it bigger. And I don't mean with the ends being money. I'm talking about your mindset, your soul, your heart.

Are you always striving to be a better person yet the pressure of being better in sales keeps you in the wrong mindset? Using your head over your heart? Then this field manual is for you!

It starts every day with a story, a verse, reviewing your battle plan for the day, offering a prayer, recording your thoughts, and writing down your own prayer requests. You can read it at night if need be, but it works better to get your in the frame of mind you need to be, if you read it in the morning. Use it right alongside the Bible and you are set!

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255

Almost Done

I have another week in the book I am reviewing for BookSneeze and then I will post my review here this weekend... maybe Monday. My weekends tend to be busier than I expect, especially in December with all the 'parties'.

Until the wknd...

Sweet and Savory Crockpot Pot Roast - borrowed from A Year of Slow Cooking

Sweet and Savory CrockPot Pot Roast Recipe

The Ingredients.

serves 6

4 pounds beef rump or chuck roast

2 onions, sliced in rings

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar

1 cup ketchup (I bought the Organic. the marketing worked!)

2 cups beef broth

2 cups baby carrots (optional--I've made this with or without.)

The Directions.

Use a 6-quart slow cooker. Put the roast into the bottom of your pot, and add onion slices, separated into rings. Pour in brown sugar, vinegar, and ketchup. Toss in carrots (if using). Pour broth evenly over the top. Cover and cook on low for 6 to 8 hours, or until the meat has reached desired tenderness.

If you find your meat isn't quite as tender as you'd like prior to serving, remove it from the pot, cut it into a few pieces, then return to the crock, and cook on high for about an hour. Tough and/or dry meat isn't from over slow cooking--it's from under slow cooking!

Serve over mashed potatoes. I made these---and the kids gobbled it all up.

crockpot365.blogspot.com

Pre-Review for Booksneeze

I am loving this book I'm going to review for them. It's a Christian salespersons field manual! How cool is that? It takes you through a 22-day training which is why it's taking me a little longer than usual to read. I was reading two-days in one night so I could get the review done, but I got a little thrown-off, so I try not to always do it. I want it to help me too, you know! I am a Christian and I am in sales (Avon and everything else I do in life)!

You will really enjoy this book.

Back in approx. a week with the review!

Recipe borrowed from "A Single Serving" blog by Shirley Anne Fifer

Cannellini and Italian sausage supper

Posted on 03 December 2010 by safifer

One Italian sausage provides seasoning and a bit of meat for two meals. The starting point gives enough for two servings. When I’m using the Italian sausage for two separate meals like this, I usually buy sweet instead of hot, since I can readily add the heat I’d like with crushed red pepper flakes at the time I’m preparing the meal.

§ 1 medium onion, halved lengthwise and thinly sliced

§ 1 sweet Italian sausage, meat removed from the casing and crumbled

§ 4 cloves garlic, minced

§ 1 tablespoon olive oil

§ 2 cups cooked, drained white beans (cannellini or great northern) or 15-ounce can rinsed and drained

§ 2 tablespoon water

In a 12 inch skillet with a tight-fitting cover, add the olive oil; when the skillet is heated add the sliced onion, and cook until it is beginning to brown. Add the sausage and brown. Add minced garlic and cook about 2 minutes. Add the rinsed beans, and cook covered about 5 minutes.

Remove half the bean/onion/sausage mixture to be used for a second meal. Cool and refrigerate.

Meal 1:

§ Half the bean/onion/sausage mixture

§ about 15 grape/cherry tomatoes, halved

§ 1/4 cup antipasto salad mix (pitted olives, peppers, carrots) from the salad bar, chopped finely.

§ several sprinkles of crushed red pepper flakes

§ 2-3 teaspoons chopped fresh sweet marjoram or Turkish/Greek oregano, or 1/2 teaspoon dried herbs.

§ a single-serving size handful of haricots verts (longer, thinner type of green bean)

§ 1 teaspoon water

§ salt and fresh-ground black pepper to taste (the antipasto salad is salty so taste before you add additional salt.

Add the herbs, the chopped antipasto salad, crushed red pepper flakes and mix well. Over medium low heat, add the tomatoes, lay the haricots verts on top of the cannellini beans, add the water, cover tightly and continue to cook until the haricots verts are tender. Serve with shavings of Pecorino Romano over the canellinni beans, and the haricots verts on the side, drizzled with a few drops of extra-virgin olive oil.

Meal 2:

§ the reserved cannellini bean/onion/sausage mixture

§ about 15 grape/cherry tomatoes, halved

§ 3 generous handfuls baby spinach

§ 1 tablespoon water

§ salt and fresh-ground black pepper to taste

Place the cannellini bean/onion/sausage in sauté pan, add the water, halved tomatoes, and cover. Heat gently for about 5 minutes (until starts to steam). Add the spinach, cover, and allow spinach to wilt. Toss to combine with the bean mixture.

I had this with some steam-sautéed carrots as an additional vegetable. Add a glass of good friendly red wine and it’s a very satisfying meal that’s easy and economical.

Find her site here (single folks and single families, check it out, it helps a lot to not have sooo much food left over)! http://a-single-serving.com/

Jamie Oliver's Chicken in Milk recipe

chicken in milk

main courses | serves 4
A slightly odd, but really fantastic combination that must be tried.

Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/gas 5, and find a snug-fitting pot for the chicken. Season it generously all over, and fry it in the butter and a little olive oil, turning the chicken to get an even colour all over, until golden. Remove from the heat, put the chicken on a plate, and throw away the oil and butter left in the pot. This will leave you with tasty sticky goodness at the bottom of the pan which will give you a lovely caramelly flavour later on.

Put your chicken back in the pot with the rest of the ingredients, and cook in the preheated oven for 1½ hours. (Cover for 1st 1/2 hour). Baste with the cooking juice when you remember. The lemon zest will sort of split the milk, making a sauce which is absolutely fantastic.

To serve, pull the meat off the bones and divide it on to your plates. Spoon over plenty of juice and the little curds. Serve with wilted spinach or greens and some mashed potato.


Happy Days with the Naked Chef

ingredients

• 1 x 1.5k/ 3½lb organic chicken
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 115g/4oz or ½ a pack of butter
• olive oil
• 1/2 cinnamon stick
• 1 good handful of fresh sage, leaves picked
• zest of 2 lemons
• 10 cloves of garlic, skin left on
• 565ml/1 pint milk

James 5:16 Confessing My Sins

I was trying to start a new devotional with my 13 yr old son this morning, and only got so far before I started crying. It got so bad that I couldn't start again, I had to move it over to him and tell him to read as I walked away to try to calm myself. I feel distant from God again, and I am an emotional person, so this was getting the better of me. It took several moments to calm myself in my room. After I explained to him why I was so upset, I gave him a hug, we prayed, and I helped him finish getting his stuff ready for school, help find a hat, etc.

When he left, I just broke down. I cried out again, couldn't see through my tears, and made my way to my bed. I had the sense to kneel, but He knows my knee problem and I am sure will forgive me.
So there I sat on the edge of my creaky bed, crying my eyes out, praying hard, out loud. I felt the urge to pick up my bible and look up 'conviction'. What I found was 'confession'. I turned to the two personally written excerpts from biblical teachers in the Women's Study Bible I have in my bedroom. They talked about confessing your sins to God, admitting what you know of your sins, asking him to show you other sins you have committed, and then confessing them to another human being. (James 5:16 - Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results.)

After crying it out, I was convicted by him about staying online too long playing games, and not spending time in his word which was sent to us from him to be read on a daily basis, sometimes all day if we fear trouble from satan.

What I was led to do next made me nervous - I was told to blog it. So here I sit, typing out my conversation (my crying) to him, and admitting my sins to you, whoever you might be.

(This first sentence is rough, but it was said)

I don't understand how a piece of crap like me could be allowed into your kingdom, but I want to be there. I want to go to heaven. I want to be with you. God, I need your help. I am so lost, so far from you right now. I have felt disconnected from you so long. I am a daily sinner. I stay online too long and I don't stay in your word like I should, your word that you sent to us to read. I know that I am a liar, I know that I still think about stealing (and I thank him that I do not act on that feeling). I know that I have lusted in my heart. I need your forgiveness. I need your love and I need your safety. I want your Holy Spirit to be in me. Please show me the sins that I do not know I am committing and help me face them and overcome them. Always keep me safe from satan, I do not want him in charge of my life. It is you I want in my life first, before everything else. I want to be reminded that I am to ask you first before I do anything. You are the one to be prayed to first before I make any decisions regarding anything in my life. I am to ask you what is to be done. I am to pray to you for comfort, for help, for peace, for love. God, you are the beginning and the end. I am to remember this, every moment of every day. Please help me. Please love me. Please forgive me. Please stay close so I can always feel you. I feel so scared sometimes like you have left me but I know you haven't. I know you are right here looking over me; understanding, forgiving, loving. I wish I could be just like that. I want so much to be like you. Oh, God, I love you, I love you, I love you. Thank you, Amen.