grace grits and gardening

Chicken Tortilla Soup

January 31, 2023 By Talya Tate Boerner 3 Comments

(This post contains affiliate links. I may earn a commission on sales.)

This is my favorite chicken tortilla soup recipe! I’m not exaggerating when I say it is super easy to make. Chicken tortilla soup is yummy no matter the season, but on a cold winter day it will truly warm your insides.

As I write this, sleet is steadily falling; the ground and streets in northwest Arkansas are blanketed in at least an inch of frozen precipitation. (Second week in a row of winter weather for us.) If I could make a big pot of this soup for our city employees who have been working so hard to clear streets, I would!Continue Reading

Sunday Letter: 01.29.23

January 29, 2023 By Talya Tate Boerner 22 Comments

Dear Sunday Letter friends,

It has been a week, y’all.

We returned Monday from a weekend trip to Austin just in time for a whopper of a snowfall. The official measurement for Fayetteville was 8.95″. (By the way, I took the bright snowy picture above from my kitchen window at 1:30 a.m.! And we had hours of snowfall after that.)

For real, it was like the heavy snowfalls of my childhood, the wondrous type with fat drifting flakes that accumulated quickly and sent us sledding across fields and making entire snow families in the front yard.

Yes, as much fun as Austin held for us, I was glad we made it home in time for such a magical S N O W.

Sunday Letter: 01.15.23

January 15, 2023 By Talya Tate Boerner 8 Comments

Hiya, Sunday Letter friends!

This past week has been a mixed bag of weather here in northwest Arkansas. From 75 degrees to rain and hail to frozen precipitation—I suppose there’s always something for everyone. Unless, that is, you prefer your atmospheric conditions served up on a consistent basis.

Some of our shrubs look to have given up on this life. The first cold snap back in November really did a number on lots of plants. Our Schip laurels look to have been sprayed with bronzer. But come spring, they should revive and put on new growth. Plants suited for a particular growing zone typically survive even the craziest arctic events because their deep roots continue feeding and providing starch until warm weather returns.

Still I worry over them. The blooms on Schip laurels provide an incredible amount of much-needed early spring nectar for bees. And I love our bees.