How do you kill chicken noodle soup?

I've managed to do something that I didn't think was possible. I killed homemade chicken noodle soup...a whole crockpot full of homemade chicken noodle soup. Talk about a tragedy. The waste! It still makes me sad/mad thinking about it. I put in a whole chicken, vegetables, salt/pepper, and stock into the crockpot this morning. Several hours later I pulled the chicken out to get the meat off the bones, removed the "dead" veggies...they had given their flavor to the stock, and put fresh veggies & the chicken meat back in...let everything continue to cook. About 4:30pm I add a whole bag of egg noodles to it and head out to take Morgan to her writing class & Schoolhouse Rock Live rehearsal. I get home about 6pm and scoop up bowls of soup for dinner. I notice that the noodles aren't very noodle-y. Hmm....okay. We sit down and take a bite...Oh the disappointment! The noodles had turned to MUSH...seriously "wet bread" type of mush, ick! The flavor seemed to be completely missing. I was so sad, mad, and disappointed. A whole day, 1 chicken, carrots, celery, noodles, stock...all for naught. How can you do this? How do you screw up chicken noodle soup in the crockpot?

Let me tell you how. You forget the onion, garlic and HERBS (darn it Kelly!), you put the noodles in TOO early, and most of all....you assume that you can NOT screw up chicken noodle soup in the crockpot so you don't double check yourself. Yep, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, this will get you every time!

We could see no way to save it. With great sadness we dumped it. And then made grilled ham & cheese sandwiches for dinner and ate them with heavy hearts. I will make a delicious, homemade chicken noodle soup this fall or winter. I will! I am determined.