It's Tuesday...

You know I just realized that Tuesday totally gets jipped. Really, Monday sucks because it means the weekends over with, Wednesday is the all important "hump" day, Thursday is just a good fricken TV night, and well, Friday speaks for itself. Poor Tuesday, nothing to look forward to. Now that I'm over that....

What a busy week and a half it's been! Last Saturday was our local LLL groups Walk for World Breastfeeding Week. We met at the Lake George Sunroom, ate some snacks, did some raffling, the kids got their faces painted, and then walked around the surrounding area of Lake George. The weather wasn't the greatest, it was cool, breezy and cloudy. We had a pretty good turnout, 35 people, and we raised $100!!! That is so great! I really enjoyed putting it all together, and now I have a billion ideas of what I want to do for next year.

After the walk, the girls and I went to the new library in town. That place is AWESOME!! It's huge, and the whole first floor is kids stuff. They had a little play area with legos, and big train track, puzzles, games, etc. The girls had a great time. I look forward to going there by myself and sitting for hours...

In food news, I have a new favorite dish, and it really might be my signature dish, mainly because of it's name: Fricken Chicken. I'm so not kidding!! Mom (thanks mom!!) gave me a new cookbook that the Breast Center put out, and I found this recipe. It's very much like a chicken Aafredo. It's sooooo not good for you, but dang is it GOOD!!!!!!! I will try and post the recipe tonight. I also made a batch of bread dough that is sitting in my fridge from my "Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day" book. I also came up with a great broccoli and rice hamburger hotdish with stuff I had leftover in my fridge, I'll post that one tonight too.

Rachel likes eating pancakes for breakfast, so I started making a bunch on the weekends and freezing them. I also grate about 2 apples into the mix, you can't even taste it, and at least I feel like she's getting some more nutrients!! Emma loves oatmeal, muffins, and this morning she even had a sunbutter sandwich!

I shall post more tonight, it's bowling night for Brad, which means a quiet evening for me:)

Fall Has Arrived

You know that Fall has arrived when you see a big bag of apples on the counter. Unfortunately they are not from our tree, it didn't produce much this year. A co worker of Brad's sent home a big bag of apples from the trees. I have made two pies from them, and they are wonderful! I would like to make a couple more and then make some applesauce from the rest. The pie recipe I came up with a couple years ago by adding ingredients from different recipes. I really like the result, the crust is super flaky, and the pumpkin pie spice adds just enough *something* to the pie!

While I was making the pie, I gave the kids their own dough to play with. Kept them happy for at least an hour! I remember when my mom would make pies, my brother and I would get to make our own crust from the leftovers, I still have those little pie pans and now my kids get to do the same! I tried twice to get a picture, but for whatever reason my taped up camera isn't working. Grrrr.

For lunch I made homemade pizza. I used a half white/half wheat flour in my bread machine, and I had some leftover pizza sauce in the freezer from the last pizza I made. I just used hamburger and cheese, forgot to brown some sausage. The kids didn't mind, I only have two small pieces left! Tonight I'm not sure what we're having yet, as Brad is bowling, and we have an ice cream social at school tonight.

Ok, here is my apple pie recipe...

Crust: This is for an 8 or 9 inch double crust
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 c. shortening (I use lard)
6 Tbl water

Combine the flour and salt, cut in lard until crumbly. Add water as little bit at a time. divide in half

Filling:
Apples. Honestly, I'm not sure how many, I like to have a nice pile in the crust.
Over the apples pour 1/4 c honey
Mix together 1/2 c sugar, 1 Tbl. cinnamon, and 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice- sprinkle this over apples and honey.
Add 1/2 c water (or so) to the apples, spread crust over top, and cut slits. bake at 350 degrees for one hour.

Oatmeal Muffins

This recipe I got from one of my daycare moms, and it is soooo good! The only thing I did differently was that being I did not have buttermilk, I used a cup of whole milk, and added 1Tbl of lemon juice to sour it. I let that sit for about 20 minutes or so. And, I like to soak my grains, so I mixed up the batter the night before I baked them. Soaking grains makes it easier for your body to digest them, and it brings out more nutrients. Ok, here's the recipe...

Oatmeal Muffins

1 c. oats
1 c. buttermilk
1/3 c. shortening (I use lard for everything) or butter
1/2 c. brown sugar
1 egg
1 c. flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda

Soak oats in buttermilk for 1 hour. Cream shortening/butter, brown sugar and egg in bowl. Mix dry ingredients together. Stir into shortening mixture alternately with oats/buttermilk until just moistened. Fill sprayed or lined muffin cups 2/3 full. bake at 400 for 20 minutes.

I have an apple pie in the oven right now, a co-worker of Brad's sent home a huge bag of apples from their apple tree. Hope it's good!!

Another Week

What a fantastic weekend we had! We went to the lake, our last "hurrah" for the year. It was beautiful, warm, sunny, just what you want when you go to the lake. I made a batch of potato salad, a pasta salad, and some oatmeal muffins (I promise to post the recipe). For lunch on Saturday, we had cheddar brats, and for supper Brad made T-bones on the grill, and no not for the kids!! There is nothing better that food on a charcoal grill. We were able to take the pontoon out for awhile yesterday, but today was too windy, and I didn't much feel like hurling off the side of the boat in the middle of the lake.

We had a campfire last night, which is the girls' favorite thing about camping. And yes, mom and dad had to endure an hour of telephone (seriously, there was only 4 of us to play), and "I'm going on a camping trip, and I'm going to bring".... *sigh*. I was exhausted just trying to think of what to say. Although I must say that I was proud that my girls always were bringing their favorite food I make!!

I had to laugh this morning because Rachel informed us that while were out by the campfire (the girls sleep in the back bedroom, and had gone to bed), Emma woke up screaming. Rachel sat up in bed and asked her why she was screaming and Emma said, "it was dark". Too which Rachel replied, "ya, Emma, it's called NIGHT! Now go to bed and don't scream anymore!" I laughed so hard, poor Emma never gets any sympathy from Rachel.

Today, albeit windy, was another gorgeous day. we basically sat on the beach all afternoon and let the kids play. The resort we stay at has an awesome water trampoline, and other play equipment. Rachel is always Miss daredevil, and Emma was pretty daring herself today! Emma had her life jacket on while she swam, and I always tell her she looks like a bobblehead when she swims, she does it so fast!!!

And last but not least, the little half-pint (or should I say quarter pint) is still potty trained! It's amazing, and wonderful! Her favorite part is screaming "POOPS COMIN OUT MY BUTTS" everytime she goes #2. It's hilarious.

I'm including my favorite picture from the lake, taken in the evening. This summer I have been much more into photography than I usually am. We're looking at getting a new camera. Although I think ours works just fine, and I don't car that people laugh when they see it taped up. hey man, it works!!

We.Have.Poop.

Yes, that is correct, Miss A pooped in the toilet today!!!!!!!!! I laughed so hard, because she had just peed in her training pants, so I put a diaper on her. I'm eating lunch in the living room, and she comes running in holding her bottom saying, "mama, I got to potty!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" So I tell her to go in the bathroom. She sits down and screams at the top of her lungs, "mama! Poops comin out my butt!!!!" I laughed so hard I cried. So there ya have it, poop.

In cooking news, I came up with a great dish today! I'm calling it Chicken Curry Stew. here's the ingredients:

1-2 cups cubed chicken
1-2 cups white sauce (I use 4Tbl butter, melt and add 4 Tbl flour, add some minced garlic and cook for a minute or so, then add milk to the right consistency) or you could use a can of Cream of Mushroom Soup
Chopped potatoes (I always leave the skins on)
Chopped carrots
Pureed zucchini- ok, I know that sounds odd, but I love to puree veggies and add them to casseroles, I had just pureed a huge zucchini, so I added it, about 1 cup or so.
1/4 tsp curry
1/4 tsp Poultry seasoning
Salt and pepper to taste

I mixed everything up and baked it at 400 degrees for about an hour or so. The kids LOVED it! Next time I am going to put a lattice type crust on top.

"Mama, I bush da toiyet"

When I get to heaven, one of the first questions I will ask God is why could he not have made kids to be completely potty trained at 2. As in, no help from the parents. In all honesty though, have you ever thought for a moment how our bodies work, without much help from us? To me it seems like a highly unlooked part of how our bodies work. I think God thought it might be one of those "extra perks" things for parents. *sigh*

Alayna has decided to potty train. Yesterday. She strips down completely, and hauls her skinny little butt on the "toiyet". How she doesn't fall in, is beyond me. She will sit on that darn toilet for 20 minutes. And, mind you, she does this 15 TIMES A DAY. Does she actually GO on the toilet? Until tonight, I had not heard her actually potty. I am all for this, if she follows through with it, I'll give her a couple days to see what she does. If nothing comes of it, I'm locking all the bathroom doors.

P.S. If you can't read two year old speak, the title says, "mama, I flush the toilet".

Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day

I am in love. Really. I am head over heels, butterflies in my stomach, in love. With whom, you say? This book. I loooove homemade bread, but it really takes a bit of time to mix, knead, rise, punch, and bake the dough. I bought this book last week, and have already made 4 loaves of bread!! The concept is simple, they give you several "master" recipes, which you mix up, and keep in a 5 quart container. After the initial rise, (no kneading required!!!!) you store the dough in the fridge. When you are ready to bake some bread, you cut a hunk of the dough off, let it rest for 40 minutes, and bake for 30 minutes. Last week I made the "Boule" recipe, which is more of your typical artisan bread dough. This week I have the "light whole wheat" recipe in the fridge. I made a couple loaves to take to "gourmet club" last weekend, and everyone couldn't believe it was homemade! I can't wait to try all the recipes. There is a bagel recipe, french bread, sweet rolls, flat breads, you name it! I think I should be paid for my advertising, I've already gotten three people to buy the book!!!

No, I do not condone this behavior...

Just to clarify, I do not allow my cat to sit on the counter. But this just cracked me up, because I could NOT keep her off! She so wanted to see what I was doing, so I finally let her be, and she sat there the whole time I was mixing up these muffins!!!

Being it's "apple" week in daycare, I found a recipe for apple/oat muffins. I mixed them up when the kids were in bed, and baked them this morning. They were fabulous! It called for whole wheat flour, so they were really dense and heavy, but I love things like that! The kids gobbled them up too. This afternoon we are going to make apple trees with our thumbprints as the apples. I was hoping to be able to go pick some apples today with the kids, but it's been a rainy day.

This morning I happened to turn it to MSNBC to see what coverage they would have for 9/11. They actually were re-broadcasting the entire morning show from NBC on that morning. I was working that day, and missed all of the coverage. I watched it most of the morning completely dumbfounded that this ever happened. I said a prayer for everyone directly impacted by this tragedy, and continue to pray that this never happens again.

Tonight Brad is coming home, yay!! The older two have gymnastics from 6-7, and that is always a nice break for me:)

Just Another Day...

Blah. Today has been such an "off" day. I'm anxious for it to be over:) Brad is going to be gone a lot the next couple weeks, so it means some long days for mama. This weekend we are heading up to some friend's of ours for our annual "Gourmet Club" night! There are five couples that get together once/twice a year and we each take turns planning a gourmet meal. Everyone is assigned something to bring, and we just eat, relax, and drink a lot of wine! I will soooo need some wine this weekend!!!

This week we are learning the letter A, and also apples. So for breakfast this morning, I made apple pancakes. I just used my normal pancake batter, and grated a whole apple into the batter. Next time I will grate two apples, because you couldn't even taste the apples! We have a huge apple tree down in our front yard, although this year there isn't much for apples. Bummer. However, back in our woods, we have an apple tree that has a TON of apples on it. I'm hoping to get back there one of these nights with the kids to pick apples. Wish me luck, hopefully I'll find my way back:)

Last night was the Monday Night Football opener with the Vivkings and Greenbay. (We won't talk about how they did...) We had the inlaws over for chili and grilled cheese sandwiches. The chili was sooo good! My SIL gave me the recipe, and it really is the best chili I've had! Today I added some great northern beans, ketchup and a bit of brown sugar, and turned it into "calico beans". If I would have called it chili, the kids wouldn't have eaten. Silly little things.

I'm also including a pic of Alayna with her doll in a sling. She had that baby in her sling all night! I thought it was pretty adorable, especially being that she lived in a sling the first 5 months of her life!!

Ahhh, the weekend!

I am so glad it's the weekend! It was a great week, as I only had daycare kids Wednesday-Friday. Short week for me, which was wonderful! The girls survived their first week, and honestly, it was such an easy week for me. I am down to only 5-6 kids here during the day, and it really feels like I'm on vacation! I love having the little ones at home, because they LOVE to learn. We've been back to doing circle time, and last week we worked on the letter A, and writing our names. I am very happy to be on a better schedule!

It's also been a busy week of cooking. Monday I whipped up a big batch of smoothies so the girls can have them for breakfast. I blend frozen strawberries, blueberries, peaches, bananas, chopped spinach, yogurt and milk. They love these for breakfast. I'm also going to make a batch of waffles to freeze and pop in the toaster. I also made a batch of spaghetti sauce, (still needs some tweaking, I think leaving out the Bay Leaf will help), two loaves of honey wheat bread, and two dozen cinnamon rolls for this weekend. Rachel came up to me yesterday and said, "mama, I love your homemade food!"

I started setting out a fruit/veggie/cheese platter for when the kids get home from school. It's not quite snack time yet when they come home, but they're always starving, so I figured this was a great way to get more healthy snacks into them! Then they usually will have some crackers, applesauce, yogurt or cereal bars.

Tonight we are having tacos, per Rachel's request. I'm not sure what we'll have tomorrow. This is what's on board for this week:

Monday- Lunch- Grilled cheese pie with ham, raw veggies, homemade bread

Supper- Camper's Hash- which is like an egg skillet with cheese, hashbrowns,

and sausage links

Tuesday- Lunch- Hamburger hotdish, raw veggies, homemade bread

Supper- Beef Roast with potatoes and carrots

Wednesday- Lunch- Tuna sandwiches, potato wedges, veggies

Supper- Homemade pizza, probably sausage

Thursday- Lunch- Sloppy joes, brown rice with veggies, homemade bread

Supper- Beef stroganoff- I'm going to try a crockpot recipe this time, we'll see how it goes!

Friday- Lunch- Calico beans, grilled cheese, veggies

Supper- Not sure, maybe venison sausage?

Next weekend we will be a friend's of ours overnight for our "Gourmet Club". We get together about once/twice a year to make a yummy gourmet meal together, it's a blast!

First Day of School!!

Well, the girls are off to school, *sob* *sob*. I did really well this morning, I didn't even cry! The weekend, however, was rough. I was nervous, and felt sick all weekend, thinking about Emma going to school. I think it's just because she is not as outgoing as Rachel is, and is so tender-hearted. But I know she will do fantastic, and she is so ready for school!! I made them both banana pancakes (which neither of them ate) and strawberries for breakfast.

Rachel finished her first chapter book, Junie B. Jones last night!! I have a hard time getting her to read, so I am so proud of her finishing it! And Emma is half way done reading her first "Dick and Jane" book! Amazing. I had a fantastic summer with the girls, and am a bit sad to have it end. We spent a lot of time at the lake, and it was so fun to watch the girls swim, and see how much they have learned!

So now my house is quiet, Alayna is still sleeping, and I took the day off. Mom is going to come over for coffee, and Emma will be home by 10:30. I cannot wait to hear how much fun she had!!!!!!

Spa LeZimm

Since it was the day before school started, I figured we would have a spa day at home, hence the name "Spa LeZimm"!!! I made a special bath for the girls, and we did oatmeal and banana facial masks, and used a scrub for a body wash. The girls got to use their wine goblets with water and lemons. After their baths, I gave them manicures and pedicures! They thought it was a blast, and it was a good way for us to spend some time just the girls, before the craziness of school starts!!