Busy Place Around These Here Parts

One of my favorite blogs right now is the Elliot Homestead.  She has a way of writing that puts you right there, and her dry sense of humor cracks me up.  Especially this post, the chicken feet photo had me laughing out loud.  I love how she explains so eloquently why they do what they do, as far as how they eat, the food they grow, etc.  

Eating healthy, whole foods is not easy.  It takes time, planning and patience to truly eat well.  I am fortunate enough to only work 3 days a week right now.  On my Tuesdays off I pretty much spend all.day.long in the kitchen.  And I love it.  I am exhausted by the end of the day, but I love seeing the fruits of my labor...

Today I was able to make a full crockpot of yogurt, granola to go with the yogurt, 5 loaves of banana bread, smoothie popsicles and a batch of granola bars.  Plus I made Chicken Parmesan for supper, cleaned house, did 8 loads of laundry and got lunches ready for tomorrow.  But who's keeping track?

I love knowing that even when I am not home during the day, my girls have healthy food readily available for them.  Do we still eat some crap??  Yup, in fact last night I may or may not have pigged out on Cool Ranch Doritos....Just keepin it real people...

Happy (Belated) 4th of July!

Hope everyone had a fantastic 4th!  We stayed in town for the 4th as our church has it's annual parish festival that starts on the 3rd.  They have tons of food, music and beer.  Yes I said beer and church in the same sentence.  Crazy Catholics....  

July 4th has always been one of my favorite holidays, I have a huge bin with all my decorations that I pull out every year.  It's also a special holiday because thats the day Brad proposed to me 16 years ago...:)  He proposed at the parade....my Dad made a vinyl sign that Brad had attached to the side of the fire truck and pulled me out in the middle of everyone and got down on one knee!  On July 11th we celebrated 15 years of wedded bliss...

This year since I'm working outside the home, I had Rachel put the decorations out.  I must say, she did a mighty fine job!

I have always loved the Americana look and actually keep some of these things out year round.

I also made the girls a frozen fruit Independence Day smoothie!

We headed to the lake on Friday and spent the weekend at the camper.  Lots of fun, sun and great family and friends.   Couldn't have asked for a better 4th!

So Proud

This girl makes me one proud mama!  For the last 3 years she has been working with the Special Ed department in school.  She goes twice a week to work with Krista.  They do a lot of sensory work with her and Rachel reads to her.  She goes when her class goes out for recess, and has loved every minute of it! 

Krista graduated from 8th grade this year, and Rachel had the honor of pushing her wheelchair down the isle!

She was a nervous wreck worried that she would trip, but she did awesome, although I did shed a tear or two....ok, full out sob but whatever....

 

This is the teacher that Rachel worked with and her best friend Taylor who would go with her to work with Krista.  The thing that surprised me the most was watching Rachel with Krista and how natural she is with her, LOVE that!  She may make me want to pull every hair out of my head one at a time, but she is a pretty awesome kid!

Alayna's 7th Birthday

Our little (and I do mean little, all 40 pounds of her) mousey turned 7, and for her birthday she wanted a bowling party.  I figured this was my easiest bet dealing with the energy of 5 seven year olds!  It was the perfect amount of time (2 hours) and the kids had a blast.

Bowling ball cupcakes, yes I realize they look more like ghosts, but hey, who cares?

Our sweet and sassy 7 year old!  This girl may weigh slightly more than a toothpick, but man oh man can she pack a punch!  She has more energy than a hyena and keeps us on our toes, but we wouldn't have it any other way!

She has the best sense of humor, and keeps us laughing 24/7.

For the treat bags, I bought some cute mini bowling sets and bowling tattoos from Oriental Trading Company.  Some fun straws and "bowling pin" forks, and we were ready!

Happy birthday Mousey!!

Emma's 10th Birthday

For the queen's double digit birthday, she decided she wanted a movie night party.  She had lots of ideas and plans, so I just followed her lead!  She invited 8 girls to spend the night, (WHAT, 8????) and I went to town planning and decorating.

I found the cupcakes on Pinterest (of course) and LOVED how they turned out!  

Most of the decorations I bought from Oriental Trading Company ( love that place), the subway art I found free online and the popcorn bucket I stuffed with foam and hot glued popcorn on top!  

I filled these containers with candies and cut the labels off the boxes to hot glue one.

Here is the queen with her cupcake!  This girlfriend is such a diva, she cracks me up! 

I bought these popcorn crafts for them to do, along with decorating their own popcorn bags.  Needless to say they were all sugared up for a week!

For their parting gift, we gave away popcorn bags (duh).  Emma had such a great time and said it was her best birthday ever!  I think she says that every year, haha.  We are very proud of this girl, she continues to make us proud with her soft, sweet spirit along with all of her diva-ness!!

Lentil Vegetable Soup

I love meat, don't get me wrong, but sometimes I enjoy a good meat free meal.  And this soup fits the bill.  If I were to serve a meat free supper, I am pretty confident that my husband would pack up his things.  He is a farm boy, meat and potato raised.  I don't believe the term "meat free" is even in his vocabulary.  That's ok, it just means I get to enjoy all the tasty recipes good ole blogland gives me!

This recipe is from a sausage lentil soup I have and have made before, this time I left out the meat and added more veggies.  I made a big batch and plan to eat it all week for lunch.  It's one of those soups that tastes better the longer it's in the fridge.

Lentil Vegetable Soup-

1/2 bag of lentils rinsed and drained

2-3 medium carrots- chopped

1 red bell pepper- chopped

1/2 green bell pepper- chopped

1/2 onion- chopped

2 cloves garlic

1/4-1/2 tsp. cumin

1 bay leaf

2 cans broth (I used 1 can vegetable and 1 can beef)

salt and pepper to taste

Olive oil

Saute carrots, peppers and onion in olive oil 5 minutes, add chopped garlic.  Mix in lentils, cumin, bay leaf and broth.  Bring to a boil and simmer until lentils are soft.  Remember to take out the bay leaf!

Freezer Cooking Day

One thing I have started doing since working outside the home is to do one day a month of freezer cooking.  I love having meals in the freezer that I can pull out and are ready to be baked when the girls get home from school.  My work schedule has changed for now because it has been so slow.  I've always had Friday's off, and now I get Monday's off too.  I know, don't hate me...*ducks*

Obviously, I love this schedule as it gives me lots of freedom to do things that I haven't been able to do since having kids!  Like go out to lunch with friends, volunteer in school and so on.  

I sure enjoy having that day to get things prepared for the week!  This week I made meatballs ala Pioneer Woman, they are soooooo delicious, and flavorful.  I also made Tator Tot Hotdish, Cheeseburger Quiche from my 30 Day Gourmet Freezer Cooking Manual, red sauce for lasagna, granola, pancakes and homemade Lara bars.   My fail for the day was the pancakes.

I found a recipe online for pancakes using coconut flour that I've had on hand for awhile, but never used.   I don't know that I will keep the flour, as it is very hard to work with.  Coconut flour absorbs liquids very quickly, therefore you need to use more liquid than normal.  This recipe called for 6 eggs.  Yowsa!  The pancakes were very eggy tasting and none of us cared for them.  Emma said she would eat them with a lot of syrup...Alayna said it tasted like a sugared homelet (her version of an omelet).  Not sure if my flour was old, or if that is really how they are supposed to taste???

Anyone else ever tried coconut flour?