Busy

I seem to have found a grove of keeping up with this house now that I don't have to work in the mornings. It's been nice to get things done and still find a little me time. However today cleaning the bathrooms with Ashlyn home was disastrous. She wanted to "help" and that was a blast. I lost my temper after she dumped her shampoo (half a bottle) into a cup thankfully. So glad it didn't go down the drain. But still she has done this twice, down the drain, and has not learned that it is NOT okay. I asked her if she knew that would make me mad and she said yes. So why, and she just looked at me. Next week I will be cleaning bathrooms on Wed. when she is at school! I feel like I didn't sit down at all today, but I feel accomplished so its all good. Earlier I made a double batch of those yummy granola bars, and I just cut them up, and put them into a gallon ziploc bag. My family is super excited because they are SO good! Teagan even shares his with a friend at school who also likes them. Glad they are getting eaten. So happy to have found an easy to make snack that tastes good and is better for us to eat. Win all the way around!!! 

Yummy Treat

Okay so some blogs generally have a Pinterest Wednesday. In this house we have a Pinterest Daily! I am always using ideas or recipes from this AMAZING site!!! Love it so much! Well I have been meaning to try and make up some homemade granola bars. I bought the ingredients like at the beginning of summer, but I never made them. I guess I thought I needed the oven, which you totally DON'T, just stove top! So today we are tight on money and the snack food is dwindling down for school lunches so I thought I need to make these granola bars. It was beyond easy and the tiny taste I had was so GOOD!!! Here is the link to my pinned recipe http://pinterest.com/pin/88101736431242943/

Teagan helped me make them up. I hope that both boys come home tomorrow raving about the yumminess. 

It was Pajama Day at school today, yes we do get ready in this house during the week days! ;)

Stirring the mixture of peanut butter, butter, brown sugar, and honey

Adding in the oats, rice crispy cereal, and crushed pretzels (also vanilla extract)

Smash into a wax paper lined pan and refrigerator for 30 minutes. 

Cut up and I stored mine in a ziploc bag in the fridge. 

Nail Art

I really love my nails. Seriously like my most favorite thing about me. Sad huh. Anyways, I have been bad about painting them so the other day I looked up some ideas on good ol' Pinterest. Such a wonderful site!!! I decided to paint them red and white with polka dots. Really loved how they turned out. If I had black I would have totally added a bow or even a Mickey Mouse face. Maybe next time. My friend wanted me to paint her nails, so today she came over and I did hers. I LOVE how they turned out. It was pink and silver with like a leopard spots on the nails. It makes me want to do mine over. Ashlyn got her nails painted yesterday, but the little stink peeled the polish off. I spent a good 20 minutes on them. Gotta love almost 4 yr olds! She wanted me to paint hers again, but honestly not sure if I want to because she'll probably just peel it off again!

Chili AGAIN

I made Chili again on Sunday and remembered to snap an after pic. However I thought I had white beans, but nope none at all :( so I used some black beans. They worked fine!!! Here is the link to the recipe that I used. HERE

I changed just a few things. I made it all in the crockpot and only used half a can of chicken broth. Chicken was also left in breast and then shredded down after it was cooked. There was more chicken this time around, and I almost could have used more broth to this chili. Then I also added a jalapeno for some KICK(seeds and all)!!! Super yummy. Make sure to add the whipping cream and sour cream at the end. Like the recipe I waited to add when I wanted one more hour of cooking. It lasted in our house oh two days with the left overs. Nothing got wasted from this deliciousness!!!!!!

Biscuit Donuts

Tried another pin on Friday. I made some donuts for the kids. Okay I started making donuts for the kids and then Brian got home with a box from Bashas. So I save these for Saturday. Totally fine and tasty the next day. Here is the pin. It was super easy and I dressed them up as the original pin just made circles, not sure if she made donut holes, but I didn't want to waste anything. I had a fun pumpkin cookie cutter so I went with that it being "fall" and all. LOL Fall it's still in the 90's here. Anyway I made up these donuts and pumpkin bites and then dipped them in cinnamon and sugar...YUM! The kids thought they were cute and yummy. 

 

Here is my cute little cookie cutter!!!

 The pumpkin hole and the pumpkin bite. 

 After the dough was in the oil fried.

 First dipped in melted butter, and then dipped in the cinnamon and sugar.

I only made one package of biscuits, and that seemed enough for the kids.

Too much cilantro...NEVER

Cilantro is so yummy! Love that stuff! I found a recipe on pinterest for a cilantro pesto, sounded great. Found here. I made up a crock pot of chicken to shred and then made up the pesto. Also there was a recipe for a mock Chipotle Rice with of course cilantro!!! Found here. So together what a dream meal! Add some black beans and we got a killer burrito!  Love it!!!

Happy USA Shirts

Every year, I ALWAYS get something patriotic or red, white, and blue for us to wear. This year, I thought it would be fun for the kids to create their own shirts. I found a fun way for them to do so on OF COURSE pinterest! HERE It is pretty simple, good quality crayons, a white t-shirt, and some fine sandpaper. I had the crayons and tees so to the Dollar Tree I went for the sandpaper. So project USA tees was a whole DOLLAR! Very fun indeed. I wanted to make Brian and I some as well but we didn't have any plain white tees. Maybe next year!

So the plan had been for the kids to create, but we did run out of time so Teagan was really the only one that "created" his own shirt. I helped by drawing up first what he needed to color. Don't forget that what you draw and color will be opposite. I had to remake Rayles because I did it wrong, forgot to make the letters backwards Ashlyn's was wrong too, but I didn't feel like fixing it so I left it messed up. 

 Teagan working hard.

 Make sure to really press down hard with the colors so they show up once you iron it on to the shirt.

 Place some kind of cardboard between the shirt layer so the colors don't bleed. Then also a piece of paper towel between the sandpaper, and the iron. Iron away and transfer your design.

 Here is Teagan's t-shirt.

 Here is Ashlyn's, the blue and stars should be on the other side. Oh well!!!

 Here is Rayle's Superman USA inspired tee.

 Looks great!!!

 Little face paint adds a nice touch!

 Rayle rocken his tee.

 Teagan in his tee.

 My three patriotic kiddos in their homemade USA tees!!!

Set the design in the dryer, then wash separately so colors don't bleed. Should be good after that. So many gift and fun options for this idea! Have fun creating!!!

Rayle's Super Hero Blast

Rayle turned 6 in the month of June and unfortunately, we all got sick around the weekend we were to have the party. So I postponed it a few weekends and got prepared for some super hero action. I found a ton of fun things on pinterest to help make it perfect. 

 This is a comic book pennant banner. So glad I had some old comic books laying around. Found Here.

 Here is the banner up.

 Another view.

 I made a up my small three tier cakes, thanks Ashlyn for helping yourself to some of it.

 Top tier, I went with a Batman theme.

 Middle tier, I choose a Spiderman theme.

 Bottom tier was Superman, but since it was on the bottom you can't see a whole lot.

 I used some sixlets to help with decorating.

 The cake all decorated. I used cream cheese frosting, OH SO GOOD!!! Found Here.

 The table all set. Love the color combinations. You just can't go wrong with the primary colors!

 The fruit was SO GOOD!!!

 Another two ideas from pinterest! Mason jars with cupcake wrappers and then straws. Also a drink that inspires Super Hero Action!!! Mason Jar Idea Found Here. Drink Idea Found Here.

 Cinnamon and Sugar Pretzels. These pretzels were so yummy. I loved them!!! Found Here.

Here are the goodie bags. Also one of the items in the goodie bag was a Super Hero thumb war topper. It was so cute! Also found them on pinterest. Here is the link.

One more look of the table.

Is it obvious how much I love pinterest????? Such a great site for ideas and inspiration!!!

Philly Shmilly

I have been wanting to try new recipes this summer and came across one that I could NOT pass up. It was for Philly Cheese Steak Sandwiches. YUMMMMMM Found Here. It sounded to good and so we had some friends over to taste the goodness too. It was a hit, well at least for me and Brian! The kids didn't like the GREEN, (bell peppers!) Oh well we adults all enjoyed it, and well sometimes it should be all about the adults!