This and That

I haven’t been posting a lot lately.  Right, yes you can see that.  It is the busy season and I have been doing lots of things.  Nothing too exciting, but wonderful just the same.  So I will leave you with some pictures that you may look at.

Big Brother, Little Brother

My Adorable Kitchen Assistant

Making cookies

Getting into Mommy's lipstick

Going to school (my neice and nephew are in the picture)

A picture of the backpacks (very important)

So I may not be posting regularly, but I do hope everyone has a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Menu Plan Monday

I’m tired just thinking about this week.

Roast, roasted potatoes and spinach salad

Vegetable soup (made with yesterday’s roast), corn bread

Sandwiches! – lots of cooking to do for Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Day – LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS OF FOOD

Leftovers

Pizza and a salad

For more menu plans, please visit Org Junkie.

Favorite Thanksgiving Recipes

I have some favorite recipes that I have made for Thanksgiving.

Aunt June’s Sweet Potato Bake

Buttery Bread Machine Rolls

No Fail So Easy Pie crust (can use whole wheat or just all purpose flour)

All of the above recipes can be made ahead and frozen.  I also make mashed potaotes.  You can do some of the work ahead for those.  Peel and cut them into small pieces and cover with water and refrigerate overnight and make them the next day.  You could whip them up the night before and refrigerate but you would have to add more milk and butter the next day when reheating.

For more great Thanksgiving recipes, please visit Life as a Mom.

Say What?

Tonight while I was doing disco aerobics, my son Isaac was watching me and they did some hip moves and he was like, “Mom, move your hips.”  Then he sighed and was looking at the hip-moving women on the tv and said, “I wish I was married.”

Ahhhhhhh, I immediately said, “Well, time for a Bible video in your room.”  So he watched David and Goliath while I finished my aerobics.  At least he has the right idea about marriage.

Move Your Butt Monday . . . The Kitchen

Now I know the title sounds scary – The Kitchen.  It isn’t the whole kitchen.  I am asking you to pick one thing – your spice drawer or your cabinet where you keep your Tupperware.  You know you have that scary Tupperware cabinet.  I am not asking you to go out and buy new things.  You don’t have to do that.  I did.  I got rid of all of my plastic ware.  I wanted to get glass but my husband said he would break it at work and since I pack all of his lunches and he is the one that uses the plastic ware I did not buy glass.

Here is a before and after of my plastic ware:

Here is what I did.  I took everything out.  I kept a few things and then I did buy those lock lid Rubbermaid things.  I wanted the lids to fit together.  I was tired of all of the mish mash.  I did invest a little less than $20.  There is a few ways to keep your plastic ware.  A book I read suggested that you put all of the lids onto the proper container.  If it doesn’t have a lid – get rid of it.  Then you may store them like that although that does take up more room.  If you don’t want to store them that way take a plastic container and put all of your lids in there.  You are still going to have to search for a lid but at least the lids will all be in one place.

Now onto the spices:

In the plastic container is where I keep any mixes in a pouch that I might have.  I do try to make my own, but I am not superwoman.  I also wanted to label the lids of the spices but I just ran out of labels for my labelmaker so I will be doing this soon.  Some of my spices already come with their lids labeled.  As you can tell I moved them from a cabinet to a drawer and this has worked SO much better for me.

So your assignment this week is to tackle one thing – a drawer or a shelf in your kitchen.  Take everything out and reorganize or throw away or better yet – give away!

Please leave a comment and let me know what you do or if you have a post with pictures I will link it to this post.

Happy Monday!

I am listing this post at Tackle it Tuesday on 5 Minutes for Mom.

Menu Plan Monday

All right people, I am out of inspiration for meal planning.  I just have no idea what to fix.  I ask my husband and he said, “Do you have any cheeseburger macaroni?”  Um, yes that is hamburger helper and no I do not have any of that.  I could try a homemade version.  We might try it.  Anyway, I am at least going to plan and we will see how it goes.  And have I mentioned that I cannot make anything with red sauce because my husband has acid reflux?  I can’t make spaghetti or lasagna or most taco things.  People, these are the easiest meals to make.  So now I have to get creative.  Also, as for the Sunday Dinner Challenge – it has been canceled because we have been sick 2 out of the last 3 Sundays.  The other Sunday my mom volunteered to watch the kids and we actually got to have a date – woo hoo!  I am going to try for the first Sunday in December and probably let the challenge go after that until January.  Is anyone else doing it?

Slow Cooker Orange Chicken, peas and peaches

Cheeseburger Macaroni, broccoli and fruit smoothies

Oven Fried Chicken, baked potatoes and salad

Slow Cooker Beef Barley Soup and homemade bread or rolls

Biscuits and Gravy, scrambled eggs and bacon (and maybe some fruit)

Leftovers one night, pizza maybe one night and we may go out to eat – who knows!  I may have to try Kate’s Barbecue Chicken Pizza.  It looks pretty good.

There you have our weekly menu plan.  I hope everyone has a wonderful week.

For more menu ideas, please visit OrgJunkie.com.

Homemade Hamburger Bun Recipe

This recipe is from a friend from church – thanks Anna!  The pictures of her hamburger buns are MUCH better than mine.

These are her notes:  **This is my Hamburger bun recipe that I LOVE and is super easy…

I use my bread machine to make the dough and then shape as needed. Again, I use all instant yeast, so any water needed in a recipe can be cold – make it warm if you use a different yeast:)

1/2 cup water

1/2 cup milk (warm if non-instant yeast)

2 tablespoons butter, melted, cooled

1/2 teaspoon sugar

2 1/2 to 2 3/4 bread flour, divided

1 teaspoon salt

2 1/4 teaspoons of yeast

1 egg white, lightly beaten

sesame seeds

Mix as you would for bread in your bread maker – liquids then dry stuff  – set on dough setting and once it is done…

move to a clean bowl and cover and let rise for 30 minutes or so until doubled in size (I grease my bowls)

Gently punch down dough to deflate; place on lightly floured surface and divide into 6 pieces. Form each into a ball; place on a cookie sheet (I grease mine instead of using parchment paper). Cover and let stand 3 minutes. Flatten into just about 4 in rounds. Cover with towel and let rise 15 minutes.

Place another lightweight baking sheet/pan on top of the buns (helps to make them flatter and more even) and let rise another 25 minutes until almost doubled.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly brush the tops of the buns with egg white and sprinkle with sesame seeds. Bake 20 minutes or until golden brown and bottom sounds hollow when tapped.

Allow to cool on a wire rack. After completely cooling, I wrap mine in foil and then place into freezer bags and freeze – I use them in 2s and they thaw and reheat wonderfully!

***My notes:  I did not do the thirty minute rise and they still turned out very good.  They were really delicious and I would make them again.  I think I may try half whole wheat flour next time.  Yet another reason to love my breadmaker.  Also, I did not use the egg white and sesame seeds.  I just brushed them with butter and called it a day.

For more recipes please visit:

Tasty Tuesdays at Beauty and Bedlam

Tempt My Tummy Tuesday at Blessed with Grace

Move your Butt Monday – The Fridge

You probably thought I was going to talk about exercise didn’t you?  Well, I guess I am talking about a different kind of exercise.  Move your Butt Monday is something my cousin and I are going to be taking turns hosting.  We are doing this mostly to get ourselves motivated, but you are welcome to join us in tackling things that need to be done around your house.  We liked the “Make your Home a Haven” idea but no one seems to be doing it so we decided to.  Of course “Make your Home a Haven” is such a nice and polite title, but my cousin is a little more crass than I (right Amee) so she titled it “Move your Butt Monday” and really it does make you want to get up and do something right?

First of all, head on over to her blog and she will give you very good instructions on how to get started.  Today we are working on cleaning up our fridge.

After much sickness this weekend I feel like I need to clean everything so why not start with the the fridge:

Before

And After:

Looks a little empty now doesn’t it?  I still need to tackle the top of the fridge where we keep our snacks, but I need to go get a few baskets for that this week.

Don’t forget to head over to Klutzymama’s blog and see what she did.  We will be doing this every Monday.  We are going to keep thing simple.  Also, we are not doing a Mr. Linky but we will add your’s to our post if you leave us a comment.

Simple Family Supper

Tonight we had the privilege of having Heather from Simple Family Suppers come to our Titus 2 meeting at our church.  She spoke on the importance of family supper.  She brought her friend Kiersten to be her worship leader.  She gave spiritual encouragement and practical advice.    She really encouraged us that we do not have to do it all.  We don’t have to be so hard on ourselves.  She talked about starting simply.  The focus was on sitting down at the table together as a family at least once a day.   One thing she said really stuck out to me, “Use the family meal to fight for your family“.  If you have been reading my blog you know how I feel about Sunday dinner.  She provided research that states the good things that happen to children who sit down with their family to eat once a day.

I could go on and on.  She has some E-books for sale.  She has a blog and a Simple Family Suppers facebook page.  She sells monthly menu kits.  I did get to see her November’s menu and it is really comprehensive and there are some wonderful recipes in there as well.  I would encourage you to check out her e-books!

We hope to have her back at our church soon.

Thank you Heather, I know there is so much more we could learn from you!

Please visit Heather at her blog, Choosing Simplicity, More than Survival.

For more Frugal Friday posts, please visit Life as a Mom.

Freezer meal wrap up and recipe

I found this recipe for Zesty BBQ Chicken.  It is so easy and delicious.  Here is the recipe for those of you who don’t want to click the site:

Ingredients

• 6 frozen skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
• 1 (12 ounce) bottle barbeque sauce
• 1/2 cup Italian salad dressing
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

Directions

1. Place chicken in a slow cooker. In a bowl, mix the barbeque sauce, Italian salad dressing, brown sugar, and Worcestershire sauce. Pour over the chicken.
2. Cover, and cook 3 to 4 hours on High or 6 to 8 hours on Low.

Now, here is how you can use this in three different ways:

1.  Make sandwiches

2.  Put the warm chicken on a spinach salad.  I used spinach, the chicken, cheese and sliced almonds and it was so delicious that you do not even need dressing.

3.  Put it on baked potatoes.

This really is a super easy recipe and there are so many ways to use it.  Did I mention that it freezes very well also?

Now onto my OAMC:

My OAMC day was halted on Tuesday.  I went to pick up our beef.  We order from a local farmer.  I picked up a quarter which is 180 lbs. of beef people!  Well, I split it with 2 other people.  But they couldn’t pick up the meat from me until next week so my freezer is literally stuffed completely full of meat.  I don’t think I could get anything else in there.  So I will have to save some of my freezing for next week.

Here is my original list:

Breakfast:

Quiche in a Bag (but made in muffins – using muffins and muffin liners)

Peanut Butter & Banana Muffins from Deceptively Delicious

Doughnuts from Deceptively Delicious

Breakfast cookies

Lunch:

Corndog Muffins

Pita Pizzas with spinach puree (from Deceptively Delicious) – DONE

Popcorn Chicken

Dinners:

Day 1:

Chicken Mix and Broth (use 4 roasters) – DONE

Master Beef Mix (5 lbs. of meat)

Day 2:

Chicken Bombay (2)

Chicken and Dumplings (can be done in the crock pot as well) (2)

Slow Cooker Orange Chicken – another crock pot recipe

Brown Sugar Chicken – another slow cooker – DONE

Zesty BBQ Chicken – DONE and delicious!

Dump Maple Mustard Chicken – one bag no cooking

*With the chicken mix, beans and the chili garlic paste I can make these meals on the day of:   Sour Cream Enchiladas and Burrito Pie and quesadillas and Creamy Chicken Casserole – make like sour cream enchiladas try it?.

*With the meat mix I can make sloppy joes, bacon cheeseburger roll up, cheesy beef and rice casserole, taco mac, Mexican stuffed shells

Desserts/Snacks:

Peanut Butter Honey Bars (I am going to add flaked coconut and I had to bake them about 5-10 minutes longer to get them set)

Chocolate Chip Cookies (I do use all whole wheat flour and coconut oil instead of shortening)

Lynn’s No Bake Cookie Bars

Mixes/sides:

Alfredo Sauce (can be used with pre-cooked chicken and some pasta and broccoli)

Rice – make 10 cups and portion into 2 cup portions and freeze

Chili Garlic Paste – DONE

Black eyed peas – DONE

Brown Beans – DONE

Black beans – DONE

Baking:

Pita Pockets – DONE

I also made some whole wheat pumpkin scones and cinnamon rolls and breakfast casserole, but it will all be gone tomorrow since I have play group at my house.

So I did not get everything done.  I will hopefully do that next week when my freezer is a little less full.

This post is listed at:

Life as a Mom’s Ultimate Recipe Swap

Dining with Debbie’s Crockpot Wednesday