Sunday, November 29, 2009

More recipes and bread update

Remember the bread recipes I posted back here? Well so far I've only made the pumpkin one, but it was really yummy! No raisins, but I put in milk chocolate chips and walnuts and it was pretty good.

I also tried out a shortbread recipe that I found in Sunset Magazine. It turned out pretty well too. The biggest problem was getting it out of the pan.

Here's the recipe.

Shortbread

Makes 16 cookies
Time 1 1/4 hours
2 cups flour
1 cup cold unsalted butter, cubed
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 tsp salt
2 tbsp coarse sugar

1.Preheat over to 325. Mix flour, butter, granulated sugar, and salt in the bowl of a stand mixer on low speed until just blended. Increase speed to medium and mix until dough is no longer crumbly and just comes together. (This took a really long time. I kept thinking that I did something wrong, but eventually it all became one glob of dough.)
2. Press dough evenly into a 9 inch round cake pan. Sprinkle with course sugar.
3. Bake until golden brown, 30-40 minutes. (35 for me) Cut still-warm shortbread with a fork, tines down into 16 wedge shape pieces with shaggy edges. Cool completely, then invert pan onto a work surface and carefully separate cookies.

Make ahead up to 5 days. Store airtight up to 1 week.

We used colored course sugar, the kids thought it was great.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Giveaways!

So my friend over at SugarPopRibbons is doing a ton of giveaways right now! You should go check out her blog. One of her giveaways is for awesome bath stuff from Kristine's shower. Go check out her post about it here.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Happy Birthday Connie!

I know we filmed this last year, but I can't figure out how to get videos off of my new camera, so last years song will have to do... Love you Connie! Hope you have an awesome day.


Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Breads

So I mentioned before, that I was looking for cookie recipes. Well I tried the ones I copied from Lori's blog and they were so yummy! I will definitely be making them for our cookie exchanges.

Next up is breads. I have to take desserts to two holiday parties. I think I'm going to try this pumpkin bread this almond poppy seed one. I'll report back how they turn out.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

I'm doing a couple of cookie swaps at Christmas parties we have coming up, so I'm on the hunt for yummy recipes.

This one looks really good.

And I think this post has some yummy ideas too. For some reason I can't like to Lori's post about them, so I'm just going to copy and paste her directions. Hope that's okay!

Cream Cheese Cookies

1 8 oz package cream cheese (the low fat cheese with the funny n name works great, too), softened
4 TBspn butter or margarine, softened
1 egg yolk
1 tsp vanilla
1 box cake mix flavor of your choice (I used devils food in the above pic)


(That's it!)


I usually soften the cream cheese and butter in the microwave at decreased power. Cream butter and cream cheese together until well mixed. Mix in egg yolk and vanilla. Beat in cake mix 1/3 at a time until mixed well- depending on your mixer you may need to beat in the last 1/3 by hand. Cover and refrigerate cookie dough for 30 minutes or until chilled. Preheat oven to 375. You can drop the dough by teaspoonfuls or roll into balls- I will say the roll into ball cookies are much prettier. For the cookie cups, roll into a 1-1.5" ball and press into a greased mini muffin pan. Make indent in cookie with finger. Bake at 375 for 6-8 minutes. Cookies are done when bottom is set and slightly darkened- be careful, cookies are easy to burn.

Just a tip your first batch will probably cook for a minute longer than subsequent batches, just in my experience with various ovens. So if you find that your first batch is done at 8 minutes (and I always check at 6 or 7 minutes even with the first batch), then check your 2nd batch a minute sooner. Also, cookies will be slightly set- if you eat one fresh out of the oven it will be like eating a very hot slightly set piece of dough (which is absolutely delicious but very messy). As cookies cool they will set more. Cool on pan at least 3 minutes before moving off cookie sheet. For these cookies, as with most cookies, I find it is extremely important to use a good quality cookie sheet- not an old, burnt one or a cheap thin one. My favorite for a flat cookie sheet is a Wearever Air Bake cookie sheet. For the mini muffins I bought a heavy duty Wilton mini muffin pan. It is a very heavy pan, nice and thick. The bottoms of the cookies burn easy, so this is important. Another thing I do to check if the cookies are done, using a metal turner, the cookies are done (on a cookie sheet) when you can lift part of the cookie without it immediately falling apart and bottom of cookie is darker than top.

So what's your favorite cookie? Share the recipe with me!

Where to draw the line?

I am so frustrated right now. I don't want to air a bunch of dirty laundry, I just want to vent a little. I should be sleeping, but I can't. Writing is like therapy. Hopefully I'll be able to sleep after I vent a bit.

----

It's one thing if you want to screw up your life. Go out and do your crazy $hit. I don't care. But it's not okay to be doing that stuff while you take care of your babies! They deserve better than that. I'm done with you. I'm over it. I won't be helping you ever again.

At the same time though, I can't totally turn my back. Not when there are kiddos involved. I don't know how to cut off the crazy people(this means you!), and still help and support the kids(your children, ya know the ones you are supposed to love and protect.)

----


I am just so angry right now. I'm angry at you and I'm frightened for your children. I don't often say that I hate anyone or anything. But right now, I hate you.

----

Sometimes I wonder if I should set up a live journal blog. Then I can have posts that are private and no one can read them ( I think that's how it works anyway.)

Monday, November 16, 2009

Oops

I am failing at posting every day. I totally forgot to post yesterday, and I've pretty much nothing to say today. We've been so busy lately. I'm helping run a playgroup, so I'm scheduling tons of activities which is good, but I have to go to all of them right now. And Amelia's got school which involves a lot of driving. And she is going to be in the nutcracker in December, so she has lots of long rehearsals. But she seems to enjoy it so that's all that matters right?

I'll try and come up with some real stuff to post about for tomorrow.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

I've got nothing.

Hi. It's Saturday. I had a migraine today. Throwing up while your head is exploding sucks. I spent three hours at Amelia's ballet studio while she practiced for the nutcracker. We finally got the rest of the sod for the backyard.

That's all I got today. :-)

Friday, November 13, 2009

Follow me!


By TwitterButtons.com

I just figured out how to put a button for twitter up on my blog. So, you should all go follow me. Because I need more followers. Yup. (Can you all tell that I'm running out of things to blog about this month?) So you should click on the bird up there, and then follow me and I will also follow you. Okay? Okay!

7 Random things Meme

I can't find the link for the person who tagged me. I'll add it later.

Rules:

1. Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 random and or weird things about yourself.
3. Tag 7 random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.
4. Let each person know that they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

7 Random things about me:

1. I drink tea every day.
2. I love baking, but I hate doing dishes.
3. I get bored easily. I need to change things up pretty often.
4. I love to read, and will generally read anything I can get my hands one.
5. I crave alone time. It's something I don't really get with two little ones in the house.
6. I have asked Amelia 5 times in the last 10 minutes to get dressed. Her clothes are out for her ready to go, but she will not get dressed. When I tried to help her get dressed she told me to leave her alone and let her do it herself. Battles like this are slowly driving me batty.
7. I just had egg beaters, a laughing cow wedge, and some tomatoes, all scrambled together, for breakfast. Yum!



For this meme, I randomly tag the following fellow NBPM'ers:

1. Gumbo Mum
2. Gray Matters
3. The Blog that Ate Manhattan
4. JACKY CARTER
5. Habbala
6. Laughing at Chaos
7. Blog Voyeur Turned Blogwhore

Thursday, November 12, 2009

My little pony give away!

If your child is obsessed with the My Little Pony toys like mine is, you should go check out the blog at Sugar Pop Ribbons.

She has like five different ways you can enter, so if you want to win My Little Pony toys go visit her blog.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Better late than never...

So I forgot to come online and write a blog this morning. I was busy doing laundry, and feeding the kids breakfast, and changing sheets on the beds. I meant to write a post after that, but I had to pack our lunches and get the kids to the park on time for the play date I hosted. I was going to just put up a picture after the park, but I got wrapped up in planning our menus for the week, and making my grocery list while supervising Amelia doing arts and crafts. (Anthony was napping.) I planned to just type a few words real fast after nap time, but then we had to go the grocery store. After dragging two grouchy kids through the grocery store, and then unloading the van and putting everything away with my two little helpers, I wasn't really in the mood to get on the computer. Instead, I started dinner, read the kids a story, put the garbage cans away, and even managed to lock the kids and myself out of the house. While we were out there I did some weeding and watered the new sod in the back yard. At least I had dinner in the oven before we got locked out. Then I managed to get the lock to work and we got back in the house. We ate dinner, the kids played and I cleaned up the kitchen, did dishes and swept and mopped the kitchen and dining room. The whole time I was thinking, "I need to go put something up on my blog!" I was headed to the computer when I remembered that we left a sweater at the park today so I drove back across town to see if it was still there. It was! When I got back home it was time for baths and bed.

So here I am at 930 PM finally writing my post for the day. Maybe I should just write tomorrow's post while I'm here...

Monday, November 09, 2009

Zzz Zzz Zzz

I am so tired today! Bleh, I just can't seem to wake up. I had to work in Amelia's class room too; it was fun, but it threw off my morning, I got nothing accomplished. And Jeff's working late because he had to stay home with Anthony this morning. So yeah. Instead of taking Amelia to ballet, I want to get in my bed and sleep.

Oh no!

My blog and I totally got into a fight last night. (Or maybe I was going around with my internet connection, I'm not really sure.) Either way I missed posting! I wrote a nice little post about our weekend and other very interesting things; however, I never got it to actually post. Oh well, we'll just count this as Sunday's post. Thirty posts in thirty days. Two of them will just have to be today.

Saturday, November 07, 2009

Pretty


Aren't these pretty? I love etsy. I could spend hours on there finding all the things I need. Or think I need anyway...






I like these earrings too. And both pairs are less than $20. They might make a nice little stocking stuffer.

Friday, November 06, 2009

Overheard today

Mama #1 "Do you think that woman knows her butt is hanging out?"

Mama #2 "I don't know, you'd think she'd feel it, it's really cold in here."

Yes this conversation occurred today at story time at our local library. It's a large group of caregivers and children, and there were at least forty people there. This mom was sitting on the floor in the front row and she was wearing those awful low rise jeans. (I'm sure they look great on someone, but it sure isn't me or a lot of other mamas) She also had a really short shirt on. Standing up she looked nice. When she sat down though, the problem presented itself. For the whole story time, I and the 38 other people in the room saw her ass. And I don't mean the jiggles above the butt, we were looking at full on crack. I felt really bad for her, but I figured going up to her after the stories were finished and letting her know about the problem would just embarrass her further.

So internet, what would you have done? Would you have quietly moved next to her during story time and said something? Waited until afterward and mentioned it politely for next time? Or would you do what I did, which was nothing at all? (Although I did refrain from pointing and laughing so that's good right?)

Thursday, November 05, 2009

The Couponizer?

Remember when I mentioned my to do list a couple of weeks ago? I talked about cleaning up my coupon mess. Well I got most of those tasks completed that day and have since finished everything except for the coupons. I have been trying to figure out a good way to organize my coupons. I've found a few things to make at home, but so far none of them are really working for me.

So, I've decided to check out some of the options I can buy. On one hand, I keep thinking that it's silly to spend money for a coupon system since the whole point is to save money. At the same time, I know myself and if I have better tools, I can be much more efficient.

So far, the best option I've come up with is the Couponizer. Yes, the name is kind of goofy. I'll admit that. But I've seen a couple of reviews that are good so I think I'm going to try it out. There are a few more options I want to look at before I make a final decision, so I'll let you all know what I end up with and how I like it. In the mean time, have any of you used any particular item to organize your coupons?

Oh and on the topic of saving money, I found a great website for all sorts of free and cheap stuff. It has tons of great deals. Go check out http://www.forthemommas.com/

Tuesday, November 03, 2009

Tackle it Tuesday: The blinds

So I know the topic of this Tackle is not very exciting. Really, who cares about vertical blinds? Well I do! Since we got our windows put in last June, the blinds over the sliding door have been broken. The window people broke them; they were also supposed to repair them but that didn't happen. The were still intact, but we couldn't open or close them. Jeff's friend Mike got rid of his blinds and happened to have the piece we needed for ours. The new piece (which is about 10 feet long) has been sitting on my porch for the last week. So today I decided I'd just fix it myself. Amelia offered to be my assistant and hold the drill for me. :-)

First, I had to take the old blinds down. Then I had to clean everything, the piece from my front porch was filthy and it had definitely been a while since I washed the blinds in the house too. Next I took the old blinds apart completely. Finally I was able to put it all back together again with the new pieces and rehang it all. I probably won't attempt taking the vertical blinds down again on my own, it's heavy and really awkward. But on the plus side, we can eat dinner without the sun in our faces. Woohoo.

What are you tackling this week? Leave me a comment and tell me about it.

Monday, November 02, 2009

Menu Plan Monday: What's in the Freezer?

My menus might seem a bit random this week, but my freezer and my pantry are overflowing, so I'm trying to use up stuff we have. It's about time for me to go through it all again and purge stuff that's expired or we won't eat.

Monday: Baked Chicken, broccoli, brown rice
Tuesday: BBQ Pork Chops, Steamed Sweet potatoes, Salad
Wednesday: Hamburgers, homemade guacamole, Chips, baked beans
Thursday: Whole wheat Pasta, Salad, veggies
Friday: Probably Leftover Pasta
Saturday: London Broil in the crockpot with potatoes, onions, celery and carrots
Sunday: Leftovers from Saturday or grilled Cheese Sandwiches.

Go to Orgjunkie.com if you need more meal planning ideas.

Sunday, November 01, 2009

National Blog Post Month

It's time once again for the NaBloPoMo. (Try saying that five times fast!) My goal this year is to get through all thirty days, posting every day. We'll see if I can do it. What about the rest of you? Are any of you participating? Leave me a comment and I'll visit your blog. Happy NaBloPoMo! :-)