Saturday, January 28, 2012

Weekly Menu



Ya know, I'm really have a hard time accepting that fact that February begins this next week.  Searoulsy.  It seems like just yesterday it was New Years Day and now, the month is gone!  As I'm writing this post, I don't even have my February meal plan in place . . I'm not motivated for some odd reason.  I'll get there and will have it written by the end of next week but right now, I wish I had a chef who planned (and cooked) all of our meals HA! 

Here's are plan for this coming week:


Saturday:  More then likely, my husband and I will order dinner in which means the kids will have something simple like soup or grilled cheese.

Sunday: Chili and Cornbread (This Chili recipe is something that has been on the menu since SEPTEMBER but it just never gets made - I think in September it was too hot out HA!)

Monday: Overnight French Toast and Bacon

Tuesday: Chicken Fried Steak, Mashed Potatoes with Parsley gravy and fried corn

Wednesday: Crispy Orange Beef and Broccoli with Baked Brown Rice (This is a new recipe!)

Thursday: Chicken Caesar Sandwiches and Baked Onion Rings, Peas

Friday: Stuffed Shells, Salad and Garlic Bread (I made this in December but totally messed it up so I wanted to try it again to see if it really is as good as I THINK it is!) 

Friday, January 27, 2012

Food Friday - Coconut Chicken

I've made these wonderful little chicken bits of goodness twice and we have loved them both times.  I originally made them on a day I thought Darryl would be gone overnight because he doesn't usually like Coconut but, he happened to make it home and guess what?  He said these were GOOD!  I made them again recently and they were just as good the second time around. 

Coconut Chicken
adapted from Confessions of a Homeschooler

The recipe below calls for Chicken Thighs but both times I've made it, I only had chicken tenders on hand so I used them and think I always will.  I still cook them for 45 minutes though and they come out tender.  Because of the butter drizzled on top, they have a great flavor and don't get overly crispy either (and I don't cover mine with foil either).  I served mine with Savory Rice, Peas and Rolls but it really does go with anything that you love!

Ingredients:
  • 4-6 chicken thighs
  • 1/3 cup dry plain breadcrumbs
  • 1/3 cup flaked coconut
  • 1/4 cup butter, melted (can substitute olive oil)
  • Salt & Pepper (to taste)
  • Cooking Spray
  • Optional: tin foil
Directions:
STEP 1: Season chicken with salt & pepper to taste.
STEP 2: In plate mix breadcrumbs and coconut together, and roll chicken thighs in breadcrumb mixture 1 at a time to coat well.
STEP 3: Place coated chicken in lightly sprayed baking dish and drizzle lightly with butter or olive oil.
STEP 4: Bake at 350 for 45-55 minutes until chicken is done.
Serve with baked potato and your favorite veggie!
TIP: Place foil over the chicken for the first half of baking just to keep the coconut from browning too much.

Thursday, January 26, 2012

What I'm Reading

Hello!  Last week I was reading the book The Fence My Father Built on my Kindle.
I did finish it and just wanted to say that it did not have the twist I thought might happen.  It really was a good book - I did feel like, after a pretty long story, the last 1/4 of the book moved really quickly to wrap everything up and I actually got a little lost and had to "flip" back through a few pages sometimes to re-read it to see what I missed.  I have decided yet whether this is a read again book so for now, it is in the archives of my Kindle.  :-)

Currently I really have no rhyme or reason to what I pick on my Kindle to read next.  I have the books sorted by the date I received them but they are sorted by the newest added so I just pick the one on the top (I should probably reverse that and read the oldest stuff first???) So, the book I'm reading currently is called Always the Wedding Planner, Never the Bride.
This book currently sells on Amazon for $9.99 for the Kindle ($11.99 for the actual book).  I am glad that I picked this one up for free - I wouldn't have actually bought it.  The story is cute - about a wedding planner who meets the love of her life and gets engaged within a few weeks; and then they move to take new jobs and run into all kinds of snags.  One thing I don't like is that in between each chapter are "tips or recipes" like the Top 10 wedding Flowers, or Themed Wedding ideas.  I just skip over all of those sections to get to reading part.  This one is a pretty quick read - I'm enjoying it, but not enough to have paid full price for it :-)

I'm still working on learning my Kindle better.  I've found the "manage your Kindle" button on Amazon and I'm thinking that maybe I need to save some of the books somewhere other than my Kindle because now, with so many books loaded on it, it seems to move slower than it used to (Kind of like an overloaded computer) which is why I also think I probably will delete books that are not my true favorites after I read them (Like the one I'm reading now!) I wonder how much space the books would take up on my hard drive/external hard drive?  I'll have to research that process.  I also need to clean my screen on my Kindle HA! 

What are you reading?  Anything really good?  I'm willing to pay for a GOOD book - especially if it is something I want to save and re-read later :-)

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

A Special Feature Post


Do you recognize this button?  It is featured on the left hand side bar of my blog.  I've used this blog in the past for birthday ideas and was looking forward to possibly having my kids birthday parties posted on it.  I was kinda disappointed when I went to send Josh's party ideas because I noticed that there were no posts happening at all . .. but then the host e-mailed me to let me know that a friend of hers was taking over the blog and my party WOULD appear in January! 

Josh's Farm Party was featured recently!  How fun is that? 

One of the things I liked about this site is that she has lists for both birthday party ideas and cake ideas so if you are looking for something specific it is fairly easy to find. 

I guess I should send in Nate's party now that Josh's has been featured and see if that one gets a shout out too!





Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Too Cute Not to Toot!

I have to tell you - I have been busy making some projects from past "Too Cute" posts that I'll be sharing soon.  PLUS I have even made one of my OWN ideas!!  Seriously!  Can you believe it?  I'm also getting ready to start searching for some new ideas to work on next month too!

Lets start with this great printable from A Step in the Journey.  I really love the quote and will be printing my own this week.  I'm thinking that I will frame it and hang it above my desk as a daily reminder.  I'll show you once it is hanging up :-)
This next idea I am posting for one person who reads this blog - she got a Kindle Fire this year and mentioned that she hasn't been able to find a good case - well neither could Color Me Glamorous so she MADE one and shared her full tutorial.  Check it out!
I Heart Crafty Things shares an adorable tutorial for making these monster Valentine's Boxes.  In future years, as the boys get older, I plan on have each of us make boxes and then put notes in them through the weeks before the big Heart Day.  A Friend of mine does this with her 8 (yes 8) boys and I just think it is awesome! These boxes are just too great not to make :-)
Thought I would share this adorable idea for a little hot chocolate party.  It is such a simple idea from Dukes and Duchesses.  I think this would be fun to do with the boys after an afternoon of playing in the snow :-)
This is an idea I saw on Pinterest originally but the link sends you to a shop to buy the kit - I didn't want to buy the kit.  Then I found this idea over at And I Thought I loved you Then  with instructions on how to make the Snowball Kit!
So, this really isn't an "idea" but it is a concept and, since it is the plan to finally purchase "My" camera after tax time, I wanted to save this post from Its Overflowing - it's a blogger camera course.  It is the second post - so you can, I'm sure, find the first post and there will also be more.  I'm kinda excited to use it as a base to help me out (Plus I have a friend who has promised to teach me all she knows HA!)
Sassy Sites has done it again.  This time she is sharing a ton of links for ideas to make Valentine's for kids.  I love it for future years - it would be fun to make some of them and put them in those Monster Boxes and mentioned above.!
That's all for this week :-)  People have been kinda quiet this week in bloggy land - I think everyone is still recovering from Christmas :-)

Pinterest Challenge - Success and Not So Much Success

Lets start with the success.  This was a simple idea that came at just the right time.  Last week I posted about the Memory Shortage I had on my hard drive.  I remembered pinning this idea from Real Simple not long ago so I pulled it up and did a little research on this great way to store photo discs.
This just clicked in my brain and was such an easy concept.  Unlike most people (or so it seems) I do not catorgerize my photos by event but rather in chronological order so the color coding of the jewel cases was not something I needed to do but otherwise I loved this idea.  Here is what my simplified version looks like.
Very simply, I burn each year on to a disc (or multiple discs depending on the number of photos) and just put an small index card on the front of the first disc.  I did buy colored cases only because they were cheaper and look more fun in the box!  The box is just a Rubbermaid shoe box which fits the discs perfectly.  I also, as you can read, have "tabs" for the professional picture discs we have had done and I save the copies of the photo pages I create as well. 

Now for the not so much success stories.  Surprisingly, they were both food items.

First up, this recipe for 3 Cheese Chicken Alfredo Bake was one of the very first "pins" and was so excited to make it - it just looked so incredibly yummy! 
I finally got around to making this last week for dinner.  Even while I was making it, it looked good but I kinda wondered what rocatta cheese would do to the texture.  I should of thought a little longer about that concept.  Really, I should have . . oy!
So, do you want to know what the best thing on the plate was?  Nope, not the pasta - it was the garlic bread.  The pasta dish was nasty nasty!  Two reasons.  1)The texture was just not good.  It was kinda chunky and not creamy - that rocatta cheese really messed with the alfredo sauce.  2)The taste - it had none.  It was very bland and non-interesting to eat.  To make it worse, it is actually an expensive dish to put together between the two containers of alfredo (at about $4.00 a container - YIKES!) and all of the cheese . . .not a good one to flop on at all!  So, I would not recommend making this dish personally but, if you want to try it for yourself click on the link I gave above and you will find the recipe there :-)

Now, for the second flop.  Amazingly, it is chocolate and peanut butter - how can you go wrong with that one?  These are called Better Than Crack Brownies which sounds like they should basically make you stand on a mountain peak and sing to the heavens after every bite, right?
So, I whipped a batch of these up with some left over Peanut Butter Cups from Christmas and this is what mine looked like:
I don't think the name suits them and that could be part of the problem - I expected way too much.  They are more like a brownie with some fudge on top.  It's one of those recipes that is just ok - not anything to make again but they weren't awful.  I will say that I used Cocoa Pebbles in the fudgy part instead of Rice Krispies and that probably impacted the texture but not the taste.  You can try them yourself, if you like, by clicking the link above :-) 

Monday, January 23, 2012

A Wedding

I don't know about all of you, but I love Weddings :-)  Especially those of people I know well!  On Saturday, January 14th, Darryl's Niece, Rachel, got married and we were honored to be part of it!  We were very excited about this wedding since Rob and Rachel have been together for 7 years and we figured that this day would come long before now!  Darryl and I were responsible for the music - we knew months in advance but, as is normal, we waited until 2 weeks before the wedding to practice . .. we should have practiced sooner LOL  No, it went really well but we could have used a few more songs for the prelude and postlude.  I also sang "When I Say I do" by Matthew West



The wedding itself was beautiful - it was held in a church that was just "grand" in appearance making for some beautiful photos. I will apologize now for my photos - my camera is on its last leg so it tends to be a little blurry sometimes plus I was not using the flash so any small movement caused a blur. 
 Rachel - she looked beautiful :-)
 Rachel and the Guys
 Rob, the groom, and our nephew Levi (Rachel's brother)


 Darryl with his sister, Kelly
 Rachel and Darryl - yes, she is really that short and yes, he is really that tall :-)
The First Dance :-)

Despite a really bad snow storm with white out driving conditions - it was a great weekend.  Darryl and I, thanks to his hotel points he has earned, were able to stay the weekend so we got some time away which was even better then the wedding - the wedding was just the excuse we needed to do something like that, I guess :-)