Spring Break-day 1

 This year Spring Break is a bit different for us.  We only really have 1 week.  We've always have had 4 weeks.  With Noah on a traditional schedule now at school, he has 1 week while the other two have 4.  We decided to make the most of the one week we had together.

Monday morning found us loading up the car with all sorts of winter gear even though it was 75*F where we were.  We drove up to Big Bear Lake.  We started climbing the mountain and the kids were so sad there wasn't any snow.  We rounded a bend in the road and then there were screams of delight, "SNOW!"

Our cabin was nice and cozy.  The kids had the upstairs loft all to themselves.  We spent the rest of the day getting acquainted with our surroundings.  The lake was beautiful.  There was enough snow in the back for the kids to sled down a small hill.  Damon and I started to unwind.

It was a peaceful evening.

fun times!

It's almost spring break and I am glad.  I've never really felt so ready for a break.  At the end of each week I am so worn out and tired.  I'm not the only one who feels this way, but that's never seemed to have happened to our family before.  It is sad.

 Our great friends, the Melanson's, came down to visit during their spring break. We were so excited to see them even if it was only for 2 days.  My kids have never really not known them.  It's fun to watch them grow up.  The adults were able to go out to dinner.  It seems so easy now that we don't have to find a sitter and all of them pretty much take care of themselves.  It used to be such a hassle when they were little.  We were sad to see them go and sorry we couldn't join them at Disneyland. 

 Lily's class went on a field trip to Sea World.  We had a lot of fun together.  It was a great day.  Lily went on Atlantis for the first time as well as Riptide.  She can't wait to go back and ride them again.

 baseball/choir-Adam seems to be keeping us very busy these days.  This week he had 2 baseball games and a choir concert.

 new cake-I made a chocolate marble pound cake.  It was good.  I also made a Chocolate sour cream cake.  That was good too.  I made them from scratch.  It wasn't to hard.



tennis-Lily just finished up a month of tennis lessons.  I'm a horrible mom and didn't take any pictures.  She enjoyed it though.

swim/carpool-Noah just finished up cotillion (which he is so very sad about.  HA!)  We are also still going strong with swimming (he set a goal to do a 50 free in 33 seconds).  Mom is happy to be done with carpool for a week.  No pictures of carpool.  Just picture 6 tweens who are grumpy and loud.

It's a fun time of life!!  Can't wait for conference this weekend.  Should be great.

Busy times

I've been wondering why we are so tired all the time and the weekend always seems to fly by and when Monday comes again it is even harder to get out of bed.  We are busy.  Thursday and Friday used to be our down days and now they are just as busy.  Since baseball season started even our Saturdays are gone.  We realize this is just our phase in life right now.  We love it, but we are tired every night.

Today I decided to relax and do some creative baking.  I did a yummy vanilla cupcake with a chocolate butter cream filling and a mint butter cream frosting.  It was fabulous.  I managed to only eat one, but there was also a lot of finger licking.

We had Noah's Court of Honor tonight for scouts.  Noah earned 4 merit badges and is now a 2nd class scout.  Way to go Noah.  He is only 4 activities away from getting his 1st class badge.  We are so proud of him.

Girls day Out!

 Today was a fun day.  My crazy friend Heather thought it would be fun if a bunch us went down to Mission Beach and rented Segways.  She was right.  It was so much fun.  We live in an amazing place and it's nice to actually go out and enjoy it.  We always get so busy with life that we forget to enjoy what millions of people come to vacation to.

We live here.  How cool is that!!

 We rolled right past the hotel that Damon and I spent our Honeymoon at.  We were laughing because Heather was rolling while trying to take the picture and I was rolling into the plants.  Fun day!

French Fun!

We haven't been able to have a lot of fun lately because of schedules, but this Saturday we had a little free time in the morning and wanted to enjoy the beautiful Spring, that felt more like Summer, day.

We headed downtown to Little Italy to a cafe called Fabrison's.  It's a little French Cafe that serves crepes and croissants and all things yummy.  We watched the cook make the large crepes.  We loved our food and our server humored us by listening to our French and helped the kids count to 5 in French. 

 It was a well needed field trip.  We enjoyed it and the kids can't wait to go back.  The craziness continued when we got home, but at least we had this moment of enjoyment.

Dinner #29.2 & #29.3

I spent the day cleaning my kitchen.  Not very fun.  I guess that's a downside to cooking so much.  Tonight's dinner was on the grill so my stove/oven would stay clean.

29.2-Asian Barbeque Chicken

2 tablespoons soy sauce

 1 tablespoon olive or vegetable oil

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper (cayenne)

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

8 chicken drumsticks (I also did chicken thighs)

 Heat gas or charcoal grill. In small bowl, mix all ingredients except chicken; brush mixture over chicken.

Place chicken, bone sides down, on grill over medium heat. Cover grill; cook 15 to 20 minutes. Turn chicken. Cover grill; cook 20 to 40 minutes longer, turning 2 or 3 times, until juice of chicken is clear when thickest part is cut to bone (180°F).

The kids absolutely loved this.  It was hot and juicy.  Crispy on the outside and perfect on the inside.  I doubled the sauce recipe because I added a lot more chicken.  Serve with noodles, rice, or quinoa  and a steamed vegetable.

 29.3-Calzones


Ingredients:
1 loaf of frozen bread dough, thawed ( I make my own dough, but to each his/her own)
mozarella cheese, shredded
 spaghetti sauce- I made my own pizza sauce

 Pizza topping ideas
pepperoni
ham
mushrooms
olives
bell peppers
onion
pineapple
hamburger
italian sausage
fresh tomatoes

Make about 2 equally-sized dough balls (they should each be a little smaller than a softball). Spread each dough ball out on a lightly floured surface as if you were making a pizza (spread it out as much as you can without tearing it). Put as many toppings as you would like in the middle then mix it all together with cheese. Carefully fold the dough over the toppings and pinch the edges together. Make a couple little slits in the top of the dough, spray the top lightly with cooking spray, then bake at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes (or until golden brown). Heat the spaghetti sauce in a small pot and simmer until calzones are done. You can serve the calzones with the sauce on the side then dip the calzone into it OR you can pour the sauce over the calzones and top with cheese.

  Make sure to fill them really full.  The first two I made weren't as full and ended up being really more bread the anything else.  Depends on your oven, but I should have cooked them at a little bit higher temp like, 375*F and 20 minutes.  We also put a little sauce inside before we folded them.  We split the dough up into smaller balls so everyone could make their own calzone. Yummy and fun to create.

This whole cooking new things experiment has been stressful, fun, exhausting, challenging and quite the adventure.  My kids were excited today when I was preparing the menu for the week and I asked them what they wanted.  I got some new mixed with the old.  There were some winners and some losers. Let me know what was best for your family. 

I'm going to be cutting back on new meals.  I will do no more than 2 per week with one new dessert.  The kids have already picked out the desserts they want to create.  Cooking is creating.  It's art.  Good luck and remember to have fun.  I'm so glad to not be taking pictures of my food anymore.  On that note, we just got a new cake cook book and there are hardly any pictures of the cakes in the book.  I like to see what it should look like.  We've still found some yummy things to create.

Dinner #29.1

So I have to make 3 extra meals to make a total of 29 new meals.  Today was supposed to be a busy day, but baseball was cancelled and everything just kind of fell into place.  We also had Dr. Seuss Night at school.  I made dinner today at 11:30am and threw it in the crock pot until we were ready to eat at at 5:30pm.  I also had a few extra minutes to make some bread for lunches tomorrow.  The kids all ate dinner.  It was yummy! 

Dinner #29.1

Easy Vegetable Beef Soup

Seasoning Blend 

1/2 onion

4 1/2 teaspoons finely chopped garlic

1 teaspoon Italian seasoning

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1/4 teaspoon salt 

 

Soup

1 lb ground beef sirloin

2 1/2 cups water

1 bag (16 oz) frozen mixed vegetables

1 can (14.5 oz) Italian-style stewed tomatoes, undrained, chopped(I used diced tomatoes.  I don't like big chunks.)

1 can (8 oz)  tomato sauce 

 In small bowl, mix all seasoning blend ingredients.

In skillet, cook beef and seasoning blend over medium-high heat 5 to 7 minutes, stirring occasionally, until beef is thoroughly cooked; drain

Stir remaining ingredients into big pot and the beef. Heat to boiling over medium-high heat; reduce heat. Cover; simmer 20 minutes, stirring occasionally, until hot. Ladle soup into 6 bowls.

I did brown my meat in a skillet with the seasoning and then put everything into my crock pot and let it cook for 6 hours on low.  It worked out well and then I didn't have to be around all day.  Either way will work.  The kids talked about how colorful it was.  They also talked about how yummy it was.  Enjoy!