Archive for the ‘recipes’ Category

i saw michael myers

Good morning! I can hardly believe Halloween has come and gone and now it is November. Hard to believe we only have a little over three weeks until Thanksgiving here in the US and then only a little over 50 days until Christmas! Before we move on to prepping for other holidays, though, I must recap our Halloween night.

I could sum it up in two words – fun! And exhausting. That would not make much of a blog post though, so I will add a little more detail. After church and relaxing some in the afternoon, my parents arrived to hang out with us. They wanted to see little M all dressed up and have dinner together. Plus, they would be our candy passer outers while we were out with M (to the total SEVEN kids we had show up – lots of leftovers to handle).

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We got M all dressed up, for the third time, and were ready to head out at around 6 pm. Except no one was out yet. No one. So, we did dinner first! I made a crockpot vegetable stew from a recipe my friend gave me, which I slightly modified. You can figure it was easy and healthy with me making it. Fortunately, it was incredibly tasty too.

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Italian Vegetable Stew

  • 1 red onion, diced
  • 2 zucchini, diced
  • 1 small package frozen vegetable soup mix
  • 1 can Navy beans (or other white bean)
  • 1 can Italian seasoned diced tomatoes
  • 1 can vegetable broth (low sodium if you can find it)
  • 1 can condensed tomato soup
  • 1 packet pesto mix

Simple place all the ingredients in the crockpot. Stir to combine and cook on high 4 hours or low 8 hours. I think it could have gone without the condensed tomato soup. Or I would try to find one without HFCS as the 3rd ingredient.

After dinner, we began to head out. Peter, Makenzie, & I…

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…and of course the little man came along for the ride as well.

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How do you like my “costume”? 😉 I didn’t get many pictures trick or treating because it got dark fast. We started at 7 in the neighborhood next to us. It took a lot longer than we anticipated. We only hit a very small section of it, but there were so many hills and each house had a ton of steps to climb up (or down) to the front porches.

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Holy leg workout! Plus, the entire neighborhood consists of one big hill after another. After making the small loop there, we headed back to our neighborhood. We considered just going inside since it was already 8:15, but knew we had to stop by Peter’s brother’s house to say hello and a couple of our neighbors. So we hit up 4 or 5 more houses to visit them, then came home around 8:45. I was beat! Lugging a 25 lb kid around that long gets exhausting. And we can’t forget the jack o’ lantern I was hauling either.

We spent a few more minutes talking with my parents and then quickly went to bed after they left. By the way, I love my mom! She did dishes and cleaned up some to help me out while I was gone. Thank you, mommy!!!

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Alright, that was our night. But I can’t leave out the one creepy moment. It was Halloween after all. After visiting one house, we turned around to start heading back down the driveway only to look up and see this…

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…standing at the end of the long driveway, somewhat across the street, under the street light. Freaky!!! He just stood there staring like Michael Myers until we were down the driveway and moving down the street away from him again. If he started walking after us with the creepy Michael Myers walk or if I had seen him again that night, I think I would have screamed. There’s my Halloween moment for the evening. Now, have a great Monday!

  • Do you like scary movies? I used to love them a lot more. They scare me more now than back in the day. I don’t do gory ones at all now…only the psychologically freaky ones.
  • Look for my first day of the Q + A series in tonight’s post. ASK ME ANYTHING if you haven’t already.
  • Congratulations to Julie on her wedding!!!! Love her and I wish her the absolute best. 🙂 Next time I see you, Julie, you will have been married over half a year! And to think, we talked wedding this past summer. Time flies!

Posted by on November 1st, 2010 46 Comments

pumpkin stuffed french toast

I would like to start this post with a moment of silent appreciation for the weekend. Better yet? I want to scream from the rooftops I LOVE THE WEEKEND!!! You all seem pretty discerning. Can you tell I’m in a great mood today? How could I not be? I truly love my life. Sure, some days downright stink. Yea, I get excited about future possibilities. And alright, things may not be super exciting in these parts with lots of crazy adventures. But I love my life!

Please don’t be scared away…I have a special breakfast to share with you. Pumpkin Stuffed French Toast. Not only Pumpkin Stuffed French Toast…but Pumpkin Stuffed French Toast with a “baked” apple topping. And you know my style so you know this was incredibly easy. I told you you would want to stick around despite my annoyingly peppy opening paragraph. 😀

This morning, after sleeping in until after 7 am (another glorious thing about weekends), I plodded downstairs in my pajamas to make breakfast for my family. Not just any breakfast. But the. best. breakfast. ever. made. in. this. house. EVER! That may not be saying much since my “cooking” is pretty limited. Either way, this is good. Really, really good.

It all started with two spoonfuls of pumpkin, one tablespoon of maple almond butter, and a couple dashes of pumpkin pie spice. Of course slathered between two slices of hearty whole wheat bread.

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While waiting for the griddle to heat up I got a sudden stroke of inspiration to do the apple topping. I didn’t have time to bake apples or cook them stovetop. I wanted my apple topping. To the microwave I go! In a microwave safe dish I put one peeled, cored, and chopped apple, 1 teaspoon brown sugar, a dash of cinnamon, and a few tiny drops of butter.

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I nuked this mixture for 2 1/2 minutes, stirring once, while my stuffed french toast cooked. So, back to the toast. I dipped both sides of the sandwich in an egg, milk, pumpkin pie spice mixture before placing it on the griddle and cooking for about 2 minutes per side, until slightly browned. Then, plop the sandwich on a plate. Cover with the apple mixture. Voila!

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I tasted this like Giada de Laurentiis does on her shows. Mmmmm….ohhhh…Does anyone else get slightly uncomfortable watching her taste food?

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Well, I don’t really. I do always kind of snicker though because she seems a little too into it, if you catch my drift. Then again, all her food likely tastes better than this and I know I couldn’t help myself this morning. I will no longer snicker, Giada. I fully understand now.

Would you believe me if I said the morning only got better after that? Peter took M with him to run some errands so I had peace and quiet for a few hours. I think I could hear the angels singing. No? That’s just me actually able to hear myself think? Darn. The angel thing would have been cool.

Then, after they got home, we headed out for a walk all together in this stunning weather God has been giving us here.

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And now, the rest of the day…a day of family fun at the fair!!! I cannot wait!!

  • What is the best breakfast you’ve had recently?
  • Any fun weekend plans?

Posted by on October 9th, 2010 35 Comments

 

 
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