Not So Lazy, Am I?

September 2 was National Lazy Mom's Day.

It's also Shelftember and I told my kids I wasn't going to buy bread at the store this month. So I took our crystallized honey and uncrystallized it (decrystallized it?) by putting the honey container in a pot of hot water until it was the consistency I wanted. I then took that honey and used it to make wheat bread (with some help from my baking buddy).

I did a few dishes (Bosch, etc.), only a few, because I burned my hand on the oven door the night before while putting the pizza in and soaking my hand in hot soapy water would not be a good idea.

I did do laundry, though. I fed myself and my two-year old, watered plants, got kids to and from school.

Oh, and I got some grossness off our counter before accidentally spilling oatmeal on it (the counter) while getting it (the oats) out of the cupboard (and I had just refilled the container the other day so it was full). So I cleaned up the oats as well. 

And I cleaned up the flour Jet dumped on the table. That's one of his favorite things to do while being my baking buddy. If there is a measuring cup or other container on the table with flour in it, it must be for dumping out. I mean that's what I do, sprinkle a little on the table to help with kneading, so why not the whole thing?

 

I wasn't so lazy but in the evening I did something for myself. I went to the Provo Library for a launch event for the newest book from Sarah M. Eden. It was so nice and she is so entertaining, both speaking and in her writing. I used some birthday money and got myself that book and got it signed.

I'm glad I took that time for myself.

Shelftember

I'm trying something new this month I learned from Jordan Page at shelfcooking.com

It's called Shelftember. It's to spend a lot less money on groceries by turning to your fridge, freezer, and pantry first for meal planning.

You know I do a lot of celebrating with food. This is an opportunity to still celebrate, but maybe with less going out specifically to buy certain groceries for certain holidays. I've been meaning to do better using up some of the things that just sit there on the shelf so this is the perfect challenge for me to do that. I can be creative in what I do do. 

Here's how we started off the month:

First day of September dinner was homemade BBQ chicken pizza with spinach salad (including the salad toppings). 

I'll share more about Shelftember in other blog posts. Now it's late and I need sleep more than to catch up on my blog.

Getting Busy Again

Man, it's getting busy again as we're trying to get used to routines with the kids back in school.

In the meantime, let's see if I can find another picture of the sky. It's become my thing when I make you wait for me to catch up on my blog.

 

Here's the sky when we had some smoke from fires come in recently from I think Idaho.

Eat Trail Mix Outside

August 31 was National Trail Mix Day. Trail Mix for after school snack. Success.

It was also Eat Outside Day so a few of us took our food outside to eat, then Jr. Jr. and Jet had fun on the trampoline.

S'more Reflections

August 30 was Toasted Marshmallow Day. S'mores for after school snack. No complaints.

Then I had to document this because I made a new recipe again for dinner and I want to remember. It was so good, I couldn't stop eating it. We ate Southwest Chicken Skillet from budgetbytes.com along with onion roasted potatoes and veggies with leftover dill dip. Still yumm.

Jr. said the main dish reminded him of the Southwest Chicken Nachos he gets at school and would love it adapted for nachos. Yeah, we can figure that out. I have made Southwest Chicken Stacks before which are basically nachos. Mmm, now I'm craving nachos.

I remember when I first started really cooking back in my college days, I only knew how to follow recipes. No adapting. No throwing together. I was a very picky eater when I was younger. I didn't like onions. I would only eat them on hamburgers and in onion rings. It seemed like all the recipes I had called for onions, though, so I started cooking with onions. And ever since then I've loved onions. 

Ask my kids how many times they've heard, "I used to be picky... and ever since then I've liked..." stories.

When I met Jeremy, he would just throw things together to make something good. Wow. He could follow a recipe, but he could do this other thing, too. Wow. I have obviously learned since then to throw things together and adapt recipes (including leaving onions out, but why would I now? I love onions).

 

So... yeah... anyway... we can figure out Southwest Chicken Nachos for Jr.

Chop Suey Success

We haven't had much success with celebrating Chop Suey Day (August 29) in the past. Two years ago there was a power outage before I could make chop suey (though we did watch that scene from Flower Drum Song). Last year we didn't even celebrate it at all.

This year I was determined so I adapted a recipe for Vegetable Chop Suey from hillbillyhousewife.com and made it for my family. Mmmm, it hit the spot with me that night. Jet was a big fan, too.

We again listened to the song, "Chop Suey," from the movie, Flower Drum Song.

Bow Ties and Birthdays

We celebrated Jr.'s birthday in August. We celebrated it on August 28 which is Bow Tie Day. It worked out because Jr. wanted bow tie pasta with chicken and alfredo sauce for his birthday dinner anyway. He also wanted apple slices, carrots with dip, and pineapple pop. If it's not orange it's pineapple in this family.

The dip he wanted was like one he had recently. I don't know what was in that dip so I looked around for dip recipes and found one for vegetable dill dip that I thought I'd take a chance on from Six Sisters' Stuff.

He was pleased with that dip. He said it tasted like the other one and he liked it. Success!

I will definitely make that dip again, though next time I might use a little less seasoned salt. Several of us thought it tasted a little too salty (but who knows? Maybe when I halved the recipe, I accidentally put the normal amount of salt in. I'll have to make it again soon to see).

When planning out cake and ice cream, Jr. asked for his siblings' input. Lucky suggested chocolate ice cream so Jr. asked for Death by Chocolate. Jr. Jr. suggested lemon frosting then Nichole thought of something that would go well with lemon, strawberry cake. So Jr. asked for lemon frosting with strawberry cake. "But make it tall. I don't want a short cake." Get it?

So he got two round cake pans instead of a 9X13 pan. With frosting between the layers of course.

I think he enjoyed his birthday. He ate so much dinner he wasn't sure he felt up to cake and ice cream but later he did, which made some brothers very happy.

Since we weren't sure if we'd do cake and ice cream, we sang to him as we were giving him his present. After we got done singing, he blew out the "candles" on the present. Lit candles and wrapping paper would not be a good combination so I'm glad we got to do the real candles on the cake later and yes, we did sing to him again.

Happy Birthday, Jr.