Saturday, March 27, 2010

Flowers

[in the car]
Ethan: How come Sean always gets you big flowers and I can only find small ones for you?
Sean: I know where to go - I will show you.

.... 20 minutes later at Giant....

Ethan insists that I do not follow them-so that Sean can show him where to get 'big flowers.' While in line to pay, Ethan comes running up to me-telling me that I need to go to the car (and hands me Sean's car keys)....Sean tries to walk by without me seeing the flowers in his hand... I go out to the car and they join me a couple of minutes later-with "something" behind Ethan's back. He climbs into the car and very excitedly showed me the flowers that he picked out for me. TOO CUTE!!!!!

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Saint Patrick's Day 2010

We woke up on Saint Patrick's Day to find that the leprachauns came while we were sleeping! They left their footprints on our counter and left some Hershey's kisses (they must have run out of their gold chocolates)!


Over the weekend, they visited Ethan's classroom - although none of them were caught, they left their trademark footprints around his classroom and on the student's traps that they carefully hid in spots that they thought the leprachauns would go looking for gold.

Monday, March 15, 2010

Recipes Update

So I am going to continue to post the "keeper" recipes on here-not only for others (if anyone else actually reads my blog) to also try and enjoy, but so that I won't forget about them or lose the recipes. :)

So here are the latest ones that I've tried that turned out good:

Garlic Chicken 'n' Gravy
4 boneless skinless chicken breast halves
1/4 teaspooon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
5 garlic cloves, peeled and chopped (I didn't have any, so I just used garlic powder)
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons chicken broth, divided
1/2 cup white wine or additional broth -- I used the additional broth, obviously:)
1/2 teaspoon dried basil
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

Sprinkle chicken with salt and pepper. In a large skillet, cook chicken and garlic in butter over medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until browned. Add 1/2 cup broth, wine or addtional broth, basil, and oregano. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 7-9 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink.

Remove chicken with a slotted spoon and keep warm. In a small bowl, combine flour and remaining broth until smooth; stir into pan juices. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 1-2 minutes or until thickened. Serve over chicken.

Linguine with Garlic Sauce
12 ounces uncooked linguine
1/2 pound sliced bacon, diced (I used my food processor so that the pieces were smaller)
5 cups fresh baby spinach
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
1-1/4 cups milk
1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, cubed
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/2 cup pine nuts, toasted

Cook linguine according to package directions. Meanwhile, in a large skillet, cook bacon over medium heat until crisp. Using a slotted spoon, remove to paper towels; drain, reserving 1 tablespoon drippings. (I had made the bacon beforehand, so I used 1 tablespoon of canola oil instead of the bacon grease).

In the drippings (or canola oil), saute the spinach, onion and garlic until tender. Add the milk, cream cheese, butter, salt, nutmeg and pepper; stir until smooth. Stir in pine nuts and bacon; heat through. Drain pasta; toss with sauce.

Black Bean Taco Salad
1 pound ground beef
4 cups torn leaf lettuce
1 large tomato, chopped
1 cup canned black beans, rinsed and drained
1/2 cup catalina salad dressing
4 cups nacho cheese tortilla chips

In a large skillet, cook beef over medium heat until no longer pink drain. IN a large bowl, combine the lettuce, tomato, beans and beff. Drizzle with dressing and toss to coat. Arrange tortilla chips on a serving plate; top with beef mixture.

**this one needs some more pizzaz next time. We added sour cream, cheese and tried it with dorritos and tostito chips - it was ok. Maybe next time add alvacado and some other things, but it was ok, and Ethan liked it and it was incredibly easy.

So there you have it! I have lost track-I don't know if I'm hitting my New Years Resolution of making 3 new recipes a month, but at least there is a conscious effort to expand my cooking abilities AND there haven't been any (yet!) that have been absolutely disgusting:)

Leprechaun Trap

Ethan's Kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Hellman, asked that each student make a leprechaun trap and bring it to school to try and catch some of the quick, gold-seeking little guys... I remembered an article I had read last year about some cool "trap" ideas, so after a quick google search, I found the article - here is our final Leprachaun trap!


My boss let me go into work late so that I could drop Ethan off directly at his elementary school with his trap so that it wouldn't get messed up at daycare. He was so excited and it was so sweet to drop him off at the kiss-and-ride!

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Ethan's First Love Note

So today after I picked Ethan up from daycare and we were on our way home, he asked to have his back pack. I didn't really think anything of it so I handed it to him when we were at a red light. He then started taking every single thing out of it - I asked what he was looking for and he said "something private." Hmm... that spiked my curiosity but I didn't probe anymore. He couldn't find this "private" thing, and so when we got home, he dumped everything out of his backpack in his frantic search. He then pulled out a peice of paper, announced he found it, and then asked if I wanted to see it. Of course I wanted to know what this private thing was! So I looked at and here is what I saw...

Here is the front...



And when you open it up...


He is only in kindergarten!! I'm so not ready for this..