Stuck in the Muck

So. . .this what my hubby does every now and then. . .
This is what happens when boys get together to play in their trucks.
(Sorry about some of the small pics--I obviously wasn't there to take pictures!)
Stuck the first time. . .

driving. . .

Really stuck. . .

Trying to get out. . .for three hours. . .not sure they looked this happy by hour #2.

Getting out with the help of BIG Jeeps with swampers. . .

And I'm sure they'll go out and do it all again in a few weeks. . .

Birthday Cupcakes

This is my first time posting over at Tempt My Tummy at Blessed with Grace. . .I've seen a few others do it, so I thought I would give it a try. My little recipe is not my own, I found it at a website, and linked to it, of course! But the "creative" bit was kinda fun, so I thought I would share it with you!

Last weekend was E's birthday. I usually make cakes for my family. My mom did that for us as we were growing up, and now I do it now for all of us.

Well, instead of a full cake, I made cupcakes. I found a wonderful recipe for Vanilla Cupcakes and Chocolate Cupcakes. These recipes were easy (just as easy as a boxed cake) and they turned out beautiful. . .almost like coffee shop ones.

Below are the vanilla ones. Look how {perfect} they look!

A close up. . .do the bubbles mean I may have over-mixed the batter? Oh well, it didn't matter because they tasted GREAT! Light and vanilla-y!

Then, here is a photo of what I did with them. Of course E had wanted a "Cars" themed cake. Then we took a trip to our trusted Wal-Mart, and these little jumping frogs were in the Party favours area. E changed his mind! And they would be a little extra something for the cousins to play with after the cake.

I piled all the cupcakes into a 9x13 lined with blue tissue paper, frosted each of them with vanilla icing, sprinkled them with sparkly blue sprinkles (courtesy of Michael's) to look like the water, and placed the cute little froggies on top. Not bad, I think. And kinda easy.

Here are a few things E needed for his party. (He set up the picture. . .I may have helped him move some things afterwards to make it all fit in the picture) Again the bubble sticks were from Wal-Mart to give to the cousins . . .and the price is right (if you can read the little price tag showing)!

Thank you E for your help in writing this post! Oh the things you get to do with your kids as a SAHM!

And p.s. Happy birthday!

I Won a CD!

I won a giveaway!

I haven't really entered many of these--many US blogs are only looking for US people to enter, and the ones I can enter, well, when you enter a giveaway, there are so many people! The chance of getting your name pulled out of the hat or jar. . .

But this time it was my turn to get sent a little something!

Kim over at Homesteader's Heart was hosting the giveaway. She has a beautiful blog--very inspiring. When I entered, it was the first time I had seen her blog. She was giving away a CD set and a sample CD.

In the meantime, little A was born, so I wasn't really checking or posting on my blog or Facebook. When I finally did, I had a comment from Kim that she had a little something to send me! Well, that was an extra {little} smile for me after coming home from the hospital with our new {little} smile-maker.
Here is the sampler CD that I won. It has five songs from the various other Cd's of the Planting Seeds Family Worship. It's a neat little something to let me kiddos listen to and use when I go back to teaching again. :)

Thank you very much Kim. Feel free to take a moment to hop on over to her blog. I'm glad I did! You'll like it--I promise.

Menu Plan Monday

Menu Plan Monday. . .


Monday-Hamburgers (It's a long weekend here, so I'm hoping for some grilling. And of course some eating-outside-kind of weather!). . .and maybe a potato or pasta salad

Tuesday-Cheesy Ham and Pasta Bake (this is a new recipe for me--looks easy though), cut veggies

Wednesday-Soup and Grilled Cheese

Thursday (CP)-Chicken Pot Pie (from a few weeks ago still!), crescent rolls, salad

Friday-left-overs

Saturday's Snack-see photo below

Sunday Breakfast-Pancakes and bacon



Saturday's Snack. . .we haven't been so creative over here in terms of snacking. Even my kiddos are eating a lot of "packaged" snacks and cereal, which they love. I guess I'd rather be baking cookies and muffins for them. There just isn't a lot of extra time. . .and my post-baby body is thinking that healthy foods like apples, bananas or something extremely healthy might be a better choice! ;) Saying that. . .I have to admit that a friend brought our family a cake--my favourite cake--last Sunday afternoon when she came to meet little A, and well, this is what is left. . .photo taken on Wednesday. Like I said, I'm thinking apples or carrot sticks is a better snack for me!

For more MPM ideas, visit http://www.orgjunkie.com/. (I'm #225!)

Menu Plan Monday

Yep, still Monday! This is short and sweet. . .we have a bunch of left-overs from our weekend's birthday party that I am trying to use up. Nope, no cake or cupcakes anymore. That is all eaten up already!

Monday-Pizza Buns, Sweet Potato Fries (I got some sweet potatoes from my dad and was super excited to make fries! I did a combo of mostly this and also this recipe) An easy meal today!

Tuesday-Beef Stir-fry (with more veggies), rice, tatziki and bread

Wednesday-left-overs or sub sandwiches

Thursday (CP)-Hawaiian Chicken (either this CP recipe, or the one from the LC cookbook)

Friday-Skewers--thought I would try something a little out of the ordinary to begin the long weekend and make Skewers of all kinds. . .meat ones, veggie ones, and fruit ones. Hopefully the weather is okay to grill them and eat outside! We'll see if it goes over well. . .but it is something the kiddos can help me with--well the fruit part of it anyway. We'll work on fine motor skills a bit!)

Saturday's Snack-Cupcakes (I'll post a photo of what I did with these soon in another post!)

Sunday- Hash browns, sausage and eggs

See? Very short and sweet!

For more MPM, see www.orgjunkie.com!

A Fishy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day! (belated, of course!)
I hope all of you moms out there had a good day and were blessed by your families!

Our day was . . .fishy!

Here is me with my kiddos--the ones to whom I owe a Mother's Day for me to celebrate in the first place! (Well, aside from my own mother and MIL, etc).

And here is part of the reason our day was fishy. . .my hubby and I made a "fancier" meal than our usual breakfast for supper Sundays. This is a Salmon in Tarragon Sauce, with cheesy garlic bread, salad, and fruit salsa. Salmon recipe to follow.

And here is the other reason our day was fishy. . . there is a creek near our home and every Mother's Day there is a big "salmon fry release" that takes place. I don't know exactly who hosts this event, but it was kinda fun to do with the kids.

Here is E and A with their pails of fish. And then all the joys of releasing those little fry-guys! Now most families or kids who do this take their bucket and just throw it into the creek. Not so with my kids. Their dad is a firm believer in getting ew-ee and gooey, so my kids have learned to release each little salmon individually to ensure that each of them make it into the stream successfully.

Last year, E made it through 13 buckets, so this year, both E and A had to do 13 buckets each. They probably would have done more, but the time ran out. :)

Here is a few shots of the creek area. . .it is beautiful. . .

Also, we met E and A's cousin there (and aunt and uncle and oma and opa). So naturally we needed a picture of them together.

Mother's Day for me this year was not full of gifts and spa treatments and so forth. It did include staying home and being surrounded by my own wonderful family. With a hubby who is a firefighter, I've had two weekends without him around a lot. Then, if you add in all those Canucks games. . .well, he hasn't been "around" too much lately! ;) So it was nice to just sit on the deck with a glass of wine, and play backyard soccer with the kids and have a LONG nap. Those were HUGE gifts to me this year! And with a new little one around, I am even more thankful for the gift of being a mom.

So. . .for the fish recipe. . .

It comes from a book called "The Freshwater Angler: America's Favorite Fish Recipes" (1992, Creative Publishing International). It was first made by my MIL, and I actually liked it a bunch, so I decided to give it a try. It is mostly all about the sauce. The "rub" seems to need to be marinated longer than the recipe says, or needs to be a bit "stronger" (in my humble opinion). We did this on the BBQ, not in the oven and used salmon fillets--FYI.

Salmon with Tarragon Sauce

(George Gruenefekd-Montreal, Quebec), p. 79

6-8 servings

1 whole drawn Salmon or substitute (3.5-4.5 lbs), head removed

2 T. snipped fresh parsley or 1 t. dried parsley flakes

1 T. snipped fresh tarragon leaves or 1/2 t. dried tarragon leaves

1/4 t. salt

1/4 t. paprika

1/2 t. pepper

1 T. fresh lemon juice

Sauce:

1/4 c. margarine or butter

1/4 c. all purpose flour

1 T. snipped fresh tarragon leaves or 1/2 T. dried tarragon leaves

1/2 t. curry powder

1/4 t. salt

1/8 t. pepper

1 c. ready-to-serve chicken broth

1 c. milk

2 T. dry white wine

Heat oven to 375. Cut 28x18" sheet of heavy-duty foil. Place salmon on foil. Sprinkle cavity with first ingredients. Fold long sides of foil together in locked folds. Fold and crimp short ends; seal tightly. Place on large baking sheet. Bake 40-50 minutes, or until fish begins to flake when a fork is inserted at backbone or thickest part of fish.

Meanwhile, prepare sauce. In 2-quart saucepan, melt margarine over medium heat. Stir in spices and flour. Blend in broth and milk. Cook over medium heat for 3-5 minutes, or until mixture thickens and bubbles, stirring constantly. Stir in wine. Serve salmon with sauce. Garnish with additional fresh tarragon sprigs, if desired.

And . . .this weekend there was a plant sale at the high school, so me and the kiddos did a little bit of planting. . .re-potting and also planting seeds together. We'll see how the seeds come up. We had a few sparse areas and a few "oops"es where too many seeds fell out of our fingers!

Menu Plan Monday

It's still Monday. . .not too much of it left. . .but I am still blogging "on time."

Monday-Perogies and Sausage (w/fried onions, peppers and tomatoes), corn, salad

Tuesday- Salmon Strudels, salad

Wednesday- French Toast Casserole, bacon (we didn't have this on Sunday, we made a fancier dinner instead. This one is already in the freezer and ready to go).

Thursday-Chicken Pot Pie (CP), crescent rolls (will give this one a try!)

Friday- left-overs. . .or probably out for a certain 1st-born's b-day)

Saturday's Snack- . . .can I get back to you on this one? there's just not a lot of extra time these days to be creative like that!

Sunday-pancakes. . .and cake!

Well, a short post. . . for more mpm, visit www.orgjunkie.com!

Menu Plan Monday

I'm back again! Life got too busy and, well, no time to blog. Plus we've had a few people bless us with meals! Along with some freezer meals, we ate well--and it wasn't so much work for me! This week, its back to regular life--and cooking again! (Okay, so you will notice its quite easy for cooking. . .)

Monday-Meatballs (freezer) in BBQ sauce, Alfredo noodles (pkg.), salad

Tuesday-Hot Chicken Sandwiches, veggies

Wednesday-Left-overs

Thursday (CP)- Cheese and Bacon Chicken, Oven Baked Jo-Jo's

Friday-Pizza Buns, fruit salad

Saturday's Snack-Easy Bran Muffins

Sunday (breakfast)- French Toast Casserole, bacon

This week's snack. . .I have to admit (although embarrassing) when I was in the hospital, there were bran muffins for breakfast one day, and I LOVED them! (You'd figure that I would have had cravings during pregnancy, not afterwards!) So, I had to give it a try. this link is an easy recipe for them, and they turned out great! I added raisins and cranberries to mine, but you could probably add blueberries or so (with a little icing sugar?). Nice and easy breakfasts or lunches this week!

For more MP ideas, visit www.orgjunkie.com!