3 Easy Meals (Freezer/ Crock-Pot)

I've always been intimidated by Indian food, but recently I tried it at a few different places and became obsessed with the chicken masala!

I saw this recipe for crockpot butter chicken and decided to try it out.  (Bonus recipe for homemade Naan bread!  Seriously so easy and delicious!  I will never buy naan at the store again!)

My misshapen naan... I made an extra batch and put it in the freezer as well!

There were a couple things I had to buy that I don't usually have on hand like fresh ginger, curry powder, curry paste, and garam masala.
I normally go to Whole Foods for one thing: raw local honey. (If you buy in bulk it's much cheaper than buying any of the jarred honey.)  And this week I wanted to try out some of this amazing looking Thai curry paste.  I decided to get the red curry paste (they also sell yellow and green)  so I could use it in the butter chicken recipe.
I wasn't able to find garam masala at the store so I used this simple recipe to make my own.  I happened to have everything on hand. I did find curry powder at Whole Foods and realized they sell many spices in bulk so you can buy as little or as much as you like.  I just got a little baggy of it.

I bought a pack of 6 chicken breasts (about 4 lbs total) so when I got it out to make the butter chicken I decided to portion it out to make a couple other recipes to put in the freezer.

I used 2 chicken breasts for each recipe.
I chose to make this Thai chicken soup and this Honey sesame chicken recipe.  For the Thai chicken soup I already had the curry paste.  I didn't have the coconut milk, but I can get that before I decide to cook it.  I used only 1 of the 2 cups chicken stock, the other I will add when I cook it.  I just put everything else, aside from the peas and garnishments, into the freezer bag with the chicken.  (I omitted the fish sauce since I didn't have it and my husband doesn't like it anyway.) Then I double-bagged the whole thing and slipped the recipe inside so I'll know what I need to add when I make it.

I did the same thing for the Honey sesame chicken.  All 3 recipes called for fresh ginger so I was glad to be able to use up a big chunk of what I'd bought.  And I had my raw local honey on hand.  For this recipe you don't even have to chop the chicken since it will shred in the crock pot.. So simple!

Now I have a couple easy dinners in my freezer for a busy, or lazy, day!

Baby #3 -- Gender Reveal!

We already have a girl and a boy so with my third pregnancy (I'm 22 weeks) we decided to do a gender reveal.  I was excited because we've never had a co-ed baby shower, and this would be the first time we got to find out what we're having at the same time as our families.

I found these adorable invitations on etsy.

But I was able to make something very similar using Word.

Our ultrasound was on a Tuesday and we planned for our families to come for the gender reveal on Saturday so we had to be very patient!  We had the ultrasound tech put the results into an envelope, and immediately dropped it off with our trustworthy baker friend. She baked cupcakes, half with blue frosting on top, half with pink.  But in the middle they would all be the same: either pink or blue.

On Saturday we had our whole family over and everyone cast their vote for boy or girl.  It was fun to see what everyone thought.  I had made the kids shirts that said "Team Girl" and "Team Boy" with a pink bow and blue mustache respectively.

Kids' tables

Our ultrasound pics and baby pics of me and the husband

Our cute cupcakes, and I made lollipops with mustache and bow molds

Naomi was in charge of getting everyone to write their vote on the white board

Once everyone had arrived my husband, my 2 kiddos, and I each got our cupcake and bit in while everyone watched.  I took the biggest bite possible to make sure I got some of the middle frosting.  I had thought it would be a boy so I was surprised to see pink frosting!   My daughter was so excited that she's going to have a sister.  She jumped up and down and said "team girl won!"

I was trying to chew the giant bite I took, and Pete was saying "I told you!!" 

This was such a fun experience for our family and me, I'm so glad we did it!

Superhero capes/ Masks

In November the kids were invited to a superhero theme birthday party.  Judah already had a batman shirt with a velcro attached cape, so I wanted to make him a matching mask.  And Naomi had nothing so I decided to make her a cape and mask.  I found this great blog tutorial for superhero masks!  So I used that.  And I found this tutorial for the cape.

Here's how they came out!

Cutting out my patterns

Naomi's finished cape...

The kids before the party!

Kindergarten Word Bingo!

I've been using a wonderful curriculum for writing for the past few weeks.  It's called Spell to Write and Read (SWR), and I am totally obsessed with it.  My kindergartener, on the other hand, is not as thrilled about learning to spell to write and read 20 words per week.  She's doing great, but I try to give her a break and make it fun while still meeting our weekly goals.  I get her to do the tough part by promising a fun game or activity afterward.

Today I put together a bingo game using the 4 lists of words we've had so far.  I found this template and decided to make my own so I could use the words I wanted.

Since I only have one student I played against her.  I printed all the words and cut them out.  We took turns drawing a word and reading it then trying to find it on our card.  We used coins as bingo markers and played until the whole card was filled up.  It was fun!

If you want to make your own I can email my template.  :)

Recipe Share

This is how I feel a lot of times... But this week was a good one for dinner recipes so I thought I'd share!

We went camping last weekend, and I came home with a few left over hotdogs.  I didn't feel like eating hot dogs again, but I wanted to use them.  So I found this mini corn dog recipe on Pinterest.  It's pretty simple, and the kids (and I) loved it!

I got the idea from a friend to make chicken skewers for camping, so I've been doing that the past few years.  This year though I didn't make enough, and all the teenagers wanted them so Pete didn't get any, and I only got one.  So I decided to make them again this week.
I just cut the chicken breast into chunks and marinate with whatever I have on hand.  For camping I used BBQ sauce and beer.  This week I used TJ's Soyaki sauce.  Then just skewer the chunks of meat (you can add veggies if you want) and throw them on the grill.  So easy and delicious!
I also tried this ramen salad from Pinterest with a little modification.  I made a half recipe, and it was a plenty!  Here's my version:
SALAD:
1 package ramen noodles (calls for beef but I used Ichiban original)
1 12 oz package broccoli slaw
1/2 cu. slivered almonds
1/2 cu. sunflower seeds
2-3 green onions, chopped
DRESSING:
1/4 (or less) honey or agave
1/3 cu. oil (I used olive and a dash of sesame)
1/4 cu. white rice vinegar
dash of soy sauce
flavor packets

Just put the salad ingredients in a bowl.  In a separate bowl mix the dressing ingredients.  Pour the dressing over the salad and toss it all together.
I will definitely be making this again!

I've been wanting to try a recipe using soda for a long time... My husband had bought a 2 liter of root beer, we drank maybe 1 glass each, and I knew we weren't ever going to drink the rest so I decided to try this bbq pork stuffed sweet potato recipe I saw on (you guessed it... ) Pinterest!  I obviously used rootbeer instead of coke, and it came out great!  But I wanted a little extra topping so I decided to make shoestring fried onions.  Here is the recipe I used.  I didn't even tell the kids they were onions, and they were none the wiser... Everyone loved it!  I was a little worried that I was crowding the onions too much in the oil, but they came out perfect.

 And last but not least was last night's amazing dinner... Fish taco bowls.  I used tilapia rather than cod simply because it was cheaper.  Any my husband doesn't eat fish so I made his with chicken breast.

Can you tell I love cilantro?

Mermaid Birthday Party

My first born just turned 5!  I knew I wanted to do a pool party for her and just invite a few of her friends.  When I saw this mermaid tail idea on Pinterest I wanted to try it.  It looked simple enough.  But I couldn't find towels that were in my budget that I thought would look cute.  I found some lime green beach towels at dd's for $6 each and thought they would work, but we'd need to embellish it somehow.  So after some brainstorming and fabric shopping I decided to sew a fin onto each towel with the help of my seamstress step-mom.

I drew a pattern on a big sheet of paper and cut it out.

Then pinned it to the fabric for the tails.  We were making 5.

 Once we had the 2 sides cut out we turned them inside out and sewed all but the top edge.
Then turned them right side out and ironed them flat.
We only had 3 beach towels so we cut them in half and folded over and finished the unfinished edge. The towels were big, and the girls were small enough that half a towel was long enough for them.  We just sewed the tail onto the bottom edge of the towel.

We measured the girls and sewed two pieces of velcro onto each towel.

Here's the finished product.

I put them in their party favor buckets.

 The girls were stoked on their mermaid tails!

 I also had a table full of craft stuff where they could decorate tiaras, make bead necklaces, and paint with watercolors.

Summer Library Program

I meant to post this last month, but I have just been so busy!

When I went to sign the kids up for the "Dig into Reading" summer reading program at the local library, I discovered the adult summer reading program called "Beneath the Surface."  Kids win prizes and adults get entered into drawings as they complete different tasks.  One Saturday morning I spent the whole morning looking at the different activities to be completed on my summer reading card. I discovered a world of free activities I never knew existed on the library website!

Free eBook or eAudioBooks and Music downloads
Free or Discounted museum tickets
Mango Languages - Free online language courses
Free Interactive Children's eBooks (Tumblebooks)

So go sign up or just check out the library website!