Momma's Playground

Snowmen Rice Krispie Treats

2011-12-19T09:44:00.000-08:00

Yesterday me and Dawson made a little snowman family out of rice krispie treats. I saw this cute idea over at 1 Mom 3 Boys; Lots Of Love And Laughter and knew it would perfect to do with Dawson because we have been talking about building a snowman since we moved to Utah. We haven't been able to build any real snowmen yet because it hasn't snowed enough. I'm sure it won't be long before we're able to!

These were simple to make and even easier to decorate. I let Dawson (3 years old) do most of the decorating and he did a really good job!

To make them you just have to

3 tbsp butter
10.5 oz bag of miniature marshmallows
6 cups Rice Krispie cereal
1 can of vanilla frosting

Candy to decorate

I used:
sweetened flaked coconut
M&M's
Fruit Roll-Ups
Pretzel Sticks

Prep:
Melt butter in a large saucepan set over low heat. Add marshmallows, cook, stirring until melted and well blended. Add cereal; stir until coated.

Divide mixture and lightly pack into three 1 cup portions, three 1/2 cup portions, and three 1/3 cup portions. (I sprayed my measuring cups with Pam so the rice krispie treats would slide out easily.)

Working quickly, with damp hands, form each portion into a firmly packed round ball with a slightly flattened bottom. I let each ball set on wax paper for about 15 minutes and then I stacked the balls, three high, biggest to smallest to create three figures.

Spread a thin layer of frosting all over each figure. (If the treats are still warm they might start to come apart, if that happens just reshape the ball and let them sit for awhile longer before working with them.) Place the coconut in a shallow dish. Roll each figure in the coconut until well coated.

Use melted chocolate (I just used frosting) and m&m's to create "eyes", "noses" and "buttons" on the figures. Wrap pieces of fruit roll ups around the base of the smallest ball as a "scarf".

Gently push the pretzel sticks into each side of the middle balls for "arms".

Wordless Wednesday - The Disney Movie "UP" House!

2011-12-07T10:11:00.000-08:00

Ok so this isn't exactly "wordless" but I'll try to keep it short. :D We moved to Utah from California last month! I grew up in Utah but have been in CA for almost 4 years so a lot has changed since I have been gone. We heard about a house that was built not too far from where we live that looks like the house in the movie Up! We had to go check it out! Here are some pictures that I took while we were there. It was AWESOME!

Here is the house from the movie (they had it playing in the house) in case you don't remember what it looks like.

This bookcase is at the top of the stairs...

And it's also a door to a hidden room!

Me and Dave want to go back soon to walk through it without the kids because Dawson kept trying to touch stuff so we didn't really get to spend as much time as I wanted there. We need to hurry, though, because somebody bought the house and they close on it next month and I don't think they'll let random people walk through it like you can now. :P

Christopher Pop-In-Kins is here!

2011-12-05T09:52:00.000-08:00

A few nights ago before bed we read Dawson and Ashlynn the Christopher Pop-In-Kins book. After we were finished reading the story we asked him a few questions about it to make sure he understood what we read. He understood very well that Christopher comes to visit and we can not touch him or else he'll lose his magic. Before he went to sleep he told me he was going to dream about Santa and Christopher Pop-In-Kins. ♥

The next morning he had seemed to have forgotten about the story and Christopher was hiding on a wreath that we having hanging up. Dawson walked past him a few times without seeing him so I decided to remind him about the story that we read. Then I said maybe Christopher came to visit us, we should look for him! It took Dawson a few minutes to spot him but when he did he was SO excited!! That was a few days ago and since then whenever Dawson wakes up he is excited to see where Christopher is hiding or what he is up to. Besides sitting in the wreath he has also been holding on to a balloon and playing with some of Ashlynn's toys. We're having a lot of fun with him already and it warms my heart to see how excited Dawson gets to see him everyday.

I plan on posting a few pictures every couple of days to show what Christopher has been up to. Here he is playing with some of Ashlynn's toys.

To learn more about this cute little elf you can read my Christopher Pop-In-Kins review here.

Do you have a cute little elf visiting your family this year?

Handprint Thanksgiving Turkey Craft

2011-11-15T07:54:00.000-08:00

This is one of my favorite crafts that we have done in a long time! I love it because it has Dawson's little handprint (age 3) and Ashlynn's little handprint (10 months old). I made the handprints into cute little turkeys and then I wrote "Happy Thanksgiving" and Dawson traced it! He did such a good job! He's really been getting into tracing things lately. He has me write the entire alphabet a couple times a day so he can trace it. (He does pretty well with writing most of the letters by himself already but he has fun tracing too) He loves to write, draw, and make art projects. He's so creative!

Anyway, I saw this craft on Pinterest and knew it would be perfect to do with Dawson and Ashlynn. Have you done any Thanksgiving crafts this year? If so please leave me the link so I can stop by and see!

Christopher Pop-In-Kins - A New Family Christmas Tradition

2011-11-01T09:25:00.000-07:00

I wanted to share a new Christmas tradition with you that we will be starting this year. I know that it's just barely November but I wanted to share with you now in case you have never heard of it before and wanted to start it with your family too! Before last year I had never heard of anything like it. It was too close to Christmas by the time I had heard about it and Dawson had just turned two so we decided to wait until this year start it.

We normally set up our Christmas tree on Thanksgiving after dinner. Or if we're feeling a little bit lazy we'll do it the day after Thanksgiving. This year we are going to be moving from California to Utah right after Thanksgiving so putting up the tree isn't going to happen until the beginning of December. And that's when we'll introduce the kids to Christopher Pop-In-Kins!

Christopher "pops in" every day in a new hiding spot to check on the kids and make sure they're being good. The kids are not allowed to touch him or else he will lose his magic and have to return to the North Pole to have it restored. I know Dawson is going to love trying to find where Christopher is hiding every day and if he starts to be naughty I will remind him that Christopher is watching and will tell Santa what he sees.

The Christopher Pop-In-Kins kit comes with the Christopher Pop-In-Kins doll, a book telling the story about Christopher Pop-In-Kins and why he visits children during the Christmas season, and a case that holds the book and doll. The doll is pose-able so you can move his arms and legs and pose him differently every day. And he is SO cute!!

I love the illustrations in the book, too. It's a cute story and I know Dawson and Ashlynn will love looking at the pictures while me or dada read the story to them.

The book is a hardcover which is great because it will last a long time. The elf is also very sturdy. This is a great buy because it will provide you with years of family fun and memories!

You can buy Christopher Pop-In-Kins from Amazon or head on over to the Christopher Pop-In-Kins site for a list of other places to buy him.

I'm going to have some more posts in December about what Christopher Pop-In-Kins has been up to at our house and how the kids are liking him so stay tuned for those! :) Will you be joining in on the fun this year?

Disclosure: I received the Christopher Pop-In-Kins kit for free in order to try the product and form an opinion for this review. I was not compensated in any other manner. All opinions expressed above are my own. Thank you to ElfFun.com for allowing me (and my kids) to review Christopher Pop-In-Kins. I'm looking forward to starting this new tradition with my family. All opinions in this post are my own.

Shutterfly Photo Card Giveaway Winners!

2011-11-01T07:57:00.001-07:00

My Shutterfly giveaway ended last night so it's time to pick the winners! *drum roll*

The winning comments are 12, 8, and 14 which belong to Heather, Christina, and Amy! Congrats! I will be emailing you all shortly. :)

Thank you Shutterfly for allowing me to have this giveaway! For those of you that are still interested in ordering from Shutterfly they are always offering some kind of discount on their site. Shutterfly rocks! :)

Just Me Music Giveaway Winners!!

2011-10-28T07:58:00.000-07:00

Here are the winners for the Just Me Music giveaway! Thank you to everyone who entered! I had a lot of fun hosting this giveaway. Also thank you to Just Me Music for providing me with the CDs and DVD and for letting me have this giveaway. Dawson still listens to his CD everyday and has so much fun with it. I know Ashlynn is going to love hers, too, when she gets a little older.

Enough talking, let's get to the winners!! :) *drum roll*

The Grand Prize goes to comment number 24 which belongs to Holly Siek!! Congrats, Holly! You have won two personalized CDs of your choice and the VeggieTales DVD!

The Second Prize goes to comment number 1 which belongs to MissBlueEyes! Congratulations! You have won two personalized CDs of your choice!

The Third Prize goes to comment number 35 which belongs to Amy! Congrats, Amy! You have won 1 personalized CD of your choice!

I will be contacting the winners shortly. If I don't hear from them by Monday a new winner will be drawn for their prize. Thank you again to everybody who entered!!

A Shutterfly Christmas - Win 25 free photo cards (3 winners!)

2011-10-27T13:25:00.000-07:00

We've been very happy Shutterfly customers for a few years now. We've printed pictures and had them sent to grandparents who live out of state, we've made a calendar with our pictures in it for two years in a row now (I'm excited to get started on next year's calendar!), and we've also gotten our Christmas cards from Shutterfly for the past two years. We are always happy and impressed with how everything turns out.

Here is our 2009 Christmas card from Shutterfly:

I chose to use a Flat Photo Card that year and loved how it turned out.

Here is our 2010 Christmas card from Shutterfly:

I decided to change it up a little bit and went with a Folded Greeting Card last year.

We always get so many compliments about our Christmas cards. And it's so fun to send out personalized cards and then friends and family get updated pictures at the same!

This year I haven't decided which style of card I want to use let alone which card. They have so many great choices! I know it's going to be hard to decide and that's why I have already started looking. How cute would this one be now that we've got two little ones?!

photo from Shutterfly - Two Elves Holiday Card

The holidays seem to sneak up on us so I'm hoping to have our card picked out and ordered soon so I can scratch that off my to-do list and focus on other things. Luckily picking out the card is the hardest part, Shutterfly does most of the work after that. Easy peasy.

And if your looking for cute personalized gifts I would definitely recommend making a calendar. We made one for our parents last year and they LOVED them. We've decided to make that a Christmas gift tradition from now on.

Win 25 FREE photo cards!

Because Shutterfly is SO awesome they have offered to give THREE of my readers 25 free cards!!!

To enter leave me a comment! (don't forget to leave your email address so I can contact you if you win)

For extra entries: (leave a separate comment for each entry)

Follow my blog
Follow me on Twitter
Tweet about this giveaway (please leave a link to your tweet)
Share this giveaway on Facebook (please leave a link to your post)

This giveaway will close on 10/31 at 11:59pm. Three winners will be announced the following day. Please leave your email address in the comment so I have a way to contact you if you win!

Are you a blogger? Want a chance at 25 free cards this holiday season? Register here: http://goo.gl/DDw7Q

**Disclosure: Shutterfly is giving me 50 free photo cards as well as providing the giveaway prize. All opinions are my own. I LOVE Shutterfly!

Wordless Wednesday - Dawson is 3!!

2011-10-26T06:00:00.000-07:00

My baby boy turned 3 years old yesterday. ♥

Muffin Tin Monday - Halloween!

2011-10-24T05:30:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday!! I have some BIG news!! My baby boy, Dawson, is going to be THREE years old tomorrow!! Can you believe it?! His birthday party is going to be on Saturday so I decided to go ahead and do our Halloween lunch this weekend since I'm sure we'll be too busy with other things next weekend to even think about it. So here's what he had...

mummy dogs (hot dog wrapped in a crescent roll), ghost shaped marshmallows, witches hats (bugles)

ketchup for dipping, Halloween shaped spook-aroni and cheese, Greek yogurt with Halloween sprinkles
And for dessert a Jack Skellington cake pop!

Here's a closer look at Jack:

And a closer look at the rest of his meal:

He LOVED this Halloween tin! I made him save the cake pop for last and he finished everything except maybe 1/3 of the hotdog. Yay!

To see more muffin tin meals head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

**Don't forget to enter my Just Me Music CD/DVD giveaway! There are not very many entries and there will be 3 winners so your chances of winning are not bad at all. :) And your little ones will LOVE hearing their name sung by their favorite characters.

Jack Skellington Cake Pops

2011-10-21T07:19:00.000-07:00

Not too long ago I watched Nightmare Before Christmas for the very first time. I have no idea what took me so long to see it but I loved it! Even before I had watched it I had been wanting to make some Jack Skellington cake pops, so after I watched it I really wanted to make them. So I did. :)

I did a quick Google search for Jack cake pops before I made them and found a cute little template for his body from The Party Animal. I had to have it so I printed some out and I love the way they turned out. Between the Jack cake pops and the Cinderella cake pops that I made, I don't know how I'm ever going to make character pops again without printing out accessories to go with them! I love how they turn out. :)

**Don't forget I've got an awesome Just Me Music personalized CD/DVD giveaway going on. The prize would make a great stocking stuffer for your little one! And there will be 3 winners!

Just Me Music Personalized CD/DVD Giveaway! 3 Winners!!

2011-10-17T07:00:00.000-07:00

I am so excited to share this giveaway with you! Dawson absolutely loves Mickey Mouse so when I found this CD I knew it would be perfect for him. Just Me Music allows you to personalize the CD so your child hears their own name throughout the CD. We've had these CDs for almost a week now and Dawson still gets really excited to hear Mickey Mouse and Goofy say his name. He listens to the CD multiple times a day, too, luckily the songs are pretty catchy so I don't mind listening to them over and over. haha Our CDs came the day after we got back from Disneyland so it was great timing! Here is a little video of Dawson listening to his CD for the first time.

I told you he gets really excited when he hears them say his name! *lol* The CD we chose for him is Sing Along with Mickey, Minnie, and Goofy. There are 23 tracks and over 25 minutes of music and dialogue. We really like the songs that are on the CD. Some of Dawson's favorites are Zip-a-dee-doo-da, Do Your Ears Hang Low, and Twinkle Twinkle.

Ashlynn is too young to realize that the princesses are saying her name but she's definitely not too young to listen to music! She got the Disney Princess Tea Party CD. Thankfully Dawson is willing to share the CD player and doesn't mind when I turn Ashlynn's CD on. He gets just as excited hearing her name as he does when he hears his own name and likes to try and make Ashlynn dance with him. :) The Disney Princess CD has 17 tracks and is also over 25 minutes long. It's a really cute CD and I look forward to being able to turn it on and have a tea party with Ashlynn when she gets a little older. For now she enjoys dancing with me while the music is playing. :)

And last but not least we got a VeggieTales DVD. Dawson has never watched VeggiesTales before so I didn't know if he would be interested in the DVD or not. I wish I would have gotten some video of him watching it because he LOVED it! He turned around to look at me every time he heard his name and had the sweetest smile on his face. He was so happy! You can see a sample of the VeggieTales DVD here.

I think these CDs (and the DVD) would make a great and unique gift. (This would make a great stocking stuffer!!) We love them! Besides the Mickey and Princess CDs they also have Elmo, VeggieTales, the Wiggles, and Barney! If you want to hear a sample of the CDs with your child's name you can do so on their website. It's really fun to hear a sneak peak of what your CD will sound like!

Here's the really fun part! Just Me Music has offered to give away some personalized CDs to 3 of you!! That's right, there will be 3 winners!

Grand Prize: 2 Personalized CDs (winner's choice) and the VeggieTales Silly Song Personalized DVD
Second Prize: 2 Personalized CDs (winner's choice)
Third Prize: 1 Personalized CD (winner's choice)

**please include your email address in each comment if it's not available on your blogger profile so I have a way to contact you if you win

How to enter: (mandatory entry)

Visit Just Me Music and then come back here and let me know which CD you would choose if you won. (1 entry)

For extra entries: (Please leave a separate comment for each entry)

Follow my blog through Google Friend Connect (1 entry)
Follow Just Me Music on Twitter (1 entry)
Like Just Me Music on Facebook (1 entry)
Post about this giveaway on Facebook (2 entries) Please leave a link to your FB post
Tweet about this giveaway (2 entries) You can tweet about this once a day, please leave me the link to your tweet

You can copy and paste this tweet or use your own:

@JustMeMusic personalized #Disney CD #giveaway from @JamieTweets0811 3 winners! http://mommasfabulousplayground.blogspot.com/2011/10/just-me-music-giveaway-3-winners.html

This giveaway is open to everybody worldwide. As long as your child's name is in their database (you can check on their website) they can make and send you a CD!

* You must complete the mandatory entry before the extra entries will count.
* Please leave a separate comment for each of your entries.
* Don't forget to include your email address (if it's not made public on your Blogger profile) in your comments so I can notify you if you win!

Winners will be drawn using random.org. I'll email the winners and post them here. Winners will have 48 hours to respond before a new winner will be drawn.

Giveaway ends October 27th at 11:59pm.

Coupon Code: From now until 10/27 you can use the coupon code "mommasplayground" at checkout to get 10% off your order at JustMeMusic.com

Disclosure: I received two CDs and a DVD for free in order to try the product and form an opinion for this review. I was not compensated in any other manner. All opinions expressed above are my own. Thank you to JustMeMusic.com for allowing me (and my kids) to review the CDs and DVDs. We absolutely love them! All opinions in this post are my own.

Cinderella Cake Pops

2011-10-06T06:00:00.000-07:00

I made these Cinderella cake pops for my niece's 4th birthday. I was excited when my sister told me she wanted Cinderella because it was something I haven't done before. I'm always up for trying new things! I was a little nervous about what they'd look like when they got to her because I had to ship them from San Diego to Salt Lake (in July!) but thankfully they made it there ok. And I heard they were a big hit at the party! :)

Wordless Wednesday - Surprise!

2011-10-05T07:23:00.000-07:00

Ok, so this isn't "wordless" but I won't make it too long...

In less than a week we are going to Disneyland for Mickey's Halloween Party! We haven't told Dawson that we're going yet, we're keeping it a surprise. :) He does get to pull off a Mickey head from the chain every morning and he knows that when they are all gone there will be a surprise!

Cake Pops - Swimming Teddy Bears

2011-09-29T06:00:00.000-07:00

Over the past few months I have made quite a few cake pops but never got around to posting them... so I am going to start posting them now. :) These swimming teddy bears turned out super cute and I'm pretty proud of them. I think I'll definitely be making them again to take to summer barbecues or pool parties!

New Books - Kohl's Cares

2011-09-28T13:43:00.000-07:00

Kohl's has new books and stuffed animals for Kohl's Cares for Kids program! We love this program and always buy the books. I love that we get a great deal on books and I also love that 100% of the profit from these items is donated to support kids' health and education initiatives nationwide. It's a win-win! I think this time I might even buy a book for myself... You can get this A Very Merry Christmas Cookbook for only $5 too!

**This is not a sponsored post, I just really LOVE this program and want to share it with everyone.

Muffin Tin Monday - New Foods

2011-08-28T22:00:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday!! This week Dawson tried a couple of new foods and most of them were a success!

cheese pizza on a whole wheat muffin, graham cracker with peanut butter, broccoli & cheese

pear slices, graham cracker with peanut better, honey goldfish crackers

The cheese pizza on a whole wheat muffin and fresh pears were new to Dawson and he loved them both! He's had canned pears before, I'm not sure why I haven't thought to buy fresh pears before now... :/ He's tried the broccoli and cheese before and didn't like it so I thought we'd try again and he wasn't a fan again. He did take two bites of broccoli, though, that's a win in my book.

To see what others did for Muffin Tin Monday stop by and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

Muffin Tin Monday

2011-08-15T12:45:00.000-07:00

Dawson's lunch was pretty simple today but I decided to throw it into a muffin tin just for fun anyway. I had planned on having him try some snap peas for the first time today but I totally forgot until I started getting my lunch ready (after he had already started eating). I offered him some but of course he wanted nothing to do with them. Sort of what I expected. I'll try again in a few days. :)

He had a cheese dog, some ketchup (that I attempted to make into a smiley face but he didn't seem to notice #mommyfail), watermelon, and blueberries. He gobbled everything right up.

And just because, here is a closeup of Ashlynn. I love how long her eyelashes are getting. ♥ She enjoyed some peaches for lunch today, not in a muffin tin, but I am still planning on buying her some flower silicone cups sometime in the near future. :D

Head on over to Muffin Tin Mom to see what others did for Muffin Tin Monday this week!

Muffin Tin Monday - Shape Searcher

2011-08-07T21:25:00.000-07:00

Dawson is totally obsessed with Blue's Clues and there is an episode called Shape Searchers where they find different shapes. Yesterday morning he asked me if I would play Shape Searchers with him. Of course I wanted to, so I grabbed his puzzle with the shapes on it, took the pieces off and we tried to find shapes around the house that matched the shapes that we had. It was really fun and Dawson found a lot of different shapes.

Since we had such a good time playing Shape Searchers I decided to make a muffin tin lunch with foods of different shapes and have Dawson match up the shapes with his puzzle pieces. Here is what I came up with:

triangle (pizza), circles (zucchini chips), oval (watermelon)
squares (cheez-its), trapezoid (cheese bread), rectangle (graham cracker w/peanut butter)

Then I asked Dawson to match up his puzzle pieces with the different shapes that he saw. He thought it was a lot of fun and he got them all right! :)

Yay Dawson!! :)

He ate pretty well and actually ate his zucchini chips first and even asked for seconds, that made me happy. :)

To see what others did for Muffin Tin Monday this week head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

2011-08-03T06:00:00.000-07:00

I'm sure most of you have heard of Pinterest by now, but if you haven't let me tell you how great it is!! It's a virtual bulletin board where you can pin anything you want. I love that when I see something that I want to come back to I don't have to bookmark it on my computer anymore. Instead I just pin it and then I have a visual of everything that I've ~~"bookmarked"~~ pinned (the picture will link back to the site that you got it from). My favorite things to pin are recipes that I want to try, and crafts that I want to do with Dawson (and Ashlynn when she's a bit older).

So far we have tried a lot of the dinner recipes that I have pinned... and I don't think I've done any of the crafts with Dawson yet. I'll work on that though. You can have as many pinboards as you want and you can pin whatever you want... I must warn you, though, it can be very addicting! If you are already on there let me know so I can follow you! You can find me here. :) And if you are not on Pinterest yet but want to be let me know because I have 6 invites that I can send out, I will just need your email address. :)

Happy pinning!

Muffin Tin Mon... Tuesday!

2011-08-02T09:07:00.000-07:00

I decided to give Dawson a muffin tin lunch again yesterday. I stopped doing them for awhile because he is such a picky eater AND he goes through phases where if I give him more than one thing at a time he'll pick one of those items and won't eat anything else. So for awhile there I was just giving him a sandwich, after he finished that I'd give him some carrots, after he finished those I'd give him some blueberries, etc, until he had eaten enough. I was so happy yesterday when he ate everything in his tin except for like two chips. Yay!! Maybe we can start doing MTM regularly again.

Here's what he had for lunch yesterday (I didn't post it yesterday because I had just posted about some of our favorite books and I usually don't like to post more than once a day) ...

pb&j sandwich, veggie chips, sandwich

goldfish crackers, grapes, cheese

I'll have to come up with a fun theme to try next week. I have more fun doing themes and we haven't done one for awhile so I'm excited to see how Dawson likes it. :) And I've decided that next time I go to Michaels I am going to buy these:

Because Ashlynn has recently started eating baby food! How cute would it be to feed her some squash out of a cute little flower?! Ok, so it would totally be for me, I think she's too young to even notice, but still. :) I'm sure once she starts eating puffs and cheerios (not for a couple more months) she'll have fun dumping them out and playing with the silicone flowers. Yep, totally buying them soon!!

To see what others had for Muffin Tin Monday this week head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

Kohl's Cares for Kids - Clifford!

2011-08-01T09:50:00.000-07:00

The Kohl's Cares for Kids program is now featuring 4 Clifford The Big Red Dog books! It's been awhile since I have posted about this program... We absolutely love it and always buy the books they are featuring. They change it up every 3-4 months or so and I always get really excited to see what the new books are! To be honest, this time when I saw they were Clifford books, I was a little disappointed. I have never read any Clifford books or even watched Clifford before, but because we love to read and love that 100% of the net profit from the books (and stuffed animals) is donated to help kids charities nationwide, I still wanted to buy the books. And I am so glad we did because we LOVE these books!! We got them 2 weeks ago and Dawson has wanted to read one before bed every night since we got them (we always let him choose the story we read before bed). There are two stories in each book and they are all really cute. We have even started watching Clifford now. *lol* And I'm seriously thinking about going back and getting all the stuffed animals, too. We usually don't get the stuffed animals (we did get the ones with the Toy Story books and Winnie-the-Pooh books and that's it) but I really think Dawson and Ashlynn would have fun playing with them.

I would definitely recommend these books so if you haven't already, go out and buy them! The money goes towards a great cause and you get a great deal. Everybody wins! And no this is not a sponsored post or anything, I just LOVE this program and these books. :)

Wordless Wednesday - Giggles

2011-06-29T10:36:00.000-07:00

Just a short video of Ashlynn laughing at Dawson. ♥

Baked Zucchini Chips Recipe

2011-06-03T10:27:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I posted the recipe to these yummy turkey burgers with zucchini and I'm sure you all are on the edge of your seats waiting for the baked zucchini chips recipe, right? ;) They really are good, in fact they are one of our new favorite sides. Even Dawson, who may be the pickiest eater in the world, loves them! He begs for seconds which is so not like him, but I am not complaining!

We tried Gina's zucchini sticks recipe first but the middle of some of them were super mushy, I think because I didn't cut them all evenly. My solution to that was make them as chips instead of sticks! It's a lot easier to keep them the same size that way.

Baked Zucchini Chips (adapted from SkinnyTaste.com)

2 medium zucchini cut into 1/4 inch slices
1 large egg white
1/3 cup seasoned whole wheat bread crumbs
2 tbsp grated Parmesan cheese
cooking spray
1/2 tsp garlic powder
salt
fresh pepper

Preheat oven to 475°.

In a small bowl, beat egg whites and season with salt and pepper. In a bowl, place breadcrumbs, garlic powder and cheese and combine. Spray cookie sheet with cooking spray and set aside.

Dip zucchini chips into eggs then into bread crumb and cheese mixture, a few at a time and coat well. Place the breaded zucchini in a single layer on cookie sheet. Bake at 475° for about 7-8 minutes, then turn over and bake for another 8-10 minutes until browned and crispy. Serve with marinara sauce or ranch for dipping.

Enjoy!

Turkey Burgers with Zucchini Recipe

2011-06-02T08:40:00.000-07:00

I am seriously obsessed with skinnytaste.com. My obsession started about 2 months ago when my husband and I decided we were ready to lose weight together. We had both wanted to lose weight for a couple of years now, but we weren't ready to make the lifestyle changes that we needed to in order to be successful. I'm not sure what "clicked" but we are both ready now. In the last two months we have been eating healthier, exercising, drinking only water and lots of it, and just being a lot more active. Since the second week in April (almost 2 months ago) I have lost almost 16 pounds and my husband has lost 21 pounds!

I was so excited when I came across Gina's recipes at Skinny Taste and couldn't wait to start trying some of them. So far we have tried at least 10 of them and have loved them all! I'm going to start sharing the ones that we try here, along with any other new (or old favorites) recipes that we try and love. I know you could easily hop on over to Gina's blog (and I think you should!) and see these recipes there for yourself, but I like getting recipes from friends that I know they love so I figured you might too! (We're friends, right? ;) ) I also like to make a few changes to some of the recipes that we try to sort of make it our own, so the recipes that I post might be a little different from Gina's. :) We've been counting calories and not going over our daily calorie goal, and Gina posts how many calories are in each of her recipes which helps out a lot! Of course if you change the recipe up a little bit you will have to add or subtract calories to get an accurate count. If anybody knows of anymore recipe blogs like hers please let me know. :)

Anyway, have I rambled enough yet? Let's get to the recipe already! ;)

Turkey Burgers with Zucchini (recipe from SkinnyTaste.com)
Servings: 5 • Serving Size: 1 burger no bun Calories: 156

1.25 lbs 93% lean ground turkey
1 small zucchini, grated
1/4 cup seasoned breadcrumbs
1 clove garlic, grated
1 tbsp red onion, grated
salt and fresh pepper

In a large bowl, combine ground turkey, zucchini, breadcrumbs, garlic, onion, salt and pepper. Make 5 equal patties. Barbeque burgers until they are cooked all the way through.

Easy enough, right? Adding the zucchini means less calories and fat per serving and they taste yummy! My husband and I agreed that we would be adding some garlic next time though.

Only my husband and I were eating these burgers (Dawson isn't a big meat eater yet) so I only used 6 or 7 ounces of ground turkey and adjusted the rest of the recipe around that.

Since the turkey burgers called for zucchini and I wasn't making the entire recipe I had some zucchini left over, so I decided to make zucchini chips to go with them. I'll post that recipe tomorrow, it's one of our favorite sides (even Dawson approves!). See the baked zucchini chips recipe here.

Does anybody else use sandwich thins instead of regular buns? We love them! And they're only 100 calories for the entire "bun". We like to use them with sandwiches also but we still use our whole wheat bread, too.

I plan on writing a little bit more about our weight loss journey in the next few weeks, we still have a while to go before we meet our end goals so I am sure they I'll have plenty to write about.

39DollarGlasses.com Giveaway Winner!

2011-05-28T20:24:00.001-07:00

~~Congratulations, Niurka!!~~ You are the the 39DollarGlasses.com giveaway winner! You will be getting an email from me shortly. :)

**Update 6/1/2011 I have been unable to contact the winner so a new winner has been drawn. Congratulations, luckycoleman! You will be hearing from me shortly!

Thanks to everyone who entered! :)

39DollarGlasses.com Review and Giveaway!!

2011-05-18T06:00:00.000-07:00

I was so happy when I was contacted by 39DollarGlasses.com to do a review and giveaway because I had just went to the eye doctor to get an updated prescription. Talk about perfect timing! I had never heard of 39DollarGlasses.com before so I headed over to their site to see what they had and I was extremely impressed! They have a HUGE selection of metal eyeglasses, plastic eyeglasses, rimless eyeglasses and much more! And only $39 dollars for prescription glasses (and prescription sunglasses!) is a steal in my book.

I was a little worried about ordering glasses online, I am the type of person that likes to try things on before I buy them. I like that I was able to print out an actual size picture of the frames that I was looking at. They also have a little picture on each page where you can click it to match your face shape (round, oval, square, etc) to help you visualize a little better to what those frames will look like on you.

I decided to go with the Miami glasses in brown and I love them. They are super comfortable, they fit great, and most important of all... I can see perfectly when I am wearing them! I was impressed that they came with a hard case, a soft case, a micro-fiber cleaning cloth and a tiny screwdriver for tightening or loosening the hinges.

And I also like that if you are not completely satisfied with your order (which I am!) they offer this 100% Worry Free Guarantee:

At 39dollarglasses.com, we offer a 100% Worry-Free Guarantee. Our objective is simple: to make sure every customer has a wonderful experience purchasing from us. If you are unhappy for ANY REASON you may return your eyeglasses for a full refund (less shipping) or one-time exchange at no cost. (Exchanges for higher-priced items will only be charged for the difference in price). We even provide FREE return shipping!

Want to buy a pair? Use this code: MOMMA for 10% off your order!

One lucky reader will win a pair of prescription (or non-prescription) eyeglasses or sunglasses up to $75.00! (Open to US and Canada only)

Mandatory entry: Like 39 Dollar Glasses on Facebook and then come back here and tell me that you did!

Extra entries:
Become a public follower
Add my button to your sidebar
Blog about this giveaway (leave a link to your post)
Tweet about this giveaway (leave a link to your tweet)

* You must complete the mandatory entry before the extra entries will count.
* Please leave a separate comment for each of your entries.
* Don't forget to include your email address (if it's not made public on your Blogger profile) in your comments so I can notify you if you win!

Winner will be drawn using random.org. Winner will have 48 hours to respond before a new winner will be drawn.

Giveaway ends May 27th at 11:59PM

Disclosure: I received a pair of prescription eyeglasses for free in order to try the product and form an opinion for this review. I was not compensated in any other manner. All opinions expressed above are my own. Thank you to 39DollarGlasses.com for allowing me to review a pair of their glasses!

Family Movie Night Tickets - 101 Dalmatians

2011-05-11T06:30:00.000-07:00

I got a request for some family movie night tickets a couple of days ago. I hope they look ok, I wasn't able to print them myself because my printer is acting crazy, it's 11pm and I don't really feel like messing with it. My bed is calling my name! :) Anyway, I wanted to make sure that I got these posted in time for Kayla (and whoever else wants them!) to use them. I made it a little bit smaller this time. If anybody prints it out in the next couple of days let me know how it looks.

To save it just click on the ticket to enlarge it and then right click and choose to save it to your computer. Enjoy!

You can get more family movie night tickets here.

French Dip Recipe

2011-05-02T09:44:00.000-07:00

Today is my husband's birthday and he has requested french dip sandwiches for his birthday dinner. I have been meaning to post this recipe for awhile now (I actually uploaded the pictures on March 27th and this post has been sitting there waiting to be edited since. ha!) so I figured I might as well post it now since I am reminded about how much we love this recipe! (It's been in the crock pot for a little over an hour already and the house smells wonderful!!)

If you're like me and the thought of soggy bread completely grosses you out, don't worry, you can eat french dip without eating soggy bread! You just have to make sure you toast the bread really well and it won't get soggy at all when you dip it. It's SO good!

Ok, so this is a pretty simple recipe but it tastes fabulous!

French Dip (adapted from Allrecipes)

What You'll Need

4 pounds rump roast
1 onion, sliced
1 (10.5 ounce) can beef broth
2 (10.5 ounce) can condensed French onion soup
6 fluid ounces of dark beer
garlic powder
pepper
6 French rolls
2 tablespoons butter
Mozzarella cheese

Directions

Trim excess fat from the rump roast, and place in slow cooker. Add the beef broth, onion soup, beer and onion. Sprinkle with garlic powder and pepper and stir a little bit. Cook on Low setting for 7 hours. (I slice the meat when there is about an hour left and then put it back in the crock pot to finish cooking)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Split French rolls, and spread with butter. Bake 10 minutes, or until heated through. (After 10 minutes I turn the oven to broil and keep them in a couple minutes longer, just keep an eye on them)
If you haven't already, slice the meat on the diagonal, and place on the rolls.
Top with cheese and put back in the oven (I still have it on broil) until the cheese is melted.
Serve with sauce for dipping.

When I am making this just for the two of us (Dawson isn't a big meat eater) I only use a pound of meat but keep everything else the same and we always have leftovers.

I am totally looking forward to dinner tonight! Good choice, babe, and happy birthday!!! I love you!

Muffin Tin Monday - Easter Bunny

2011-04-10T22:44:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday! We decided to go with a Easter Bunny theme this week.

carrots (bunny food), bunny shaped grilled cheese, bunny marshmallows

yogurt with sprinkles, hard-boiled egg and bunny graham crackers

Dawson ate a little bit of everything except the sandwich and the egg. For some reason he wouldn't touch either one of those things and he usually loves grilled cheese sandwiches... :/

To see other Muffin Tin Meals head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

Taggie Blanket

2011-04-08T05:30:00.000-07:00

When I was pregnant with Dawson we got a Taggie Blanket as a gift from somebody and I honestly didn't know what it was... Fast forward a few months when Dawson was about 6 or 7 months old and started finding the tags on all of his toys and sucking on them! Seriously, the tag was totally his favorite part of any toy! And then a light bulb went off, THAT is what that blanket is for! (It's not really a blanket, I don't know why I keep calling it that...) Anyway, I got it out for him and he really liked it. We even bought him a taggie book and can you guess what his favorite part of both the book and the blanket were? Yep, the actual tag. :P There's no fooling this kid, he's been a smarty pants from the very beginning. :D Here is a picture of him sucking on the tag of his taggie book.

I hope that Ashlynn likes tags as much as Dawson did because I made her a taggie blanket. :) I hope she's not disappointed that it is missing a real tag!

I am loving my new sewing machine! I have made so much progress from the first time that I sewed, my seams are so much straighter!!! I am looking forward to getting lots more practice!

Wordless Wednesday - My Loves

2011-04-06T06:00:00.000-07:00

Family Movie Night - Tangled

2011-04-05T06:00:00.000-07:00

We haven't gone all out for a movie night in a long time! We were really excited for Tangled to be coming out on DVD because we hadn't seen it yet so we decided to do something special. :)

Dawson helped with some decorations by coloring them for me. I like this picture because you can see where he drew Flynn's nose in...he ended up scribbling all over his face so you can't see his nose (or his face really!) by the time he was finished.

And just for the heck of it here is a picture of Ashlynn. :P

Here is our table all set up...

Dinner didn't go exactly as we planned but we made it work! We had angel hair pasta (which was actually baked chicken spaghetti but we can pretend). We were supposed to have braided breadsticks with it but I was planning on using the breadsticks that come in the tube and the commissary just happened to be all out. We also had Rapunzel lettuce salad, an idea that I got from Christina's Tangled movie night! (We had to use our Mickey bowls since we were going to be watching a Disney movie)

For dessert we had blue jello with orange "boats" on top. An idea that I got from SuperMom Moments.

I got the tower, Rapunzel and Pascal crafts from the Disney site. Dawson colored Pascal for me. ♥

And of course our movie tickets were ready to go! This is our first family movie night that we've needed four tickets! :) Oh and I almost forgot, I made the long braid out of yellow yarn which I couldn't have done without my husband's help because I got it all tangled. haha

How did he get so messy?!

We absolutely loved the movie and really enjoyed our movie night. Now that I have seen the movie I have a few more ideas that I wish I would have included in our movie night... Like serving dinner out of a frying pan, and floating lanterns are definitely a must!!! I also really wish I would have included the sun, whether it be like the purple bunting with the sun icon on it like Christina and SuperMom did, or maybe even placemats made out of purple construction paper with the sun icon on it would have been neat! We're going to definitely do a Tangled family movie night again in a few years when Ashlynn is old enough to enjoy it so I'll have to remember those things that I wanted to add to it. :)

Muffin Tin Monday - Spring

2011-04-03T22:43:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday!! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend. ♥ We decided to have a little fun with our muffin tin this week and include things that remind of us spring!

turkey and cheese sandwich shaped like a flower, carrots and ranch (rabbit food), yogurt with spring colored sprinkles
(butterfly) apples, spring salad, butterfly shaped apples

Dawson got really excited about the butterfly shaped apples and he loved the sprinkles in the yogurt. He only finished about half of his lunch but I can tell that he really enjoyed it.

To see more muffin tin lunches head on over to Muffin Tin Mom.

Hamburgers and Fries - April Fools!

2011-04-01T05:30:00.000-07:00

Order up! I made some yummy burgers and fries for lunch today... ok, ok, April Fools! ;) They are actually cupcakes, brownies and sugar cookies! I wanted to send something to work with hubby for April Fools and ever since I saw these in Bakerella's blog a couple of years ago I knew I wanted to try them. They were a lot of fun to make and I think they turned out pretty cute!

Did you do anything fun for April Fools?

Family Movie Night Tickets - Tangled

2011-03-30T10:55:00.000-07:00

We are going to have another one of our family movie nights this weekend!!! Since Tangled just came out on DVD and we haven't seen it yet we will definitely be watching that! I've already got most of our night planned and I'm really excited for it. I decided to make some more movie tickets and post them in case anybody else is having a Tangled movie night and wants to use them. I'll post pictures of our movie night next week. :)

You can add your last name to the second ticket if you want (for example Harrison Family Movie Night) or you can just print the first one as is. To save them just click on the one that you want, then right click on it and choose to save it. If you are going to add your name I use the Tahoma font size 18pt.

Enjoy! :)

DIY Car Seat Cover

2011-03-29T05:30:00.000-07:00

I sewed! I sewed!! My wonderful husband bought me a sewing machine a couple of months ago! Yippee! It took me a while to make anything because before now I had never sewed, I always talked about all the stuff that I wanted to make but didn't really think I ever could because I didn't even know how to use a sewing machine. I'm learning now though! I'm glad that my husband knows how to work a sewing machine and could teach me what I needed to know because I didn't know how to work it at all! In one night I went from not even knowing how to turn a sewing machine on -- to making this:

It's basically a blanket with velcro straps and boy is it handy!! I always throw a blanket over Ashlynn's car seat when we go out and then I either have to hold the handle with the blanket over it (which makes me nervous because I don't feel like I have good grip on the handle) or I have to put my arm under the blanket to hold the handle and then she's not completely covered like I would like her to be. So this car seat cover is perfect for me. :) I followed a few different tutorials that I found by Googling car seat cover tutorials.

I still have some practicing to do but I am beyond happy with how this turned out.

I have a long list of things that I want to make and I'll be sure to post them here as I finish them. :)

Muffin Tin Monday

2011-03-27T21:25:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday everyone!!! Wow, it has been so long since we have had lunch in a muffin tin! Dawson is still a super picky eater so I am hoping by reintroducing Muffin Tin Monday to him he might be excited to try new foods! I kept it super simple this week...

Top Row: pizza, marshmallows, pizza

Bottom Row: mac & cheese, more mac & cheese, chex mix

I am really looking forward to making lunch fun again! To see more Muffin Tin Meals visit Muffin Tin Mom!

Breakfast Casserole Recipe

2011-03-25T05:30:00.000-07:00

Before we head into the weekend I thought I would leave you with this yummy breakfast casserole recipe. It's super easy and tastes SO good! Adapted from Mommy D's Kitchen.

Lasagna Style Breakfast Casserole

What you'll need:

6 eggs, beaten
8 frozen hashbrown patties
1/2 lb bacon, chopped
2 cups cheddar cheese, shredded
1 green pepper, diced
1 can mild Rotel, drained

Bake hashbrown patties according to package directions. While they are baking cook your chopped bacon until crispy.

Once your bacon is crispy remove to some paper towels to soak up extra grease. Drain grease from your pan and return to the stove. Cook your green pepper until soft.

Add your beaten eggs to the green peppers and scramble. Add the can of Rotel a minute or so before they eggs are done. Remove from heat and set aside.

Spray an 8x8 casserole dish with non-stick spray. Layer your ingredients like so:

4 hash Browns, 1/2 your bacon, 1/2 your scrambled egg mixture, 1/2 shredded cheese, then start over.

Bake at 350° for 15 minutes or until cheese is melted and gooey! Let rest for 5 – 10 minutes before cutting.

Delicious! Enjoy! :)

(Sorry about the picture quality, like I said in a post earlier this week I use my phone a lot to take pictures, I need to stop being so lazy and start using the really nice camera that we bought a couple of months ago!)

Lions and Tigers and Bears (oh my!) Cake Pops!

2011-03-24T05:30:00.000-07:00

I made these cute little cake pops a couple of weeks ago... Lions and tigers and bears! Oh my!

I think they turned out super cute so I thought I'd share. :) As soon as I saw them in Bakerella's book I knew I had to make them! Now the tough part...decided which ones I want to try next! There are so many cute ones to choose from!

A quick question for those of you who make cake pops...what kind of candy coating do you use? I use the candy melts that you can get Michaels but I am thinking of trying a different brand because I have a hard time writing on the ones I use with my edible markers. :/

Wordless Wednesday

2011-03-23T05:30:00.000-07:00

I took this picture with my phone so they quality isn't the greatest but Ashlynn looks adorable so I had to share. I need to stop being so lazy and pull out my camera more often instead of using my phone! Anyway, Ashlynn is 10 1/2 weeks old!
And here is a short video of Dawson telling a joke... (He's 2 1/2 now!)

In case you can't understand him he says "Why did the chicken cross the road?" and then "(to get) to the other side!" He's hilarious! :P

24 days old - Ashlynn is Home!!!

2011-02-02T05:45:00.000-08:00

Ashlynn is home!! It's beyond wonderful to have her here with us. She is going to be one spoiled baby because me and Dave want to hold her all the time! :) Dawson was excited to see her for the first time at the hospital but once we got home he didn't seem to notice she was even here. He just wanted to play. After awhile though, about an hour before his bedtime, I was holding Ashlynn on the couch and he came over and wanted to cuddle with us. :) I LOVED having both my babies cuddling with me.

Here is the video of Dawson and Ashlynn meeting for the first time...

He was so sweet!!! :) I can't even explain how I felt seeing his reaction to her, I was just so happy!

We bought this outfit for her to come home in when we thought she was going to be born in February... Even though she decided to come early it still worked out really well since she came home on February 1st!

Look at how cute she is in her monkey pj's!

Here we are cuddling on the couch. :)

And just a little video of Ashlynn.

Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers! We are so happy that our baby is home!!

Wordless Wednesday - Our baby girl

2011-01-26T06:30:00.000-08:00

Ashlynn is 18 days old today! She's still in the NICU but is doing great. Here are some pics that I just love. ♥

Eskimo kisses.

Mama's girl.

Stretch!

Snuggle bug.

Do these booties make my feet look big?

Her umbilical cord fell off! Check out that cute belly button!

I just love her.

Introducing Ashlynn!!!

2011-01-17T07:00:00.000-08:00

Our baby girl is here!! My water broke at 34 weeks 3 days, so she was almost 6 weeks early! She weighed 5lbs 6oz and was 17 3/4 inches long. Just a little thing! She is 9 days old today and still in the NICU. :( She has been able to breathe on her own since birth, she started maintaining her body temperature on her own at just a few days old, now we just have to get her to eat! She has an NG tube right now because she is supposed to be eating 47 cc's every 3 hours, but she rarely finishes so they put whatever she doesn't eat on her own down the tube. Hopefully she'll get the hang of it and be able to come home soon!

Ashlynn Marie
1/8/2011 11:11 pm
5 lbs 6 oz
17 3/4 inches long

Here are some pics!

Just after she was born...

Mama holding her in the NICU for the first time.

Dada holding her...

Her bilirubin levels were a little high so she was under the lights for a couple of days.

4 days old and she got a new bed! No more bili lights, no bed warmer AND she got her IV removed! (She had an IV that was basically feeding her since she wasn't eating much and she was getting antibiotics)

I love this sweet little face.

Here she is at 1 week old...

We are so in love with our baby girl, she is such a sweet little baby. Dawson hasn't met her yet because they don't allow anybody except parents and grandparents into the NICU to visit. I'm excited to bring her home, I know that Dawson will just love her.

Please keep little Ashlynn in your thoughts and prayers. We need her strong and healthy enough to come home soon!!

A Very Merry Christmas with Shutterfly!

2010-11-11T08:00:00.000-08:00

I am a huge Shutterfly fan! I've been a member of their site for about a year and a half now and I absolutely love it! Last year I ordered a 2010 calendar with our pictures on it and I'll definitely be ordering a 2011 calendar in about a month or so. I love the way it turned out. Here are some pics of our calendar...

I'm about halfway done with our 2011 calendar. I can't wait to finish it up and order it!

I also used Shutterfly to make our Christmas cards last year, those turned out great too! Here is what we sent out to family and friends last year:

Adorable isn't it? Dawson had such a cute little baby face! Anyway, we are definitely sending out similar cards this year. I need to take some new Christmas pictures of Dawson and get them ordered pretty soon!

Here are just some of my favorites this year, it's going to be hard to pick one!

Peppermint Ice Snowflake

Holly Jolly

Starlight Trees

I'm really into the reds and greens and anything that looks Christmasy! You can choose from folded greeting cards, flat stationary cards or flat photo cards and there are SO many different designs! I love how easy Shutterfly is to use and it seems like they always have some sort of sale or discount going on.

So, which card is your favorite?

Disclosure: I will be receiving 50 free Holiday cards from Shutterfly for writing this post.

For your own chance to get 50 FREE Holiday Cards from Shutterfly go here.

Muffin Tin Monday - Halloween

2010-10-24T23:15:00.000-07:00

Breaking News: Today is Dawson's birthday!!! That's right, my baby boy is 2!

This week's muffin tin theme is Halloween! I'm happy with how Dawson's tin came together this week considering I didn't buy anything extra for it and just used what I already had at home.

Top Row: spooky eyes (blueberries w/sprinkles), ghost (banana), spider (oreo w/twizzler legs)

Bottom Row: Pumpkin (grilled cheese), ketchup, spooky fingers (chicken tenders)

Dawson didn't eat very well, I think because he wasn't feeling well. (We had our tin on Saturday, he's feeling better now. :) )

To see what others came up with this week head on over to Muffin Tin Mom.

Apple Fritter Recipe

2010-10-19T09:40:00.000-07:00

When I saw this apple fritter recipe over at Oh My! Sugar High yesterday I knew I had to try it right away! I did make a few changes and they came out perfectly so I will go ahead and post the recipe that I used.

Apple Fritters

2 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup milk
3 tablespoon butter, melted
2 large eggs
2 medium Granny Smith apples, peeled and diced
Vegetable oil for frying

Glaze

2 cups powdered sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons milk

Pour 1 1/2 inch deep vegetable oil into pan and heat over medium heat. Allow it to heat up as you are making the batter.

Combine flour, baking powder, salt, brown sugar and cinnamon in a medium bowl stirring with a fork to break up any clumps.

Add milk, butter and eggs. Mix together well.

Mix in diced apples.

To make the glaze just stir together the powdered sugar and milk. Set aside until fritters come out of the oil.

Using a large spoon (or a small ice cream scoop) gently place some batter into the oil. I probably only used 2-3 tablespoons of batter for each fritter, I made them small to ensure the insides cooked completely. Once the batter starts bubbling around the edges and a little in the middle (kind of like pancake batter does) it's time to flip it. You can also peek every 30 seconds or so and when the bottom looks brown enough it's time to turn it over. Brown on the other side and then using tongs take the fritter out and place on a paper towel.

Using a butter knife spread the glaze on the top of the fritters while they are still hot.

I made ours pretty dark brown because hubby and I both like a little bit of crispness on the outside and the middle is still soft and yummy!

These turned out SO good!!! I had to throw my first 3 away because the inside wasn't done completely, I just had to play around with the oil temperature a little until I got it just right.

I definitely recommend making these and eating them the same day. My husband and I each ate one last night (ok, maybe we each had two!) and they were perfect. We wrapped up the extras and today they are not very good, to me at least. Hubby took some to work and I haven't been able to ask him what he thinks of them. The outside is no longer crisp and they are almost soggy in the middle. Next time I make them I will definitely do it in the morning and I'll make sure we have people to share them with!

Muffin Tin Monday - No Theme

2010-10-18T12:32:00.001-07:00

Hello strangers! It's been awhile since we've had lunch in a muffin tin and after today I am wondering why I stopped doing it?! Dawson ate so much better today than he has in a long time. It might have just been a fluke, he does have good days every now and then, but I think the muffin tin helped. I guess the only way to know for sure is to keep trying.

So this week there is no theme for muffin tin Monday and I was too lazy to come up with a theme of my own so I just put together some foods that I know Dawson likes.

Top Row: cheese stick broke in half, strawberries, white cheddar popcorn
Bottom Row: chicken tenders, ranch for dipping, fries

The only thing that he didn't finish was the strawberries and a couple of fries. I was a little surprised that he didn't eat the strawberries because he loves them...he tried dipping one in the ranch (he actually dipped everything except the popcorn in the ranch) and I don't think he liked it and that's probably why he didn't eat them. He loved the cheese dipped in ranch. Yuck! *lol* But at least he ate well today! :)

To join in and see what others did for Muffin Tin Monday this week head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom!

Halloween: A Look Back

2010-10-14T11:40:00.000-07:00

Amanda over at Funny Days with Mommy and Maddie has a linky up for posts about kids in Halloween costumes and I thought it would be fun to join in! So here's a look back at what Dawson has been for Halloween...

This was in 2008, he was born just 6 days before Halloween so we didn't buy him a real Halloween costume because he was so small. He did have a few really cute Halloween onesies though!

His onesie says "this is my costume!" He's also got on a cute little pumpkin hat and pumpkin socks. :)

I also really like this ghost onesie that he had.

I think all together he had 5 or 6 Halloween onesies, we got a few of them as gifts and couldn't resist buying a couple ourselves since we knew he was going to be born so close to Halloween.

Last year he was a dinosaur! And it was his first time trick-or-treating. He had just turned a year old so he didn't really get in to it much but he liked being outside walking around with everyone.

Rawr!

This year he was going to be a skeleton but when we took him shopping for a costume we learned that he is scared of skeletons so that wasn't going to work. We ended up finding this really cute pirate costume that he wasn't scared of and I like it a lot more than I would have liked a skeleton.

Doesn't he look adorable?! The boots are a little big, we actually just trimmed them down a little bit this morning so they would fit him better because he is wearing his costume tonight! The housing that we live in is having a Fall into Fun party tonight and kids are supposed to wear their costumes. We are looking forward to going, it should be a lot of fun and I'm excited to see Dawson dressed up in his costume again.

I think he's going to have a lot of fun trick-or-treating this year and seeing all the other kids in their costumes. He has already mastered saying "trick-or-treat" so he's ready to go!

Wordless Wednesday - It's a Girl!

2010-09-01T08:42:00.000-07:00

Muffin Tin Monday - ABC's

2010-08-23T04:10:00.000-07:00

The themes are back! Yay! We have been slacking lately when it comes to having our weekly muffin tin lunch but I am hoping that will change. We are in the middle of moving right now so we might have to miss next week but hopefully after that we'll be back for good!

I was super excited to see that the first theme after summer break was ABC's because I got some awesome mini alphabet cookie cutters from my swap partner Christina and I haven't had a chance to use them until now.

Top Row: A is for apples, B is for blueberries and C is for cheese
Bottom Row: grilled cheese, cinnamon oatmeal alphabet cookies, grilled cheese

Did you notice the letters on the bread?! Here is a closer look...

How cool is that? I used the mini alphabet cutters to make imprints and then I buttered and grilled the sandwich. I love how it turned out! We are definitely going to be doing that again. Thank you again Christina!

Dawson loved his lunch and surprisingly only didn't eat the cookies. I thought those would be one of the first things to go because he loves them. He decided he wanted to share some of his lunch with Mickey which I thought was too cute. :)

To see what others did this week for MTM head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

More Family Movie Night Tickets

2010-08-05T05:30:00.000-07:00

I've got some more movie tickets for all of you to snag if you would like. We've been using these tickets for our own family movie nights and they've been a big hit.

I used Tahoma as the font because I think it's a pretty standard font. I also checked to make sure photobucket had that as a font choice incase you don't have a photo editing program you can just edit it there if you want. Our movie tickets usually say HARRISON FAMILY MOVIE NIGHT across the top, I made the top line off centered on some of the tickets incase you want to add your own last name. (Font size 18pt) Or you can add your name above the one that are centered or just leave them as they are. Does this make sense? If you have questions you can always email me.

You can also add the date and time that you will be watching movie under the movie title. You can see the tickets we used for our Cars movie night here for ideas on what I'm talking about.

To save the tickets simply click on the one that you want, then right click on the ticket and save it to your computer.

You can take as many tickets that you want. :) If you post them in your blog it would be great if you linked back to my blog so if anybody else wants to come grab some they can.

Don't forget to come back and check out more of our movie nights and to snag more tickets. Enjoy! :)

You can also get tickets for Toy Story, Cars, A Bug's Life and Lilo & Stitch here. If you have any requests on what movies you want tickets for just let me know and I will try to get them made ASAP.

Family Movie Night - Finding Nemo

2010-08-03T05:31:00.000-07:00

For a few weeks now Dawson has gotten really excited every time he saw Nemo. He has a Nemo beach ball and a Nemo book, but we had never watched Finding Nemo and still he loved him so I knew that our next movie night definitely had to be Finding Nemo!

We started off by doing a couple of crafts. I had Dawson paint a paper plate so we could make Dory. He didn't really seem that into painting that day which is surprising because he normally loves to paint. He was finished painting after about 2 or 3 minutes which is totally fine by me...less mess to clean up! *lol*

We also made a little fish family with our handprints. We did Dawson's first and we had a little too much paint on his hand so it didn't turn out perfect but we were still happy with it.

Then me and hubby made some jelly fish out of paper plates and crepe paper. I also added some little fish tails to our plates to make them look like fish.

And, of course, our movie tickets!

For dinner we had SEAnut butter and jellyFISH sandwiches in the shape of a fish. (ok, ok, me and Dave had BLT's and Dawson had the PB&J.) We also had some asparagas that was supposed to be like seaweed and some mac and cheese with goldfish crackers which represents anemone where Nemo lives! (I accidentally cut off the fish's tail when I was taking the picture! Oops!)

And for dessert we had blue jello with swedish fish and whipped cream.

We had a really fun night and Dawson actually watched a good amount of the movie, he really does love Nemo! I have no idea what movie we are going to be watching next but I do know that our next movie night won't be for another 3 weeks because...well just because! At least I know I have plenty of time to plan it!

In case you missed it I made some movie tickets for you snag! And I will have movie tickets for 7 more movies posting on Thursday so look out for those. :)

Also if you have been doing family movie nights please let me know, I'm going to be making a few posts featuring some of the movie nights that others have been doing.

Muffin Tin Monday - Breakfast

2010-08-02T05:30:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday everyone! This week we decided to have a breakfast tin. :)

Top Row: apple cinnamon waffles, scrambled eggs, bacon
Bottom Row: blueberries, watermelon, cantaloupe

Dawson mostly ate the fruit, a bite or two of his waffle and a little bit of bacon. He did a little rearranging too, apparently he didn't like where I put his food.

To see what others did this week head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

Family Movie Night Tickets

2010-07-29T05:30:00.000-07:00

I've got some movie tickets for all of you to snag if you would like. We've been using these tickets for our own family movie nights and they've been a big hit. So far I have only made them for 4 movies. I'm planning on making more over the next few weeks, if any of you have a request for a certain movie that you want let me know and I will try to get those made soon.

I used Tahoma as the font because I think it's a pretty standard font. I also checked to make sure photobucket had that as a font choice incase you don't have a photo editing program you can just edit it there if you want. Our movie tickets usually say HARRISON FAMILY MOVIE NIGHT across the top, I made the top line off centered on some of the tickets incase you want to add your own last name. (Font size 18pt) Or you can add your name above the one that are centered or just leave them as they are. Does this make sense? If you have questions you can always email me.

You can also add the date and time that you will be watching movie under the movie title. You can see the tickets we used for our Cars movie night here for ideas on what I'm talking about.

To save the tickets simply click on the one that you want, then right click on the ticket and save it to your computer.

You can take as many tickets that you want. :) If you post them in your blog it would be great if you linked back to my blog.

Don't forget to come back and check out more of our movie nights and to snag more tickets. Enjoy! :)

Family Movie Night - Lilo & Stitch

2010-07-20T05:30:00.000-07:00

I'm happy to say that I have finally seen Lilo & Stitch because we finally had our movie night that we were supposed to do a month ago! To be completely honest I was having a hard time planning it because I have been SO tired lately. I forgot how exhausting being pregnant is! I think I am starting to get my energy back now so hopefully I can keep up with this blog more.

For dinner we decided to go with a Hawaiian luau type theme. We had bbq chicken kabobs, Hawaiian rolls and lots of fruit! For decorations we had leis which we wore while we ate, tiki glasses, luau plates and napkins, a pineapple and a palm tree.

The fruit was so good! Me and Dawson almost finished the entire plate ourselves. We LOVE fruit and I have been craving it a lot lately!

For dessert we had molten lava cake!

And of course our movie tickets. We have 4 tickets this week because my sister is here visiting. :) I have gotten a lot of questions on how I make these tickets...I just use Photoshop and google the images that I want to use. You can also download the Disney font at dafont.com. In the next couple of weeks I am going to post some tickets that you will able to save to your computer and edit as you wish so anybody can snag them if they want them. If you have any requests on what movies you want tickets for just let me know.

After dinner we got Dawson dressed up in a grass skirt and a lei. He shook his booty for us and we all cracked up! He didn't want to wear it long though.

Oh! I almost forgot! Dawson colored these cute Lilo & Stitch pictures for us. :)

Muffin Tin Swap

2010-07-19T05:30:00.000-07:00

I participated in my first muffin tin swap and it was a blast! Michelle over at Muffin Tin Mom who also hosts Muffin Tin Monday hosted this great swap. I was paired up with my good friend Christina from Three A's and a C. I had a lot of fun shopping for her!! I also had a lot of fun receiving packages from her. My wish list consisted of mini alphabet cookie cutters and party picks and look at what I got...

I'm so excited to start using them! Dawson is just now starting to show an interest in learning different letters so I am really excited to use the mini alphabet cookie cutters (as well as the regular sized ones that I already had) to focus on different letters every week.

Thank you again Christina, I love everything. And thank you Michelle for putting this all together, I already can't wait for the next one! :)

Muffin Tin Monday - 4th of July

2010-07-05T05:30:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday! It's been a couple of weeks since we've done our lunch in a muffin tin, mostly because I have been super tired lately. I couldn't pass up a 4th of July tin though!

Top Row: strawberries, berries with whipped cream, blueberries
Bottom Row: pb&j sandwich, cheese and crackers, more pb&j

He loved that his sandwich and cheese were in the shape of stars, he kept showing them to me and was really excited about it. *lol* He ate pretty good too!

To see what others did head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

Wordless Wednesday - Big News!

2010-06-22T20:55:00.000-07:00

For more Wordless Wednesday posts head on over to 5 Minutes for Mom.

S'more Brownies

2010-06-22T05:30:00.000-07:00

The other day Christina over at Three A's and a C posted a recipe for some Rocky Road Brownies. YUM! Hubby and I are not big fans of nuts so I decided to change it up a little bit and instead of using chopped nuts I used graham crackers. And because I love peanut butter, I threw on some Reese's peanut butter chips, too. (And I cheated a little and used a box of brownies instead of making them from scratch.)

To recreate these super yummy little pieces of heaven you will need:

1 box of brownie mix
1 1/4 cup mini marshmallows
3/4 cup graham crackers broken into small pieces (3 or 4 whole graham crackers...I can't remember exactly how many I used)
1 cup milk chocolate chips
1/2 cup Reese's peanut butter chips

1- Bake brownies as directed on box.

2- While brownies are baking mix remaining ingredients together.

3- Pull brownies out of the oven when they have a few minutes left. Sprinkle chocolate chip mixture over top. Continue baking 5 minutes or until marshmallows have softened and puffed slightly.

4- Let cool for a few minutes and then dig in! Enjoy!

These are like the ultimate s'more. Ooey, gooey and delicious!

Father's Day Gift Idea

2010-06-18T05:30:00.000-07:00

I thought I would share what me and Dawson made Dave for Father's Day last year in case anybody is still looking for ideas.

Aww!! Look how little my baby was! I can't believe that was just a year ago! This isn't a perfect picture of the shirt that we made Dave, but I think you'll get the idea. I used some fabric markers to write out "Best Dad in the World! Hands Down!" and then I put Dawson's handprints on it. It turned out really cute and Dave loved it!

I hope everybody has a great Father's Day weekend!

Family Movie Night - A Bug's Life

2010-06-15T05:30:00.000-07:00

We had another family movie night last Saturday and it was a blast like usual. :) We were going to be watching A Bug's Life so we planned dinner around that. Here is our dinner table all set up:

We decided to use our picnic table cloth to give it a little bit of a picnic theme. And if you look closely you can see ants wandering around. (Don't worry the "ants" are really just raisins.)

Our movie tickets were set out and ready to be used.

We decided to use some brown construction paper as place mats and I drew some ants on them. For dinner we had piles of dirt (mini meatloaves), an ant hill (mashed potatoes), green plants (salad).

We also had caterpillar rolls.

Ladybugs (strawberries) and more caterpillars (grape kabobs).

And for dessert we dirt and worms (Oreo cheesecake and gummy worms).

I didn't get Dawson's drink in any of the pictures but he was drinking bug juice! (Ok, ok, it was really Mott's for Tots apple juice.)

I had Dawson make a caterpillar out of an egg carton (he LOVES to paint!) and we used his new Rollitt paint set to make the ladybug. He painted a paper plate black and another one red and then I added the dots and put it all together.

And before the movie we changed Dawson into his bug pj's! It was SO hard for me to get a picture of him, he does not like to stay still for long.

I'm really looking forward to our next movie night because we are going to be watching Lilo and Stitch and I have never seen it before! It was hubby's pick and he is definitely going to have to help me with the planning since he has seen it and I haven't.

Muffin Tin Monday - No Theme

2010-06-14T04:45:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday!!! Dawson's tin is pretty simple again this week and filled with food he loves.

Top Row: cheese crackers, chicken fries, cheese
Bottom Row: cheesy pasta shells, ketchup, more cheesy pasta shells

I was super happy that Dawson ate everything except 2 of the chicken fries. I think this is the most he has eaten at a mealtime in MONTHS. Yay!!

To see more muffin tin meals head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

Muffin Tin Monday - Dippers

2010-06-07T06:30:00.000-07:00

There is no theme this week for Muffin Tin Monday so we decided to keep it simple and kind of go with a dipper theme for dinner last night.

First up we have cut up mini meatloaf with ketchup, carrot sticks with ranch and a roll and mashed potatoes.

He ate some of the carrots, the ranch, the ketchup and most of his potatoes.

While he was eating his potatoes (he still won't use utensils so he was using his hands) he was singing or something. I thought it was pretty cute so I took a little video. :)

To see what others did for MTM this week head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

Another Egg Carton Butterfly

2010-06-04T06:30:00.000-07:00

We've been having a lot of fun with our egg cartons lately! Who knew they could be so much fun and you could make such cute things with them?! I already posted about a butterfly craft that we made out of an egg carton and we decided to make another one because it was so different from the first one we did. Dawson loved painting it of course. After it dried I trimmed it up a little more and twisted a pipe cleaner around it.

This definitely won't be the last craft that we do with an egg carton. :)

Family Movie Night - Cars

2010-06-01T06:30:00.000-07:00

This week we decided to watch Cars for our family movie night. I had so much fun planning it and I love how everything turned out.

Last week we got started on making a decoration for our movie night. We let Dawson paint 4 pieces of paper - 1 black, 1 red, 1 yellow and 1 green. He had a lot of fun painting away.

And they all turned out really well!

Now can anybody guess what we did with these?

Anybody?

After they finished drying I cut them up to and glued them together to make a traffic light. It turned out really cute.

I was a little stumped when it came to a craft that we could do on our movie night so I turned to my friends on Facebook. A couple of them had really cute ideas and I absolutely fell in love with one of the ideas that they shared. Let me just tell you that paint plus cookies cutters can potentially equal AMAZING artwork. To see the awesome post that inspired this next craft click here.

He is definitely getting better at stamping...

And it turned out pretty cute. This is definitely something we will be doing again when he gets older. (And I think I might even try out it out, too.)

Now it's time for dinner! We picked up a black table cloth and yellow streamers at the dollar store and turned our table into road! And my AMAZING husband made some checkered flag placemats out of construction paper. (He made the traffic cone, too!)

For dinner we decided to do it tailgating-style. We had chili dogs, pasta salad (in the shape of wheels of course), homemade tortilla chips and queso and soda. I made the chips in the shape of cars and Piston Cups. :)

Movie tickets...

For dessert we had chocolate donuts. I tried to set them up to look like the tires in front of Luigi's.

And you can see some more decorations that we used... some of Dawson's cars, the Cars DVD (we didn't notice until we popped it in to watch it that we grabbed the bonus DVD and not the movie. Oops! A quick trip upstairs fixed that problem.) And check out Dave's awesome traffic cone (it's just missing a garage door or else it could be part of the Cozy Cone Motel).

And Dawson's traffic light.

And I can't forget to add a picture of my cute boys in their Cars shirts (well hubby's isn't a Cars shirt but close enough).

Again Dawson didn't watch too much of the movie but the little bit that he did watch was ADORABLE! You know how at the beginning there is a huge wreck during the race, well Dawson climbed up on me with the most serious look on his face and said "ok cars?" Awwwww!!! He was asking if the cars were ok!! It was the sweetest thing.

We are really loving doing these movie nights and I already have most of the next one planned already! We are going to be watching A Bug's Life! I think we are going to watch it this Saturday as long as we don't have too much going on. Hopefully we'll make it through a little bit more of the movie this time, but if not it's still fun. :)

Muffin Tin Monday - Memorial Day

2010-05-31T08:41:00.000-07:00

We weren't going to do Muffin Tin Monday today because honestly Dawson hasn't been eating very well at all. He won't try anything new and even things that he used to love he won't touch anymore. He's been like this for a few weeks now and it seems like it's getting worse. :( It can be very frustrating at times... I really hope this is just a phase that he gets over quickly.

Last night I had the idea to use his football muffin tin because he LOVES footballs. I thought that might make breakfast a little more exciting for him and maybe he'd eat more...

Top Row: strawberries, toast with strawberry jam, blueberries
Bottom Row: strawberries, cheerios, blueberries

He did LOVE the football tin and got all excited about that, but he definitely didn't eat any better. :( He ate all of the blueberries and strawberries which was expected but he wouldn't touch anything else. *sigh* Hopefully lunch goes better.

To see what others did for Muffin Tin Monday this week visit Muffin Tin Mom's blog.

Happy Memorial Day!

Three Cheese Chicken Penne Pasta

2010-05-30T07:00:00.000-07:00

We tried this Three Cheese Chicken Penne Pasta recipe from kraftrecipes.com the other day and it was so easy and so yummy that I thought I'd share it with you!

Three-Cheese Chicken Penne Pasta Bake

What You'll Need:

1-1/2 cups whole grain penne pasta, uncooked
1 pkg. (9 oz.) fresh spinach leaves
1 lb. boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into bite-size pieces
1 tsp. dried basil leaves
1 jar (14-1/2 oz.) spaghetti sauce
1 can (14-1/2 oz.) diced tomatoes, drained
2 oz. (1/4 of 8-oz. pkg.) PHILADELPHIA Neufchatel Cheese, cubed
1 cup KRAFT 2% Milk Shredded Mozzarella Cheese, divided
2 Tbsp. KRAFT Grated Parmesan Cheese

HEAT oven to 375ºF.

COOK pasta as directed on package, adding spinach to the boiling water the last minute.

COOK and stir chicken and basil in large nonstick skillet sprayed with cooking spray on medium-high heat 3 min. Stir in spaghetti sauce and tomatoes; bring to boil. Simmer on low heat 3 min. or until chicken is done. Stir in Neufchatel.

DRAIN pasta mixture; return to pan. Stir in chicken mixture and 1/2 cup mozzarella. Spoon into 2-qt. casserole or 8-inch square baking dish.

BAKE 20 min.; top with remaining cheeses. Bake 3 min. or until mozzarella is melted.

I need to work on taking pictures of food because I really don't know what I'm doing. *lol* It was really good though and we'll definitely be making it again.

Handprint Crab and the Beach!

2010-05-21T06:30:00.000-07:00

I found this cute little handprint crab over at Ramblings of a Crazy Woman and I knew it would be the perfect craft for us to do this week since we were going to the beach. I changed it up a little bit and let Dawson paint the ocean/water (or "wawa" as he calls it) before we did the crab. I know how much he likes to do crafts and just doing handprints isn't very fun for him...he wants to paint!

Dawson painted SO well! I didn't have to remind him at all to stay on the paper. He did get a little bit of paint on the table but I could tell it was on accident, he seriously amazed me. He did so good!

After the blue paint dried we added his handprints so there would be a crab in the water.

If we do this again (and we just might...) I'd do his handprints first and after they are dry I'd tape a paper over the crab and then let him paint. That way when I take the taped paper off you would still be able to see the crab really well. I still LOVE how it turned out, I love all of his creations.

And before I go here are some pictures from the beach that inspired us to do this craft...

Daddy and Dawson walking towards the water.

Dawson LOVED putting his feet in the water.

He didn't want to leave when we were trying to get him to play in the sand.

He only sat in the sand for about 30 seconds...

And then he took off for the water! (Don't worry Dave is right beside him just out of the picture)

It was hilarious to seem him RUN as FAST as he could toward the water. He wanted to be in the water so bad...

And then he was happy again. :)

Me and my baby.

We'll definitely be headed to the beach a lot this summer because Dawson absolutely loved it.

Family Movie Night - Toy Story

2010-05-18T06:30:00.000-07:00

We had our first family movie night last Saturday and it was really, really fun! While I was setting up and making dinner Dawson colored a picture of Buzz Lightyear. Buzz is definitely his favorite.

He finished it just in time so I could add it to the table with the other decorations. :)

For dinner we had cheese bread in the shape of Woody's hat, boots and his sheriffs star.

And a Pizza Planet pizza in the shape of Buzz Lightyear's spaceship!

And for dessert we had alien cupcakes.

For decorations we put out the Toy Story DVD, a Toy Story Book, Buzz, Woody, Rex, the picture Dawson colored, our movie tickets and one of Dawson's toys.

Oh, and of course Dawson had to use his Toy Story sippy!

After dinner we got ready to watch the movie, but before we did I had to a picture of one more little detail. In the movie Andy writes his name on the bottom of Buzz and Woody's shoes, so we thought we'd do the same. Unfortunately none of Dawson's shoes have white soles and I really didn't feel like painting on the bottom of his shoe so we made it a little more temporary. I still think it's pretty cute. :)

Dawson only watched about 15-20 minutes of the movie before he wanted to get up and play which really didn't surprise us. Even though we didn't get to watch the entire movie we still had a really fun night and we're looking forward to the next one. I think we'll be watching Cars next and I've already got some fun ideas for that.

Muffin Tin Monday - Birds and Nests

2010-05-17T00:00:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday! This week's MTM theme is Birds and Nests. Here is what we came up with:

Top Row: trees (steamed broccoli & cheese), nest (shredded cheese), worms (chicken noodle)

Bottom Row: birds! (chickadees crackers), bird eggs (blueberries), more worms (chicken noodle)

Dawson helped me decide what was going to go in his tin this week. Sorta. As I was putting it together I put some shredded carrots in for the nest even though I pretty much knew he wasn't going to eat them. As soon as I finished putting it together he ran into the kitchen and said "cheese!" And then a light bulb went off. Thanks Dawson! You'll definitely eat shredded cheese, so I swapped out the carrots for cheese. :)

He ate a little bit of everything except for the broccoli, he wouldn't even try that. I think we are going to try broccoli again next week for the Seeds, Plants and Flowers theme.

Dawson has been sitting in a booster at the table with us for the last 2 weeks or so because we realized his high chair had been recalled. We called the company and they are sending us a part to fix the problem but we haven't gotten it yet. I think by the time it does get here he isn't going to want to sit in his high chair anymore since he has been at the table for awhile now. I guess we'll see.

To see what others did this week for Muffin Tin Monday head on over and visit Muffin Tin Mom.

We've Got Tickets!

2010-05-14T07:00:00.000-07:00

We are having our first family movie night this Saturday! I am really excited. We are going to be watching Toy Story and I have a fun little Toy Story themed dinner planned and I'm sure we'll do a craft, too. Although I still haven't come up with a craft yet... any ideas?

We are going to try to have family movie night every other week, hopefully it works out that way. I'll post about our movie nights on Tuesdays since I know everybody is pretty busy on the weekends and we usually do Muffin Tin Monday on Monday.

To see other fun family movie night ideas go check out Three A's and a C. Christina has been doing movie nights with her family for a few weeks now and reading about hers has really gotten me excited to do the same with my family. And if you have family movie nights with your family let me know so I can read about them. :)

Don't forget to come back on Tuesday and see what we did.

It's My SITS Day!!!

2010-05-11T21:00:00.000-07:00

*happy dance* It's my SITS day!!! What does that mean, you ask? Well, basically it means I am the featured blogger over at The Secret is in the Sauce. *applause* Thank you, thank you!

First of all I would like to welcome all my SITStas. I have made so many friends from SITS and I am looking forward to making many more.

I guess I should introduce myself! My name is Jamie and I'm a 26 year old stay-at-home mom. I am married to a handsome sailor named Dave and we have an adorable son named Dawson who is 18 months old. I love cooking, baking, doing crafts with Dawson and just hanging out with my family. You'll find a lot of the crafts that we do and the things that I bake in my blog.

My little family:

Here are a few posts that I would love you check out:

Dawson Dances with Goofy - This is a short video of Dawson dancing with Goofy at Disneyland. He LOVES to dance, in fact he started moving to music before he could even stand up.

Egg Carton Butterfly Craft - Me and Dawson love doing crafts together. This is our most recent craft.

Puppy Cake Pops - I love to make cake pops or anything else that involves baking and being creative at the same time.

Thank you so much for stopping by my blog!!! And a BIG thank you to Heather and Tiffany for letting me have my day and for creating such a great community for all of us. :)

Egg Carton Butterfly

2010-05-10T08:15:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday! Me and Dawson did a few crafts this weekend! I'm excited to show you what we did because they turned out pretty darn cute. The first one that I am going to share is our egg carton butterfly.

I cut out the egg carton for him and then I let him paint it. He did a pretty good job! He didn't always paint on the egg carton, but that's ok because the paint we use is very easy to clean up.

When he was finished painting the egg carton, I got a white piece of cardstock and let him use his Dot Art Paints to paint the paper.

As you can see in the picture he didn't do a lot of dotting. I kept showing him on my own piece of paper how to make dots, but he wanted to color with them. That's ok though, I love how it turned out.

After all the paint dried I cut the cardstock into the shape of butterfly wings and then glue the wings to the egg carton. Then I added a little pipe cleaner to make an antenna.

Dawson liked admiring it when it was finished.

We decided that we are going to use the wall behind his craft/snack table to display his artwork. His table is in the playroom so we will be able to see his art all the time. This butterfly is the first one to go up on the wall. :)

I'm excited to fill that wall up with all of his creations.

Kohl's Cares for Kids - Toy Story

2010-05-06T12:03:00.000-07:00

The Kohl's Cares for Kids program is featuring new books! Toy Story and Toy Story 2! And they've got Buzz Lightyear, Woody and Rex plush toys, too! The books and plush toys are only $5 each. And if you've never heard about the Kohl's Cares for Kids program before let me tell you how great it is! Not only do you get a great deal on books, but they donate 100% of the net profit to children's charities nationwide. To date they have raised more than $126 million nationwide! What a great cause! I'll definitely be heading over to Kohl's today to pick Dawson up some new books. Yay!

Homemade Churro Recipe

2010-05-03T04:00:00.000-07:00

When I told Dave that this week's Muffin Tin Monday theme was Cinco de Mayo he suggested that we make some churros for Dawson's tin. Awesome idea honey!!! We've never made churros before. I looked up some different recipes and found the one that I wanted to use on AllRecipes.com. After reading the reviews we decided to tweak the recipe a little and they turned out perfect! This is the recipe that we ended up using:

What you'll need:

1 cup water
1 tablespoon white sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 quarts oil for frying
1/2 cup white sugar, or to taste
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1. In a small saucepan over medium heat, combine water, 1 tablespoon sugar, salt and 1 tablespoon vegetable oil. Bring to a boil and remove from heat. Stir in flour until mixture forms a ball.

2. Heat oil for frying in deep-fryer or deep skillet to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Pipe strips of dough into hot oil using a pastry bag. (I used a Wilton 4B tip.) Fry until golden; drain on paper towels.

3. Combine 1/2 cup sugar and cinnamon in a plastic bag. Place drained churros (a few at a time) into bag with sugar mixture and shake until well coated.

Dave said they were just as good as any churro that he's gotten at the fair. I think they are better than any churro that I've gotten at the fair because half the time those churros are stale. These were so yummy and so easy!

Muffin Tin Monday - Cinco de Mayo

2010-05-03T03:59:00.000-07:00

Welcome to another installment of Muffin Tin Monday! This week's theme is Cinco de Mayo. A few days ago I told my husband what the theme was and asked him if he had any ideas for it...he said we should make churros! So we did and they turned out SO good and they were SO easy! (Homemade churro recipe)

Anyway, here is Dawson's tin.

Top Row: bean and cheese quesadilla
Bottom Row: homemade tortilla chips, "salsa" (really just tomatoes), homemade churros

To see other muffin tin meals head on over to Muffin Tin Mom.

Bread Machine Cinnamon Rolls

2010-04-29T07:00:00.000-07:00

If you have a bread maker and you love cinnamon rolls then you *must* try this recipe that I found over at Money Saving Mom. They are SO easy and they taste SO good!

Bread Machine Cinnamon Rolls

Dough:
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons warm milk
3 tablespoons canola oil
1 egg, lightly beaten plus 2 egg whites
1/2 cup sugar
4 cups flour (Add a bit more if dough seems too wet after first few minutes of kneading in the bread machine.)
1 teaspoon salt
3 teaspoons active yeast

Filling:
2 tablespoons butter
2/3 cup brown sugar mixed with 1 tablespoon cinnamon

Icing:
1 teaspoon milk (I had to add more milk because it just wasn't coming together for me.)
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
4 tablespoons (or less) butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla

Put the dough ingredients in the bread machine in the order listed and run on the dough cycle.

After the dough cycle is finished, roll the dough into a large rectangle and spread it with 2 Tablespoons melted butter and 2/3 cup brown sugar mixed with 1 Tablespoon cinnamon.

Roll up and cut into 10-15 rolls and place in two greased round cake pans.

Bake at 325 degrees for 20 minutes or until browned.

Spread the icing on as soon as they come out of the oven.

If you want to make the dough and roll out the rolls the night before (which is what I did and why you don't see pictures of the first few steps...it was like 11 o'clock and I was tired. *lol*) you can put plastic wrap over the cake pans and stick them in the fridge until you are ready to bake them in the morning.

Muffin Tin Monday - Mickey Mouse

2010-04-26T13:10:00.000-07:00

There is no theme for Muffin Tin Monday this week so we decided to do our theme. Mickey Mouse! When we were at Disneyland a couple of weeks ago I couldn't pass up buying some stuff that we could use for MTM!

I couldn't resist bringing down his Mickey ears and I was really hoping that he would wear them while he ate lunch but he didn't want to. Oh, well. I tried. :)

Mickeyroni and cheese, Minnie and Donald cookies, toast

Mickeyroni and cheese, yogurt with Mickey sprinkles, Mickey shaped jello

And for dessert a Mickey cupcake!

This is Dawson's first muffin tin meal sitting on a booster at the table. He's usually in his highchair. We'll probably still use his highchair, but he really likes sitting at the table with me and dada.

To check out other muffin tins head on over to Muffin Tin Mom.

Mickey Mouse Cupcakes

2010-04-26T05:30:00.005-07:00

While we were at Disneyland a couple of weeks ago I bought a few things that I thought would be perfect for our muffin tin meals. This week there wasn't a set theme for Muffin Tin Monday, so I decided it would be the perfect time to do our own Mickey Mouse theme. And it gave me the perfect excuse to make these Mickey Mouse cupcakes that I have been thinking about for a couple of weeks now. They didn't turn out quite as perfect as I had imagined, but they are still pretty cute and pretty easy to make.

I baked some cupcakes, frosted them and then dipped them in crushed up Oreos. For the ears I used mini Nilla wafers, frosted those and dipped them in crushed up Oreos, too. And the buttons on front are white confetti sprinkles.

If you wanted to make some Minnie Mouse cupcakes, too, these red and white polka dot baking cups from Bake It Pretty would be perfect for them! And then you wouldn't have to stick on a whole bunch of confetti to make it look like Minnie's dress. For the bow you probably find some candy that would work, or just piping out some colored frosting in the shape of a bow would be pretty easy. Ok, now I want to make Minnie cupcakes!

I'm happy with Mickey for now though.

I used Mickey sprinkles on some of the cupcakes, too.

Sooooooooooooo yummy!

DIY Personalized Disney Shirts

2010-04-21T05:30:00.000-07:00

Before we went to Disneyland I decided I wanted to get us matching Mickey head shirts to wear. I looked around on Etsy and the shirts were $18 each and not exactly what I was looking for.

My friend Christina over at Three A's and a C is obsessed with all things Disney, so I decided to ask her if she knew where I could get what I was looking for. Well, it turns out she had just made her family Mickey head shirts for a trip to Disney World that they took in March. Once she told me how easy it was to make them, I knew I had to try it out! She also told me where to find a ton of cute Mickey heads on photobucket.

So, I found the Mickey heads I wanted to use, then I personalized them in Photoshop. Here is what Dawson's looked like:

Then I printed the Mickey heads out on some transfer paper, cut them out, got the t-shirts I wanted to use and ironed them on. (Actually hubby ironed them on for me because me and the iron are not friends. Thanks hubby.) So easy! And they turned out so cute!

Here we are wearing them at Disneyland!

I'm going to be making Dawson another shirt sometime within the next couple of days, I'll post it when I do and show you how it turned out.

Creamy White Chili Recipe

2010-04-19T05:30:00.000-07:00

I didn't do a lot of cooking while Dave was deployed because it's hard to cook for 1...well technically 1 1/2, but Dawson isn't always the best eater so I'm not counting him. So now that Dave is back I've started trying out all the new recipes that I've been wanting to try. I love being able to cook again!

This is recipe that I got from a friend. She brought this soup to the Superbowl party that my parents had and I was in love with it when I tried it. Seriously, I love this soup.

2 lbs. chicken breast cooked and diced
1 lg. onion diced
3 cans great northern beans drained and rinsed
2 (14oz) cans chicken broth
1 (7oz) can green chilies diced
1 tsp. garlic powder
2 tsp. salt
2 tsp. cumin
2 tsp. oregano
2 tsp. chili powder
1/4-1/2 tsp. pepper
2 cups sour cream
1 cup whipping cream or half & half

Combine chicken, onion, beans, broth, chilies, and seasonings. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer uncovered for 30-35 minutes.

Stir in sour cream and milk.

Serve immediately. Serves about 6

This soup is heaven.

Hubby and I agreed that next time that I make it I should add a little more pepper and chili powder. And instead of 2 cups of sour cream I am going to start with 1 and see how it looks and tastes and add more if it needs it. ***We tried it with 1 cup of sour cream instead of 2 and we like it better with 2 cups of sour cream. It was still good though.***

We just had this for dinner a few days ago (and I ate it for lunch 3 days in a row finishing up the leftovers) and I am already ready to make it again. It is that good!

Small Talk Six - Tearjerker Films

2010-04-16T19:51:00.007-07:00

Six movies that make me cry.

1- 8 Seconds
2- Titanic
3- The Notebook
4- Armageddon
5- Patch Adams
6- Brother Bear

I could name a lot more, it doesn't take much to make me cry, but those are the ones that I could think of without digging through all my movies.

To join in and see what movies other people have listed head on over to MomDot.

Pictures From Disneyland

2010-04-16T08:00:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from our trip to Disneyland last week. I have about a gazillion pictures, but I'll just post some of my favorites. :) We had SO much fun. We went to Disneyland for 3 days and met 20 characters and rode about 10 rides. The trip was perfect!

Inside "it's a small world"

Uh-oh! My boys got locked up in Toontown!

Dawson at White Rabbit's house.

And I have to show off the cute jacket and hat that Dawson got because I LOVE them!

And if you missed the video that I posted on Wednesday of Dawson dancing with Goofy you can see it here.

Wordless Wednesday - Dawson and Goofy

2010-04-13T19:15:00.005-07:00

Dawson dancing with Goofy at Goofy's Kitchen. (Disneyland)

To see other Wordless Wednesday posts visit 5 Minutes For Mom and Seven Clown Circus.

Mickey Pops

2010-04-13T05:00:00.000-07:00

We went to Disneyland last week and before we left I made some cute little Mickey pops that I saw over at Three A's and a C. They were super easy and turned out super cute! I used oreos, mini nilla wafers, chocolate bark and lollipop sticks.

They are not as cute as the Mickey cake pops that Bakerella posted on Sunday (thanks a lot Bakerella for making these little guys look so plain! *lol*) but they are quick and easy for when your not in the mood to bake, but still want a cute little treat.

I think I am going to make these again sometime in the near future and I am going to add a face to them using the instructions that Bakerella did on her cake pops.

I'm going to post pictures from our trip to Disneyland later this week so make sure to check back to see those. And there will be an adorable video of Dawson dancing with Goofy in tomorrow's Wordless Wednesday post.

Muffin Tin Monday - Colors of the Rainbow

2010-04-11T23:00:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday!!! This week's MTM theme is Colors of the Rainbow. I'm really looking forward to seeing what everybody came up with because I love colorful tins. Here is what Dawson had...

tomatoes, cantaloupe, bananas
avocado on ritz, blueberries and grapes

Dawson enjoyed his tin and ate pretty much everything except the tomatoes and bananas.

And then he ate a rainbow cupcake that I made for dessert.

Those were a big hit! So cute and so yummy!

Head on over to Muffin Tin Mom for more fabulous muffin tin meals.

Rainbow Cupcakes

2010-04-10T14:30:00.002-07:00

This coming Monday's muffin tin theme is the colors of the rainbow so I decided to make some rainbow cupcakes to go in Dawson's tin. They are super easy to make and I thought I would share them now in case anybody else wants to make them for their tin on Monday.

I used white cake mix and made the mix according to the directions on the package and then I followed the directions on Disney's Family Fun website to separate the mix and add the food coloring.

I love how pretty the colors look. And they look pretty cool once you put them in the tin, too.

While the cupcakes were baking I made vanilla frosting from this Pioneer Woman recipe. SO good and so easy!

After the cupcakes came out of the oven and cooled for a bit I frosted them. Voila, yummy rainbow cupcakes.

Make sure to come back on Monday and see what else was in Dawson's colors of the rainbow tin.

Easter Cake Pops

2010-04-02T04:30:00.000-07:00

My husband had never had a cake pop before so I decided to make some this week. They didn't turn out exactly how I had imagined, but they tasted great so that's ok.

They didn't turn out quite as cute as Bakerella's but I'm glad that I made them anyway.

I hope everybody has a great Easter weekend!

Wordless Wednesday

2010-03-30T21:03:00.002-07:00

Daddy and son after 8 months of deployment

You can see more pictures from his homecoming here.

Hubby's Homecoming

2010-03-30T04:30:00.001-07:00

Dave is home! I can't even explain how great it is to have him back! I thought I would take a minute to share some of the pictures we got of his homecoming on Friday.

Me, Dawson and Dave's mom, were waiting at the pier to watch the ship pull in. Dawson fell asleep in his stroller while we were waiting which made the morning a lot easier. I think we were at the pier for just under 2 hours when we saw the ship coming. That was such an exciting moment!

Here they come!

We were standing in the perfect spot. (We found a little corner away from the HUGE crowd that seemed to have a better view than where everybody else was.) The ship pulled in right in front of us. And Dave, his dad, his brother-in-law and nephew (the 3 of them joined the ship in WA for the Tiger Cruise) were standing on the flight deck almost right in front us... Dave's mom was waving a welcome home sign and her jacket through the gate so they were able to find us and then we found them...

Can you see them?

You probably can't in that picture...let me zoom in a little more...

We were SO happy to see them!!! Dawson was still napping...

It took a little while before they could start letting people off the ship, but luckily time seemed to be going by pretty quickly. We were excited to see people starting to come off...

Dawson finally woke up, but he wanted to lay down on me for a few more minutes.

And then finally we saw Dada!

Dawson wouldn't let Dave hold him at first...

But he wouldn't take his eyes off him and he had the sweetest smile on his face. I could tell he was happy to see his daddy.

After a few minutes I put Dawson down and he started running around and Dave was chasing after him. After a couple minutes of that he finally let Dave hold him.

By the time we had walked to the truck about 15-20 minutes later, Dawson was saying "mama dada!" We could tell that he was excited that both of us were there now.

It didn't take long for Dawson to warm up to Dave at all. He has been home for a couple of days now and it's as if he was never gone.

Muffin Tin Monday - Blue and Purple

2010-03-29T07:37:00.005-07:00

Happy Monday! This muffin tin meal is special for us because it's the first one that daddy has been able to participate in. :) He returned home from his deployment on Friday! Yay! I'm going to post pictures of his homecoming tomorrow. It was such an emotional and exciting day. It was just awesome!

This week's MTM theme is the colors blue and purple. We decided to give Dawson a breakfast tin.

Top Row: toast with grape jelly, froot loops, blueberries

Bottom Row: blue scrambled eggs, blueberry yogurt, purple grapes

To see what others did this week, make sure to check out Muffin Tin Mom.

$25 Amazon Gift Card Winner

2010-03-23T04:00:00.000-07:00

Before I announce the winner let me tell you a little story. I had 65 entries on my giveaway! Yay! I was so excited that so many people stopped by to enter! I decided I better read some tutorials on how to number my comments that way finding a winner would be easier and accurate. It took me about 45 minutes to figure it out, but I did it! (I hope nobody has issues leaving comments now. I am probably going to change it back in a few days because I like having the comments pop-up better than I like having them embedded. Hopefully I can figure out how to change it back...)

Anyway! After I got it all figured out I headed over to random.org to see who the winner was...

My friend over at Three A's and a C won! Congratulations, Christina!

This giveaway was SO much fun and I want to thank everybody who entered! I love having giveaways and I know this definitely will not be my last.

Oh, and if you read the beginning you know that I spent 45 minutes trying to figure out how to number my comments...and then the generator picked comment #2! So yeah, that was totally a waste of time. *lol* I totally could have counted 2 comments accurately without them being numbered. But that's ok, at least I know how to do it now for future giveaways. :-)

No Sew Fleece Mickey Mouse Blanket

2010-03-18T04:30:00.003-07:00

We are going to Disneyland in 18 days! Dave and Dawson have never been before (well, Dave went to Hong Kong Disney, but he's never been to Disneyland in Anaheim, California) and we are all really excited about the trip! A few months ago when I started planning our trip I started to develop a major obsession for Mickey Mouse. I have always loved everything Disney, I buy Disney movies as soon as they come out, even if I haven't seen them before, but I wouldn't say I have ever been obsessed with Disney...until now. It's not all things Disney that I'm obsessed with, like I mentioned before it's this cute little Mouse that has me hooked! I decided that I wanted to make Dawson a Mickey Mouse blanket that he can use while we are staying in the hotel at Disneyland. (I bought him some cute Mickey Mouse pj's, too, I can't wait for him to wear them!)

Anyway, about the blanket, I have never made a blanket before so I wanted to start out with something simple. I went to Jo-Ann's and picked out the 2 pieces of fleece that I wanted. I got 4 yards total, 2 yards of Mickey and 2 yards of red.

Then I trimmed the edges that needed to be trimmed...

Next I laid the 2 pieces of fleece on top of each other. One side of the fleece is a little fuzzier than the other side, I made sure the fuzzier side of each piece was facing each other and then I trimmed what I needed to, to make sure they were the same size. I forgot to take a picture of this step, but I think it's simple enough.

Then I cut a piece of paper into a 5 inch square, and I used that paper as my guide to cut all 4 corners off both pieces of fleece.

Then I lined my yard stick up to use as a guide so I would know where to stop cutting. One end was lined up with one of the corners that I had just cut out...

And I used my measuring tape to make sure that I had my yard stick lined up straight on the other end of it.

Then I started cutting my strips, I tried to make them each about 1 inch wide, but I was just eyeing it, it would have taken FOREVER to measure before I cut each strip.

After they were all cut I tied each strip together. (A Mickey strip to a red strip) And I forgot to take a picture of this step, too. Oops!

Here is the finished product... the Mickey side...

And the other side...

It is so soft and comfy, I love it and Dawson thinks it's pretty neat, too.

St. Patrick's Day Crafts

2010-03-16T04:30:00.001-07:00

I ordered Dawson a table and chairs set two weeks ago and last week it came in! I was able to put it together while he was napping and when he woke up I was anxious for him to try it out, so I had a couple activities set up for him.

First of all I printed out a St. Patrick's Day page for him to color. I have tried coloring with him a few times since before he was even a year old and he really hadn't gotten the hang of it. He was more interested in eating the crayons. So I really didn't expect him to do much, but I figured we would try again anyway and he totally surprised me! He colored! On the paper (and on the table, thank goodness for Mr. Clean Magic Erasers!) and he did such a great job!

I love how he was actually moving the crayon back and forth on the paper. Yay!

Don't you just love it?! I am so proud!

Next up was a sticker collage. A few weeks ago I saw a post over at Three A's and a C where she did a sticker activity with her daughter who is about the same age as Dawson, and I knew I wanted to try it with Dawson, too!

I handed him the stickers and let him put them wherever he wanted. I had to push the stickers down after he placed them because he kept trying to take them back off.

Here is how his sticker collage turned out:

He had a lot of fun and so did I. I am happy we have a little table for him to do crafts at now, I'm sure we are going to get a lot of use out of it.