Tasty Tuesday

Alright all...I have a few recipes to share on this Tasty Tuesday!

The first recipe is one that I stole from Abby's blog and is PHENOMENAL!  When I was trying to think of different appetizers to make for my Jewelry Party I had last week, I made 2 different items and both were tasty.

BUFFALO CHICKEN BITES

3 cups shredded cooked chicken 
1/2 cup Frank's hot sauce (or a little more if you like things hot)
4 oz cream cheese
2 cups medium shredded cheddar cheese

Mix all that up very, very well and then make little balls with the mixture and lay out on a plate.

Now you will need:

1 cup flour
4 eggs, beaten
3-4 cups panko

Add each of those to their own bowl for dipping.  First bowl will be flour, second bowl eggs, and third bowl panko and place them in a line.

Dip the balls into the flour first, then the egg, and finally cover with panko before adding to the greased pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes...

The Chicken Bites taste just like the dip but is LOTS, LOTS, LOTS, and LOTS of extra work.  So if you don't have the time or patience, I would HIGHLY and STRONG recommend that you make the Buffalo Chicken Dip!

Of the two recipes I made last week for my party, the chicken was my favorite but this next one was tasty as well!

Pizza Fondue

1 small onion
1 lb ground beef
2 T butter (I omitted this)
1 T oregano (I didn't have any so I used pizza seasoning)
1 T garlic powder
1 T corn starch (I omitted this since I didnt have it on hand)
2 (10 oz) cans pizza sauce
10 oz shredded cheddar cheese
1 cup shredded Mozzerella Cheese

Brown hamburger and onion with butter (I also added a can of mushrooms and a half a package of turkey pepperoni I had in the fridge).  Drain.  Mix spices and corn starch with pizza sauce. 

Pour sauce over hamburger and cook until bubbly.  Add cheese.  Put in crock pot and serve with italian bread that has been baked so it's nice and crusty. 


There ya go...my 2 tasty recipes for this week.  I made a new meal tonight, so if you are all lucky and if I remember...I will post another tasty recipe this week!

Oh geez...how could I forget to share this...Paige slept in her bed all night by herself Monday night.  She must of been tuckered out from Preschool.  LOVE IT...lets see if she does it again tonight.  Anyone want to make bets with me...?

Maniac Monday

I would like to call my Maniac Monday...Mexican Monday!  Tonight at the last minute we decided to go to El Mariachi for supper.  YUM YUM YUM.  If you have never been there, it is a must.  It is in Johnston!  I opted out for making supper tonight because of our busy schedule this week and had no free time this week except for tonight to get Paige dance stuff.  OMG....this girl just costs too much already.  All I can say is that I hope her feet don't grow before recital time :)

Today was a special day because it was Paige's 1st day of 3 year old preschool.  Paige was super excited and couldn't wait.  I could tell she was going to like preschool because the minute we opened up the door to school, she marched up the stairs and was ready to play.  That was a good feeling for me and knew she was going to have a good year.

Paige wanted to take a picture on the mower-

What a smile Paige!

A little side profile shot...work it girl :)

Of course...she is wearing "powder", necklaces, and bracelet.  She even curled her eyelashes this morning.  I think we have our hands full with this chica!

Workin it again~~~~

Approaching preschool...

Paige has her own cubbie and hook for her backpack.  (Do you remember book orders?!  Paige came home with 3 book orders tonight.  When I was in school, I looked forward to ordering from the book orders.)

As I mentioned, dance starts next week and we have nothing!  So tonight I made my first dance shopping experience with Paige.  We walked into the store and Paige was in heaven with all the dance outfits and "pretties".  This was quite the ordeal buying ballet shoes, tap shoes, tights, and a dance outfit.  The staff was very very very helpful and knew exactly what to do with Paige and what she needed.  The lady put the tap shoes on Paige and the second she stepped down, they made the tap noise and she giggled and thought that was so cool.  The little things in life that make Paige giggle...LOVE IT.

While we were looking for a dance outfit, I noticed they had gymnastic outfits.  Paige will be signed up for gymnastics as well in Ankeny starting next week.  The result = buying a leotard.  I loved the leotard she picked.  You can't really tell in the picture but it was lime green, pink, orange, and all sorts of fun colors.

She must of been stretching in this picture??

I think she likes it!?

Will she be a dancer/gymnast or a volleyball and etc. girl?  That is the tough question!

Paige picked out a purple outfit for dance.

After spending some $, I was ready to get out of there and pray that she will NOT grow out of any of this for this year.  Overall, this was a fun night and something that I will look forward to doing with my girl every year.

~~~Good Night all~~~~

Sunday FUNday

Wowza....what a busy week we had!  What a relief the week and weekend is done and time to start a new week.  

This weekend Tiffany and I hosted a baby shower for Lindsey and Joey Saturday night.  It was a great time and everything turned out peachy!  Shout out to Tiffany for making the BEST diaper cake :)

Sunday us girls had another baby shower for Lindsey.  Holy cow she received lots and lots of nice baby items.  As I write this post right now, Paige has been sleeping for about 2 hours, she must of been tired.  

Paige starts preschool tomorrow as well as a new daycare.  They will both be at the same house and I think she love having the 2 1/2 hours of preschool.  It's sad to think that Paige will be starting preschool already...my baby is growing up.  I shall report how the first day goes for Paige.

The picture below was taken Thursday night, but since I obviously haven't blogged, I had to post the picture tonight.  Just wanted to show everyone that Paige is getting better at putting her headbands on :)

Friday night, Paige and I went out to Jordan Creek and went school shopping.  We found her a new backpack and a few new outfits.  Following the school shopping we ate at Chick-fila (LOL - not sure how they spell their name!)

Speaking of the restaurant, I was blown away by this new ketchup invention.  These rocked and were so convenient.  

By the looks of this picture, Paige may have a little fighter in her?

Paige is getting to be quite the expert at driving her car.  The kids cruised all night in this thing.  Paige drove her cousins around (Sam 2 years old and Blakely 1 year old)

With all 3 kids in the car, I got a little nervous.  But they didn't mind.

What cute kids!

HAWKS...HAWKS...HAWKS...

vs

Huskers

Paige just loves Natalie and being around her!  This morning the girls were in Paige's room playing and came out in their outfits.  Just getting ready for football season!

ugh...time to go fold laundry.  I wish laundry would fold itself.  Is that possible?  PLEASE??!!!

Have a good week everyone and lets hope Paige has a good week at her new Preschool/daycare.

Tasty Tuesday

Sorry folks....I was to busy to blog on Sunday because we were having too much fun-

 Paige swept the garage floor (in her PJs)

Rode her car

We went to Kohls the other night and Paige still has a merchandise credit there.  So Paige picked out headbands and chapstick.  Here she is sporting her new headband (her hair was wet)

I was bored Sunday afternoon so I used my curlers to curl my hair.  Paige saw me and wanted her hair done too!

Paige thought she was pretty cool because her bed got taller!  I finally put a box spring under the mattress and it defiantly raised her bed up more.

Monday night I was not able to blog either due to it being a Maniac Monday night.  As you can see Paige was a maniac last night with her pink headband.  I just have to laugh at this because she reminds me of someone in the Richard Simmons workout videos.  Right?!

I'm such a mean mom...I took a picture of the back of her head because it was the best :)

This brings us to Tasty Tuesday.

Sunday night we went over to Lindsey and Joey's house for supper.  I was TOLD to bring a corn casserole.  So what do I do.....?  I head over to my trusty friend Abby's food blog and start searching.  I wanted something different and I found it!  Thanks Abby for the recipe.  Everyone loved the corn casserole.

1 can whole corn (undrained)
1 can creamed corn
1 stick margarine (I used light margarine)
8 oz. sour cream (I used light SC)
1 egg
1 box Jiffy Corn Muffin Mix

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Melt butter in microwave.  Beat egg in separate bowl.  Combine corn, sour cream, corn muffin mix, then add the egg and muffin mix.  Spray 9*13 pan with cooking spray and then add the mixture.  Cook in oven for 55 minutes.  To test if its done, stick a tooth pick in the casserole and when it comes out clear, it's done!

Whats UP Wednesday

What is going on everyone on this fine beautiful Wednesday?

I'll tell you what is going on with me...came home to Paige sleeping!  It is amazing how much stuff you can get accomplished in like a half hour while your child is sleeping.  I was able to make tater tot casserole, stuffed jalapenos, pick up Paige's room, bathroom, and my room!  I thought I better take advantage of the girl sleeping and get my blog in.

I left you all on a suspense Monday night, I know you are all anxious to find out what we did last night!  Let me tell ya, it was nothing too exciting but it was exciting for us.

Where do I start with our fun night?  First off, I would like to say thanks to Lindsey for making an itinerary for our evening.  I told her we were only going if she did that and stuff to do with Paige.  Lindsey came through on my request and she was successful!  I love having plans and knowing what we are doing.  If you have not guessed what we did yet....we went to the....IOWA STATE FAIR!

First stop was Little Helping Hands on the Farm.  I was amazed by this, and thought they did a great job putting this interactive farm together.  Paige took the bucket when we started but she refused to wear an apron :(

The farm consisted of planting your vegetables in the dirt...

Picking the apples off the tree...

Paige was pretty pumped because she found a "pink" apple on the tree, so of course that was the one she picked and placed in her basket.

There were a few other jobs to do on the farm but I didn't bother to put the pictures up...don't want to bore my fellow followers too much with our fun night!

Paige then got a gas can to fill her tractor up and hauled her basket of goodies...

She then milked "Besie" I think that was her name!

Now this is the part that I think was pretty cool and taught kids something!

All the food/produce that was in the basket, Paige had to sell it at the Farmer's Market...

After selling her goods, she received money for it...

Then with her hard earned $1, she got to pick one item out of the grocery store.  She chose a bomb pop.  But wow, they had some great items in the grocery store.  Just noticed Paige could had bought a loaf of bread!!  That would had come in handy at home.

Of course, we had to go see the John Deere tractors.  HOLD UP....  I would like to say CONGRATS to my niece Blakely for making it in the John Deere 2013 Calender.  Her 1 year old picture was sent to John Deere and they picked her to represent a month in the calender.  I will share the picture sometime. My niece is going to be FAMOUS :)

SPARKLES = PAIGE!

Paige spotted this ice cream from afar and we got our pictures next to it.  Paige wanted to get a picture with Baby Stewart.

Then she finally agreed to take a picture with mommy...

Paige was wound for sound last night!  My dad wanted to listen to some music so we went to Stockmans to get a beer and then sat at the Dinner Bell because Lindsey was swelling up like a balloon!  Lindsey and my dad ordered a sandwich while Paige ran through the Dinner Bell and watched the horses go by.  Notice Paige's scrapes on her nose and lip! I didn't think it was going to look that bad...poor girl!

Mr. Ronald had one more request as we were walking out of the fair, stop at Hairball.  So we did.  Remember, Lindsey is swelled up like a balloon and this wasn't on her itinerary, so we were kind of nervous.  BUT she let us watch the concert for a little bit.  Not too sure who had more fun at it, Paige or mommy?  We probably watched for half hour and the whole time Paige wanted on my shoulders to watch and clapped her hands the whole time.  

The poor girl was having so much fun, she was sad when we left.  She asked if we could stay longer to listen to the band.  What a trooper she is.  While walking back to the car, we were able to hear The Band Perry finish their concert followed by fireworks.  Paige gave us a double thumbs up for the evening.

See ya next year Iowa State Fair - it was fun and now I can say I have been once this year and that is good for me.

Well....my casserole is done so that means I better go wake up Paige and eat.  Have a good night everyone!

Maniac Monday

Who would had thought that I would blog 2 days in a row!  Wow - must be a miracle :)

For Christmas, Paige received an Ant farm from my parents.  I just remembered that we had it so Bryon ordered the ants and they came in the mail the other day.  Last night, Paige and I attempted to be successful in getting the ants in the farm.  I'm never good at this stuff!  Bryon said there was to be 30 ants sent, but I'm not sure if we received that many or if some died...WHO KNOWS.  

 GOOD WORK PAIGE!

 This is the part where I did it wrong!  We should had put the tube in the side and let the ants crawl in.  However, I was reading the directions and that is what it said to do!  Bryon said another set of directions online said to put them in through the side, which makes LOTS OF MORE SENSE!

Well I can report today, out of the supposedly 31 ants, only 2 are living tonight.

Following our ant farm, Paige and I thought painting would be more successful for us!

 I guess here is another picture of Paige trying to get the ants to go in!

Back to our painting!

This now leads us to our nature walk that we did tonight. If you can recall, Paige and Launa went on a nature walk with me a few months ago.  Paige wanted to do it again tonight but thought we needed a the buggy as well.  However, we didn't have Launa with us either :(

 Paige had to feed her baby before we left.  The baby ate hot dogs!

Our walk finally started, Paige wanted me to take a picture of her and her cart!

Does this count as part of the nature walk?  It does, but it won't fit in our zip lock bag Paige!

Paige was tuckered out after about 5 minutes of walking and needed water

She cracks me up...

WOW - Paige must be out of shape!

Following this, Paige got tired and wanted me to push her.  So I had the bright idea of having her sit on top of the buggy and me pushing her.  However, my back got tired of bending over so I started pushing her by holding onto the top of her head and doing it that way.  Well NOT SO SMART...I think we hit a crack in the road or a rock or maybe even Paige moved an inch...whatever it was, it was not good!  The buggy goes flips forward and Paige goes tumbling out and lands with her face in the road, hands out and legs out.  CRYING CRYING CRYING!!!!  Of course, she got her lip and started bleeding.  So i dusted her off and put all of our belongings back in the buggy and trucked back home.  I don't think Paige got the hint that I knew her lip hurt.  She cried the whole way home!  But I do have to say, after carrying her in one arm and the buggy in the other arm, I asked her to walk for a little bit and the "princess at the time" got down and walked!  Holy cow!

So we got home and she examined her knees, legs, arms, face, and her toes!

What a cute picture Paige...sorry...I have seen way better of you.  But check out the lip.  OWIE!

So guys...that was my night.  I do have to say that I made some pretty good marinated pork chops, mushrooms, and rice tonight for supper.  YUMMY :)

Tomorrow will be exciting...tune in tomorrow night or the night after (depending on how tired I am) to see what Paige and I have going on tomorrow night!