I CAN do it!

I've been canning apple butter and pear butter for years and the past couple summers, I've canned relish also.  This year, I knew I wanted to do a bit more and it's certainly kept me busy!

I started out with dill pickle chips.  I loosely followed this recipe, but they aren't as crispy as I would have liked.  Hopefully next year, I can remedy that.

Since I still had several jars of zucchini relish left from last year, I didn't make anymore than Yvette and I made when we were visiting one weekend.  I could eat this with a spoon!

We also made pineapple squash and I did make another batch of that at home.  Had to use up all that yellow squash and zucchini!

Then I moved onto cinnamon pickles, which I ended up making a second batch of because the first batch wasn't crisp.  These are a bit labor intensive but definitely worth the effort!  They are so yummy and Konny loves them!  SCORE!

Next up was pickle spears.  These came out crispy and super yummy.  I made several batches.

Our garden was a bit crazy with jalapenos this year and E loves to eat them, so we canned them up!  I enlisted him to cut them up for me!  I didn't really follow a recipe for these, just threw in a little bit of garlic, celery seed and mustard seed.  There is still a lot left, so I'll be pickling another batch and making some cowboy candy too!

The husband also loves okra, so he brought me home a bag from his parent's garden and I canned that for him too.

Finally...SALSA!  I would seriously love to make TONS more of this.  It's super tasty but I would rather gut a deer anyday than peel and seed tomatoes.  What a chore and it takes sooo many!  We will have to settle for 10 pints of this and 2 are already gone!

I'll be getting some apples from Azure Standard next month to make apple butter and apple sauce.  We usually get pears from one of E's coworkers too, if the late freeze didn't kill them this year.

We still have some green tomatoes in our garden, so if they continue to ripen up I might make some zucchini salsa.  I would also really like to make some sweet spiced zucchini pickles but that will have to wait until next year!

I love going downstairs and seeing all my hard work! 
It's definitely rewarding!

Pinterest is also for Husbands!

Pinterest doesn't just inspire fun recipes and projects for me.  It also inspires me to ask Eric to build me things!  Ahhh, what would we do without pinterest?

We used to keep all our balls in the wagon, but when I sold it, we needed storage for all the soccer balls, bouncy ball and footballs.  I happened to see an idea on pinterest which Eric was able to recreate with no problem at all!

We were also needing a place for backpacks and jackets during the school year.  I'd been looking at different cubbies/locker type things on pinterest for awhile.  I showed Eric the ideas and this is what he came up.  It's so nice not to have the kids stuff spread out everywhere, plus there's no last minute morning scramble to find their stuff!

Guess it's time to find another project for him.  I'm so lucky to have such a handy and talented husband!  Maybe I need a board specifically for honey-do projects!

Embracing the yellow squash

Eric's parents gave us sooo much produce this year.  I was so thankful to have it because we ended up with squash bugs again.  One thing there was lots of was yellow squash and I was thinking....okay, what exactly am I supposed to do with all of this?!?! 

Pinterest to the rescue!!

I learned pretty quickly, you can just shred it up like zucchini and bake with it.  The first thing I made was Zucchini and Yellow Squash Bread.  I made the usual allergy friendly adjustments and instead of equal amounts of 1.5 cups of each squash, I did 1 cup zucchini and 2 cups yellow squash.  It was super yummy and the kids gobbled it up!

Next I tried Southern Baked Yellow Squash.  Oooh yes!  It's so delicious.  I believe Kelton and I were the biggest fans and we ate most of it!

I wanted to can some yellow squash too, so I was searching recipes for relish and pickles when I came across a recipes for canning squash as if it were pineapple.  YUM! 

Putting zucchini in brownies is a pretty common thing, right?  So Yellow Squash Brownies should be pretty tasty too, right?  They were!

I saw several recipes on pinterest that used pureed yellow squash.  I knew I wanted to give that a try, but couldn't decide on a recipe, so I just used my go-to oat muffin recipe.

I seeded, cut up, and steamed 3 small/medium-ish yellow squash.

Then I pureed it in my blender and measured out 1 cup. 

1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup brown rice flour
1/2 cup oat flour
1 tsp xanthan gum
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup oil
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup pureed yellow squash

Heat oven to 375.  Combine dry ingredients and wet ingredients separately.  Fold wet ingredients into dry until just combined.  Spoon into muffins papers and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.  Bake 20 to 25. Makes 1 dozen.

I felt like these were rather bland, even with the cinnamon sugar on top.  Maybe adding 1 tsp pink sea salt and using 3/4 cup sucanat instead of regular sugar next time would make a difference.

Not that the kids had any trouble eating them, especially with some butter and honey!

Isn't yellow squash fun?  I can't wait until next summer to continue finding yummy ways to use it up!

Good Morning Protein Smoothie

I like to drink a smoothie in the morning on my way to work.  I feel like it's the perfect filling breakfast.   However, carrying my purse, my other bag, my smoothie and my coffee in the morning gets to be more than I can handle.  So I came cup with this go-to breakfast smoothie recipe....coffee included!   I have it almost every work morning, except in the fall when I occasionally switch it up for a pumpkin spice latte protein smoothie!

Here's what you're going to need...

Ingredients

frozen banana
1 cup vanilla almond milk
1 cup chocolate almond milk
1 scoop vanilla protein powder
1 TBSP Chia Seeds
1 TBSP Flaxseed
1 single serve sleeve instant coffee.

Throw all these yummies in your blender.  For me, this is my Ninja blender that E got me for Christmas.  I am seriously in love with it. 

This is not very exact.  I admit, I don't measure my milk.  I just kind of eyeball the 8oz and 16oz mark on the blender. 

You can change up the milks, using whatever variety you'd like.  Go with all vanilla or all chocolate.  Maybe use chocolate protein powder to really make it chocolately.  You could use cold coffee or coffee ice cubes.  I love that the little single serve coffees are often available as free samples or crazy cheap after a coupon.

Blend it all up, put it in your tumbler cup with a straw and you're ready to walk out the door.  This one is obviously not headed to work with me.  I enjoyed it after a bike ride on one of my days off.

Heartspring Pedalfest 2013

Pedalfest is a 5 mile, 50K or 100K ride to support Heartspring.  Last year when I signed up, I was still very much "deer in the headlights" from finding out Konnor was a bit farther behind than I originally thought.  I figured it was a perfect way to put some positive energy into a facility that we'd be visiting regularly. 

This year, I signed up with heartfelt gratitude from the progress we've made thanks to Heartspring and Konny's lovely therapist.  Through Heartspring, we've also had a speech eval, seen the developmental pediatrician and will soon look more into genetic testing.  Konnor loves going to his appts and we really only have problems when it's time to work his neck, which seems to be his weakest area.

While I did only do the 50K again this year, I was so lucky to have my friend, Cori, ride with me!

And guess what!?!  It's not too late to donate!  You can still SPONSOR MY RIDE until Sept 9th!

The thing I love most about Heartspring is that events like Pedalfest make it possible for even kids without health insurance (like we have) to receive much needed services!  I love knowing that if tomorrow, we found ourselves in a bad place, Konnor would still be able to get the help he needs!

Back to School!

You would think that after so many years of sending Kelton to school in the fall, it would get easier.  But nope!  Especially this year when he reminded me numerous times that he would like me to just drop him off and not walk him in.  So I did.  And then I cried a little.  He's such an awesome little man and growing up just way to fast!

Katie's first day was a whole week after Kelton's, which gave me plenty of time to fret over it. 

She was crazy excited, me not so much.  She was fearless, I was terrified.  I somehow managed to hold it together until I walked down the hallway to leave. 

The only thing she had to report after her first day...."MOM! We had 3 recesses!!"  She is truly loving it and we have been graced with a wonderful teacher.

 

Things will be so much different this year, packing 3 lunches!  I've found that a little prep work on Sunday afternoon saves me lots of time on the week nights!  I just pack all the little baggies at once and then throw them in the night before!

Since the kids have snacks everyday, I also packed a box full of safe snacks for Katie, that I will keep full throughout the year.

Plus I have another teacher to spoil.  Like last year, I started out sending a Teacher Survival Kit, full of things they might need throughout the year. 

Kelton has a male teacher this year, which is going to make it a bit more of a challenge since I won't be able to send lots of nail polish, lotion and other girlie items.

This year, to give me a better idea of what our teachers like, I made up a survey for them to fill out.  I also gave them to the secretaries because they are important ladies who deserve taken care of also!

I'm excited help out with Katie's class parties this year and continue to help with Kelton's.  I'm also heading up the boxtop committee for the PTO, so (friends and family!) don't forget to save those boxtops for us!

Konny has a screening for headstart preschool this week.  While it will be a very good thing, it might also have him attending preschool a few hours a day on my days off.  I'm not ready for that!!  If it's best for Konny though, I'm sure I'll manage to get through it!

**The teacher survey is a word document, so if you'd like it, email me and I will send it to you!!