tiny chef

This little lady loves to be in the kitchen as much as I do.  She begged all evening to make homeade dog treats and wanted to make them while I was busy in the kitchen cooking.  Our kitchen isn't super large so I kept saying NO!

 Finally she wore me down.  

She found a pinterest recipe for dog treats and had them whipped up and in the freezer in no time.

The pups devoured their treats and have more leftover for days to come. 

 I love my mini chef and so do Lily and Daisy!

orange rolls all waffled up

If you follow me on Instagram you know that I am waffling all the things.  

I have been doing tons of experimenting since Valentine's day with my new waffle maker.  I have done muffin mixes and tater tots and grilled cheese sandwiches and even apples and pears with cinnamon.

Yesterday we had a snow day and so I made orange rolls for breakfast for the kids.  They are ok, but I will do the orange rolls differently next time.  I won't smash them all on the hot iron at the same time.  You live and you learn right?!?   I think it would be fun to make them in different shapes too!

The Pillsbury orange rolls still tasted super yummy even though they looked a little odd! 

banana pudding and Chex mix X2

We've been having fun in the kitchen today.

Banana pudding is so fun and easy for kids to make.  They cut the bananas, lined the dish with cookies, stirred the pudding and kept layering until the dish was full!

We also made our traditional Charlie Brown Chex mix aka *trash*!!

The kiddos measured all the ingredients and helped me stir each time the 15 minute timer rang.

  Layla loved reading the back of the cereal box.  Don't we all love reading the back of cereal boxes?  

Well, she read the Muddy Buddy recipe and we had all the ingredients for it.  Holy Moly.  I've never made this recipe before, but it is amazing.  Mmmmmm!  I'm so glad we tried it, but now I have to try to practice a bit of self control.  I could eat it all and all of the trash too!  Tis the season right?!? 

{homemade} ice cream sandwich

Every where I look on the internet I see homemade ice cream sandwiches, so I decided I needed to join the fun!  

The kids are happy I did.

Since I bought 500 half gallons of Blue Bell ice cream last week I decided we should use it creatively.

It was on sale.  We really didn't need 3 containers of ice cream, but it is summer and we do need to keep cool.

I baked chocolate chip cookies and smashed cookies n cream ice cream in between two cookies.

I put them in the freezer for the afternoon and we had them for dessert after dinner.

I only made 3 and that was a wise choice.  The kids each got one and Gary and I split one.  I'm quite certain we all could have eaten three a piece.  They were some sweet and rich little treats.

And they lived happily ever after in our tummies.  

festive jigglers

We made patriotic jello jigglers this afternoon.  It was a fun craft as well as a delicious snack!

We always have fun when we get to play with our food!

wine dye & blue berry jigglers

Momma played with dye today...uh oh!

Actually it worked out just fine!

I love the throw rugs from Target.  I usually get new rugs once the old ones get grungy looking.  Target rugs are the best for our household because they can be washed when we spill on them.  They are also less than $5 a rug and that is good for me because I like to get new colors when I get tired of my current rugs.

Well, shame on Target I haven't been able to find my favorite rugs.  I decided to dye the rugs I have until I find new rugs.  I sorta really just wanted to play with dye too.  heehee!

Here they are:  faded and dingy.   

And then after a few spins in the washing machine they are so much better!

What do you think?

They aren't quite as dark as I hoped.  

I was thinking they would be a bit darker, but I like the way they turned out.

While I was waiting for the washer to agitate the dye water I boiled water for jello jigglers.

The kids get so tired of the same old snacks after Layla gets home from school.

You can't really go wrong with jello jigglers!

The kids used Easter themed cookie cutters to cut out fun shapes to eat.

I used 4 boxes of Jello brand berry blue jello and 2 1/2 cups of boiling water.

I mixed the jello into the water and then poured it into a Pyrex dish.  

Then I put it in the fridge for 3 hours.

Easy Peasy.  

I'm not sure why it took me so long to master the talent of making jigglers, but I just recently got the recipe just right! 

Daddy was working in his office and heard all the excitement.  He ventured out to sample the goodies!

Silly little man!

Silly girl and her beard.

Layla's eyebrow seems to be healing just fine.  The stuff underneath the glue is getting darker and doesn't look so pretty, but we are just letting it do it's thing.  The glue should fall off in another week or so.  We don't want to mess with it or cause her pain. Honestly I wish I could help get some of the glue off of her forehead.  It makes her face look dirty.  BUT looking dirty for a few days is just fine.  I don't want to scar her little face in any way.  

She doesn't seem bothered by it at all.  She is more excited about getting back to her normal activities.  The doctor wouldn't let her participate in P.E. or recess.  Tomorrow will be her first day back to normalcy and she is very very excited!  

I hope you had a great Thursday!

pizza pies

We wanted to do something fun and different last night for dinner since the kids don't have school today.  I thought homemade pizzas would be perfect.  The kids are always begging to help us in the kitchen.  We all four had lots of fun creating our own pies!

Gary got all the ingredients prepped and ready while I helped the kids take baths and put on their pj's. 

This is the best pizza sauce HANDS DOWN! 

Black olives are a must on our pizza.  

The kids almost ate all the olives before they could get in on their pies.

I was shocked...BOTH kids ate artichoke hearts & mushrooms.  They both snacked on them and topped their pizzas with them!

Hayden's little hand snagging a mushroom!

Gary brought this string cheese home from Wisconsin and it melted nicely on the pizzas.

Daddy smeared the pizza sauce and the kids did the rest!

Layla creating her pie!

She added artichoke hearts too!

Yum!

Hayden's turn to create!

He added artichoke hearts too!

My little three year old rocked this pizza creating task!  He had a great time!

My pie!

Daddy's pie!

In the oven they went for about 10 minutes.

I think Hayden's pizza looks like a kid pizza!

I was proud of Layla adding bell peppers.

I topped my pizza with some tomato basil cheese Gary bought in WI.  It was the perfect touch.

The pizza crusts I bought were 400 calories.  I wasn't sure if I could finish a whole pizza, but I did.  I added those calories into the "my fitness pal" app first thing Sunday morning.  I planned my whole day of eating around what turned out to be a 642 calorie meal. Yikes, but it was fun and worth it!

Gary's pizza was very similar to mine, but he added pepperonis and jalapenos.  His pizza looks super gourmet in my opinion.  Looking back at all our pizzas I think our creations match each of us so well.  Heehee!  Only I would say something like that.

Happy Monday!  

I hope you have a wonderful holiday today!