Projects

I've never met a person that says they have enough time to do all the things that they want to. If that's you, keep it to yourself, because all of the rest of us will hate you. There are lots of things I would do with extra time like run more, go back to school, be a better housekeeper, cook more (and more nutritiously), play with my kids more, blog more, stay in touch with more friends and family, garden, date nights, organize... anything and everything, keep up with my school stuff, practice the piano more, learn to play my harp... you get the idea. There are so many things I wish I had more time and energy to accomplish, but the reality is I have to get the day to day stuff done and at this point our family is pretty much just in survival mode. However, this school year is a lot different for me than any previous years, I have 4-5 days each week that I am at home! Of course this has mostly translated into increased sanity and more play time with my little rascals... toss in a little piano practicing, working out, and internet time wasting and I'm back to the same amount of spare time as usual. Really it's great, but I want to start adding in some of those other things that I've always wanted to, starting with projects around the house.

I am not good at decorating or crafting. I am not very creative when it comes to making my house feel like a home, but I'm pretty good at seeking out things I love (thank you blogs, pinterest and random google searches). We have lived in our house for 3 years now and I'm starting to feel pretty sad about how little I've done to make it our own. Time for that to CHANGE! So I am making my first list of projects to make my house a home. I'm starting simple, but with winter coming on it seems like we spend way more time indoors and we also seem to have a lot more stuff hanging out all over the floor... so I'm starting there.

PROJECT 1: Over the door "hang-all" for the mud room. My inspiration (bottom left corner below):

from This website. I think I want the knobs to be white or black with a rustic banged up paint job. I'm still trying to decide if I want to go with my original color scheme that I wanted for that room, if I do the knobs will be bright pink, yellow and orange... we'll see.

Project 2: Sticking with the them and the same website, I need a small pretty coat rack for inside the front door. It is going to hang low, and I might even hang the occasional ribbon strung holiday decoration from it. The inspiration (top left):

I just love the pretty knobs! I think there will only be four on mine. Now.... where do I find them???

Project 3: Coat (hat, back pack, tie, etc) hanger for Jack's room. It will look like the front of a propeller plane. Sorry, not picture for this one, but I'll try to describe the picture in my head. I will make the front of a propeller plane out of wood and paint it to match the plane theme already in his room.The propellers will each have three little knobs to hang things from. Ok, I'm giving myself some serious credit for creativity on this one! I'm sure it's going to be so stinking cute!!

Project 4: I can always use a little more space in my kitchen drawers and cupboards so I'm going to hang my measuring cups and spoons inside a cupboard door. This will free up a drawer for my tupperwear lids... and then free up a huge shelf in my cupboard for more kitchen gadgets (my FAVORITE)!

Mine will be much simpler. I'm just going to buy 3M hooks and use a level to make them straight :) Maybe I'll post a picture.

Project 5... and 6: My inspiration for these two came from a Relief Society activity. Another girl (who happens to have an amazingly cute home) painted a super cool picture frame. She hangs it on the wall and hangs things inside of it, like ornaments. The video I'm linking shows the idea using an old window frame... I'm going with simpler! After I looked at the video, I noticed the other one on the same page and realized I wanted to do something similar... A chandelier of ornaments. I'm thinking I will make a ball shape rather than a Christmas tree shape, and since my current light fixture isn't a glammy/glitzy style I think I will go with some brown base more crafty looking ornaments. This one will be an adventure, but since I don't decorate for Christmas until AFTER Thanksgiving, I've got a little time.

Now, no looking at pinterest, blogs or magazines until these are finished. Wish me luck!

Happier Halloween

I have never liked Halloween, except for the candy of course. Even as a kid I really hated dressing up because I just felt weird, and I didn't really care for knocking on all of the neighborhood doors asking for candy. There were a few exceptions I suppose. One year I was a BYU cheerleader and I loved my costume so much that it made the whole experience worth it. The same was true when I was Ty Detmer (BYU Quarterback/Heisman award winner). Essentially all of the other Halloweens I felt like my costume just wasn't good enough and I didn't really want to run around the neighborhood all night. There was another problem. My parents hated Halloween, so I almost felt guilty liking it. My dad still complains that it is a Pagan holiday and we shouldn't celebrate it. I also detest pumpkin guts, so making Jack'O'Lanterns never appealed to me. All of these things added together made me pretty unenthusiastic about this night of ghosts and goblins.

Since I have had children I have enjoyed it a bit more. I haven't dressed up for years, but I do like seeing them dressed up, however the process to get them to that point has usually been less than fun. I have been a boring mom that has no Halloween decorations and really can't get into all the Halloween traditions.

This year was different, maybe just a little, but different still, and I think I might be making progress. First of all the Young Women were in charge of the Ward Halloween Party this year which forced me to get festive a little earlier. I also saw a darling craft on facebook and decided to copy it with the kids. I got really excited for Jack's costume and putting it all together (including a little sewing)! It all turned out pretty great. I even dressed up... and liked it!

Woody, Anikan Skywalker and Witch before the Halloween Party (Cow was still napping). At the party, Jack and Gunner won the costume contest. It's true, they were pretty fantastic!

Can you tell that the holes on my stomach make a skeleton face?

On Halloween night before Trik'or'treating with Jack and Daddy's Jack'o'Lantern.

After walking around the neighborhood, we visited Aunt Cassie at work, Grandma and Grandpa Bolton and Aunt Chelsey, Grandma and Grandpa Bolton, and Grandma Linda and Grandpa Thurgood.

I think it was a pretty successful night!

What's For Dinner?

You may recall that I recently (ok, maybe not so recently) set this goal of a once weekly post about a new recipe. I suppose it was just another case of starting a goal incredibly excited and motivated but petering out as soon as other stuff, often referred to as real life, got in the way. The good news I have tried lots of new recipes and it has even been on a fairly regular basis, but I don't remember most of them. Here is a link to one that I do remember that was quite yummy (and simple):

Crock-Pot Stroganoff Loved that it was in the crock pot all day, but my big discovery... don't use the stew meat or whatever it calls for, use a roast. Pull it out when it is cooked through, shred it, and drop it back in the sauce for a while. So tender!

I recently purchases a new recipe book called Hungry Girl: 300 Under 300. I ordered it online after hearing amazing things about her books and glancing at a few recipes. I was sooooo excited when it came in the mail.... but I must admit, it wasn't as incredible as I had hoped. So far we have found a few recipes that looked good, sounded good, had reasonably inexpensive and regularly used ingredients and actually turned out tasting good. I think we have tried about 10 recipes. Most have been pretty good, but the ingredients were a tricky thing. Ground beef style soy crumbles... no thank you. So we substituted a few ingredients where the calorie count would only be slightly affected. Another little issue-many, of the recipes are designed for only one serving. I guess hungry girls eat alone. Maybe the biggest problem is that Jack hasn't liked much of it at all, and he needs MORE calories anyway. I have decided to try at least 2 a week from the book, but I don't promise to report on any of it.

The Best Boys!

This boy is always making me smile. I just wanted to mention two of the absolutely adorable things he does lately. First he says thank you for EVERYTHING. When I get him out of his bed and give him a kiss he tells me thank you, when I give him a snack he tells me thank you, and pretty much any other time that I do something for him that he likes he says thank you. In fact once he told me thank you when I wiped his nose, right after he finished screaming because he actually hates that. Thank you was actually one of the very first things he said, right after mama and daddy. We tried to teach him the sign, but he learned to say it before he learned to sign it.

The other super cute thing is being proud of himself. He has a "Little People" fire truck that is filled with building blocks that can be put in the back of the truck through holes that match the block shapes. He will pick up a block and put it in the right slot and then throw his hands in the air and shout "YAY" every time. It is so stinking cute!

Not to leave out my other two amazing boys I better say something about them too. I've nicknamed this one:

DASH! Because he is always going at top speed. The great thing he's doing lately is making lots of new friends. He is always wanting to stop by different neighbors' homes to say hi and he always wants to run across the street to play with one of his best friends.

He talks like he does everything else--super fast! Kind of like his mom. He does a lot of other things a lot like mommy and sometimes it drives daddy just a little crazy. He certainly has a mind of his own, and I love that about him! I prefer the word strong willed over stubborn, and boy is he :)

This guy is are sweet nature boy (I know Dash is in the background there, but he's kind of everywhere). He seems to be a never ending encyclopedia of knowledge about anything and everything in the wilderness. I am always surprised at the intricate details he knows about random animals and plants. So awesome.

He said the funniest thing the other day. Daddy and his uncles were teasing him a bit about a girl at school that he has had a crush on for a couple years. Daddy asked him "Is she a good kisser?" His response: "I don't know, I've never seen her kiss!" So cute. Glad to know he's still sweet and innocent considering his daddy was already thinking about kissing me when he was about that age ;)

I have the BEST boys!

Balance

The last 4 years of my life have felt very uNbAlAnCeD to say the least. I have felt like every moment I have is torn between school work, housework, trying to enjoy time with my kiddos and hubby, church callings. You might be thinking yeah, yeah join the club, everybody is busy, and you are right, everybody is, but there was something else. With all the to-do's between school, work, home and church I was feeling like an epoch failure! I could spend tons of extra time on my grading and lesson planning at home and still feel like I wasn't reaching a single student but that took all my time away from being a good mommy which meant I was a grumpy mommy. So I would try to spend less time on school work and things got even worse there and I lived to dread every minute I spent with students in my classroom. That's not at all what I had expected for my career. It felt like a constant battle: make school survivable or keep my house semi livable and make sure my kids got some happy mommy time.

I had to pick. I could never choose everything! Something (or rather many things) always got dropped. I felt like I was dropping every ball thrown in my court. In addition my poor husband was having to fight the exact same battle and I could do nothing to support him because I was too worried about my own balancing act. We kept talking about the light at the end of the tunnel, but living in the darkness waiting for that light was just becoming too much to bear. I hated the person I was becoming and I felt like I was missing the time of my life I had been looking forward to most since I was a little girl!

Finally it just couldn't go on anymore. Thankfully that was about the time Tyler got a job with IHC that would offer benefits for a part time employee. We decided that, while it was maybe financially a bad idea, I had to be more there for my family so I needed to switch to part time. It didn't happen right away, and the process that it took to get there was emotionally exhausting, but it was the best decision we could have made. Yes financially it has been challenging (ummm, that is a massive understatement by the way), but the pay off has been amazing in other ways. Most significantly, we are experiencing something we had only dreamed of... BALANCE!

Balance is an incredible thing (ready for my inner nerd to vomit science on you...) When the forces on an object are balanced the motion of that object remains unchanged, this doesn't mean there are no forces, it just means they are balanced. Take the example of a hockey puck gliding along a sheet of ice. Unless it is hit by something, it continues along its path. There are still forces acting on the puck (gravity and normal force), but it just keeps on moving along... sometimes said: an object in motion remains in motion. And that is in essence what I am beginning to feel. There are certainly still a great deal of demands on me daily, but all in all they seem to be balanced! I am now a little like that calm disc, gliding along the ice, heading in a certain direction and moving at a steady pace. Of course the occasional (or frequent) external force comes along and takes me a bit off course. The big difference, was that before something always had to come first, there was always one demand that could knock all the others out of my plans for days at time, and usually that was school/work related. Now, I feel like I can give priority to everything when it is needed.

The things that I used to put off until summer or long weekends are now a constant part of my life. I can plan healthy meals, exercise, play outside with my boys for hours at a time, hang out with my man (when he isn't too busy), keep up with grading and lesson planning, work on projects around the house, keep up with my church calling, spend time with friends, and amazingly even enjoy some me time. No, I still don't have it all together. I forget things I'm supposed to do, there are usually several unfinished tasks on my to do list at the end of the day, and I still get cranky about all sorts of things that I should probably not worry about. But, I feel balanced and that is enough.

Baby Animal Days

Last year a friend of mine introduced me to a fun event up in... almost Logan, called Baby Animal Days. I couldn't wait to take Jack again and introduce little Gunner to the baby animals as well. As the day approached it appeared that the weather was not going to cooperate, so we called ahead and they said it was a light shower. I figured it would keep the crowds down and we could handle a little rain. After an hour and forty-five minute drive in terrible conditions, the light shower had turned into a decent snow storm, but we had come all that way, so we decided to brave it. We were not prepared and poor Jack ended up pretty wet and chilled, but we just stayed long enough to see all of the baby animals and get out of there. With very few other patrons that didn't take long.

All of the animals were darling, and the bunnies were extra snuggly because of the cold. I thought I had gotten more pictures of Gunner with the animals, but I guess that was my mom. I'll have to get them from her. I had Gunner in a carrier the whole time, which kept he and I both quite warm.

Checking out the chick's beak.

Last year he kissed the duckling, this year we could barely get him to hold it.

Warming his hands on the bunny.

Gunner was very gentle, except when he almost pulled this bunny's ear off.

How we stayed warm.

Yummy BBQ Chicken

Last week's new recipe:

Zesty Slow Cooker Chicken Barbeque

It was super easy, but had more pizzaz than the standard chicken with BBQ Sauce in the Crock-Pot. We served it on toasted whole wheat hamburger buns, melted a slice of cheese on it, and topped it with a slice of tomato. Everybody loved it. Hayden even ate the chicken plain when we ran out of buns :) Oh, and I added some finely diced onion to the sauce before cooking it.

The next day we were making quesadillas and I made one with Mozzarella, the left over chicken and diced tomatoes. It was super delicious.

Make again sometime? I think so!

Fast and... almost Fantastic

I tried two new recipes this week and both deserve at least a mention.

The first was a yummy chili called Lizard Stew. The boys liked it and I would definitely consider making it again on a busy night because it can be cooked in a pot right before serving, or just left in the crockpot all day until you are ready to eat.

Lizard Stew

1 lb hamburger browned and drained

26 oz. Can Minestrone Soup

15 oz. can ranch-style chili beans

10 oz. can diced tomatoes with green chilies

1 lb. Velveeta (I use the lower fat made with 2% milk)

Combine all ingredients except cheese and heat until bubbly. Add cheese and heat until melted. Serve over corn chips. If done in crockpot just add cheese about 30 minutes before serving.

What I LIked: It was full of flavor and just the right amount of heat. It was so easy to make and the kids liked it. The name :) what's not too love about that. I also like that it has lots of veggies and fiber from the beans. It didn't take much to make me feel super full!

What I didn't like: It is super high in sodium and fairly high in calories and fat, but as mentioned above it does have a pretty high nutritional content as well, so in moderation it's a pretty decent meal. It has Velveeta in it... it's kind of hard for me to get behind a meal that has processed cheese product.

If I were to give it a grade, Lizard stew would get a B, and I will keep on standby for a crazy night that needs a warm meal.

The other meal was called Fast and Fantastic Black Bean Soup, and fast it was, but I wouldn't give it fantastic. I love black beans and I love soup. I thought it would be a great meal with some quesadillas. It was pretty good, but left something to be desired. Tyler thinks cilantro, and it probably would have helped if I had remembered the green onion on top.

What I liked: It was easy to make. The flavor was pretty good especially with a little sour cream and quesadillas. It was a good portion size for our little family.

What I didn't Like: Again with the Velveeta, but this helped me use up some of what was left. The beans didn't really blend to smooth so there were funny little bits in it. The flavor was kind of weak.

I would probably give this one a B-, and will consider it again as a cold day lunch, and maybe add more salsa or some herbs and spices to give it a little more flavor.

Hopefully this week I will come up with a family favorite that's a healthy timesaver.

A New Family Favorite

I think it was January of 2010 that I decided I would try to make one new dinner each week. I Wish I could say I now have over 60 new dinners in my repertoire, but I failed. After a few weeks I ran into roadblocks, and, like other new years resolutions, it died out.

This has nothing to do with why I tried a new recipe tonight. Really that was just necessity. I had some left over brown rice and a somewhat picky 8 year old coming for dinner along with no hubby to keep the hungry boys occupied until it was done. I knew I could pretty easily throw together some chicken and rice with some vegetable and some cream of something soup, but that sounded pretty lack luster to me.

I like the Kraft website because you can put in ingredients that you have and it will give you recipes that match. My ingredients: chicken, brown rice, and carrots. I almost passed over this recipe because I didn't like the name. I was hoping for something healthy with a moderate calorie count, and the name just didn't shout that to me, but turns out at less than 500 Calories per serving it wasn't too bad (and by the way a serving was way more than enough for me). So, here it is:

Farmhouse Chicken Dinner (see what I mean about the name, sounds a little too hearty)

I made a few adjustments:

• I didn't have any Light Zesty Italian, only Fat Free Italian, which doesn't work to cook chicken in so I mixed half olive oil and half dressing. It worked fine, but I'm sure it would also be great as directed.
• After reading a couple of reviews I got worried that it was going to be bland, so I added a little garlic salt. I think it would be great to add some to the flour mixture, although I didn't feel the dish was bland at all.
• It didn't take 20 minutes!! I hate overcooked chicken so at about 14 minutes of simmering I stuck my meat thermometer in and discovered it was cooked through so I took it out.
• I didn't use instant rice because I already had leftover brown rice. The rice doesn't cook with the chicken, so it doesn't matter.
• I forgot the parsley... oops

What I liked:

It was very easy to make and called for ingredients that I almost always have on hand. It was delicious; the combination of flavors seemed right to me, but I'm no food critic. The carrots were yummy and flavored with the sauce and cooked to just tender (with only 14 minutes). The chicken was cooked to perfection. I don't know if I or the recipe get credit for that, but either way it was luscious (ok I know Ryan Lamb doesn't read my blog, but if he did he would be laughing right now)

What I didn't like:

Once it was all served up on the plate, it had a bit of a casserole feel to it and that's just not my favorite, nor Tyler's. The sauce didn't thicken, at least in the time that I gave it. Even runny, it made for a great gravy.

Back to how I started this long post - this meal has inspired me to get back to my one new meal each week goal, but this time I have a new idea of how to stick with it. I am going to post the recipe and my review each week. I hope you enjoy. If not, maybe at some point I'll follow it with pictures of my always darling boys :)

Also, if you have any favorite dinner recipes please share!

Your Secret Weapons Please

Yes, it has been months since my last post and now you happen upon my blog and you are greeted with a post about the least glamorous of all motherly duties... cleaning the bathroom. Well I'm sorry, but that is what is on my mind this lovely saturday morning. I woke up motivated to get my Saturday chores done, mostly because Tyler would be leaving for work at noon and I wanted to get it done before I had both boys to entertain all by myself. That tends to slow down the cleaning, so off I went. I grabbed my trusty bin of scrubbing, disinfecting, and sparkling bathroom cleaning chemicals.

It seems since early on in my life it has been hard for me to commit to any one particular set of cleaners. There must be something to clean mirrors, disinfect and clean countertops. Wipe away nasty toilet germs, bleach the heck out of the toilet bowl and finally make my tub and shower sparkle! I'm fairly comfortable with my selection of cleaners for mirrors, counters, and toilets, but the tub and shower have always left me a little befuddled. Frequently the two are made of different materials and have different needs. Clearly the shower walls need something that sprays and the tub must have something the bubbles up and disinfects. Often, when Tyler is faced with shower/tub he feels it is sufficient to spray it down with water and finish off with our standard after shower spray. I feel strongly that this is not enough. Seriously friends, we stand in their naked... and with BARE feet!!! That thing needs bleached.

Generally for the tub part I look to comet. I love the bubbles, the sparkle and the germ killing goodness. I have even found a lemon scented version and enjoy it very much... but this still leaves the shower walls and doors. I faced an even greater dilemma this week as I realized that I was out of comet and had forgotten to pick up more. So I looked in the bin... windex... not germ killing enough, clorox wipes... not scrubby bubbly enough, toilet bowl cleaner... hmmm bleach, check, bubbly check why not. Well news flash, this is some strong stuff. For my bathroom I wore gloves and was pleased with the final result. After a deep scrub to the tub I sprayed everything out and finished off with a leave on shower spray for the walls. Near the end however I discovered a hole in my gloves and realized I would have to go gloveless for the remaining bathrooms, ICK. Oh well what was I to do? There was a job that must be done and I am the woman for the job, so I set forth looking forward to a nice antibacterial hand scrubbing and moisturizing following the dirty task.

It was then that discovered the harshness of the toilet bowl cleaner. I would say strong base to say the least. My hands feel awful, and now I'm a little worried to put naked baby bums back in the tub. I rinsed much more carefully (like 5 or 6 times) this time around and was still satisfied with the final result but decided that I will definitely need to make a trip to the store before my next bathroom cleaning adventure. Alas, all bathrooms again sparkle and shine... at least for now. Not to mention, I managed to get them all done before 10:30 :) good day. But, my question for all of you faithful readers (hmmm I better post this to facebook so I at least get 2 or 3 of you...) What do you have in your arsenal for that oh so gruesome job? I feel ready to commit so that I don't have to face down the daunting cleaner aisle at Target ever again feeling vulnerable and unprepared. Help me please!