Pupcake and Nes-tell milk.

Bonnie had the cutest "Kids say the darndest things" post and I was wishing I wrote down more of the funny little things my boys say...when that evening we were making Nes-quick and Matt and I came in the room to find Cody once again trying to sneak more.....

and he lovingly looks up at Matt and I and says...."Can I have some more Ness-tull milk??"

lmao. we laughed so hard....Nestle....lol....= Ness-tull milk...HAHAHAHa

Little Matthew on the other hand can't call Cupcake..."cupcake"..he calls her...Pupcake, or Pancake.( my fav! pancake...lol).. too funny. Matthew also fell asleep on his bedroom floor after pulling out EVERY toy right before dinner the other night after he had eaten a doughnut..lol...too cute!

And My Mikey......well that one is just crazy and loves running out of his room and telling me all the differences between the movie and the book of "Harry Potter and The Chamber of Secrets". What a smarty pants.

RECIPES

I've had a good deal of my friends asking me to add some of my favorite recipes on here so I'll add a few and continue every so often. I love seeing my friends blogs with recipes because it gives me new ways to spice up my cooking. I hate getting stuck in a rutt! So thanks gals and ENJOY!!


CHEESY BROCCOLI SOUP:
this was my ex mother in law's recipe and I changed it up so it's my recipe now..lol

there are two ways to make it, the cheater way and the long way. they are both great but for the sake of time I cheat! lol not every time but a good bit of the time. It just starts smelling so amazing I can't wait to get to eating it! I double this recipe, and freeze half!

6 cups chicken broth
2tsp. salt
2-3 large broccoli heads(chop off tops, tiny and set apart. then chop stalks as small as poss, set aside) I do 3 per pot..hehe
1-2 onions (chopped as small as you can) I do 2 per pot
1 (8oz) jar cheese whiz or velvet ta cheese
1/2 cup margarine
1/2 cup flour
almost 2 qrts milk (I use whole but I want it thick!)

hard way......
chop up broc, and onion as small as possible, cook with broth,and salt as long as possible, pull out and put through blender until pureed. Put back into pot, and continue cooking on low heat. In a separate pot melt butter and slowly whisk in flour, cook on, low for about 1-2 minutes so the flour looses that starchy taste. Add to broth mix, whisk in. In another separate pot, set jar of cheese in water with lid off until warm. Slowly stir jar of cheese or brick of cheese into soup. Cook as long as possible3-5 hours all the while on LOW heat stirring almost constantly (ya see why that's hard..lol)

easy Cheater McCheater Pants way.......
I chop off the broc heads and use my pampered chef veggie chopper to chop it tiny! put all the little heads into the broth, and salt. Cook on low, while I chop the onions, and broc stalks as small as possible, and steam them in the microwave until tender, aprox 10-15 mins, puree only the steamed veggies, and pour into broth mix. Cook on low. in separate pot melt butter, add flour, cook 1-2 mins, and add to broth mix. In a water bath heat the cheese in the jar with the lid off. Add to soup once it's heated. Stir into soup and stir as often as possible until its Incorporated, approx 45 mins-2 hours.

Super YUM!!!!!



cheater chicken and dumplings:
oh btw Alena for turning me onto this. again I changed it a good bit so now it's my recipe..hahaha

4 rolls croissant rolls
1 small rotisserie chicken OR I used 10 chicken tenders I cooked and seasoned and chopped into half's
4 small cans cream of potato soup
2 cups chicken broth
salt and pepper
1 small bag frozen corn
5 small carrots peeled and chopped up tiny

if you use the rost. chicken remove off bone and shred up some.

heat oven to 350. in a casserole dish spray with pam, wrap each piece of chicken in a cros. using 3 1/2 tubes of rolls.
put in the oven for 3-5 mins until the crost starts to cook up some (you dont want them too doughy in the mix) . Remove from oven, pour on all 4 cans soup and spread it out. Pour on chicken broth, salt and pepper to taste. Steam the carrots and corn until ALMOST tender. Add to soup mix, make sure they are covered in the soup. Use remaining rolls and cut into small, long strips, lay them in a criss cross pattern over the top of the entire mix. Increase temperate to 400. Put in oven for 30-40 mins until golden bubbly.


Easy Meatball soup (crock pot love!)

I mucho loved this one because I heart my crock pot!

1 lbs frozen meatballs, Italian style
5 cups beef broth
2 cans diced tomatoes with Italian seasonings
4 medium size potatoes peeled and diced
1 lrg onion, diced
1/4 tsp garlic pwdr
1/4 tsp black ground pepper
16 ounces frozen mixed veggies. (I used cau-broc-carrot)

In Crock pot, add meatballs, broth, tomatoes, potatoes, onion, garlic pwdr,and pepper. Cover and cook on low for 7-9 horus. Last hour, add in the winter veggies, and cook on high 1 hour.
I serve with salad and parm cheese. It's Great in bread bowls!


Home made bread sticks:
this recipe came from Wretha and Steph and omg thanks so much you two, I use this one ALL the time!! it's a huge fam fav!!

1 tblsp yeast
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cup warm water
3 1/2-4 cups flour
2 tblsp sugar

Heat oven to 350. Soften yeast in the warm water. Add flour, salt,sugar, and softened yeast and mix well. Knead for 5 mins. Set aside and let rest aprox 30 mins, until dough has risen to double. Mean while mix the topping

1/4 cup mayo
1/4 cup butter/ marg
1/4 cup parm cheese

mix well.

Spread dough on cookie sheet that has been greased with butter. spread to edges. smear topping on. cut dough into strips bread stick size. Cook at 350 for 25-30 mins.


Ok thats the last one for now, because I have like 40 things that still need done today and my OCD is screaming at me to do the laundry, the shopping AND add 40 more recipes so I'm sticking with doing the household things..lol Let me know if you try any of these and how they turn out ..oo and if you alter them. I Always love to see how my friends change them up to fit their families better! ENJOY!

GATOR BAIT

I love family days! MAN I do! I love those days where it's chilly and raining and you can just SMELL fall in the air............................ mmm. I love Autumn.

On Saturday, which as EVERYONE knows, is college football game day...lol....we woke up and turned on the OU vs Texas game, so the boys could watch their Daddies fav football team while they had their weekly video conference with Dad. By the time he was done talking to them, it was pouring rain, and the game was REALLY going and we were all watching and cheering, it was so fun. After the game we ate lunch and played Settlers or Cattan as a family, while Matthew and his little helper hands were taking a nice little nap. After that while I was starting Dinner ( baked chicken thighs, steamed rice, and broccoli and bread sticks...mmm) Matt was teaching the boys about HIS favorite team , the Florida Gators, and about how to truly be a "Gator's Fan" , how to do the GATOR CHOMP and yell GATOR BAIT! the kids ATE IT UP! Matt was wearing his "Gator Gear" all day, so of course by half time all THREE of my boys were begging to wear his other jersey's and Matty got to wear one of Matt's Gator t shirts..lol..it was SO cute!!!!! By the time the game was over Mikey and Cody were in bed reading (cody is reading treasure island! wow...and Mikey is reading another Harry Potter) and Matthew was just dead tired after all the rough houseing and cheering all day, and crashed! It was a LOVELY Fall day! mmmm!

I heart football. I heart family day's. I heart my boys. I heart a clean house, board games, and crispy fall days!

CUPCAKE....the puppy...lol

I am currently suffering from a wicked case of baby fever....I blame you...Coon Clan! All of you having babies right left and posting adorable pictures of your newborns all over your blogs! lol...its like waving crack in front of an addict who is detoxing, or a new credit card in front of a shop-a-holic! lol.......jk.. it's not really all your fault, all though I do have to say if all your kids weren't so fantastically adorable it might not make one crave another ever so! lol

When I get baby fever a puppy really does seem to be the safest and soundest way to get that itch scratched..lol. So Matt and I had been looking online for puppies, at first we really liked English Bulldogs, but holy $ batman! Then I thought perhaps a smaller dog, and Matt is not a fan, so we went with a medium breed that we knew our apartment complex would actually allow, and the biggest we can have here is a boxer. So we searched and searched and man...even rescue dogs were going to cost $300 and we would have to drive a good hour and a half. So we sort of gave up and thought, if we come across one we will know we are meant to have it...lol

Sunday afternoon, I'm feeling very lazy and decide that.....frankly we need to get out, go to the local park, play football or let the kids run and what not but that we need to stop at Wally world and grab ANOTHER nerf football, as we have already demolished the one we got 3 weeks ago ( I am so lucky I have a man who gets out there and plays football with the boys almost daily!) We pull in and BLAMO......four suv's chock full of.....puppies......and of course....magicaly....boxer puppies...white boxers none the less, and I have been looking for one, (hopefully one whose hearing and vision are fine, as some all whites can have a much higher chance of deafness or blindness). We had to pull over or course, and just let Matt hop out and...price them, see if they are astronomically high or budget puppies...lol.....he grins....and waves at me..which I knew then and there......we were headed home with a puppy..lol

We held a few of them and checked them out, and man or man this one just said "Take me home!!!!" .....................so I had to!!!!

We named her Cupcake. lol..ya I know...uber girly...but ummmmmmmm excuse me....I have a house with 4...count em four men/boys. lol...there's A LOT of football, trucks, wrestling, and other testosterone rich sports and toys of the like. I need some estrogen! I get pink pink pink ! I get to say uber gay things like baby girl, and cuppiecake and so forth! so YAY me and a girl doggie and a BF who HATES the name but loves the dog so he just smiles and nods....lol... woohooo...hahaha. My boys LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE her! Matthew is a tad jealous of her being held nonstop so he is now a puppy too and wants to be leashed so I can walk him around the house, so I'm making sure to give him some extra loving. Mikey is our resident puppy care giver, and frankly is "too" helpfull..lol..Cody just likes to walk by, pet on her, and giggle at her antics for the most part.

Don't tell, but Matt, omg ...what a LOVER on this puppy! He baby talks her, kisses on her, spoils her, and gets this proud papa glazed over eye look when he looks at her all snuggled on his lap or when she licks his nose. He even wanted her little basket on his side of the bed 1st night home..I have to sneak her off to get to love on her..lol...it's so cute.

Some of you may be asking what happened my to my great dane Jupiter, and for those of you who don't know, we had to give him away. Back in January-march he became very aggressive, and had some big biting problems, I kept taking him to the vet and a pet trainer/ behaviorist to work it out, but the vet said Jupiter seemed intent on biting only Matthew and my brother Dan, and to scare his wife Manda every time she tried to come up the stairs. We had no idea why, as I had taken him to almost a full years worth of puppy training classes and he was the STAR pupil. the only thing we needed to work on was how excited he got when people came to the door, he would go nuts and have the hardest time sitting until they were in the house. Even after having him neutered the issues increased not decreased. He started shredding Matty's toys, and snarling if one of the kids went near him to try and retrieve their loved on stuffed animal. He had actually bitten Cody and Danny REALLY hard a few times and we were working on his training on it, when one afternoon, Matthew who wasn't yet 3, was darting under Jupiter's chest as he walked, back and forth and giggling, Jupiter SNAPPED down , grabbed Matthew around his neck and shook him round over and over like a rag doll, and snarling and growling at him, Matthew was FREAKING out! and Rightly so, Jupiter drew blood in a few places. I grabbed him by the collar and put him outside until I could calm down and had taken care of Matty, I put them both in the car, and went straight to the vet. My vets' Tech had commented on how amazing a Dog Jupiter was OVER AND OVER and had mentioned that if his aggressiveness didn't settle down she would love to adopt him, as she has no small kids, and 4 other large breed dogs that are like a pack and would easily put him in his place. I bawled for hours when she took him, but ....hello!!! My baby, my kids, their home and safety are FAR more important than a pet. I did all I could as a responsible pet owner to train him and care for him as I should and I was so sad to let him go. It was a good thing I did though. Because when Danny found out what he had done he said, that had he been home he would have killed the dog then and there to protect my family and his (since he was living with me at the time), little brothers are awesome! But I'm so happy he has a good home and I occasionally get emails with Pictures on how my little GIANT is doing. So.....no we didn't get rid of our dog because he was too hard to care for..but because he needed a different home and my kids come first.....so...back to my puppy....

UM ...SHE'S TOO FREAKING CUTE!!!!! YAY for 6 week old Cupcake!!! wooot woot!

trip to tucson

We had so much fun yesterday, and the boys had been really behaving, and attempting to do all of the things they should be, that Matt and I decided on a wild hair, to sneak the boys out of school about an hour early and run off to Tucson (about an hour and a half away) to the large Mall where they have a great play place and a large movie theater. So we took them to see IGOR...which...was not so bueno...sorry for all you Mommies who wanted to take your kids to a cute halloween movie......personaly I have an issue with little kids watching a suicidal bunny who can not die, commit suicide over and over and over with poisons, guns, explosives, knives and what not through out the film. It does have a very dark feel and has a few places where a smaller child...under about 6 may really get scared, and there is a LOT and I mean a LOT of sexual innuendo's and come on folks, we all know my standards on these kinds of movies are really open minded. Both Matt and I were ready to gnaw off a limb before it was over, the kids even said they didn't really enjoy it all that much, and when you add the Pro evil and what not it just wasn't my favorite kids show...lol.. sooooooooooooooo....anyways, it was mildly entertaining and I won't run screaming if I'm forced to watch it again, however, I likely won't buy it, and I buy EVERY movie..lol..ok..most.....

After the movie we headed to the play place only to realize Mikey and Cody are now too old and large to play so they sat.....rather squireled around for a good 30 mins while Matty played, and before we left the mall we got to do some window shopping and those fun photo booth stripes which actucaly printed, and when folded and taped it makes a photo cube, so cute! Then off home for a really late night McDonalds dinner and bed..lol...it was a really fun fun after noon. I love having kids who's grades and attendance is good enough you can do something like sneaking them out of school once in a great while to show them "Hey good job!!" . Cody has read over 23 books in September at home alone, and I know they read a good 20-30 minutes a day at school as it is. Mikey reads non stop so I can't keep up with how many books he read last month. Yay for fantastic kids, and a man who is just as spontanious as I am! Woohooo!

In the pictures the kids were having fun..lol..they got in the car and with music going and what not they started drifting off when Matt whipped out the camera..lol..and the dinosaur is randomly outside the mcdonalds at the hwy junction and each time we have moved here we have wanted to take a picture with it, and FINALLY we stopped there, Matt and the boys got out, but a tired mommy and Matthew stayed in the car..lol.

Southwestern Egg Rolls

We made some pretty awesome southwestern egg rolls for dinner the other night! SO yummy, and while cooking Matt took off the tip of his finger (darn knife jumped up and bit him apparently..lol) but despite the bleeding drama dinner was well worth it once finished! If you have any questions you can call me! They really were awesome! We don't DO spicey so we toned down the jalepeno's and I had to double the recipe obviously. I ended up useing the giant tortilla's and made 10 so 20 halfs, and it fed us really well. I didn't end up making the dipping sauce but I'm pretty sure that if the egg rolls turned out this good the sauce is going to taste nice as well. We were lazy and just stuck with ranch.
Normaly I would have plated them nicely when taking a picture of them but at that point we were starving! lol you're lucky there are any pictures at all! Between Matt and Mikey they sucked them down fast!

(it's important to note that they need to be frozen for 5-6 hours so they wont fall apart when you deep fat fry them, so make sure you set aside time for that)

1 chicken breast fillet ( I used about 5 chicken tender stripes, we wanted ours meatier)
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
2 tablespoons minced red bell pepper
2 tablespoons minced green onion
1/3 cup frozen corn
1/4 cup canned black beans, rinsed and drained
2 tablespoons frozen spinach, thawed and drained (make sure you chop it well or it will be stringy)
2 tablespoons diced, canned jalapeno peppers
1/2 tablespoon minced fresh parsley
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
dash cayenne pepper
3/4 cup shredded Monterey Jack cheese
five 7-inch flour tortillas


Avocado-Ranch Dipping Sauce:
1/4 cup smashed, fresh avocado (about half of an avocado)
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon buttermilk
1 1/2 teaspoons white vinegar
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon dried parsley
1/8 teaspoon onion powder
dash dried dill weed
dash garlic powder
dash pepper



Preheat barbecue grill to high heat.
Rub chicken breast with some vegetable oil then grill it on barbecue for 4 to 5 minutes per side or until done. Lightly salt and pepper each side of chicken while it cooks. Set chicken aside until it cools down enough to handle.
Preheat 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil in a medium-size skillet over medium-high heat. Add red pepper and onion to pan and sauté for a couple minutes until tender.
Dice cooked chicken into small cubes and add it to pan. Add corn, black beans, spinach, jalapeno peppers, parsley, cumin, chili powder, salt, and cayenne pepper to pan. Cook for another 4 minutes; stir well so that spinach separates and is incorporated into mixture. Remove pan from heat and add cheese; stir until cheese is melted.
Wrap tortillas in a moist cloth and microwave on high temperature for 1 1/2 minutes or until hot.
Spoon approximately one-fifth of mixture into center of a tortilla. Fold in ends and then roll tortilla over mixture. Roll tortilla very tight, then pierce with a toothpick to hold together. Repeat with remaining ingredients until you have five eggrolls.
Arrange eggrolls on a plate, cover plate with plastic wrap and freeze for at least 4 hours or overnight.
While eggrolls freeze prepare avocado-ranch dipping sauce by combining all of ingredients in a small bowl.
Preheat 4-6 cups of oil to 375 degrees.
Deep fry eggrolls in hot oil for 12-15 minutes and remove to paper towels or a rack to drain for about 2 minutes. Slice each eggroll diagonally lengthwise and arrange on a plate around a small bowl of dipping sauce.
Garnish dipping sauce with chopped tomato and onion.
Serves 3-4.