Savory Chicken Noodle Soup

I made this delicious soup yesterday. The hubs had some dental work done and needed something soft for dinner. I looked over several recipes to see what other people put in thiers and then I whipped up my own version. Not to toot my own horn but it was seriously the best chicken noodle soup I've ever had! I seem to be on a roll with yummy soups lately haha!

 

Ingredients:

 

1/2 bag of boneless skinless chicken thighs (you can also use 2-3 chicken breasts or shredded chicken)

3 cans of chicken broth

1 can corn

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 onion chopped

3 cups sliced carrots

3 cups sliced celery

1/2 tablespoon salt

1/2 tsp. pepper

1/2 tsp. oregano

1/2 tsp. thyme

1/2 tsp. onion powder

1/2 tsp. garlic powder

1 tsp. minced garlic or 2 small cloves chopped

 

 

1. Add all ingredients to crockpot, stir well.

 

 

2. Cook on low 6-8 hours.

3. 30 min before serving add bag of egg noodles. You may have to add a little bit of water at this stage if you like it soupy. 

4. Serve and enjoy!

Chilly Mornings

Hurricane Sandy brought a cold front to our area. We were very lucky, we hardly got any rain or severe wind, just cold. It's been pretty windy throughout the night and today but its not too bad. Watching the news, and the damage from this storm is just incredible.

I spent most of yesterday running errands and going to appointments so I was happy to stay home today. I didn't want to get out of bed this morning it was so cold. I'm holding off on turning the heat on for as long as I can. Running the heat is expensive! To warm up I put on my fluffy slippers and brewed a hot cup of coffee...

Whats your favorite way to warm up on cold mornings?

Healthy Pumpkin Pie Smoothie

It's Pumpkin season! Pumpkins are an incredibly healthy but often overlooked food. Here are a few benefits:

Loaded in Vitamin A which helps your vision.
High in Fiber which helps in weight loss by making you feel full longer
Low in calories
Contains lots of potassium which makes it a great food to eat after a good workout. It will help restore the balance of electrolytes.
High in Vitamin C.

I made up this delicious and healthy pumpkin smoothie for the girls and I for breakfast.

Ingredients:
1 cup pumkin puree
1 cup nonfat yogurt plain or vanilla (I like vanilla)
1 cup nonfat milk or soy milk or rice milk
1 banana
A few shakes of pumpkin pie spice
Icecubes

Throw everything in the blender and blend. You can add more milk if you prefer your smoothie runnier. I added a few pinches of brown sugar to offset the slight bitterness of the pumpkin.

DIY Magazine Holder for Cheap!

I seriously hate stuff on the floor. Whether its clothes, toys, shoes, whatever. We always save our magazines to use for crafts (or in the hubs case, bathroom reading material lol). They usually end up on the floor in the bathroom and of course this irritates me. Eventually I'd like to get a nice wood rack but at the moment funds are short and I needed a quick fix. I took a large cereal box and cut out a wave design. Then I spraypainted the box black to match the bathroom decor.

Ok so its not the fanciest thing in the world but it keeps the magazines off the floor and blends in. And of course its practically free!

DIY Organizer Bins

You may remember my tutorial on turning diaper and shoe boxes into Decorative Storage Bins. Now I have a collection of cool boxes for the girl's room. Once we move I will be redoing the girl's room in pink and zebra.

When I was looking for toy storage options I came across some I liked...

                                                                         $24 each

                                                           Or these cute ones for $30 each

Obviously I can't afford that. So I got several rolls of patterned duct tape for about $4 each and took boxes I had sitting around and created these...

Cost less than $8 for all. Suuweet!

Educational Play-Sensory Bottles

We saved up some plastic bottles for a while to make sensory bottles. This is a great way for toddlers/preschoolers to explore and learn. Its also a great travel boredom buster. There are so many ways to create these! Here are a few we made today.

 

This one consists of water, glitter and blue food coloring. Blue is a relaxing color and the swirling glitter resembles a snowglobe.

 

This one consists of rice with hidden objects. I stuck in there a blue felt ball, a tiny hair clip, a wooden bead and an old earring. I tell the girls "Find the brown bead" ect. and they shake the bottle until they find the object.

This one consists of simply oil and water.

We ran out of bottles but will be making more as we come across some. Here are several more I like.

Marbles in hair gel, toy animals hidden in shredded paper and much more Click Here

Bits of wrapping paper, bubbles Click Here

Corn syrup and sequins Click Here

Lace shirt, skinny jeans and boots

Yesterday the girls and I ran errands all morning then met with the hubs for lunch at the park. It was cool out so I was excited to wear my boots for the first time this fall. The weather has been beautiful lately, warmish but with a cool, crisp breeze. I hope it lasts for a while!

Some inspiration for my look...

Victoria Beckham

 

Lace shirt from J. Jill (but this is $40 yurrgh!)

 

This is a cute outfit for when its cool outside but not yet cold. Slightly dressy for looking nice enough to go out but versatile and comfy enough to play with the kids at the park. Like this haha!

Hair- Twisted up in a clip
Lace shirt- Rue 21
Studded bracelet- Hot Topic clearance rack
Owl necklace- Claire's clearance rack
Skinny Jeans- Refuge by Charlotte Russe via Found in a storage unit (score!)
Boots- Forever 21 via Ebay

"I love you" note Project

I got this idea from pinterest and thought it was really cool. I had an old frame in the garage which I spray painted black to match our future bathroom decor. Then I printed "I love you because..." on a sheet of pretty scrapbook paper. I assembled the paper, cardboard backing and glass in the photo frame and done!

                                                                        Before...

 

Now we write love notes to each other with a dry erase marker. Its really special to see a sweet note from the hubs when I get up in the morning.

Crockpot Taco Chicken

Here is another crockpot chicken recipe. Chicken is fairly cheap so I make a lot of variations of it. Does it seem like the cost of groceries has gone up just in the past couple months? I'm not sure but I
really think it has. My grocery bill has increased like $30 and I'm buying the same stuff I always have. It probably has something to do with the rising cost of gas. Ugh. I guess this means I'm going to have to come up with even more ways to cook beans and rice lol!

Ingredients
3-4 chicken breasts
1 can enchilada sauce (I used  the mild green chili kind)
1 packet taco seasoning
OR
1 1/2 tablespoons homemade taco seasoning (Recipe Here )

1. Place chicken in crockpot. Sprinkle with taco seasoning and then pour enchilada sauce over chicken.

 

2. Cook on low 4-6 hours.

3. When chicken is cooked, shred. You can serve over rice, in a burrito or taco.

I had some left over black beans and rice which I layered on my tortilla, added chicken then topped with cheese and green onions.

Steven fried up some tortillas, added the chicken then topped with cheese, cilantro and tapatio. He had the leftover beans and rice on the side. His looks so pretty!

Rice Krispy Pumpkins

One of my hubby's favorite snacks are rice krispy treats. He made some rice krispy pumpkins with the girls for fall.

Ingredients

3 tablespoons butter
4 cups mini marshmellows
6 cups Rice Krispies
Tootsie rolls
Green frosting

1. Melt butter over low heat, add marshellow and stir until completely melted. Add drops of yellow and red food coloring until marshmellows are desired shade of orange.

2. Add rice krispies and stir until completely coated.

3. Form into balls and stick a tootsie roll on top for a stem. Draw a leaf on with green frosting.

 

Color Me Rad 5K

Today we got up at 4am, loaded the girls up and drove to Columbia, SC for a 5k. This was no ordinary 5k. It was the Color Me Rad, a race where people throw dyed cornstarch at you along the way and at the end you have a color fight. Steven pushed the girls in the jogger and I ran beside. We all had a blast!

Pre-race...All clean

 

Clean socks and shoes

 

Clean Girls

 

Clean Steven

 

Serenity after the race. She did a model pose.

 

Haley after the race. She had a finger in her nose in almost every pic.

 

 

Me after the race. Steven got me square in the mouth with yellow!

 

 Steven after the race. And of course Haley still has a finger in her nose!

 

Throughout the race when we would come to a color station, Steven would be like "Get the girls! Get the girls!" So the color bombers would be distracted and he would slip by without getting very messy. I was not about to let him be lame, and bombed him with whole bag of orange haha!

 

 

 

 Awesome Awesome day!



Baked Oatmeal Muffins

Tomorrow we will be up at 4am and getting ready for the Color Me Rad 5k. Today I made some baked oatmeal muffins for a quick, healthy breakfast before our race. I made these with the intention of freezing some, but since half of them are already gone it looks like I will be making another batch next week. They were a hit!

Ingredients

3 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 cup brown sugar (Use sucanat if you are going sugar-free)
1 sliced banana
1 cup of fruit (frozen or fresh blueberries, cranberries, mango, sliced strawberries ect)
OR 1 cup unsweetened or semi sweet chocolate chips

5 cups old fashioned oats (I used quick oats and it turned out fine)
1 tsp salt
3 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup ground flax seed
1 tablespoon cinnamon
2 1/2 cups milk

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. In large bowl mix eggs, vanilla and applesauce. Add sugar, banana and fruit.
3. In another bowl mix oats, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and flax seed.
4. Combine wet and dry ingredients until well mixed. Add milk and stir.

5. Spray muffin tins or line with paper bake cups.
6. Bake 30-40 minutes for regular muffins and 15 minutes for mini muffins. Make sure middle of muffins are set.

Loaded Baked Potato Soup

With the colder weather we've been having I was excited to make my first soup of the fall. Potatoes are pretty cheap right now so I took advantage of that and decided to make Potato Soup. This soup turned out amaaaazing!

Ingredients

5lbs russet potatoes, scrubbed and diced
4 cloves roasted garlic (for instructions go Here ) You can also use 3 tablespoons minced garlic
1 large onion, chopped
64 oz. chicken broth
16 oz cream cheese
Bacon, chives, cheese for garnish

1. Combine potatoes, garlic, onion and broth in crockpot. Cook on low 8 hours or high for 5 hours.

2. 1 hour before serving slice up cream cheese and add to soup.

3. When soup is ready to serve add to blender and blend. I took the soup from the crockpot to the blender and then poured into a pot. There was so much soup I had to do this in sections. Make sure your lid is on TIGHT! Don't overfill the blender and be very careful with the hot soup.  (My lid popped off during the blending process and I got burning hot soup on my arm OUCH!)

4. Serve in bowls and top with bacon, cheese and chives.

T-shirt Fringe Scarf Tutorial

                                            This is an easy tutorial to recycle a favorite tee.

1. Start with a large t-shirt. Cut the bottom hem off, as close to the seam as possible.

                                                    Next cut the top of the t-shirt off.

 

Cut fringes about halfway up. Do this all the way around the shirt.

 

 

               Take the slits and stretch them out. They should roll up into a nice little fringe.

 

 And thats all folks! Really easy right? You can wear the scarf several different ways.

                                          (Forgive my trashy shorts, it was laundry day lol)