Merry Christmas to Kyler!

My parents are visiting this weekend and along with a bunch of 'home baked' cookies came a Christmas gift for Kyler. Kyler's Godmother Leah, sent up his Christmas gift to Kyler this weekend and he was *so* excited to get it.

I forgot what a blessing it was to have something your child wanted. He would do about anything to get it. We finally had him take a nap and go potty and sit down nicely before he could open in. Here are the photos from it. Enjoy Leah!














Quinton was a bit upset that he wasn't allowed to help open the gifts.







Thanks so much Leah. Kyler loves them. In fact I have a few photos right after these of the boys colouring. K can't wait to try out the sharpener on the back of the box! We can't wait to see you soon.

It may be cold outside but it's sunny!

On Thursday morning it was soo sunny out and Q wanted to wear his 'lasses'. I couldn't figure out what he was talking about until a few moments later... he wanted his glasses like mommy.

Enjoy:

Toppings are the best part of supper (#6?)

Toppings are the best part of supper! I swear K always comes up with good options for title... that and the kids can always make me laugh!!

Tonight for supper we had another new meal. Tonight was from our favourite cookbook and it's from the "teens can cook" section.

BBQ Chicken Quesadillas

Prep 20 minutes
Cook 4 minutes per batch

4 7 or 8 inch flour tortillas
1 18oz tub refrigerate shredded chicken with barbecue sauce (about 2 cups)
1 cup shredded extra0sharp cheddar cheese or Mexican blend cheese (4 oz)
1 4oz can diced green chile peppers, drained (optional)
Nonstick cooking spray
1 cup bottled salsa
1/4 cup dairy sour cream
1/4 cup sliced green onions



1 - Place tortillas on cutting board. Spread half of each tortilla with 1/2 cup of the barbecue chicken. Sprinkle 1/4 cup of the cheese over chicken. Top with drained chile peppers. Fold tortillas in half, pressing gently.

2 - Spray a 10-inch nonstick skillet with nonstick cooking spray. Heat skillet over medium heat. Cooke quesadillas, two at a time, in hot skillet for 4 to 6 minutes or until light brown, turning once. Remove quesadillas from skillet; place on a baking sheet. Keep warm in a 300F oven. Repeat with remaining quesadilla. To serve, cut each quesadilla into 3 wedges. Serve with salsa, sour cream and onion. Makes 4 main dish servings.

Per serving: 469cal, 21 g fat (10 g sat. fat), 86 mg chol., 1629 mg sodium, 46 g carbo, 1 g fiber, 25 g pro.

We changed it up again (lets be honest, when have we ever not changed it!), we didn't use the chile and we used tomatoes as a topping as well!

Here's some photos:













It was good! As far as the chicken goes I put it frozen into the crock pot with about 2 cups of water and put it on high. About 4 to 5 hours later I put in another cup of water and then about 1 hour after that I pulled the breasts out and shredded them. I put them in a container and added some BBQ sauce.

We topped them with sour cream, salsa, cheese, green onions and tomatoes. REALLY good!

Enjoy!

Sickies... and randomness

I can't believe this is happening again. People are getting sick in this house. I'm slowly making my way through the house cleaning everything we touch. Arnold was sick last night/this morning and is now in bed sleeping. The poor guy has gotten it bad. I was sick last weekend and I thought it was over with in our family but I was wrong.

The boys are feeling fine (and I plan on keeping it that way). Today Kyler told Mr Brown that Arnold was sick. Mr Brown asked if he was going to give his daddy a hug when he got home. And Quinton pipped up and said no. Mr Brown seemed surprised and Kyler responded with "We don't want to get sick too, silly!"

At least K knows the rules! Today when the boys got home they took off their snow pants and coats and we washed them, and then they waved hi to Daddy at the bedroom door. And just before nap time they did the same thing. No sickness passed around.

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Today while getting ready for my parents visit I started to get the things ready for the spare bed. I found that I can move a few things around in the entertainment until and I can put in there all the things we need for a spare bed! It's kinda nice. If we have any people coming over to use the bed late we won't have to wake up the babies!

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I washed the pillowcases and the box covers today and I'm slowly getting them done. So far no major damage so I can handle that. A few threads need to be repaired and then they should be as good as new.

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Ever find that you lose things? I'm not talking about keys or money (although I've lost both of those lately) but things like Kitchen tables! I've lost my kitchen table and dinning area to my laundry! Our dryer doesn't work so well so I end up spending most of my time hanging laundry somewhere. Not that it's a bad thing (BTW I can't wait for summer and the use of our laundry line!) it's just overwhelming sometimes. I am slowly working through the wet clothes and putting away the dry ones. Too bad I can't leave the laundry for longer than a week!

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Mommy, It's yummy! (#5)

I know I know this is getting a bit crazy, more of a food blog than anything! But it's fun. Today's meal was a great CPM (Crock Pot Meal) I swear these are my favourite meals! I love them. I love putting it in the CP and then heading out to do whatever the heck I want and having fun and then chilling out. At supper time there is a wonderful meal! And best of all, it makes the house smell good.

I love the smell that my CPM's make so much I even offered to make chili for the Superbowl Party on Sunday at church, but ONLY if I could make it in the CP at home, let it cook all day and have Arnold bring it in later so my house could smell like chili! I love it!

OK back to topic! Today meal is not only smells good, and is 'yummy' (as deemed by Q, which is a BIG deal right now with his non-eating habits) but it also is a great meal for a day like today. For those who don't know it's snowing outside. Not alot but enough to reassure me that the groundhog was right. More winter is on the way.

Beefy Minestrone

Prep 20 minutes
Cook - 8 hours (low) or 4 hours (high)
Slow Cooker size - 3.5 to 5 quarts

1 pound of lean ground beef
1 - 14 oz can of reduced-sodium beef broth
1 and 1/4 cups of water
1 - 10 oz package frozen mixed veggies
1 - 14.5oz can of whole peeled tomatoes, undrained, cut up
1 - 10.75 oz can of reduced-sodium and reduced-fat condensed tomato soup
1 Tablespoon of dried minced onion
1 teaspoon of dried Italian seasoning, crushed
1/4 teaspoon of garlic powder

1 - In a large skillet, cook beef until brown. Drain off fat. Transfer meat into slow cooker. Stir in broth, water, vegetables, tomatoes, tomato soup, dried onion, it seasoning, and garlic powder.
2 - Cover and cook on low heat setting for 8 to 10 hours or on high heat setting for 4 to 5 hours. If desired, top each serving with crackers. Makes 4-6 servings.

Per serving: 346 cal, 15g total fat (6g sat. fat), 71 mg chol, 684 mg sodium, 26 g carbo, 4.6 g fiber, 27 g pro.


So I did just about what it said. I used normal ground beef (it just happen to be what I grabbed out of the freezer this morning), the right beef broth but a bit more than normal; about 2 cups of water; the veggies were about half a bag; the tomatoes were whole tomatoes peeled, but I was too lazy to take them out and cut them up so I just mushed them around with a sharp knife in the can and it worked just fine; normal can of tomato soup; dried flaked onions (couldn't find minced at the grocery store); it seasoning - wasn't crushed; and a bunch of shakes of garlic powder.

All in all it turned out really really well. I took photos of the boys dishes as they were done first, and I needed some time for it to cool down.

Enjoy

The CN Tower!

Have you ever been to the CN tower? The CN tower held the standing of the Tallest Building in the World until Jan 2010. Then another building came into play. It needs a few more things on it on it but hey, it's close enough.

Anyway Arnold and I went to the CN tower. We had a great time when we went... 6 years ago! We have been married for almost 6 years! ok off topic.... back on topic.

When Arnold and I were on our honeymoon we went to Toronto and went to the CN Tower. It was alot of fun. We are going to go back to the CN Tower this month. Not to celebrate anything like our anniversary but to celebrate our 2 little boys. Kyler and Quinton's Birthday. Our cute litte men will be 5 and 3 years old. I'm so surprised how big they are getting and how incredible they are!

The boys have LOVED the CN Tower since forever. We see it every time we go to church. Kyler points it out every time we see it. And now everything in our house that is a tower is the CN Tower. Even Quinton does it.

The other day (I think Sunday afternoon) the boys built a tower. The CN Tower to be exact. It had to be bigger than the boys and sure enough Daddy and his little men were up to the challenge.













(you can thank Daddy and Q for those photos. K has some of his own on his own camera)

Anyway our trip is going to be the last weekend in Feb. We are thinking of going to do the "Observation Experience" which is just the elevator and the lookout/glass floor. We were thinking of doing the "sky pod" but we chose not to. If we change our minds K and Arnold will go up since Q is not quite big enough to go up there. We are holding onto all our 'spare' money from Entertainment, Eating out and Birthday budget to go. Not that it costs that much but we want it to be so much fun. We are going to take the TTC over go up and see everything, have lunch and hang out and then come back down and hit up the gift shop. I'm so excited for this.


If you want more information about the CN Tower check out this link: http://www.cntower.ca/

More new food! #4

Well it seems like we are doing more and more new foods. Today we tired something new, and it was really new to me. I have never used fresh herbs or fresh ginger. It was cool to try (thank you PW for allowing me to read your food section and know how to do some of this stuff)

Today's new food was :

Basil-ginger Chicken Noodles

prep 20 mins
cook 20 mins
serves 4-6 people

12 oz - wide egg noodles (about 6 cups)
2-3 skinless boneless chicken breasts
2 cloves of garlic - minced
1 small sweet onion
1/4 lb of snow peas
2-in piece of fresh ginger (peeled)
2 TBSP of soy sauce
1 to 2 tsp of chili-garlic sauce
2 tsp of liquid honey
2 TBSP of vegetable oil
1 TBSP of dark sesame oil
1/2 cup of shredded basil
1/2 cup of chopped peanuts.

1 - add noodles to large sauce pan of boiling salted water, cook uncovered until al dente 12 minutes or so.
2 - Meanwhile, slice chicken into stir-fry-size strips. Toss with garlic. Thinly slice onion. Leave snow peas whole, cut large ones in half if needed. Grate ginger on medium side of grater. Measure out 2 tsp. Set aside. Stir soy sauce with chili-garlic sauce and honey.
3 - Heat oils in a large frying pan set over medium - high heat and add chicken mixture. Stir often until pale golden, about 5 minutes. Stir in ginger, and onion. Continue stirring often until onion is soften (about 5 minutes). Stir in soy mixture then snow peas. Then toss with drained noodles and basil. Sprinkle with peanuts.

This comes with other things to do/use. Some examples are instead of wide egg noodles to use rice stick noodles, or instead of chicken use pork tenderloin.

I chose to go with the foods above. I also made one pan with no chicken (for a new veggie in our group) and then our normal one. It turned out REALLY well. I enjoyed the smell it had once everything was mixed in together. It was incredible.

Here's a photo, enjoy: