August 30: Labor Day weekend

Just checking in.  We have a pretty laid back Labor Day weekend ahead of us.  Nothing much on the agenda, except to go to the pool and paint our living room. 

I've developed some sort of cold/allergy/sinus junk that is highly unpleasant.  So I'm looking forward to a quiet weekend at home!

August 28

Today we went to Meet the Teacher day at Audrey's school.  She starts preschool next week in a new classroom with new teachers.  She will be going three mornings a week this year instead of two.  I'm looking forward to her starting school, and she is too!  Summer has been fun, but I think we are all ready for a little more structure in our routine.

Audrey had some anxiety about school last year, especially at the beginning of the year.  However, towards the end of the year, she was a pro at going to school and seemed to love every minute of it.  I am curious to see how this year starts...will she pick up where she left off last year or regress back to the start of last school year?  Considering that she has to go to school all day every day next year (in kindergarten, oh my!!!!!), I'd like to see her have a great final year of preschool!

Based on how she acted today in her new class with her new teachers, she is going to do great!  She sat down and talked to her new teacher for a long time all by herself.  She was not the least bit shy or anxious.  We've heard good things about her teachers, and they were super friendly today.  This is her teacher Mrs. Smith, who sat down with her to talk and color:


And the rest of the day, Audrey kept asking me when she gets to go back to school. 

With all of this back to school talk, Isla wants to be a part of it too.  Every time we talk about Audrey going to school, Isla chimes in with, "Me too!"  I'm afraid she is going to have a hard time going with me to drop off Audrey every day and then not being able to stay.  Especially after today, when Isla discovered the play house section of Audrey's classroom.  I had to drag her away kicking and screaming this morning.  We're going to have to figure out something special for Isla to do while Audrey is out school!

August 24: Grammy Lois' Birthday Party

On Saturday, we drove to Quincy to go to my grandma's 88th birthday party.  You can see the birthday girl hiding in the back there!

 

Singing happy birthday (though it looks like my dad is the only one singing in this picture...maybe this was before we actually started singing!)

 

 Audrey and Isla worked very hard to make birthday cards for Grammy Lois.  Isla worked so hard on hers, that she had a really hard time GIVING it away.  But we convinced her that Grammy Lois would really like it...and that she could make more when we got back home.

 

Jackson (my step nephew) and Josiah (my nephew) playing cars together.

I tried really hard to get a picture of my niece Braxen but she was on the go the whole time!  This is the best picture I could get.  She was looking quite stylish in her little outfit.

Here's a group picture of all the partygoers.

What's for Dinner? Night 5

Last night, we had friends over for dinner and then we all went to the pool.  In my hurry to get dinner on the table and visit with our friends, I didn't take any pictures of our meal.

We had spinach and cheese calzones, served with marinara sauce and salad and fruit.  I've made these several times before, and I think they are really good!

Maybe one of these days I will post the recipe.   But right now I'm feeling too lazy to go get it out of the kitchen and type it here.  Just being honest!  =)

What's for Dinner? Night 4

Tonight we had grilled chicken.  I marinated it in this homemade Italian dressing (which makes a GREAT marinade for chicken).  Then Daniel grilled it for us.

Confession:  I have no idea how to use the grill, as I have never grilled anything in my life.  I'm guessing it can't be that hard, and I would probably be able to figure it out.  But Daniel has always been the grill master in our family.
 
Along with our chicken, I made mac n cheese.  I contemplated making it from scratch for the sake of writing this blog post and making it sound fancier.  But in reality, I just took the easy way out and made it from a box.  I did use Annie's organic whole wheat shells and white cheddar, which seems to be a better option than the good old Kraft kind.

We also had these parmesan roasted green beans.  I'm not a big fan of green beans, but I think these are actually good!  There is something about roasting vegetables that makes them taste so much better.  Probably all the salt and spices and such that I add to them!  =)

The girls had canned green beans, because they are crazy and prefer that over the fresh roasted kind.  We also had apple slices.  Which Audrey wouldn't eat, because again she is crazy and not a big fan of apples.

What's for Dinner? Night 3

I completely forgot to post this last night!

We had a picnic dinner at the pool.  The weather has finally warmed back up into the upper 80s/lower 90s...perfect swimming weather!  Unfortunately, the pool changed its hours this week with the start of school, and it is only open in the evenings now.  We are trying to make the most of the last days at the pool, so our whole family headed out for an evening at the pool.

 For dinner, rather than eat the overpriced and not very good concession stand food, I packed lunch meat sandwiches, veggie chips, blueberries, and oranges.  I made chocolate chip mookies for dessert.

Audrey has been doing really well in the water, and she is starting to swim on her own underwater.  That's one of the reasons why I want to get to the pool as much as possible...so she can get as much practice as possible!  She's made so much progress this summer, I'm afraid she is going to forget everything she learned during the nine month break til next swim season. 

Here is Audrey showing her underwater swim.  After I recorded this video, she started swimming for longer stretches underwater by herself.  She can just about swim all the way across the width of the medium pool by herself without touching the bottom.  Considering that just a few weeks ago she wouldn't even put her face in the water, she has made a lot of progress in a short amount of time!

August 20: What's for Dinner? Night 2

Tonight I fixed Crockpot Chicken Fajitas, a recipe which we have quite often around here.  Mostly because it is so easy.  And it allows you to cook frozen chicken breasts in the crockpot without thawing them first!  I do not have the patience to thaw meat, so a recipe that allows me to cook meat from frozen, and have it turn out good in the end, is a big winner in my book.

This isn't really much of a recipe, because it is really simple.   It is super flexible and can be made in larger or smaller quantities to feed your group.  Here's the basic gist of the recipe:

Crockpot Chicken Fajitas

Frozen chicken breasts
Red pepper
Green pepper
Onion
Taco seasoning (I make my own using this recipe)
Chicken broth

Basically, you just put everything into the crockpot and let it cook!  You can cook it on high for 3-5 hours or on low for 6-8 hours.  Or you can do a combination, which is what I did today:  cook on high for 2 hours and on low for 3 hours.  You really can't mess this up.  When it is finished, just use a fork to shred the chicken.

Today I used three frozen chicken breasts and chopped up half of each red pepper, green pepper and onion.  Then I just poured in some taco seasoning (maybe 2 tablespoons?) and some chicken broth (maybe 1 cup or so?).  That is the beauty of this recipe...you don't really need to measure anything too carefully.

And, I chopped up the other half of each red pepper, green pepper and onion, and put them in the freezer.  So next time I make this recipe, it will be even easier as I will be able to use frozen chicken and frozen veggies!

I served the fajitas on store bought whole wheat tortillas with cheese (and Daniel added salsa to his).

To go along with the fajitas, I made this Green Rice Casserole.  It is supposed to be made in a 9x13 pan, but I split it between two smaller pans and made one to cook tonight and put the other in the freezer.  (I have a crazy piano teaching schedule this fall, so I'm trying to plan ahead and have some easy things in the freezer!)

To round out our meal, we also had peas and cantaloupe with our dinner.

So to keep it real, here is one of the reasons why I get tired of cooking:

Such a mess!!  Doing dishes is one of my least favorite activities!  But it is all cleaned up now; ready to be made messy again with tomorrow's cooking.