Guest post at Butter with a Side of Bread!

Check out my guest post at Butter with a Side of Bread today and learn how to make easy peach slurpees.

Peach Slurpees

Minecraft Birthday

My kids don't have friend parties every year, so I feel like the years they get to have friends over, I need to make it memorable.  This year I didn't have a lot of time to devote to planning, but I was able to find some fun graphics for free online that made everything come together really well.

I got the amazing minecraft graphics from the blog catchmyparty.com

They had invitations, food cards, banners (which I didn't use- keeping it simple), and all the other printables that you might need for a great minecraft party.  

I found this picture on pinterest and decided to try to recreate it. 

I baked a chocolate fudge cake mix in a 9x13 pan with a piece of parchment paper cut to size in the bottom.  I also sprayed the sides and the paper with cooking spray.  

While the cake was baking, I made the blue jello or "water" for the minecraft cake.  Instead of following the regular jello directions, you want to make the jello thick so you can maneuver it into place.  To make minecraft water jello, you need two LARGE boxes of blue jello.  Stir them into 2 1/2 cups of boiling water.  Pour into a 9x13 glass pan (it helps to spray the pan with cooking spray first) and place in the fridge. 

About this time the cake should be done.  Set it aside to cool and get started on the rice krispie treats.  I followed the recipe on the bag of mini marshmallows, except I added a couple extra TBSP's of butter, because I think it makes the treats softer, which worked out really well since I decided to fill all the empty space with rice krispy treat.  

 When the cake is cool, run a knife around the edges and turn the pan upside down to get the cake out of the pan.  The parchment paper should make it come out pretty easily.  I cut a piece of a chocolate wrapper (it was thick paper)- the cake box would work well- to use as a template to cut my squares all the same size (for the most part).  I marked my lines and cut about 1/3 of the cake off in a stair step pattern.  Part of it I put on top of the other piece and some of it I used underneath the second layer (since my cake was much higher in the middle than the edges- cutting it would have been an option to make it flat, but the sides of my cake weren't very thick.  Another possibility is to bake two cakes, cut them both so they're flat and then stack them together- but again, I was trying to keep things simple, so some pieces of cake got used as fillers to level things out. I also cut one piece in half to give myself a couple of short cake levels.

I frosted the tops of some pieces with green buttercream, and used my spreader to rough up the top like grass sort of.  I used chocolate buttercream to hide the wedging-layer-job on the sides, and also on some of the top pieces to hold the raw cane sugar on- I don't play minecraft, but I think that is supposed to represent dirt or something?

I cut the rice krispie treats and created a pool and filled in around the edges of the cake.

The jello worked really well.  I was worried about getting it from one pan to another, but I dipped the jello pan in warm water briefly, cut a couple of squares and used a spatula to scoop them out.  Once I got an edge up, I actually just used my hands to put them in place.  They're really solid.  I think they were in the fridge for four hours or so.  I filled in any cracks with slivers of jello.

I found paper templates online for making your own minecraft creatures here.  The first few kids who arrived saw the cake and were all pretty excited by it.  I was surprised that they all wanted jello and rice krispy treats along with the cake and ice cream.

My son made his name out of perler beads.  I had intended to make a little black and white minecraft sign too, but I ran out of time.  Google perler bead minecraft for some fun ideas though.  

My son also decided the cake needed a tree, so he made one out of legos.  "I just threw it together mom!"

The printables link has fun drink labels.

And food labels- it was interesting trying to find treats that fit each minecraft label.  "coal" for example, was mini oreos.  

10 year olds are pretty good at coming up with their own entertainment.  We watched a movie, had an impromptu dance party, played "mine and go seek" (I have no idea what that was), ate cake, ate treats, watched funny you tube clips and generally ran around being crazy 10-year-olds.  A great time was had by all, I think.  

Occasionally I receive products from BzzAgent to try out and review.  The most recent was Comforts diapers, wipes, and sippy cups.  These are found at Kroger brand stores.  Here in Utah, that's Smiths and Smiths Marketplace. 

I'm not usually a huge fan of store brand diapers.  They're thinner, the gussets are often flimsy, the tabs are weak and there is usually a terrible fragrance added.  Comforts diapers were thinner, and the gussets were not as substantial as a higher quality brand name, but overall, I think they worked well.  They are not scented and didn't cause rash problems on baby E's backside.  We had one blow out with them, but an occasional blow out when he's wearing disposables is not unheard of.  The tabs are the velcro type tabs, and held really well, an I didn't have any tear off on me.  

Price wise, they're less than brand name diapers, even from costco.  If I combine coupons and sales, I can still get brand name diapers for less, but these would work well for the in-between coupons/sales periods.

I actually really liked the wipes.  They are not scented, and didn't cause rashes either.  They felt fairly thick, and I would buy them again.  

I initially loved the sippy cups.  My 18 month old liked them better than his other sippy cups, and drank more from them.  My only concern was how thin the plastic was, and sure enough, after a couple of times being thrown "overboard", the bottom of the cup split open.  If your baby doesn't throw his cups down, or you are more attentive than I am, these are great cups.  We'll continue to use our second cup while running errands, but not in the high chair anymore.  I especially like the built in cover for the mouth piece.  Baby E liked it as well.  I'm not sure I would buy the cups again because of the thin-ness, but if you're using them instead of the take and toss type cups, these are definitely a step up.  They don't leak, and the mouth piece has a cover, which is great for carrying drinks around in the diaper bag.  I've also seen a leash you can attach to sippy cups, which might prevent them from getting cracked when babies throw them.  

Winter Gardening

CP and I decided to tackle the green house today.  He had some tomato plants that he had started that really needed to be planted, so today was the day.  We didn't mop the floor, but we cut out most of the dead plants and watered everything, and swept, and moved empty pots out.  We also cleaned up around the little table.  All of a sudden smallish people want to sit at it again...

How to Host a Spy Party

A turned 8, which meant this is a "Friend Party" year.  He wanted to have a spy party, so I started thinking about what kind of a cake I could make.  Most years I do pretty neat cakes (although we've bought the last few since we had either just moved or just had a baby...).  I also started looking online for ideas of what we could do at the party.  I found a few ideas for party games and began to piece the party together.  My most genius idea was the fake cake.

I decided that we'd start the party first thing with the cake.  It looked like this:

This is how I put it together:

Yes, that is a giant marshmallow (I cut a little off the bottom to make it not so tall) and then I cut a slice into it to put the licorice in).  It's amazing how much easier it is to frost a piece of foam than a real cake. 

The kids were all really excited about the cake (I was too- it looked really cool).  The foam was harder to cut than I thought it would be, so I actually ended up just cutting the two pieces apart- so I recommend using two half circles otherwise you'd need an electric knife or something to cut a piece of cake.  

Once we had the cake cut in half, we acted shocked.  "What in the world?  What happened to the cake?"  Even A had no idea.  This note was hidden inside of the cake:

 First thing we did was fingerprint all of the children to make sure none of them matched the print on the note- we had to rule them out as the cake thief.  Next I handed out cards with several fingerprints on them (fingerprints labeled with names of "known criminals").  Once we had confirmed that the thief really was Dr. Caker, we were able to head to his secret headquarters.  

Unfortunately Dr. Caker was a step ahead of us, and had abandoned his hideout.  We did discover a bomb and had to diffuse it before we could search the building (our playroom) for clues.  The bomb was a special "chocolate bomb", and had to be diffused by putting on special gloves (socks) and unwrapping and cutting it up with two butter knives- and then eating the pieces- all without touching it.  The kids sat in a circle and rolled dice, everytime someone got doubles they got to have a chance to diffuse the bomb, when someone else rolled doubles, they had to hand their tools to the next person.  (this is The Candy Bar Game that I used to play at parties when I was a kid).

Once the bomb was totally eaten/diffused, we searched the room for clues and found a note from Dr. Caker congratulating them on being better secret agents than he thought they would be, but that he was not going to get caught, so he had moved on to a room "more suited to living".  The kids figured out pretty quick that they had to go downstairs to the living room, which was now full of balloons.  More bombs- these couldn't be diffused, so they had to be detonated.  The kids sat and stomped until the bombs were all popped.  They discovered that several bombs had encrypted notes inside.  We pulled out the decoder lenses (pieces of red cellophane).  I had typed the notes in blues and greens, alternating letters, then added red yellow and orange letters in between so that you couldn't read the note until the red cellophane blocked out the red yellow and orange.  

That final clue led to the room where the real cake was hidden.  Cupcakes baked inside of ice cream cones.  I need to improve my technique with frosting them, but the kids liked them.  

We also had bowls of ice cream, opened presents, then the kids watched a couple episodes of Phineas and Ferb since we had some time to kill (those kids finished the clues faster than I thought they would).  If we had had a little more time, we could have watched a Spy Kids movie or something (they all really seem to like The Spy Next Door at this age).  

As kids left, we handed out goody bags:

Inside was a mini spy kit that I found at the dollar store, some disguise glasses, a magnifying glass and a candy bar.  I also used a similar bag to hold supplies for each game:

Butternut Squash Soup

The other day I remembered the shelf full of squash that is out in the garage and decided we'd better start eating more squash so none of them end up wasted.  I've been wanting to try butternut squash soup for awhile, and since we didn't have any other ideas for Sunday dinner, butternut squash soup it was.

My Mister was skeptical, but once he tasted it, he was converted.  It wasn't quite as good as the carrot soup we had at The Farm in Park City, but it wasn't too far behind in taste.  I may try the recipe with less squash and more carrots sometime...

I used this recipe from AllRecipes.com with a few alterations based on what I had and the reviews which suggested adding some things to make it not-so-bland.  Not-bland soup seems like a good thing.

• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 stalk celery, chopped
• 1 medium carrot, chopped
• 2 medium potatoes, cubed
• 1 medium butternut squash - peeled, seeded, and cubed
• 1 (32 fluid ounce) container chicken stock
• 
  

Melt butter in soup pot.  Add chopped onion and celery (unless you're using dried onions and celery, in which case, you can just add them at the same time as all the other vegetables.  Also, my addition- add 1-2 cloves of garlic, minced.  Chop and peel carrot, potatoes, and squash (it would probably be easier to cook the squash first, but you have to cook the carrot and potatoes anyway, and peeling the squash with the potato peeler wasn't that bad).  Add chopped veggies to pot, cook on high stirring constantly until the veggies are browned slightly (I didn't cook mine that long- I waited until they started sticking to the pot, then decided to just go ahead and add the chicken stock- which in my case was chicken base and water).  The recipe says to add just enough broth to cover the veggies, but it took all of it for me- I guess my squash was bigger than "medium".  I also sprinkled a shake or two of curry powder.  Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer on low for 40 minutes.  (after 25-30 the veggies looked soft enough to me, so I didn't keep cooking them).  Next, you blend portions in the blender (or a stick blender would work, right in the pot) until it's all blended.  

Serve with salt and pepper, and a sprinkle of parmesan cheese, and crunch bread.   You could use vegetable broth if you want to make it vegetarian.  My kids actually ate it without complaining- too much.  I was surprised.  It turned out to be a very nice consistency and the curry wasn't overpowering- I didn't add much, but I could just taste a hint of it.  I like butternut squash when it's not covered in brown sugar (I like it sweet too, but this was a nice savory change).

Christmas News Letter

J is in fifth grade this year, and can now wear my shoes.  His interests are soccer, electronic games, beyblade (although I’m told that beyblades are no longer “in”), and origami.  At school he sold origami creations as part of his class store, and got really good at folding ninja stars.  Mom got really good at folding boxes.  For his birthday this year, he invited his whole class and had a movie outside in the field, and found out what happens when you put mentos into diet coke (we did that on purpose, we were’t just feeding kids diet coke and mentos...).

A is in second grade, and is still just a happy kid.  He loves his teacher, his friends, soccer, and legos.  His smile is infectious, and his teacher has told me several times that he really knows how to make her heart melt.  There are few things better than knowing your child’s teacher loves him as much as you do.

CP is in preschool this year.  When I pick him up he likes to ask me, “so, what did you do today?”  He also played on his first soccer team this year.  Preschool soccer is fun to watch, since most of the kids don’t know what’s going on, and are busy climbing their coach or playing house in the goal net.  CP, thanks to his older brothers, knew what was going on, and we got some good footage of him running down the field to score a goal.  In a few years when the other kids figure it out, that may be a little trickier.

E is finally walking, at 15/16 months.  His favorite things are going down the slide, being carried around, and playing fetch, I mean catch.  He’s a happy kid, except when he’s teething, and we’re so happy he’s part of our family.  CP especially likes having a younger brother to play with (and carry around- E is not so fond of that).  Time is going by so fast, that we’re just trying to enjoy his babyness as much as possible before it’s gone.

This year I’ve discovered that I have hobbies again!  I had forgotten about them for a long time.  I ran a couple of half marathons and my very first full marathon this year (after which I promptly stopped any form of exercise- I’m still recovering- I’ll get back to it one of these days...).  I also rode (and finished) a 100 mile bike ride with some of my friends.  I felt great until mile 70 or so, after that I was grateful to my friends for keeping me going.  

Kyle had a pretty busy training schedule earlier this year when he was training for the St. George Ironman.  He finished, and is crazy enough to want to do it again in a couple of years.  He’s decided that triathlons are more fun that single-event races.  (I tried a sprint tri this year, and am unconvinced.)  

We’re still working on getting our houseplans ready for building in the spring, and are keeping our fingers crossed that everything works out to proceed as planned.  Hopefully next year I’ll be writing this letter from the comfort of my very own home.  Maybe you can all come visit.    All Our Love,  Kyle, Alice & the boys.

Track the progress of our house at http://flaglotliving.blogspot.com

Crunch Bread

CP calls french bread "Crunch Bread".  He likes it dipped in oil and balsamic vinegar.  

CP, ever since he was a baby, has done this thing where he sucks on his pointer and middle finger, and holds his ear with his other hand, when he's tired.  Tonight, he told me that he can't suck on his fingers because he had chap stick on, and that he couldn't hold his ear because they were warm.  He can only hold his ear when it's cold.  It's hard to go to bed with chap stick and warm ears...  Funny kid.

Baby E learns to slide!

Can I go back to last week?

Last week I dropped Taja dog off at the vet, where she was being kenneled while we went to Oregon for Thanksgiving.  That was Friday.  I took her bed, and a chew toy, and handed her over.  I was a little sad when I climbed into the car.  I love that dog, and I was going to miss her.

I had no idea.

Monday morning the vet called to tell us that Taja had died in her sleep.  Her heart just stopped.  I'm glad it was quick, but my heart hurts that she was not home with her family.

She was a stinky, drooly dog, with floppy ears and a wiggly bum, and we loved her.  It seems a little silly to grieve so much for a dog, but she was really a member of our family.  We're going to bury her in the yard, and plant a tree to mark her grave.

Well miss you, puppy.

Taja Harley Quinn 

(she was AKC papered, and they require ridiculously long names)

AKA Taja, Taja dog, or Puppy.

April 2002- November 21, 2011

Puppy Taja

We have a lot of pictures like this.  Taja was always kind of in the background of whatever was going on.

Taja loved playing soccer with us.

Two Christmases ago

Camping

Chewing a bone, enjoying the sunshine- one of her favorite ways to spend an afternoon.

Part of the family.

Fall Clean Up (part three)

I didn't take pictures again.  But, we forced the boys out the door this morning and they did great picking grapes until the first bucket was full, after that it was painful to keep them working.  We ended up with four buckets to put in the steam juicer.

While we were picking grapes, my Mister mowed the field, pulled the hoses from the big garden and stretched them out on the cement to get warm so he could coil them up and put them away, then he mowed the garden.  We didn't plow because we're not sure if we'll be able to garden there next year when the house is being built.  He did plow the neighbor's garden while I sat and visited.  Our neighbor gave us some horseradish, a huge banana squash, a turkey egg, and some walnuts.  It was a fruitful visit.  :)

Next, I wanted to get the yard mowed, so I pulled out the rotary mower and made the boys come out to rake the grass up so the mower would catch it.  It was really long and matted down, so that took awhile.

My Mister cleaned out the boat and laid the cover out to dry.  We need to cover it with a more waterproof tarp this winter so we don't get water build up inside it.  He also weed whacked around the driveway under the grapes.

Next up: making grape juice.  I also need to clean out the black raspberry patch, but I'm not sure I'm going to get to that.

Oh Dear, and Plums

My 4-year-old dropped the camera.  I asked him to get it for me so I could take a picture of putting italian plums on the dehydrator.  I shouldn't have asked him to get it, but he does manage to carry things most of the time without dropping them.  So, there won't be pictures of the plum project.

In addition to the dried plums (prunes), I'm also making some pureed plum jam-we discovered this two years ago when I had pureed plums to make fruit leather, but decided, last minute, to make jam instead, and we all really liked the texture of the pureed fruit jam, so we've done apricot jam this way as well.

Update

I haven't posted in nearly a month.  We've been busy with soccer and stuff around the yard, and, whenever something interesting happens, I post about it on facebook, so my mom is right, facebook reduces blog posting.

To finish off my last post, we got the honey strained, and here's what we ended up with:

We've already eaten most of one pint.  The boys LOVE J's recipe for biscuits (that he got out of the Magic Thief book) with "fresh, homemade" honey.  

It's a bit of a sad fruit year, the trees don't have much on them (with a couple of exceptions), the apples all fell before they were ripe.  There weren't very many nectarines, so we ate a couple and dried the rest.

The peach tree finally has ripe peaches on it.  Just a few, but the bonus of not-very-many peaches is that you get ones like this:

And here's a picture for my mom.  Baby E has discovered the washing machine. He likes to watch the water and clothes swirl around.  It's pretty funny to watch him bounce up and down in excitement.

Raspberries

When I was younger, I used to climb this doorway just like CP is doing in the picture (A taught him how).  I'd get to the top and my siblings would say, "RAAAASSSBERRRIIIIEEEESSSS".  If you've seen Thoroughly Modern Millie you'll know why that was funny enough to make me fall.  That's not what this post is really about, but that's how my brain works..

Thursday, some friends from my former neighborhood posted on facebook that they were getting a really great deal on cases of raspberries from their produce coop, I ordered three cases.  We ate a lot (it was nice to have enough that I could just let the boys eat away without feeling like the fruit scrooge), we gave some away, I froze a gallon bag full for use in smoothies, and made a batch of jam.  We debated making more jam, or freezing more, but thought we'd try something different. 

A couple of weeks ago I took the boys to the county fair, when we walked through the 4H building, I noticed there were several entries for canned raspberries.  I thought about some of the things we'd use frozen raspberries for- cooked for a topping on ice cream or cheese cake especially- and thought that would work with canned ones, minus the risk freezing seems to carry around here (we haven't had the greatest luck with freezers, combined with children who like to leave freezer doors slightly ajar for some reason).  Canned raspberries are beautiful.  I wish I had bought several more cases (assuming they taste okay in whatever I use them in- I don't plan on eating them plain).  

July 24th (observed)

Since Pioneer Day fell on a Sunday, it was "observed" today, and my Mister got the day off work.  He went for a bike ride in the morning while I ran hills on the treadmill (he got the better deal this time...).

Other things we did (I just realized that several of the pictures are from Saturday...):

These apricots are actually from yesterday.  He picked them saturday and we didn't get to them.  The mushy ones we pureed and then canned.  8 of each kind.

We did beans on Saturday, and also had some chicken broth from the home raised chickens we ate last week, chicken broth and green beans have the same processing requirements, so we put the broth in jars and canned it.  Two and a half pints.  

The boys decided to move their fort from the bush by the front door to this pine tree.  

My Mister spent a lot of Saturday organizing the garage.  He finished (for the most part) today and we can now park in it!  He also built a bike rack out of pvc pipe so we won't have bikes thrown down all over the place anymore.

His other major project was mowing.  He mowed all around the garden, while I played with Keiko dog, she liked sniffing in the weeds, so I think she was a little sad to see the whole thing mowed.

He mowed the field.  There is so much cut grass that we really need to go rake it up.  Who knows when that will happen though.  Taja dog enjoyed the clipped grass.  She made herself comfortable in a shady spot and watched Kyle clean out the garage.

We also got 3 eggs today.  They're still pretty tiny, but seem to be getting bigger.  

J starting out on his 1 mile fun run.

J Finishing his run


A in his 1/2 mile fun run. He's wearing a dark blue shirt and looks back at the camera after he's passed.


CP in his 1/4 mile. My Mister had a hard time finding him, so he doesn't show up until toward the end. He's wearing a bright green shirt. He managed to avoid all the crashes. I love CP's gait. 4-year-olds are adorable.

Summer so far...

The boys have been busy with various day camps.  They took a sewing class one week, and made pillow cases and these backpacks, they loved it and want to do it again next year.

We all (except Baby E) ran the Centerville Fun Run.  Mister and I ran the 5k (he took 3rd in his age group, and I was 13th in mine- with a personal best- 8:36 minute miles), J ran the 1 mile, A ran the 1/2 mile (he fell at the beginning, but got right back up and finished with bloody knees), and CP ran the 1/4 mile (which was the cutest thing ever).

A couple of parade floats were passing out otter pops, which Baby E was really happy about.  

A and his friend S show that BYU and Utah could be friends if they really wanted to (although A says he doesn't like BYU anymore, phew...)  They're wet because they went down a big inflatable water slide at the carnival at the park.

Here's CP going down- he went down 3 times in a row.

J going down.

A couple of weeks ago J and my Mister did the Tsunami Tri over at the rec center.  J did the novice 150M swim, 3 mile bike, 1 mile run.  He took 2nd place in his age group!  My Mister took 3rd in his age group (he likes 3rd apparently).

After the Tri, we came home, I went for a run, we did some garden work, then we headed up to Park City for a Mtn Bike race.  J won his race.