8.31.11

Today's outfit:

Pinterest inspiration photo:

Source: polyvore.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Black tee, khaki capris, leopard belt & shoes, silver/wood beaded necklace.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Artichoke and Chicken pasta

Tonight's dinner is a artichoke and chicken pasta.

It's super easy to make and really tasty.

First, brown some chicken breasts (or be lazy like me and use frozen breast tenderloins and add them with the other ingredients).

Secondly, add 1 can of artichoke hearts (halved or quartered, up to you) or you can use a small bag of frozen ones. Then add 1 can of diced tomatoes.

For tonight I got a little crazy and used fire roasted/garlic tomatoes.
What can I say, I'm living on the edge!

Be sure to add your salt'n peppa.

Put it on med-low heat until everything is cooked thoroughly.

Lastly, add about 1/2 - 1cup of heavy cream. Ohhh yeah!

Let come to a brief boil- just until the cream sauce bubbles, then turn it down very low and let that go another 10 minutes or so to let everything marry.

While that's going, add your pasta of choice to some boiling water and cook until al dente.

Pour some of that arti-chicken sauce over your pasta. Top with some Parm cheese if you like and bon appetite!

I remembered to take pics way late in the game, sorry folks!



Mine and Max's:


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

8.30.11

Today's outfit.

Inspiration:

Source: polyvore.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

My outfit - pinks and grey:

Since its still summer here (80-90's mainly now, thankfully we're done with the triple digits), I went with a short sleeve shirt. The scarf is hard to tell but its sort of a rose color. The jeans I got on eBay (<3) and they're Banana Republic's Trouser Jean. So super comfy and I like the overall fit/look.

I wore silver toned necklace/sparkly earrings - which you can't see in the picture at all. But they are there.

And because my shoes got cut off in the pic, here they are :)  Pale pink Coach (they look yellow in the picture, but really they're a super pale pink). I got them on eBay last summer.

Can you tell I like eBay? I definitely have been using it more in the past 2 years since Max. Before, I'd never even used it! Now, its awesome. Plus with all the apps/iPad etc, no reason not too.

I have piles of stuff that I'd like to sell on eBay too, all ready for when I get motivated to picture, price and get it in pre-shipping order. I do a bunch of donations but some of this stuff is just too nice to donate- $100 Nordstrom pants/skirts (with tags).
It kills me that I've outgrown some of this stuff I have, because they're so cute and I don't want to get rid of them, but my hips (ugh)  shifted 2+ clothing sizes post Max and since I work at home, even if I could fit into that stuff, I've got nowhere to wear it to!

These hips are the bane of my existence for the last 2 years! Ahhhhh.

:) Acupuncture tomorrow :)

Whoa, sidetracked there. /rant over 

Back to eBay, one of these days, I'll get around to selling!

All set for fall

Now that I have the perfect PINK wellies:



Bring on the rain!

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Kale Chips

Source: smittenkitchen.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

In an effort to get Max (and lets face it, me too) to eat more green veggies, I thought I'd try out kale chips.

I had never tried kale before, I'd heard it was a 'bitter' green but that roasting them made them really yummy.

So I bought a big bunch at the grocery store. Rinse/dried them. I then ripped the leafy bits off the large stems and then ripped those leafy bits into bite size pieces. Make sure you discard the stems- you don't want them at all for this. Pulled out a big ol baking sheet and plopped the greens on it, drizzled with a little EVOO (extra virgin olive oil), a dash of pepper and some sea salt. Mixed that gently together and spread out the bunch evenly on the sheet pan.

Popped that sucker into a 300 degree oven for ~25 min (could go less or more depending on how large your batch is).  You want them to be slightly crispy when you take them out. If they're still sorta soggy, leave them in for a bit more.


Now, I would be remise if I didn't say that no one ever posts how BAD it smells for the first 15 min or so of the roasting process. It smells like a poopy diaper. No joke.

You are now forewarned. :)

I made a batch of chocolate chip cookies right after to 'freshen' the smell in the house. And plugged in the Scentsy.

That said, I don't have any pictures because they didn't last longer than 10 minutes. Dead serious here.

My toddler devoured them like a no ones business. My husband came home and walked in the kitchen, looked at the stove where they were cooling and said 'oooohhh, can I try?'

He then ate the whole batch in less than 5 min (minus a small amount I pried out of his hands kept apart saying it was 'for the baby').

'They're nummy and delectable" says my husband.

I can see why other folks say they make these a couple times a week. I'll be buying more kale at the grocery store this week for sure!

Getting Organized: Part 1. The Basement.

So this summer I have slowly been trying to organize the house a bit more.

First I started out in the basement. Our basement looked like this (I can't even believe I'm showing these pics to the world btw.  /shame)

Our basement was just mainly used as a dumping ground for everything baby, storage, junk, and the unused. Behind the chair there, is our spare bedroom.

So I spent a couple nights after Max went to bed and got all the toys/baby stuff organized and put together.

I didn't really take a good shot, since it was like at 2am when I finished.

I had Sam haul out the old gym equipment. I took a huge carload of stuff to the Goodwill. I have some more to do down there still. I got new wall mounted bookshelves that Sam needs to install (I've only been asking him to do it for 2 months now) and then I can finish decorating and sprucing this place up.

I've got some World/USA maps to hang up and some additional artwork. I can't decide if I want to paint the space or leave it creamy as is.  This space gets very little natural light, so if I did paint it, it'd need to be a light color. My goal for the space is 3 fold really: play room, school room, and family hangout.

So I'm trying to design the space with those three things in mind. I've been utilizing the web and Pinterest to find inspiration pics. Here's a few I like:

Source: ohdeedoh.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Source: smg.photobucket.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Source: reddustlove.blogspot.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Source: confessionsofahomeschooler.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

You see, the reason why I want to do a classroom is I'm very seriously thinking of homeschooling Maxwell.  Controversial I know. But I really am interested in it.

SO much so that I've been devoting crazy amounts of hours into planning a toddler pre-school curriculum for this year! I'm still gathering some materials and getting my lesson plans in order. I'm shooting for a couple hours a day/2-3 days a week starting probably in September.

I figure if I work on pre-school at home for the next couple years (or even just this year heh) I can see how I like things and see if I think I can do it. That way if it doesn't work out, we know well before kindergarten. There are a TON of home-schoolers in Maryland. Lots of co-ops and groups to work/partner with.

That topic aside, hopefully I can nail down the hubby to put up those shelves and I can semi-finalize the basement.

8.25.11

Today's Outfit

Inspiration Pic:

Source: polyvore.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

My Outfit:

(Ignore the messy bed/room and bad lighting etc)
Cardi: Old Navy, Shirt Old Navy, Pants: Banana Republic, Shoes: Target, long gold necklace: ukn

Regarding the shiny shoes. A couple weeks back, a sorority sister of mine posted something on FB about her having small feet and snagging shoes in the girls department.

I was like, wow. Really?! The girls department has all the cute shoes!

So while strolling through Target yesterday, I spied something sparkly. As in gold sparkly shoes! Yessss!
I wear a 6.5/7 in women's. I found for these shoes, the girls 4.5 fit best.  So for $14 here's what I got:

Cute right?

/happy dance