Apple Butter

Thats right! Apples! The only thing better than fresh homemade apple butter... is well anything pumpkin, but apples are a close second :)

Here is the recipe that I used. Really it is more of a guideline. I made mine in the crockpot it took 8 hours. I slowly added the sugar and the cinnamon, that way I could adjust it to taste. I left out the clove because I dont like it.

I had no issues with it burning. This same recipe can be used on the stove but I have read several recipes that caution burning. Once it burns ALL of it tastes burnt.

Next came the canning. I was super worried about this part. I have NEVER canned ( I have assisted when I was younger) and I dont have a canner. I knew you could do it without one though and then I found this wonderful blog. Follow her directions exactly and you will have no problems!

Back To School

Things have been nuts around here. My little one just started Kindergarten! It has been exciting and stressful all at one go.

To celebrate her first day of school I made her a pencil cake! Now forgive me cause I did not take pics of the whole process (wanted to get it done before the bus brought her home) but I did make a tutorial :) 

                                         

Mix up your cake mix and bake in 13x9. Let cool

Cut cake to match picture. You can cut it all the way down long ways to make it skinnier (more like a pencil). Or you can just hack off two of the corners. Ice the whole cake and place in the freezer for about 10-15 minutes. It does not have to look pretty.

Tint icing pink, yellow, and black. Place it on cake according to pic. 

Add black accents to seperate sections

and VIOLA! Back to school cake :)

                                      

Water

I have been drinking more water lately. We are trying to cut out more and more of our processed food. I have not cut soda completely out yet, but I am down to half of what I was drinking. This is my favorite water bottle, the Bobble. I have the big one and my daughter has the small one. The filter will last for 300 bottles of water, which is amazing! The bottle is a little expensive to begin with but it is environmental friendly and also BPA free. For those of you that like to support American made products, the filters are produced in the USA! I have had mine for over a year and LOVE it. I just recently purchase the Bobble Hot, which is for coffee!

Earth Day!

We spent yesterday learning about the earth! We also went out and picked up a little trash. Zoey really seemed to enjoy it. I also let her make a dessert. :)

Pudding Pie - Earth Day Version

~Ingredients

     ~3.9 oz Box of Chocolate Pudding

     ~Regular Size Tub of Cool Whip

     ~Chocolate Crust 
    Opotional: Oreos and gummy worms.

~Directions
Make the pudding according to the instructions on the back of the box. Mix with tub of cool whip. I used the whole tub... and it was a little too much. You might want to use 3/4ths of it and then decide if you want more. There is no wrong way to do it, you wont mess it up. It tastes wonderful either way. To decorate we crushed oreos for dirt and added a gummy worm.

Pizza Casserole

There are loads of recipes for this floating around the net. I tried one of them and to be honest it tasted like spaghetti with pepperoni. So I tweaked it. I dont post recipes much cause I am more of a little bit of this and a little bit of that kinda gal. But here ya go.

Ingredients:
pasta
spaghetti sauce with browned hamburger in it
shredded cheese
pepperoni

Optional ingredients:
olives, mushrooms, onion, bell peppers, ham, sausage

Make however much spaghetti and sauce you normally make for your size family. Then in the sauce add some cool stuff like finely chopped mushrooms, black olives, ham, sausage, onion. The more pizza toppings you add the more 'pizza-y' it will taste. ADD SALT. Sometimes spaghetti can have a little bit of a sweet taste, but just a little bit of salt tends to help.

Once your noodles are cooked and your sauce tastes the way you like mix them together. Put half of the noodle mixture in a casserole pan. Cover in shredded cheese (I used a combo of half empty bags we had in the fridge. Mozzarella is always a good choice.) Then cover in pepperoni. Repeat this paragraph.

Bake for 15 min at 350 degrees.

Marshmallow Snowmen

We had a bag of open marshmallows that were getting hard. So I broke them out and let Z and her cousin make snowmen, especially since its calling for snow and this is probably the last winter/snow craft we will be able to get in. 

I used school glue and made 3 circles, they put the marshmallows on. They used markers for the other features. The snow is white paint. Snow flakes are thumbprints. We sprinkled a little glitter on for some sparkle :)

Mimosa Cupcakes

Cake: *some people prefer all purpose, I do not. So I used self rising. They still turned out wonderful* I also left out the vanilla extract. THIS RECIPE MAKES 28 CUPCAKES!!!

Ingredients

2 3/4 cup self rising flour

3/4 shortening or butter

1 2/3 cup sugar

5 egg whites

3/4 cup ginger ale or champagne (I used ginger ale, champagne is gross lol)

1/2 cup orange juice

1 tsp orange zest

1.preheat oven to 350. Beat shortening, sugar, and eggs together. 

2. mix ginger ale and orange juice. Alternating between flour and ginger ale mixture gradually add them to batter. 

3. add to muffin cups 2/3 of the way full. bake for 18-20 mins. (mine were done at exactly 18)

Frosting:

Ingredients

6 cups of powdered sugar

1/2 cup butter or margarine (margarine tasted just fine)

3 tbsp of ginger ale or champagne

2 tbsp of orange juice 

1. mix everything together. If too stiff add some extra orange juice one tbsp at a time until you get it the way you want. 

2. I used the star tip and piped starting from the outside in a swirl. Then added clear sugar sprinkles and small sugar pearls. 

3 Healthy Steps!

Zoey has many different cartoons that she really enjoys. One of them is Special Agent Oso. The great thing about Special Agent Oso is that he goes around helping children and teaching them the 3 HEALTHY STEPS to whatever task it is they are trying to complete.

She saw this video and has been begging me to make juice pops. :) So that is exactly what we did. The video goes a little fast and leaves out an important step so for those of you who have never made juice pops it is REALLY easy.

STEP 1
Find, Get, Buy, Wash.... Obtain an ice cube tray :) lol.

STEP 2
Pour in the juice AND (this is the part they left out) cover in plastic wrap.

STEP 3
Insert toothpicks and freeze :)

Cake Trick

I am going to share  a secret that my cousin shared with me :)

Adding instant pudding (just the powder - dont make it) to a boxed cake mix makes it wonderful!

You do not need to add any extra liquid either. I try to match the flavor of the cake with the pudding. For white and yellow cake I use vanilla or lemon (just because I like lemon) :D