Gotta Love Him

That awkward moment when you are at your son's basketball game, and your 2 year old son waddles to the middle of the court (mid-game) with his pants around his ankles yelling, "MOOOOM, I need to go POOOOTTY!!"

My cute friend has an awesome Marriage Blog, and today she has a really cool deal going on. I'm too lazy to explain about it here, but if you want to find out how to make your marriage more amazing, and for some good laughs too, click HERE to find out about it!

Be Kind

I read the following quote yesterday, and it really made an impact with me.

"Perhaps the greatest charity comes when we are kind to each other, when we don't judge or categorize someone else, when we simply give each other the benefit of the doubt or remain quiet. Charity is accepting someone's differences, weaknesses, and shortcomings; having patience with someone who has let us down; or resisting the impulse to become offended when someone doesn't handle something the way we might have hoped. Charity is refusing to take advantages of another's weakness and being willing to forgive someone who has hurt us. Charity is expecting the best of each other." ~Marvin J. Ashton

Is there anyone that comes to mind when you read that quote? I think it can relate to a friend, co-worker, spouse, etc. For me, I thought of my children. I think sometimes as parents, you expect a lot out of your children. You expect them to be well-behaved, to be polite, to do their chores, etc. And what do we do when our children don't mind? We discipline them. But I noticed that there is something missing in there...teaching. Are we taking the time to actually teach our children what is expected of them? Or are we just expecting it. If my child licks the serving spoon and puts it back in the fruit bowl, I can't just send him to his room or make him do the dishes, or what ever form of discipline have you. I need to teach him that it's not okay to do that, and why.

But like I said, this can relate to any relationship. Let's all try to be kind and patient with each other. It starts with yourself!

Fossil Cupcakes

To put it mildly, my oldest son is obsessed with dinosaurs. Yes, that is putting it mildly. I don't want to get into it. It's been my life for the past several years. Love him :)

His birthday is in a few days, and so of course he requested a dinosaur cake. (In the past, he has had a toy dino cake, a stegosaurus cake, a standing T-Rex cake, and another toy dinosaur cake.) Now that he is a little older, he decided to ask for a "fossil/paleontology" cake. So, I came up with the following.

I just made some little sugar cookies, just make sure they are smaller than the cupcake.

When they come out of the oven, immediately take a cleaned dino foot (I had a couple hundred to choose from) and press it into the cookie to make the indentation.

Here are all the little fossils.

I just frosted the cupcakes with chocolate frosting, to look like dirt or mud. Then stick the "fossils" into the cupcake. I froze my fossils so they wouldn't break when I put them in the cupcake. Then you just sprinkle them all over with some crushed graham crackers to look like fossils sticking out of sand. And there you go!

My dino-loving boy thinks they are awesome! Phew!

Pinterst Reviews

For those of you who have pinned lots and lots of recipes (like me), but wonder if they are good or not, here is a quick review of everything I have tried from Pinterest. So if you happen to have these recipes on your boards, here is my take on it. Of course, everyone has different tastes, but I think my tastes are pretty good :) Anyway, we will start with food, then finish with desserts!

Creamy Tuscan Pasta.

Haha, this was actually the worst dish I have ever made. Ever. But it might be my fault, not the recipe. It called for white wine, and so, I looked up a substitute and I found that you can sub apple cider vinegar for white wine. Well, this recipe calls for quite a bit (over a cup) and the vinegar was just too much. It tasted like vomit. So maybe if you use something else it would be okay, but I can't imagine this dish being awesome.

White Enchiladas

These are chicken enchiladas with monteray jack cheese and a white sauce. They were good, but kind of bland. To be honest, I make a way better white enchilada :)


Chicken Fried Chicken
I love Chicken Fried Chicken, but every time I try to homemake it, it comes out just wrong. Well, this one was the best that I have made, but again, it was a bit bland. I think if I make it again, I will add more seasonings. However, my husband didn't really like it at all.

Cheddar Chicken

If you have ever made Parmesan Chicken, this is a lot like it, only you add Cheddar cheese when you are breading the chicken. This was a big winner at our house! My husband LOVED it and so did the kids. I really liked it too. The only thing is, when you are breading the chicken with the cheese, it does not stick. So I had to just kind of top the chicken with the cheese, and then dip it in breading. But it was yummy!

Curry Chicken Salad

This was okay. The flavor was kind of different. Not bad, but just not right. I liked the first sandwich, but the leftovers were kind of gross. Usually chicken salad is better as leftovers. Won't make this again.

Greek Pizza

Oh. My. Yum! This was probably the best one I have tried so far. It has artichokes and feta cheese, so if you are not a fan of those, you might not like it. My husband and I loved it though, and the kids even gobbled it up! Definitely making this again!

Buffalo Chicken Wraps

These were so so so good! Of course, I LOVE bleu cheese, so if you don't you might not like it. But you could just use Ranch like I did for my husband. We both really liked them, but they would probably be better as an appetizer, not a main dish.

Okay, now on to Desserts!!

Lemon Cream Cheese Bars

I am a huge cream cheese snob!! So I pretty much pin anything with cream cheese in it. I made these and gave them to some neighbors. They told me they LOVED them. They were good, but the cream cheese snob in me knew they could be better. The crust was made using a Lemon cake mix. Didn't love that. I think it would be better with a homemade butter/flour crust. I probably won't make them again.

Mug Cake

I love chocolate cake. (Don't you love it how I say I love every recipe? Of course I do-that's why I pin them.) Anyway, I pinned this because I always make a huge chocolate cake and hardly anyone in my family will eat it, so I end up eating the whole thing in like 2 days. So I thought this would be nice when I have a chocolate cake craving, and I can just have my own serving. This was really yummy (for a mug cake.) I put the caramels in like it said, but they just dropped to the bottom and kind of got hard. Caramel is hard to work with. So then I made one w/out the caramels, and it was great!

Red Velvet Cheesecake

This pin was a little twerp because it had no link for a recipe. So what did I do? Made up my own. I made it for some friends and we all loved it. It is really rich and time consuming to make, but worth it! You can get my recipe here.

Cheesecake Sopapilla

This so SO easy to make, and really yummy! My kids didn't really love it, but they thought it was okay. But I really really liked it. My piano students also loved it. It is just crescent roll dough, butter, cinnamon and sugar, and a cream cheese filling. So I think if you like those things, you will probably like it.

Pumpkin Roll

This site claimed it was the "best pumpkin roll." It was okay. Of course, I am not a huge fan of pumpkin, but I do like it. There was nothing really wrong with it, but it was really small. I made it for my extended family, and there wasn't quite enough for everyone.

Peanut Butter Brownie Trifle
This was really really really rich, but so so so good! I made it for a friend and myself, and we devoured it! What is not to like? Brownies, Peanut Butter/CoolWhip filling, Peanut Butter Cups, Pudding. Love it!

And there you have it! I will have to do another one of these posts after I try my next list of recipes!

Forget Me Not

You may click HERE to download it for free.

My Fashion Diary

So, apparantley, the new blog trend is to document what you wear every day.

Seriously.

Have any of you seen this out in the blogosphere? I really don't mean to offend anyone, but really? I mean, I am ALL for fashion. I have a little fettish for shopping, but it's hardly noticeable. Even my husband would agree that I should probably go shopping more. (Haha, trying to make a joke, hun.)

But, I can't not be blog-trendy, so here's my little documentation of my fashion diary for this week (sorry, forgot to take pics):

Monday ~ Big fat maternity top, is that peanut butter on my shoulder? (And I didn't notice the jelly, because it was under my belly so I couldn't see it.) "Jelly-Belly"
Tuesday ~ Pajama pants - all day - my maternity pants are getting too tight.
Wednesday ~ Dishwater splashed all over my black shirt. Good thing you can't see it :)
Thursday ~ I managed to keep my top clean, but is that ketchup in my hair?

Let me know if you want me to tell you where and how to look this good! It's a gift I'm willing to share.