THANKSGIVING TURKEY

To get Reagan into the holidays I've scoped a few ideas from various websites. For November, we made a turkey's body and have been adding a feather to him daily. Each feather is written with something she is thankful for. When we ran out of feathers, we started decorating the wall with cut-out leaves. It's been a fun thing for us to do every morning-- wake up and think of something new that we're thankful for. I think this is a tradition we'll have to continue every November!



I half made-my-own pattern and stole from some websites. What I used was from here and here.

PICK UP FAIRY

If you're like me.... you get sick of cleaning up after people-- especially when you know they are capable of doing it themselves. I'm not asking for spic and span... just take the toys off my floor and dump them in the toy buckets!! I got this idea from an article I read in Family Circle... maybe it was Parents magazine.

THE PICK-UP FAIRY

At the end of the day when play-time is over and you're winding down for bed, you probably ask your sweet children to help clean up the messes they made throughout the day. If your kids willingly help.... well, then I hate you!

We told Reagan about the "pick-up fairy" (whom she calls the 'hiccup fairy'). This fairy comes to the house while we're sleeping and picks up all the toys that weren't put away and she takes them to her house. In a few weeks when the pick-up fairy is done playing with her found toys, she might bring the toys back if the little owners are being good children.

So far, the mere threat of one of her toys being swiped by the fairy in the night has motivated her enough to clean up at the end of the day. Sometimes it's even a game to hide the toys from the pick-up fairy. I love it-- I wake up in the morning to a clutter-free house in the morning-- can you say BLISS?

ps-- I also believe this trick can work on husbands. I do it sometimes to Brian as a joke... but with a hint of seriousness. Example: He often comes home from work and takes off his dress shoes, leaving them in the entryway. If they're still there the next morning after he leaves for work with a different pair of shoes on, I'll hide the clutter-shoes. I have a great time watching him look for them later in the week. HEE HEE.

Healthy Visiting Teaching Treat

Hi Everyone!

I've been trying to think of something worthy of posting and thought this idea was fun and easy.

It's fun to bring a treat to people every now and then, but in my zeal to be more healthy I try to avoid bring cookies and other unhealthy junk food.


This is what I brought to the sisters I visit teach today:

Wrap up an apple with an individual cup of caramel apple dip and peanut butter. It only cost about $1.50 total and looks totally cute, not to mention is much healthier than a plate full of cookies.

Hope you all enjoy!

Cinco de Mayo

Even though Ross gets upset about Cinco de Mayo (he served in the Mexico City mission) because people think all of Mexico celebrates it (and apparently they don't) we are going to have fun with the holiday anyway. Apparently Cinco de Mayo is kinda like Utah's 'Day's of 47' if we went to New York and said Happy 24th of July - they would look at us like we were crazy. Any who, tomorrow I am going to make mole - if none of you guys had tried mole, it is yummy, super easy and a traditional Mexican dish. There are lots of different kinds of mole - but this is Ross' fave. Give it a try :)



Chicken Mole Poblano
1 cup salsa
1/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1/4 cup raisins
1 small chipotle chile in adobo sauce (from 7-oz can), seeded
1/2 cup chicken broth
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
2 tablespoons semisweet chocolate chips
2 tablespoons ground ancho chile pepper or chili powder
1/2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
1/4 teaspoon ground coriander
1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into strips/chunks
4 flour tortillas
1 avocado, pitted, peeled and thinly sliced
1/2 cup crumbled queso fresco cheese or fresh mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup sour cream

DIRECTIONS

	In blender or food processor, place salsa, peanut butter, raisins, chipotle chile, broth, garlic, chocolate chips, ground chile pepper, pumpkin pie spice and coriander. Cover; blend until smooth.
	In 12-inch skillet, place chicken strips; add salsa mixture. Heat to boiling over medium heat, turning chicken occasionally to coat with sauce. Reduce heat to low. Cover; simmer about 20 minutes, stirring sauce occasionally, until juice of chicken is clear when center of thickest part is cut. Heat tortillas as directed on package. To serve, place each tortilla on serving plate; spoon 1/4 of the chicken and sauce mixture onto each tortilla. Top with avocado, cheese and sour cream. Fold tortillas in half over filling. Serve immediately. **We aren't huge cheese or sour cream fans, so we usually just serve it with avocados, rice and beans (Plus the rice and beans is all Annabelle would want to/can eat) . And this says it makes four servings, but we get more out of it.**

I am planning on making horchata to go along with it as well. You can always buy an horchata mix from the grocery store (by all the other Mexican food) then all you have to do is add water.

Since I am not asleep, (I'll share a great syrup recipe!)

This is the best syrup in the world for pancakes and waffles, I mean we are talking good! It is super easy and super fatty, but just don't eat it all the time!

1 cube butter
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup buttermilk (I learned a trick for this, if you don't have buttermilk, (i never do) just add 1 TBSP white vinegar to one cup milk (in this case 1/2 TBSP vinegar to 1/2 cup milk) and let it sit a few minutes, it looks sorta chunky but every recipe I have used it with works!)

bring all those ingredients to a boil,(it gets a little foamy I think because of the baking soda) and then take it off the heat

add 1/2 tsp to 1 tsp coconut extract (or to taste, i even put a little more in!) and if you don't like coconut you can just add vanilla extract, but man o man is it good with coconut!

Someone must try this and tell me how they like it, Mike wants pancakes or waffles every weekend with this stuff on it, we love it!

Sleeping! (or I wish I was!!)

Ok ladies, as a first time pregnant person I need some advice. I wake up every morning around the same time (between 3 and 4). I have to go to the bathroom or I am uncomfortable but then I have the hardest time going back to sleep. Any advice? I guess looking at blogs at 3:30am is fun, but shoot I need some sleep, I get so tired during the day!

Temper Tantrums

Just thought I'd throw this out there. Does anyone have good advice on what to do when your 3 1/2 yr. old throws temper tantrums? I feel like I've tried everything. Ignoring, time out, swearing:) Nothing seems to work. Help!
Holls(a.k.a. boobsweat) since brooklin brought up the brick bench i thought I'd reminisce.

FHE

Hi Ladies!!



Lately I've realized how important FHE is. 2008 my new year's resolution was to have FHE every monday night. I was good for a little while but I didn't feel like Landon was getting anything from it and slacked off. I got the idea a few months ago to do the same topic all month long and so far it's worked great. The first Monday I do a quick review of the topic and the next week we review and add to it. Also, I will keep the visual aid stuff I used on the lesson out all week and talk to Landon about it. I am very impressed at how much Landon has learned/reatained this way. If you have a hard time deciding what to have your lesson on, the Friend has a page with sharing time ideas that work great. They are on the theme for that month and there is a new idea for each week of the month. I love it-the lesson and topic are already prepared, I just have to read through it and put everything together.

St Patty's Day Fun

I thought I'd post some fun thing we did with the kids on St Patty's Day. The "Leprechauns" (sp?) left us some lucky charms for breakfast and put greeen food coloring in our milk. We had green jello-new flavor of watermelon, cantaloupe, and honeydew with our lunch. We also make the pillsbury 3 leaf clover sugar cookies. Also for dinner we had green french toast-nothing too fancy, gotta do something the kids like.

When the girls woke up they were sent on a treasure hunt and at the end found green bowls with gold wrapped candy and a green hot wheels car in them.

Of course we all wore green that day too. Cambree was so excited to celebrate another holiday.

TRAFFIC JAM

I just sent out a bunch of author-invites to random people I know, hoping to encourage some action on our friendly blog. If there is anyone you'd like to add to the list of authors, let's sign them up!

BABY TAGGIE BLANKET

My first attempt at something like this and I have to say it went pretty well.


INSTRUCTIONS

1- Cut two 12 x 12 inch squares of fabric, preferably something soft and cozy. I used that really soft fabric (I don't know the name) on both sides, but have also seen them done with flannel or silky fabric on one side for a contrasting feel.

2- You need coordinating colors of ribbon, cut into 4 inch strips. I did a total of 32 ribbons (1 on each corner and 7 on each side) but depending on the width of your ribbon you can use less. Try to find a variety of patterns and textures in your ribbon combo.

3- Lay your fabric right-side up. fold the ribon strips in half and pin them to the edge of the fabric, with the folded edge toward the middle. Pin the ribbons in the middle first, then the corner ribbons diagonally over the corner.

4- Sew around the edges of the square to attach the ribbon tags, taking out the pins along the way. Backstitch on each ribbon to secure them to the fabric.

5- Take the other square of fabric and place it right-side down on top of the tagged one, pin it together. The tags should be inside and the blanket should look inside-out.

6-- Sew around the outside, starting in the middle of one of the sides. Sew all the way around the square, leaving a 2 inch opening for turning right-side out. Don't forget to back-stitch at start and finish.

7- Trim around the edges and cut a diagonal edge on the corners.

8-- Turn right-side-out, making sure to square the corners off. Iron it flat.

9-- Either top-stitch around the edges for a finished hem-look, or hand-sew your opening shut.

Snuggle and enjoy!

Ok, here it is, the BUMP!

Hey guys, sorry it took so long to post something and I know this isn't even the best picture. This is me at 5 months, I am now 6 months, I stepped on the scale yesterday and had gained 2 lbs since the 5 month visit so imagine the bump 2 lbs bigger!

VALENTINE LOVES

We tried to make V-day a day of fun for Reags and tried a few things out that will hopefully develop into new family traditions. I'd rather make the "silly" holidays something for the kids to look forward to.

A HEARTY BREAKFAST


I made up some heart-shaped cinnamon rolls... made the dough and shaped them the day before and let them rise and bake on Valentines Day morning. They didn't rise the second time as well as I'd hoped, but I can always work out the kinks for next year. They were surprisingly easy to make.

No... I didn't come up with this idea myself. In fact, I stole it from this gourmet mom here.


You've got to have a red drink on Valentines Day right? So to go with our breakfast I made Blood Orange Juice... if anyone knows where they can buy a bottled or concentrated version let me know! I was told that Trader Joe's carried it, but I couldn't find it... so instead I bought 4 pounds of blood oranges and juiced them myself. I doubt that I'll have the commitment to do that every year, but it was a fun experiment at least.


To get Reags excited for the day, we made Valentines for our families. She mainly just stuck stickers on some cute card stock and them scribbled with some pink crayons, but she had a blast. I'm excited for when she can come up with some card-making ideas on her own. She loved the idea of giving the cards... but was stoked about getting some as well.


We put up some streamers outside Reagan's door so she'd have a constant reminder that it was a special day. She thought it was fun to run through them.

If anyone else has any fun ways to celebrate with the family on Valentines Day, let us know. But please... keep whatever you do with your significant other under wraps! ;)

KICK A CREAMY LEMON BARS

As promised, here is my first contribution to this experimental blog. These Creamy Lemon Squares come from the Kraft Foods and Family magazine and a link to the recipe is here.

CREAMY LEMON SQUARES

Crust:
20 Nilla Wafers, finely crushed
1/2 cup flour
1/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/4 cup cold butter

Preheat oven to 350ºF. Line 8-inch square baking pan with foil, with ends of foil extending over sides of pan. Combine wafer crumbs, flour and the brown sugar in bowl. Cut in margarine with pastry blender or two knives until mixture resembles coarse crumbs; press firmly onto bottom of prepared pan. Bake 15 min.

Filling:
8 oz (1 pkg) Cream Cheese, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
2 Tbsp flour
3 Tbsp grated lemon peel, divided
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/4 tsp baking powder

While crust is cooking, beat cream cheese and granulated sugar with electric mixer on medium speed until well blended. Add eggs and 2 Tbsp. flour; mix well. Blend in 1 Tbsp. lemon peel, the lemon juice and baking powder; pour over crust.

Bake 25 to 28 min. or until center is set. Cool completely. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours or overnight. Lift foil and bars out of pan and cut into 16 squares. Sprinkle with powdered sugar and remaining 2 Tbsp. lemon peel just before serving.

I've made these a few times and they are always a hit. Using the reduced fat versions of the cookies and cream cheese works well-- you can't tell a difference. I make these in the dead of winter, hoping that the springy-lemon-flavor will scare the cold away!

WELCOME

Welcome to The Brick Bench-- clever title? Eh, what else was I going to call this experiment. We can always change it... any other ideas are welcome!

I think it should just be a free for all-- post anything you that you think is a fun idea to share. Also, let me know if you want me to add someone as an author. We'll see how this goes. :)