Taco Salad With Cilantro-Lime Ranch

This is a super quick dinner perfect for when the heat hits outside. In the summer I usually brown the ground beef or chicken in the morning and we eat the salad cold. This is a  favorite in our house and also very budget friendly.

Cilantro Lime Ranch Dressing

Cilantro lime ranch. So yummy and delicious! Perfect for my post later for taco salad. I love homemade ranch I know exactly what's in it! There is no MSG, I can use sour cream and buttermilk containing live cultures and the kids love it! It's not Hidden Valley folks! It's so much more and you can change the ingredients to fit your salad. Bacon ranch ooh dangerous!

The Cable Knit Scarf Project!

This is a scarf I started knitting last November. At the time I was super motivated and had just finished a super simple plain scarf. My first knitting project since I was my daughters age.

Tuna Noodle Casserole

 I love casserole with homemade noodles! This was so creamy and delicious! My Granny would make chicken casserole a lot and this is similar other then the tuna. Another great, delicious budget dinner! Creamy goodness! Sorry I missed a picture or two in the steps this was a busy night in our house trying to get dinner on the table!

Homemade Egg Noodles

Living with my Granny and Grandad growing was such a blessing. I had been exposed to such wonderful things in the 10 years my Grandmother raised me and one of them is homemade noodles. It seemed like once every few weeks my Granny would make pasta and hang it from the chandelier in the dining area with coat hangers to dry. I remember watching her roll the dough with a hand cranked pasta maker and begging for her to let me help. We never had boxed pasta other then spaghetti and macaroni. Chicken soup and casseroles where always filled with delicious homemade noodles. To this day when I have tried to make a casserole with boxed noodles I never enjoy it. I know I'm a noodle snob I was so spoiled it makes somethings hard to settle for. Every so often my husband throws in tuna casserole when I ask him for a few dinner idea's. I then try to redirect his attention as hand kneading dough isn't my things usually. Who has time to spend 20 minutes kneading? Not me. But tuna casserole with regular egg noodles yuck! So one day I thought why not use the kitchen aid to knead the dough like bread but on 2 so it's a bit more gentle and voilà no more kneading! Now only to go buy a hand cranked pasta roller and I will be 1 happy camper!

Curly Endive With Spaghetti (aka Chicory)

This is a great budget saving, delicious dinner, if you like greens. My husband when I met him, didn't like spinach, asparagus, and many other things. But I discovered his idea of greens was an over cooked mess! This was delicious and simple. If you have a little white wine I deglaze the pan with it before adding the pasta, just make sure to cook the wine down.

Garlic Pasta

This is one of those simple side dish's we eat on a regualer basis! Whenever I wonder what to have with dinner my husband usually request garlic pasta!  It is easy, quick abd flavorfull!

One Skillet Chicken With Cauliflower

I am trying to be more budget friendly and this is one of those dinners that is supper yummy. This meal takes about 15 minutes to prep and 1 hour to cook.

The Garden

This is the garden the kids helped me plant! Everything seems to be growing and doing well! I am so excited to see how it ends up this year since the weather has been rather  cruddy this year! Hopefully it will be bountiful. This bed has sweet peas, red leaf lettuce, napa cabbage, broccoli and spinach. This was one of my mothers day gifts from my husband and kids! They sure made my day!  My husband ended up with his leg catching fire from a gas can catching fire on the Monday after mother's day so I had to try and force him onto light duty. Long story, but the kids chipped in and then the neighbor kids had wanted to help with whatever needed to be done so we had a lot of help!

This is the side garden. It has raspberry's, lemon balm, rosemary, lavender, 4 tomato plants, bell peppers, jalapenos, blueberries way down at the end and I just sowed in some swiss chard the other day so hopefully it will thrive!

Oven Baked Chicken Burritos

This really  is a weak picture as I wasn't planning on posting dinner for tonight as it was more a throw together dinner of bits and pieces but the whole family said yumm. Then Insisted I post. These where crispy on the outside and nice and soft on the inside. I'm sure any filling would be great but I used half a left over chicken from making stock the other day. The other half was used in chicken and gravy over garlic mashed potatoes which was so delish, but I will have to post that another day as I forgot to take a picture until we had devoured it!

Good times!

My boys! They are just soo sweet..At least when the camera's on!

Minestrone Soup

Today was cold and rainy outside. I am so tired we didn't get back last night until 10:30 pm from seeing my family in Portland and I had to be up a 3:30am. So when I came home today I asked my husband what he would like for dinner and minestrone it was! Simple comfort food at it's best!

Chicken Stock

This is my base for chicken soup and many other things. The addition of fresh ginger is very mild but great for anyone recovering from a cold! When I make chicken noodle soup I usually throw in a jalapeno seeded, especially if we are recovering from a cold!

Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp Colt's Favorite!

This is my husbands all time favorite dessert! His grandmother had large amounts of rhubarb that grew in the yard growing up and he would go out and pick stocks, dip it in sugar and eat it! He has been working hard at work and putting long hours in so as a surprise I baked him this baby as a celebration to the start of his vacation! I love him a lot!

Brownie Cupcakes with Mocha Cream Cheese Frosting



These are delicious cake like brownie cup cakes! I spent Monday morning at work think of chocolate and came home and created these little demons! Oh and they filled my chocolate craving...

Chicken And Red Potatoes In One Pan With Homemade Vinaigrette

I cook as much from scratch as possible because this was how I was raised by  Granny. We never had hamburger helper or Kraft mac and cheese. She was one of the most wonderful/kind people I ever new.
 She raised me for about 11years. In that time we never had piles of laundry (one area I fall way short), breakfast, lunch and dinner where made from scratch with the best ingredients. I remember I ate a puffed pancake every morning for breakfast for 3/4 of an entire year, my Grandfather had oatmeal with raisins and my Dad would come home from the Navy on the weekends and eat a bacon and scrambled egg sandwich. She was often times a short order cook for breakfast, what you felt like she would make, even for my fathers friends who might drive up for the weekend and sleep on our couch. On occasion I would eat pancakes with homemade blueberry sauce. She grew the berries herself and froze them. We always had a nice lunch, I rarely ate school lunch and when I did it was because I had asked. Dinners where always to die for! As a mother now I look back and have no idea how she did it all. My laundry piles up, there are toys scattered around my house ( mainly lego's from my youngest) and my dinners might only be as complicated once or twice a week but I still thrive to supply my kids with as much of the values she had blessed me with..
We never eat in the living, other then possibly once a year with a pizza night and a movie. My children never eat alone and I try as much as possible to feed my children nutritious home cooked meals with no additional junk added to it.
My children will try anything and will eat anything as long as it taste good. They love vegetables and have well developed palates. This is all due  my Granny taking the time to raise me in this manner. So this meal is one of those meals without a lot of fuss but a heck of alot better then chicken helper...lol..We enjoy this alot and I hope you will too!

Sunday Morning...Strawberry Waffles with Whipped Cream

 So last night our daughter was up most of the night with horrible hive's.