Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Molasses Baked Chicken

3 1/4 to 3 1/2 pounds chicken (I used skin and bones in mine, but to cut cals, use boneless, skinless)
1 tsp salt
black pepper to taste
1/2 to 1 tsp sallspice or cinnamon
2 TBS cider vinegar
2 TBS molasses
2 TBS brown mustard

Combine in bowl with wisk and pour over chicken. Rub into chicken. Put in sprayed pan and bake at 400 for 20-30 minutes per side until done.

Serves 4

WW: approx 7 pts per serving

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Monday, April 20, 2009

Heidi is HOME

The Pretty Pink Princess



Sunday, April 19, 2009

Polenta Lasagna with Mushrooms Bechamel



1/2 large onion, sliced
1/2 lb of shitake mushrooms, sliced - or other type mushooms
1/4 lb of button mushrooms, sliced
3/4 cup plus 2 TBS low fat milk
2 TBS cornstarch
2 oz reduced-fat cream cheese, softened to room temp
1/4 c white wine or sherry
salt, pepper, nutmeg to taste
2 1/2 c vegetarian tomato sauce
2 tubes plain commercial polenta, cute into 3/8" slices
1/2 c Parmesan cheese

Cook onions until translucent. Add mushrooms and cook another 5 min. Add 3/4 milk and bring to simmer. Dissolve cornstarch in remaining milk. When mixture is simmering, add to it. It will become thick, add cream cheese and wine. When well blended remove from heat and add spices.

Spread a few tablespoons of tomato sauce in bottom of 9x13 pan. Scatter 1/4 of polenta slices on bottom. Lightly dust with Parmesan. Put all the mushrooms next. Top with 1/4 of polenta, dust with cheese. Add sauce and top with rest of polenta, overlapping if needed.

Bake at 375 until bubbling hot, 35-45 min. Place under broiler for a few seconds to crisp up Polenta on top.
Serves 6
WW Points: 5.5
==============================================================
My family LOVED this!!!!
From Seasonings Recipe book

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Sausage- Stuffed Mushrooms


24 large fresh mushrooms (I used buttons, might want to use portabella)
1 lb bulk Italian sausage (to cut cals further use turkey sausage)
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 cup spaghetti sauce
1 cup shredded mozzarella

Remove stems, set caps aside. Chop stems, set aside. Cook sausage and remove with slotted spoon. In drippings, saute onion and mushrooms. Stir in spaghetti sauce and sausage. Stuff into mushroom caps. Sprinkle with cheese. Place in greased pan. Bake at 350 for 12-15 minutes or until cheese is melted.

Serves 8

WW points: 4 for 3 mushrooms.

Recipe from http://www.allrecipes.com/

Egg Salad

Egg Salad
4 cups peeled and chopped hard boiled eggs (about a doz)
½ c crumbled bacon – leave out to cut calories
1 TBS parsley
¼ c grated carrots
4 oz light cream cheese – softened for 30 sec in micro – possible 10 sec more
¼ c light sour cream
½ c mayo
½ tsp garlic powder
½ tsp onion powder

Yield: dozen egg salad sandwiches
WW Points: 4 (w/o bacon)
very yummy and different from my normal egg salad with just mayo, mustard, and vinegar.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Gym

Well, I did it. I decided. I decided to renew my membership with Gold's gym. I will tell you why, it is really very simple...diaper rash. I went TWO days to LA Fitness and both days when I picked him up he was poopy. I could smell him as I approached him. I guess that so many parents were yelling at them that they have just quit calling parents unless the kid is oozing out his diaper and clothes. On top of that, they take who ever walks through the door. They have no ratios for the kids that they maintain. The one day there were 23 kids to 3 staff. The other day there were 20. However, I did like the LA Fitness classes and once Wyatt is potty trained and we decided if we are going to have another, I could totally see me switching.

Cord at Gold's gym was such a pain to deal with. Very hard nosed and completely unwilling to work with me. I got an o.k. deal. They didn't raise my rate, I am still at 49.99 a month + the $50 a month day care, but they did throw in 3 personal training sessions. Which is really 2 since the first one just takes care of the paperwork and measurements and such. I would really like to have gotten 4 or even 6 out of them, but I seriously doubt I could have pushed it that far since he pretty much knew that LA's daycare sucked. So for another year I am here and we shall see where we go from there.

Monday, April 13, 2009

Easter

This was made using a template, and it is a little funky. I am not sure I like the pictures....they need a white "frame", but for some reason the template is not letting me put one one...weird...what do you think?

Easter was uneventful at our house. We made a turkey that was in the oven for over 6 hours and still didn't really seem like it was as done as it should have been. Sure hope my oven is working right.

Friday, April 10, 2009

Swing Set Pics

This is a kit from Lisa, who is trying to become a designer. Her blog is one of the ones I follow on the left side. Check it out.

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Heidi is COMING HOME!!!!!

Good news! They are discussing discharge with me today, depending results of her eye exam. She was found to have level 1 stage ROP (the way the blood vessels form on the retina), so she will be sent home on oxygen. The eye exam will determine if her eyes are improving or getting worse. If getting worse she might be in the hospital a little longer.

Yesterday she failed her hearing test, but you talk to her she responds to your voice. The doctors think it was incorrect and she was picking up background noise from her oxygen, so they are going to try the test again today. She needs a Head ultrasound and an MRI to ensure everything is still good; her first test results were fine when taken at week 2.

She is off the feeding tube and is being fed when she wants as much as she wants. The little bugger took 2 oz's her first time off the schedule. That is up from the 1 and a third oz she took every three hours.

She is up to 5 lbs. 13ozs. So, if they can squeeze her ultrasound and MRI in today or tomorrow and she does well on her eye exam she might be home at Easter! If not sometime next week.

Her room is at least painted (pink of course), I have to quickly do the paint around the trim of her new windows and hang her shelves. Her rocking Chair should be in on the 11th, I'm hoping it is in before she comes home but I would be happy just to have her home.

I have to go and buy crib sheets this weekend and I am hoping Thor paints his cradle and fixes the bottom board, so I can set that up. I also have to get her a toy box so I can paint it; not a show stopper but I don't think I'll have time once she arrives to do it. My sister is coming in this weekend and we are having a marathon sewing session to get her crib bedding and drapes all finished. I also still have to shampoo the rest of the carpets in the house so they are nice and clean.

My shower was cancelled, so I have to scramble to get at least the basics to bring her home. So I really have to bear down and determine what I need, even though I really have no clue as to what is. My mom is getting my car seat on Friday and is going to bring her home in the van, since my Mini is still broken and is the only car we have that I feel comfortable putting a car seat in.

Katie

Sunday, April 5, 2009

Tonka Truck


Weight Watchers & Gym

So I am doing it. Hopefully this time for good. Did you notice there were not many pictures of me in the scrapbooking page...well, my fat butt is just too fat. I am in a size 14, which I didn't think was too terrible, but...pictures don't lie. There is no way I am going to get into shorts when we head back to CHI on June 24th. So after the inspiration of my friend Molly who lost 40 lbs in 8 months, Kristin who has lost 10 in the last couple of weeks, my sister who has lost 5 in two weeks and my mom who has lost 8 in the last two weeks, I pulled out my stuff and started writing things down...NO MORE ICE CREAM!!!!

Now to just get the gym settled. My contract is up on April 15th with Gold's in Woodinville. I LOVE the kids staff, but at $50 a month for unlimited it is doubling what my membership costs per month. I LOVE the water aerobics instructors too. My options...LA Fitness, has pool with aerobics at 8 am and 9 am...neither time works right now, but next year the 9 am will work. The year after that it won't really work due to times when Wyatt will be in school (scary thought). Now I have heard from people that the day care is $20 a month unlimited, but that they don't take that good of care of newborns (which isn't important right now). I think they just had $39.99 per month + $149 joining ($12.42) = $52.41 no savings in cost of actual membership, but about $30 in daycare membership savings.

Then there is 24 hour fitness in Silver Lake. While it seems far, it is probably no further than I am driving now to Woodinville. Tina says the facility is AWESOME and she I think pays $29.99 a month for membership and their daycare is $40 for a 20 time punch card. I would be going approx 4 times a week, so it would last 5 weeks...saving at least $10 a month, plus whatever the membership cost savings is...if I could get $29.99 a month it would be $20 a month savings, for a total savings of $30 a month. Not a huge amount, so is it worth switching?

Saturday, April 4, 2009

The Last Port Townsend

Which one looks better?




More Port Townsend

Here is what we did on the next part of our trip to Port Townsend. We ate lunch at Old Fort Townsend and then took a walk on the beach and let the kids play. On the way into Port Townsend itself, we took a detour at Sorenson Winery....let's just say that we walked out with 6 bottles of 1 type of wine...it was that good...I see a steak in my future!!

Friday, April 3, 2009

Try 3 - let me know what you think


Ferry Scrapbook page


What do you guys think of this one? This is all so new that I am unsure of myself.

Or This?


Thursday, April 2, 2009

What do you think?


Mini Vacation - The Ferry

So the above is the view from the ferry as we approached Kingston. Unfortunately we didn't have the camera set on a very high resolution so the picture can't be blown up as much as we would like. The white is the snow capped Olympic mountains.

Wyatt was very facinated by the ferry. He couldn't sit still and was looking out the window with an expression of awe. We had thought to eat breakfast on the ferry, but he wanted none of it. Too bad it was so windy that we couldn't have either kid outside or they would have gotten blown over.