cookies!

It's Friday!  So, we made cookies.

Now I am going to have to really be dedicated to my weight loss since all these cookies are sitting on the counter in my kitchen!  I'm going to have to show major restraint.  These cookies are heaven-like.  Seriously!

I've mentioned the sugar cookie on this blog a few other times, but felt they needed the spotlight, again!  So, if you haven't made them yet, try them!  I made cream cheese icing to go on them and the girls decorated them with sprinkles. 

Have a great weekend, everyone!

naughty and nice

Today, the girls and I were in the mood for some cinnamon rolls.  When I come to think about it, I don't think I have ever made cinnamon rolls from scratch before.  I have always LOVED those ones that come in the rolls in the States.  I can always count on my mom to make them when we visit.  But, remember, we live in Mexico...they don't have all that fancy pre-packed food like in the States.  In most ways, that is a good thing. Unless you are craving something like that.

Since we were going to have something so naughty (remember, I am losing weight, folks!  Cinnamon rolls really aren't the sort of thing I should be eating.), I figured we would try to balance it out a little with a healthy, fun snack.  Fruit kabobs! 

I bought lots of yummy fruit at Costco the other day.  I wish I had bought more.  It is almost all gone.

For the cinnamon rolls, I used this recipe that I found through Pinterest.  I picked the non-yeast version to cut down on the time.  They turned out really well.  And, you can't beat the icing!  If we are doing this, we are doing it all the way!  Icing and all!

The girls were in heaven!

Since early February, I have lost 37 lbs!  I'm on a roll.  And, I only ate half of a cinnamon roll, so I don't think I did too much damage!  And, it was worth it!

pasta!

UPDATE:  I miscalculated the number of calories.  I put double the amount of cheese when I was figuring it out.  It is approximately 460 calories for a serving.  Much better!

I'm going to talk about food, again!  I know.  I'm probably pushing it with this subject.  But, right now I am trying to lose this weight and find foods that are relatively healthy and satisfying.  And, even if you aren't in the same boat as I am, why wouldn't you be interested in semi-healthy foods?

Well, Pinterest gave me another winner, at least in my book.  A quick and simple pasta dish that I just threw together for lunch.  It uses Parmesan cheese which is one of the "healthier" cheeses out there.  It isn't too high in calories.

Even though most of the ingredients are tame, one serving was still sort of high amount of calories for a lunch.  I estimated a serving around 580 calories.  So, I will have to go light on dinner.  But, it is filling and I could totally go for more greens and less pasta in the next serving.  Or maybe a little less of the cheese.  (I could have estimated wrong.  I really need a scale for the kitchen...)

Anyway, if you would like to try it out yourself, check out the Macaroni with Broccoli & Peas.

Here are the ingredients.  (not pictured are garlic, butter, and olive oil)

It was pretty good and very light and fresh.

I will eliminate some of the calories next time around.  I wanted to make it like this just so I could figure out the best way to make it.

Either way, maybe this could be a quick meal for you to throw together.  Maybe even add in some chicken.  I think even the girls might like this one.

sweet treat

These girls of mine get their sweet tooth honestly.  Mostly Bella, though.  That girl gets up thinking about sweets.  Of course, I don't allow her much more than a few sweet items a day.  Not only are they not good for her, she has a sensitive stomach.  Sweets + Bella = puke.  Yeah, I know.  Gross!

Emily, she enjoys a few sweet things here and there.  But, mostly, she likes salty things.  Fine.  But, that doesn't slow her down from asking for cookies and candy.

And, me.  My sweet tooth has been deprived of sweets lately due to my major desire to lose weight.  As you know, I have been searching Pinterest looking for easy, semi-healthy, sweet treats.  Just something that is enough to calm the sweet tooth cravings.

I found one that looked promising.  Frozen chocolate-peanut butter covered bananas.  Sounds yummy and simple!  Yesterday, I whipped up some.  I ended up using some milk chocolate and semi-sweet chocolate chips.  Melt those with the peanut butter, dip the cut-up bananas, and wham!  Pretty good sweet treat!

Here is the thing.  Emily doesn't like bananas.  Weird, I know.  But, she doesn't.  She ate the Gerber banana baby food when she was little.  But, after that, she said adios to bananas.  I was wondering if she would notice that they were bananas under that chocolate.

I gave each of the girls one and they both made noises to indicate that they LOVED them. 

Emily asked, "What are they?".  Of course, loud-mouthed Bella said, "Bananas!".  After she already ate one, Emily didn't want anymore.  She got made and said she didn't like bananas! 

Oh well.  I guess I will have to find another fruit to cover for her.

a little bit of healthy eating

As of this morning, I am down 19 lbs!  That has happened over almost 2 months.  It has taken some work on my part in order to shed those unwanted pounds.  And, I am going to give some credit to Pinterest.  You can always count on Pinterest.

I have turned to that site in order to find healthier choices when I am picking out food.  I have come across a few new recipes that seems pretty healthy and tasty.  A winning combo.  So, I wanted to share.

Yesterday I made a dip for fruit, mainly for the girls.  It just took a mixture of yogurt and nutella.  Pair that up with some strawberries, and that is a decent snack. In the Pinterest link, it calls for greek yogurt.  But, you know I am not going to find that.  I just used regular, plain yogurt.

I have been looking for things I can make for lunch.  I came across this unconventional avocado chicken salad recipe.  It was a major success!  Very tasty!

Working out everyday isn't the hard part of losing weight.  I think making smart choices in the foods I eat is the hardest part.  Having good food and making it seem like I am not missing out on anything is what I am focusing on.

Hope you like these as much as I did.  Oh, and last night I made baked chicken fajitas (no picture, sorry!) and they were really good.  Of course, I would have liked them even more with some sour cream, cheese, and lettuce.  But, I am cutting back.  Even without those extra toppings, they were pretty good.  And, pretty low in fat and calories!

Enjoy!

valentine's day

While we normally don't do much for Valentine's Day, I thought I would make some pink heart cookies.  The girls were really excited about it.

I took the opportunity to make more of those Soft Sugar Cookies that I mentioned a while back.  They are so good!  And, instead of making buttercream icing, I made cream cheese icing!  Oh, and I am very happy with the results!

These cookies come together so quickly.  And, the baking time is next to nothing.  I definitely think you should make some.  And soon!

The dough is pretty easy to work with.  I just kept checking to make sure I was rolling the dough the right thickness.

Here they are ready to go in the oven.

Don't over cook them!  You want them to be soft in the center.  These were just right.  I baked them for 7 minutes.

I halved the recipe from the link and, as you can see, it yields quite a bit of cookies!  (I need a cooling rack or two.  I use kitchen towels.  Oh well!)

I iced them with that oh-so-lovely cream cheese icing and popped some conversation hearts on some of them. 

I'm not sure I am going to be able to share them. :)  They are really, really good!

Happy Valentine's Day!

shrinky dinks fun and a little more

For Bella's birthday, I bought her some Shrinky Dinks paper and a book that has a bunch of images that you can trace/copy and color in.  Today was the first time that we have used the stuff.  The girls had never done any Shrinky Dinks before.  And, as I expected, they loved it!

I remember being little and loving them, too.  I figured this would make a nice supplemental lesson to our homeschooling.  And, let us have some fun at the same time.  One of the workbooks that we do in homeschooling is tracing.  The girls practice being SLOW and actually staying on the lines in their workbooks.  So, the Shrinky Dinks paper was extra practice for them.  I think they did pretty well.

Emily and Bella colored in their names.  Bella did everything on the butterfly (tracing and coloring) and most of the snowman.  I had to help finish tracing for her.  Emily traced most of the airplane and colored it.  I did the house with the snow.  Emily did help me color it a little.

Here is Emily showing off her name and the airplane. 

Bella was more than proud of her butterfly and snowman.

After we finished school and our Shrinky Dinks project, we ate lunch and followed lunch up with some cake.  This cake is something else!  Leslie found the recipe in one of her cookbooks and was willing to give it a go.  When she blogged about it, there was no way I wasn't going to try it out.  She claimed it tasted like a pumpkin cake.

Now, you might not remember, but I can't find pumpkin anything here.  Not pumpkin puree or an actual pumpkin.  So, the thought that I could make a cake that tasted like it...  Well, that was pretty spectacular.  And, the kicker is that one of the ingredients in the cake is TOMATO SAUCE!  Yes!  I know!  Crazy!  Try it!  Really.  It is good!  Just look at it!  Recipe here!

And, one last thing on this post.  Jorge painted the accent wall in my living room last night.  So, I wanted to give you a little preview! I love the color of blue.  It, of course, is a tad different in person than in the photo.  But, this is pretty close.  I would say it is a bit more tealish than this.  The color is called "adaptation".  But, I would say it should be called "peacock".  It is beautiful!

We bought paint for the girls' room this past Sunday at Home Depot.  Once that is done, we will head back for the kitchen paint.  After that, I am going to give you another "tour" of my house!  I am very happy with how it is all turning out!  It definitely feels like a home now!

back amoung the living

I have been sick over the past several days.  The kind of sick where you just don't really want to get out of bed.  Yesterday was the first day where I felt OK.  Today, even better!

So, now you know why I have been absent lately in blog land.  But, I am back!

Being sick surely doesn't get me out of doing my routine of things, like cooking.  I mean, when you have two little mouths that won't stop, you have to continue to cooking and such.  So, this past week I have been making simple meals.  One was those Mexican pizzas that I made a short time ago.  I had been wanting them again since making them that first time.  They were just calling out to me. I ended up making them for lunch. Well, actually, I made one.  The girls weren't interested at all.  Fine with me!

I had a pound of beef that I seasoned with taco seasoning.  Making only one Mexican pizza doesn't take much of the meat.  The rest went into the refridgerator and I have been eating it little by little.

That leads me to what I have been obessed with for the past few days.  For some reason I have been craving food that I can add lettuce and sour cream to.  Don't know why!  And, that seasoned meat did the trick.  I ended up eating ALL the meat myself! HA!  I'm not afraid to admit it.

For the past several days, this is what I have been eating.  YUM!  Nothing special.   Just a soft taco.  And, I especially like that I have been using flour tortillas. Jorge isn't really a fan of the flour ones.  So, normally we have the corn ones around the house.  But, I prefer the flour.  So, why not keep those in stock, too!

I know.  Original idea, huh?  HA!  Steal my original idea if you like.  I won't blame you.  It looks good, right? 

Since my lips are so chapped, chapped beyond belief, due to my cold, I left off the salsa because I don't need them to be burning like someone set my lips on fire. 

Next up for today, FINALLY take down the Christmas tree.  :(

a little baking for Christmas

Normally, on Friday, I post about our school week.  And, since I usually take the photos on Friday, I don't have any because we took the day off school.   The girls didn't seem to mind one way or other.  And, I got some baking done.

I just realized that this is really the first Christmas that I did any sort of baking.  Weird, I know!  I spent the morning making cookies.  All classic ones.  I didn't want to try any new sort of cookie in fear that they would turn out horribly.

I made chocolate chip cookies, soft sugar cookies with buttercream icing, and brownies.  I had a recipe for the chocolate chip cookies.  I blogged about it here.  But, for the sugar cookie, I tried a recipe from....  Yes, you guessed it. Pinterest!  And, let me tell you.  SUCCESS!  I had a feeling they would be good when sour cream is one of the ingredients.  The sugar cookies are so soft and, generally, perfect!  Not too sweet either.  I can't stand an overly sweet sugar cookie.  I definitely think you should make them!  And, I found a simple brownie recipe online somewhere.  But, they aren't all that great.  Not really worth mentioning.

But, the spread looks festive and I am sure they will be eaten up quickly once they are in front of the in laws!

I hope everyone has a great Christmas!

why I miss Kroger and a little recipe idea

I'm now used to how everything is here.  I admit that some things still frustrate me, but for the most part I have just gotten over the differences between here in my lovely grocery stores in the US.

There is one main grocery store that I go to here in Jalos.  And, for other things that I can't find there, we search elsewhere, like Costco, Sam's Club, and Wal-Mart.

The grocery store here in town, Super Jigo, is just crazy sometimes.  Last night we went there to get our groceries and I saw this in the produce section.

How in the world can they put stuff on the shelves that look like that?  If you don't go there on the right days (which I still haven't figured out what days those are), you have the worst produce to pick from.  And, the way I cook here, most of my cart is fruits and veggies.  Pathetic!

This is one thing I will never get over and makes me appreciate how great the grocery stores are in the US.

On a side note, I made another item off of Pinterest the other night.  You know, I have made tons of stuff off that website!

I have never been a fan of Taco Bell, but the few times that I went with people, I would get the Mexican Pizza, MINUS the beans!  I hate beans!

And, Mexican pizzas are such a simple idea and I'm not sure why I never thought about making them at home.  So, while I just used the idea, the recipe is still a simple one you could follow.  And, of course, I left off the beans!

an ordinary day, when you have lemons!

Can you believe there are only 10 days left until Christmas!?  I'm kind of floored by that.  Really, where does time go?

When we went to Costco this past Sunday, I found a bag of lemons!  Twelve lemons!  For around $3!  I couldn't pass that up.  They are still hard to find, but it seems they are showing up more frequently than they used to.  Which, is great!  Bring 'em on!

I posted on Facebook that I had found the lemons and my friend, Cutzi, suggested making this Lemon Lemon Loaf! Yes, please!

So, that is what part of my day has consisted of.  Making a lovely lemon loaf.  Well, two of them to be exact!  One to eat. One to freeze and enjoy eating when I can't find lemons!  Yum! (I tried a peice without the lemon glaze....I need to make the glaze.  The loaf alone is a tiny bit sour, but still good!)

I also made this simple vinaigrette dressing today.  We are going to have jalapeno popper grilled cheese sandwiches and salad for dinner!  Thank you , Pinterest!

Also, in my domestic doings today, I used another idea from Pinterest and cleaned my washer.  Seems funny to need to clean a washer, but it did kind of need it. 

I'm off to be domestic a little more.  Some days I am better at it than others!

***Update (10 minutes later)***
I made the lemon glaze for the loaf.  It was so much better! 

Yum!

chilaquiles

Things are pretty uneventful around here lately.  We did the Thanksgiving thing. We put our tree up.  And, we have started our school year.  All things you already know, assuming you have read my blog during the past week.

We are just chugging along trying to stay warm.  I've moved my work space to my bedroom so I can stay under the electric blanket while I work.  Thankfully I have a printer that allows me to print via   wi-fi!  So, I can have the laptop in bed with me. 

I was trying to think of something I can make for a quick lunch.  I remembered I bought tomatoes and chips to make chilaquiles. 

I'm sure there are many different ways to make them, but I tend to like the version that I found in Rick Bayless's cookbook, Authentic Mexican.  It's funny because I bought that cookbook while living in the US but never got around to using it until I moved down here.  (That cookbook is also where I got my enchilada recipe.)

I don't really measure anything, but I can give you my estimate measurements.  They are pretty simple to make so I never look in the book anymore.  And, that is one thing nice about most Mexican cooking, the measurements are sort of jumping off points.  Adjust as you like. 

Ingredients:

6 to 8 Roma tomatoes, boiled and skins removed
1-2 cloves of garlic, minced
1/2 of a small onion, roughly chopped
1 Serrano pepper
1-2 Tbsp veg oil
1 tsp salt
1 cup water
1 chicken broth cube  (or a cup of chicken stock)
Chips

Toppings:

sour cream
crumbly cheese
and whatever else you like (chicken, onions, cabbage, lettuce...you get the point)

First, start by cutting an "x" on the bottom of each tomato and put in a pan full of water.  Let boil until skins start to peel off.

Once they are ready to peel, peel the skins off.  Put the tomatoes in a blender with the onion, garlic and Serrano pepper.

Blend all of the ingredients together until is is smooth.  Grab that chicken broth cube and throw it in a cup of water.  Microwave it for a few minutes until it dissolves.

Grab the pan you used for boiling the tomatoes (empty out the water) and put the oil in the pan.  Heat the oil then pour the blended liquid into the pan.  Let it cook for about 4 to 5 minutes, stirring every once in a while.  The color will darken a bit.

Once it has changed color to an organish red, add the salt and the chicken broth to the pan.  Cook for another 4 or 5 minutes. 

You can make your own chips like I did in this post, or you can do the short cut, which I love, and buy some chips at the store.  They have chips specifically for chilaquiles. Kind of nice!

Take some of the salsa that you just made and put into a bigger pan that will allow for you to toss some chips around.  Put the pan over medium heat.  I don't like my chips to be soggy at all, so I just toss them around for a minute or so.  Just long enough to coat the chips and warm them.  At this point you can add other ingredients if you like, but I keep mine simple when doing them for myself.

I just put sour cream and the cheese on mine.  I like to keep it easy and simple.  If we are doing chilaquiles for dinner some night, I might add chicken and additional toppings would be onion and lettuce.

Put the chips on a plate, put your toppings on and you have a simple meal/snack.

I'm off to eat these now.  You can't let them sit very long or they will get cold and soggy!  And I don't like soggy!