Weekend Wrap-Up and Monday "School"

Not much is to report here! We are STILL in the apartment and I do not have my mom mobile yet. So we have been hanging out at "home" and when daddy is home we go do little family things. Daddy will take Tiny sledding, the boys to the store, or we go to the mall. WHICH i MUST say our Nordstroms is pretty great!! Here is our weekend and Monday "School"

Saturday

Paps stayed home with Mommy while the Big Boys went to the Fur Rondy (I think it is like the Alaskan Rodeo?). Paps had his 1st pickle and he ate some, but was pretty much unsure about this green thing!Tiny went on his 1st Farris Wheel ride at the carnival and loved every cold moment.
Paps loved playing with ALL the toys without brother aroundThat night we bundled up and went to see the fireworks. I do NOT think I have EVER been this cold in my life! OH MY WORD it was freezing. The boys did not mind but I HATED it!!!! Next year I will stay home :)

Sunday

I can't remember what we did, LOL!!!

Monday

We played with "Window Markers" it was fun, BETTER for Tiny then Paps but still fun. They clean up nice and it was a good 10min of fun!

School Time!

Paps tried some pipe cleaner fun. I stuck the pipe cleaners in and Paps pulled them out and tried to stick them back in. James is STILL having a hard time identifying "A" so we had a "stick on" activity. I used glue and wrote an "A" and an "a" and he was to stick the pom poms and marshmallows on them to make the "A"s. Then I pointed out that this is the SAME "a" that is in his name.

Paps' activity was to eat the marshmallows, ha!

I hope yall had a blessed weekend and a have a great speedy week!!!

I will be posting a "Use what you have Gumbo" recipe tomorrow! xoxo

Eskimo Kisses, Amanda

Love to Cook but Hate to Bake, BUT

Most of you know that I feel at home in the kitchen IF I am cooking NOT baking. I have never been great at baking, everything turns out HORRIBLE!!! Well, yesterday I was on a cooking AND baking GOOD day!!! I made Homemade Spaghetti-OHS and a Caramel Heath Bar Cake. BOTH turned out so yummy, I just HAD to share! I found them on 2 blogs that I read often: Elizabeth Ann's Recipe Box and Kathie Cooks. They are great reads with great recipes!!

The delish Spaghetti-OHS from Kathie Cooks
The scrumptious and super easy to make Caramel Heath Bar Cake from Elizabeth Ann's Recipe Box

Elizabeth's recipe calls for chocolate sauce but I used jarred caramel and instead of breaking the bars I just got the bag of the Heath Bar crumbles in the baking isle!

Tiny is NOT my child he did NOT like either one of them. BUT, Paps loved every single bite down to the last lick!!!

Eskimo Kisses, Amanda

"Mommy Mommy!"

"Mommy mommy, come here! a DEER a DEER"
"Where??? down there...HOLY MOLY it is a MOOSE"
Now picture Mommy 25 weeks pregnant and then.... i run to get johns boots, jump over the couch, open the porch door, to take a pic!! whew i am out of breath!

Family Favorite Recipes: Fried Rice with Teriyaki Chicken

This is delish! I MUST recommend to use Veri Veri Teriyaki Sauce whenever ANY recipe calls for a teriyaki marinade! My dad taught me this tip and it is A-MAZ-ING!!!! I was SO thrilled when our store here in Alaska carried it!! WOO HOO! Alright, On to the YUMMY recipe...

Fried Rice with Teriyaki Chicken

What you will need:

-3 cups of rice, a day old I NEVER remember this part so I just make it early in the day and stick it in the fridge
-3 chicken breast: cubed (I use scissors)and marinaded in Veri Veri Teriyaki for at least an hour
-Olive Oil
-1 handful of chopped frozen onion
-2-3 garlic cloves minced
-1/2 a bag of frozen peas
-2 scrabbled eggs
-soy sauce

Time to Cook

1. Teriyaki chicken

-In a hot skillet add olive oil (just enough to coat dish), the onion, and garlic for about 3-5min
-Add marinaded chicken cubes, cook until no longer pink

2. Scrabble eggs, in a separate skillet

3. Once Chicken is cooked
-Add the peas, cook until no longer frozen

-Add scrabbled eggs
-Add rice

-Drizzle soy sauce (add as much or little as you like)

4. Cook all together on low for about 5-10min

5. Serve and enjoy!!

***You WILL have enough for 2 nights!

Eskimo Kisses, Amanda

ABCs Part 2...AND 2 MUST haves

This morning we continued on with A, B, and the C. We made animals with the letters. I got this great idea from the Totally Tots website! This is great for what we are working on! One thing that was a tad hard for Tiny was the gluing the shapes to the correct place. SO I used our PURPLE glue stick and did each step with him. I placed the glue where the shape needed to be and he match the shapes like the sample. It worked GREAT!!!! YAY for purple glue!

Here are the the before and after! He did enjoy this and did a wonderful job. His are now on our walls with painters tape!!What was Paps doing? He was strapped in his chair with a snack, empty wipes box with toys that fit in the top slot, and ate an orange nontoxic crayon colored!

Tiny and I then made pizza which no one ate but ME!! They are only into fruit right now....AHH frustrating! Here are my TWO new obsessions!!!! They make craft time with the kids easy and fun!!

(via)

(via)

Eskimo Kisses, Amanda

the ABC's

Today was the first day John went to work all day. The boys and I are apartment bound until we move and get a car. PLEASE pray for this to go by quickly!! I normally do not mind being stuck at home but when your home is about a 700 square foot area, on the 5th floor, it is WAY different! Our neighbors have yet to complain about the running, jumping, yelling, laughing, and crying. BUT I STILL worry about this, it is a stress that I have all day. I pray I can let this go because this worry is stealing my joy of raising our boys at this time. Moving on to our day....

Thanks to friends and Pinterest, I am going to try to do a morning activity and an afternoon activity with the boys! (those of you who may not know, I am about 6M pregnant with baby boy Henry, SO outside snow time is NOT on my agenda as of yet)

This weeks theme yes, I was a 3rd grade teacher and themes are a MUST is ABC, as in the letters A, B, and C.

Today's Morning activity: Parking Lot Flash Cards for Tiny (3yrs old) and color time for Paps (1yrs old)

(I saw this idea on Pinterest for older kids using sight words so I modified it with the A-B-C. This would be so fun for anything: colors, numbers, shapes, and so on)

-We first did the flash cards to make sure Tiny KNEW his A, B, and C. "A" was hard for him, not sure why. He kept calling it "H". SO instead of having him tell me what they are I had him point to the letter when asked "Which one is A"- this was a big help and showed me he DID know his A, B, and C....MODIFICATIONS people modifications!!! :)

-Once he mastered the flash cards we went on to the Parking Lot Game. HE LOVED this!!!! At first I would show him the card and he had to park a car at each "A spot" and so on.

-Then I took away the cards and we played the game by calling out "Park the cars on C." He wanted to play with this ALL day so we left it out so he could play parking lot!While big brother was at ABC school Paps

-Played with cars

-And colored

For our Afternoon Activity we gave the toys a "bath". THEY LOVED loved this! I WAS going to use snow BUT my children are obsessed with eating ice and snow, I mean OBSESSED!!! So I passed on the snow and did "bath time!"

As you can see Paps JUST got clear water with bubbles and still in his PJs

Tiny was given a red bath with bubbles and his ABCs. They played this for about 45min! Make sure to layout towels bc you WILL have water everywhere. BUT it is just water and LOTS of fun SO worth the mess!

and it is now dinner time!!! xoxo

Eskimo Kisses- Amanda

***PS spelling and grammar are NOT my strong areas! sorry

Meatballs

Tiny LOVES these Meatballs and asks for them often! SO tonight he is getting his wish- MEATBALLS!!!

I have posted this recipe on Facebook but thought this would be a great place to start keeping our family favorites!

Enjoy!

!!Meatballs!!

2 eggs
1 1/2c Pepperidge Farms Italian Bread Crumbs
1 lb Jimmy Dean Sausage
1 lb 80/20 beef
2-3 cloves garlic (or garlic powder)
1 tsp salt
3 Tbsp. Parmesan cheese
3 dashes "Lizzie's Oh so Garlic"

-Roll into golf balls, place in Pyrex and bake for 45 min at 350*

*Later this week: Teriyaki Chicken and Fried Rice!

Eskimo Kisses- Amanda

Our FIRST Alaskan Adventure

We are HERE

Our NEW life

Full of SNOW

Surrounded with all we NEED

Love

Eskimo Kisses, Amanda