A Peek into our Week! Freezer Cooking, Gardening and my New Coffee System!

Well, some of these pictures are a few weeks old , but I figured Id share them any way! The above pic is a layered fruit cheesecake dessert I made for the 4th of July.

My oldest Minionette and I went out for a short shopping trip and stopped off for a few minutes of one on one time.

Evening garden pic. I love to take a walk in the cool evening. 

Tomatoes are coming! I can't wait! A home grown tomato tastes wwaayy better than one bought in the store!

Cucumbers are off to a good start as well. I sense a pickling post coming soon!

And pickles need dill, of course! It's so easy to grow! Most years it just comes back by itself.

I recently purchased organic coffee beans, a french press and a manual coffee grinder. Why? Well, organic coffee, because why not?! French press? Well, I've heard it makes better coffee and no waste compared to the Keurig that I wanted. Manual coffee grinder? My husband didn't understand why I just didn't buy an electric one either! Well the way I pictured it was sitting around a campfire with no electric around, perhaps in a mountain cabin somewhere and I could grind my coffee beans and brew them without electricity! OK, OK, so its a stretch, but I love it!

A friend and I did a freezer cooking session! We made 20 dozen meatballs, 56 hot pockets, and 5 batches of cookie dough! It was a great success and it only took us 4 hours!

So, what have you been up to lately? Leave me a comment below!

Be sure to keep coming back to see what we have been doing!

Psst... I've been working on a new section to the blog! Hopefully I will get it out soon! :)

Hope your summer is going great! 

-Tiffany

Best EVER Baked Mac n Cheese!

I don't know how lunchtime is at your house, but at my house with 6 kids, lunch isn't made, its found! And by found, I mean, when your hungry, find some leftovers or some sandwich makings and eat up! On a typical day, I don't stop to cook lunch. So, the other day, my oldest minionette, found a recipe she wanted to try out. It was for baked mac n cheese. 

I am not much of a mac n cheese eater, but i tell ya what... it was DELICIOUS!! And....it was easy! And.....it only used one dish! And.....you have got to try it!!  

Our Week in Pictures!

We had a busy week...or two! Lots of gardening and.... CAKE! Oh boy! We had so much cake, we are a bit tired of it! But when you look through the pictures you will see we didn't only have cake! I kept busy not only in the garden but in the kitchen as well! And after selecting the pictures for this post, I realized I had a pretty productive couple of weeks! 

The above picture collage is of our garden and my helpers pulling weeds around the beans. The tomatoes are doing great! I can wait to make a salad! There are lots of flowers blooming around our yard. Including our elderberry patch, which is in full bloom! I will make elderberry syrup again this year to use during the winter cold season. 

Check out some more pictures .......

Camping Sleepover Party

Well, here's another birthday post! I'm sure I've said this before, but 5 out of 6 of my kids' birthdays are in June! 

My Minionettes decided they wanted a camping sleepover party. So here is some highlights from the party! And this was probably the best party we have thrown yet!! 

Ninja Turtle Cake

Last weekend was Minion #5's birthday. He turned 5 years old. I can't believe how fast he grew! He told me he wanted a cake that looked like the blue Ninja Turtle, I think his name is Leonardo, correct me if I'm wrong! 

So, being the blue turtle and all, I went with Duncan Hines Blue Velvet cake mix. I baked 2 9 inch cakes and cut the rounded tops off.

I also made homemade frosting and used Wilton's green gel color to get a deep green color. 

I then started icing the cakes. And once I got a smooth finish, it was time to give it a face. An easy way to ensure you don't  mess up drawing on your cake, is to use a toothpick and draw an outline to follow with your icing.

(My pics aren't in the right order below, but you get the idea!! ;)).

Then I just used Ziploc freezer bags filled with my different colored icing to make the rest of his face. The red mouth is a bit goofey looking because I was out of red coloring, so I had to settle for a tube of red decorator gel.

Overall, Minion #5 loved his cake and the celebration! We took him to Chuckie Cheese for game time and then came home and had pizza and cake and presents. We finished the evening off by letting the kids run through a GIANT rain puddle leftover from some excessive flooding we had!

It was a great day!

Praise God for another year of life for my little guy!:)

-Tiffany

Father's Day Candy Gram!

This was a fun idea for Father's Day . Enjoy!

Photo Fridays!

Welcome to Photo Fridays! This is a mini series that I wanted to give a try and see how everyone likes it. I will just post some random photos from the week. Take a look and let me know what you think!