I love making soup. I especially love how soup can clear out a fridge of leftovers. The only thing I had to buy for this lasagna soup recipe was the chicken stock. Everything else I had in my cupboards and fridge already. I based this recipe on Paula Dean’s “Tastes like Lasagna Soup” but like most recipes I made it my own. Number one there were too many ingredients in it. I don’t want to go to the store and buy a whole bunch of extra ingredients I want recipes that are simple and easy to make. Number two I wanted to use what I had in the house. So I encourage you to use what you’ve got have fun with it. Really you could put anything in this soup that you would find in lasagna. For a veggie version just leave out the meat and add more veggies. It really is just that easy.

Some of my changes I think made the soup even better. For one I had an open jar of roasted red peppers in the fridge. These made my soup so much more flavorful and delicious than using chopped bell peppers. I also, for health reasons, make all my recipes gluten free. For this recipe there are two important ingredients that needed to be changed in order for it to be gluten free the pasta of course and the chicken broth. For my recipe you will need.

1.5 lbs ground meat (I used a combination of Italian Sausage and ground beef)

3 jars of pasta sauce (I used sauce because I have 30 jars in my basement. The original recipe calls for one and canned tomatoes plus a lot of spices. I don’t think that the kind of sauce is all that important. I used several different kinds I had an open jar of marinara and an open jar of pizza sauce. I used a jar of meat sauce and a jar of garlic and herb. Use what you have or what sounds good to you.)

1 box of chicken broth (I used Pacific brand because it is gluten free)

1 cup mozzerella (I used fresh because that’s what I had)

1 large onion

3 cloves garlic

1/2 cup chopped roasted red peppers

1 box lasagna noodles (I used Tinkayada Brown Rice Pasta)

1 cup chopped mushrooms (just because I had them in the fridge)

I started out by sautéing my onions and garlic together and then added the meat to brown. I did this because sautéing really sweetens the onions and I wanted those onion and garlic flavors to really marry with the meat. Also because I was using some sausage and some ground beef I wanted those to be well mixed together. Once my meat was browned I added the pasta sauce, the stock, the mushrooms and the peppers. I then let all the ingredients stew together in the pot for a few hours. I added the pasta and let that cook for another hour and then added the cheese at the end and gave it just enough time to melt on the top.

This soup was so delicious. It really cleared out my fridge of leftovers and I can’t wait to make it again.

After making handprints on felt for me to use on our Christmas tree skirt my three year old asked me if he could do foot prints too. “Sure why not” I said. He loved how squishy and tickly the paint felt on his feet. We did one foot, cleaned it off and then did the other. I decided to make his footprints into little snowmen so I cut them out of the felt then painted on the snowmen’s face, hat and scarf. So fun and easy. Great for a snowy day project. Just glue a ribbon to the back to make an ornament. You could attach them together like mittens on s string. You could even glue them together back to back to make a double sided ornament or hang them in a window. You could make a winter scene to glue them onto or even attach them to a Christmas stocking. Have fun with it. These turned out so cute I might have to try and get his baby brothers footprints too.

My three year old doesn’t have much of a concept of time. Nor does he know what New Years is, but he loves clocks. He also loves parties. So I decided to make a celebration just for him to watch the ball drop.

We made a clock using a paper plate. I poked a hole in the middle of the plate. I cut arms out of a red paper plate. I punched holes in the ends of those. I used half of a pipe cleaner to hold the arms to the plate. I even twisted the back side of the pipe cleaner into a little nob you can turn to change the time. I used foam number stickers and laid them out on the plate and let my son put them on the plate. He loved that we made our own clock.

Then to make a crystal ball I used a smaller plate and stuck snowflake stickers on it to make it look like the crystal ball at Times Square. We recorded the ball drop so we can watch it at our convenience and we can replay it over and over again! Happy New Year everyone!

This year my husband and I decided to celebrate New Years right. We waited until the kids went to bed and then made a special dinner with shrimp cocktail and a salad made with fresh scallops.

I pan seared my scallops in butter. Normally I would cook them on each side for about three minutes. These were gigantic scallops so I cooked them a little bit longer. If your unsure if your scallops are cooked all the way you can cut one in half and check that the color is even all the way through.

I made a dressing for my salad using
3 tablespoons maple syrup
3 tablespoons rice wine
1 tablespoon gluten free soy sauce
1 tablespoon black sesame seeds

I laid my scallops on a bed of spinach and then poured my dressing over everything. The salad was delicious and a great way to help celebrate the New Year!

This year I made a new skirt for our Christmas tree. I decided to make it a treasured heirloom by adding our children’s handprints every year. I used acrylic paint. I poured a small amount of paint on a paper plate and had my kids smear their hands in the paint. I actually used a separate piece of felt for them to put their handprints on and attached it to the skirt. You can use fabric glue or stitch the handprints on. I painted the kids names and the year next to their hands. While their hands were all painty I had them do two handprints so that I can keep one in their baby books. On the second set of prints I cut them out and wrote their names on the back with permanent marker and the year.

As a parent one of the things that I’ve come to enjoy most about Christmas is the purging that comes after. In order to find room for all our new toys we clear out the old, unwanted and just plain annoying toys. In clearing out our old clutter I just can’t help but think of kids who don’t have as much as we do. Like most people who donate we tend to box things up and drop them in one of many donation boxes around our city. However I know that new lead laws have made it harder for some thrift stores to resell toy items and I’m not sure it’s the best way to give back. Some charities and thrift stores like the Salvation Army won’t even accept used toys anymore. The problem is every toy on the shelves needs to be lead free which takes time and money to figure out which toys are and which toys aren’t. Any toy made and sold on store shelves after 2009 will be lead free in accordance with the lead laws. Even if you know your toys are lead free the stores reselling them have to be sure. So I did a little thinking and a little research and came up with a list of places you might be able to donate your unbroken and gently used toys.

(1) Homeless Shelters (2) Women’s Shelters (3) Churches, Synagogues, Mosques (4) Daycares (5) Hospitals (6) Doctors Offices (7) Police Departments (8) Fire Departments (9) Social Services (10) Children’s Homes

I also found a great website with a database you can log in and find a place near you to donate your used toys. Donation Town will also arrange for pick up at your house. http://www.donationtown.org/news/donate-toys.html

SO I propose the first week in January should be National Donate a Toy Week. Don’t feel guilty. Just do it! I know we’re going to start by asking friends and our favorite daycare providers if they need any of the toys we’re ready to let go of.

My mom made this cute mail set for my son for Christmas. I just had to share because it’s so cute and he loves opening all of his special letters from grandma. My mom is actually following me on Pinterest and had seen that I had pinned one similar to this.

She made the mailbag out of felt and the envelopes are made out of a heavy fabric. Inside the envelopes are letters from grandma, hearts made out of felt, and a notebook she made for him. So sweet and such a great gift.

Every year I get tons of compliments and questions about my Holiday Cards. Like most people with kids I get the photo cards. There are tons of websites to choose layouts from. I usually browse several sites until I find the card that I want to use. Sometimes I have the picture first. This year I picked out the card first.

We just had a birthday party in November for our son Gabriel who just turned one. The birthday party was a magical woodland theme with gnomes and fairies. I’ll be posting more about the party after the New Year. I spent probably an hour online looking at different card designs. In my browsing for the perfect card I found one that had gnomes on it. The caption read “Have yourself a merry little Christmas from our gnome to yours”. I had my card all I needed now was the picture.

So I dressed my boys in elf shirts and had them wear gnome hats that we had left over from the party. To keep them occupied and in the frame I bought a basket and filled it with plastic ornaments and other Christmasy items to keep them busy. I picked what I thought would be the best time of day for my kids which was after breakfast. Its early enough in the day that they’re well rested and after breakfast so they’re bellies are full.

When taking pictures of my kids I don’t like to use a flash I think the pictures turn out better so I made sure there was enough light. Then I just took as many pictures as I could to ensure my chances of getting a good one. I also selected the option of having the back of the card be a collage of some of my favorite out takes, which for me makes the card. We had so much fun making our cards and even more fun sharing them.

So everyone seemed to love my healthy cookie dough dip recipe so I made it again for Christmas but I made the full version the first time I posted this recipe I made it for preschool so it had to be nut free and I took out a few other ingredients while I was at it. So for this cookie dough recipe you need

1 can of garbanzo beans
1/3 cup of sugar
1/3 cup of peanut butter
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3 tablespoons flax seed
1/4 cup of milk
1 cup chocolate chips

Blend everything together except for the chocolate chips. You can use a blender or a food processor. When it has a smooth consistency mix in the chocolate chips and serve it with pretzels, graham crackers, or cookies. No one can believe that this cookie dough dip is made with beans!

This year for Christmas eve we wanted to be home with our kids and keep things simple. My three year olds new favorite food is pepperoni pizza. I decided to make pizza, i just couldn’t help making them a little bit special for Christmas. So I made pepperoni pizza in the shape of a candy cane for the kids. For the adults sausage, and mushroom snowman pizza with a pepperoni scarf and olives for his face and his buttons.

For anyone interested in my gluten free crust I used a mix by Ogran. I did not follow the directions on the box. Well really I did everything but the yeast mixture. All gluten free pizza dough mixes seem to come out really heavy to me so instead of the water and yeast I added eggs to lighten up the dough. For two boxes of mix I used three extra large eggs. It worked well the dough was very light. We should get one thing clear pizza dough is one of those things that will never be the same gluten free you just can’t get that chewy consistency in the dough without gluten. That being said you can still make good pizza just don’t expect it to be exactly the same. This was the best dough I’ve made yet.

The candy cane pizza was a huge hit. I hid extra pepperoni under the cheese. Orion had fun helping me decorate the pizzas and showing them off to everyone before they went in the oven. The grandparents seemed to enjoy theirs too and snowman pizza doesn’t have to be just for Christmas I could see making these all winter long.