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Midwest Trip Highlights

Monday, October 1, 2012 By Sherra

Way back in August when I wrote this sentence…

“Later this week, I’ll show you what else we did on our trip…”

I should have said

“In six weeks…“

Because that’s how long it has taken me to gather myself and beg Scary Baby to create the photo collages of our Midwest trip. I told you last week I’ve been a little crazy busy.

Seems reasonable to me since she was adding to my blog pressure by asking repeatedly when I was going to blog about the rest of our trip.

Without further ado, here is a baker’s dozen of photo collages created by Scary Baby to prove we did more than just eat our way through the Midwest. 😉

Chicago’s Museum of Science & Industry

We’ll always remember how Scary Baby got a turn at the periscope in the submarine exhibit. Our middle school teacher friend handled that for us. Thank you Mrs. Bowman. We were so glad she drove from the Quad Cities to spend the day and one night with us in Chicago.

All the exhibits we saw were interesting but the whispering gallery was Scary Baby’s highlight.

Scary Baby’s bird’s eye view of downtown Chicago from our hotel room on Michigan Avenue.

Navy Pier

At night it looks very cool…

Lake Koshkonong

We spent one night in Wisconsin at my high school friend Terry’s lake cottage. She owns an antique shop and added all her special decorating touches throughout the cottage.

Scary Baby was excited to learn how to kayak on the calm lake.

Windmills of Indiana

Driving home, I was glad Scary Baby got to see the windmills in the day light. We saw them at night on the way down and we agreed that their red lights blinking in the pitch black dark night is scary! Either way, they still feel like a science fiction movie as you drive towards them. She took these awesome pictures in the moving car.

Lynn’s Paradise Cafe

Finally, on our last morning before heading home, our experience in this Louisville, Kentucky restaurant was a highlight. Even though she did not want to participate in all the funky photo ops, she enjoyed the eclectic restaurant and gift shop as much as I did.

The ugly lamp contest is ingenious marketing. Our personal fav – the toilet lamp on wheels.

Did you go anywhere fun for a summer vacation? I know today is October 1st. Don’t judge.

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Friends, Moments, Teens

Blogging Milestone

Tuesday, June 26, 2012 By Sherra

While November of this year will mark my 5 year blogging anniversary, today marks a different milestone.

500th blog post!

I’m sure that many bloggers hit that mark much more quickly than I have. I’ve gone through surges of regular, consistent blogging. And I’ve been inconsistent and gone missing for weeks because real life comes first and I can’t always blog about it.

I’ve blogged through the ups and downs of the teen years of our first three darlings. This flew in the face of the millions of mommy blogs out there with young babies and toddlers. I see them now questioning how much they can blog as their kids hit middle and high school. They are getting uncomfortable with blogging. It is a parenting season that can be the hardest.

I’m here to say to hang on – there is a light at the end of the tunnel and we can see it. With our strategic family planning, those teens are now “the twenties” which is reason to celebrate. My parenting goal was to get them to 18 so they could be solely responsible for their own actions.

Then PhilBillPaul and I woke up on April 22nd of this year, only to find we are fully immersed in raising teen #4. Scary Baby at 13 may be more work than the first batch of 3.

The blog material never ends. It’s the time it takes and trying to figure out the balance of real life and some level of privacy.

The good news – I’m still not drinking.

The bad news – I’m still not drinking.

Special thanks to my friend Leigh Anne who encouraged me to start a blog. Thanks to my friends who keep up with me through the blog. Thanks to my new friends who found a kindred spirit through the blog. Thanks to everyone who has ever left a comment because the “google gods” pay attention to that.

We’re having an ice cream celebration here.

Photo by Scary Baby who believes ice cream is a grocery staple.

Disclaimer: We did have 7 college kids here on Thursday night and they made sundaes. Just didn’t want you to think it was all for us. My favorites are in order from the bottom to the top.

This blog has become our online digital family photo album where I can write the stories and upload photos and then print the whole blog as a book to add to our shelf of family scrapbooks.

Capture the stories. Even the bad ones. It’s what makes us family. And some day, sooner than later, I hope you will be able to laugh about the times that make us all stronger.

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Friends, Milestones

Busy Fun

Thursday, March 31, 2011 By Sherra

Taxes and three FAFSAs do not qualify as busy fun. 🙁

Busy fun is working from home on WordPress blogs.

I love to help other women with their own blogs!

The downside to this busy fun is that when I work on other people’s blogs, my own gets pushed down to the bottom of my “to do” list.

I seem to get computer fatigue and don’t write on my own.

Check out my latest blog makeovers. Just click the image to visit each one.

It’s always fun when clients are friends!

Take a minute and visit my portfolio. Maybe you’ll decide you want to start a blog – email me. I’d love to help!

Filed Under: Friends, Raves

Snow Updates and Superbowl

Monday, February 7, 2011 By Sherra

The theme is still snow since I asked for Midwest blizzard snow pictures.

One came via my cell phone on Friday.

My cell phone only shows the phone number and no contact name so I opened the message.

“This is from my sister in Milwaukee area”

“Our mailbox is almost buried. The drift in front of my house is over my head.”

It took me a few minutes but I figured out it was from my friend Peggy. Wow, Scary Baby and Wizzy were impressed. They wanted more details on snow drifts and how they get out if the road and mailbox are buried in snow.

Thanks Peggy!

I sent some texts with a little bossy peer pressure for these next pictures.

My younger sister lives in a submarine

My niece sent me these pictures of their portholes.

Okay, just kidding. Submarines don’t have siding.

Did Grace do all the shoveling?

Abby said they didn’t have a yardstick or measuring tape. Abby is 5’7″ to give you some idea of snow depth.

My Shovel is Bigger Than Your Shovel

My friend Ann lives near the Quad Cities (Illinois/Iowa border) and they got a little snow too.

Some people don’t mess with wimpy, little hand shovels.

That is an 8 foot privacy fence.

Aren’t you suppose to store or cover your lawn furniture before the snow does?

That is a poor little wiener dog.

Superbowl Fun

This year it was really all about the food and being together.

Because we weren’t really fans of either team. But since we needed to root for a team and the Bears or Colts weren’t contenders we went with the Packers.

Excellent choice I must say.

Christina Aguilera messing up the National Anthem was a blooper we had to rewind several times. She kept singing and covered but it was cringe-worthy.

Our professional assessment:

Half-time show: weird.
Commercials: marginal.
Game: Pretty good to watch.
Food: Very good.

PhilBillPaul picked up some boneless wings that I thought should have been called nuggets. I made a hot dip and a cold dip.

Recipe for Deviled Egg Dip that I only used about a teaspoon of hot sauce in.
Recipe for Mexican Cheese Dip that is ridiculously easy and very mild and you could spice it up if you want.

Plus bacon sour cream roll-ups that Scary Baby and The Grunter wanted.

My friend Ann wanted the recipe so I created this handy photo tutorial for her.

Make four rectangles out of your crumbling expired reduced fat crescent roll dough on a cutting board or wax paper if you don’t want to wash an extra item.

Divide the chilled filling between the four rectangles and spread out.

Don’t spread it all the way to the edges or the filling will ooze out like this when you roll them up. I’ve only made these about 40 times so I forgot.

Slice in about 8 pieces per roll.

Bake until golden brown.

What?

Oh, you want the ingredients?! Sorry, this is not a food blog and I almost forgot that. This is a very complicated Midwest recipe I got from my cousin Sally many years ago.

Bacon Sour Cream Roll-ups

1 can of crescent rolls
1/2 lb. bacon, cooked and crispy
1/2 C sour cream
pinch of garlic powder

Mix up and chill 3 filling ingredients. Spread on to 4 crescent roll rectangles (pinch seams together first). Roll up and slice. Bake at 375 degrees for 11-13 minutes or until golden brown.

Scary Baby helped make the Knox Blox pennants.

With very little enthusiasm. She poked herself with a toothpick. I told her we can stop this 25 year-old tradition any time now.

Side note: Yes, that is eye makeup, Junebug. No, we don’t allow it except on Sundays when she is bored and no, she did not wear it to church.

I saw pictures of these cookies last week and I knew I had to make them.

Chocolate Malt Sandwich Cookies – yum!

They were so chocolatey that I thought we should have something “plain” to balance them out.

Browned Butter Cookies were the perfect choice.

Our standard chocolate vanilla Carvel ice cream football cake was delicious too.

We missed the darling twins but had a nice cozy family night. Did you watch the Superbowl? Have you dug your way out of the blizzard?

Filed Under: Finding the Funny, Food, Friends, Moments, Tweens

Friday Food Fun ~ Snow & Soup

Friday, February 4, 2011 By Sherra

My high school friend Terry emailed me pictures of the giant snow drifts in the Midwest.

This one is a picture of her adorable little pink lake cottage in Wisconsin.

Looks like it might take a while to get in the front door. For you Southern readers, snow is very heavy and this drift climbed right up her porch and covered quite a bit of her front door. Add the brutal below zero temperatures and you’ve got a big project on your hands.

Maybe Terry will just wait until June when the weather warms up and the snow has melted so they can enjoy the lake.

Cold Weather Comfort Food

I’ve saved a recipe for cream of mushroom soup from a magazine for 15 years. I guess I was hoping that as time passed someone in my house would come to love mushrooms like I do.

Still hasn’t happened.

But in my weeks of illness and cold weather, I wanted soup. I wanted homemade soup.

So I finally decided to bust out the 15 year-old recipe and make it for myself.

Imagine my surprise when I discovered the recipe made enough for 16-18 servings. I love soup but that seemed a bit excessive and I don’t think you can freeze cream soups…so I cut it in half which was still way too much since I was the only one who would be eating it!

After I finished a bowl, I decided it was the best soup I’ve ever made.

Have you seen these mini saltines? Why does everything taste even better when they make them mini? They were so perfect with this silky, creamy, hearty soup.

It was divine.

Then I looked over and saw how much I had left in the pot, I sent a text to my friend Steffani and asked her if she liked mushrooms. I know mushrooms are a touchy food. You either love ’em or hate ’em.

Lucky for me, she said yes though she’d never had cream of mushroom soup. I brought her dinner in a bag the next day – a container of mushroom soup, some adorable mini saltines and a little dessert.

I’m not going to bribe you to try it like I did Scary Baby. That was a $5 dollar mistake.

I’m just going to say if you like mushrooms, make this soup.

I also knew I needed a little dessert and loved those Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookies I had made the week before for the college girls, I wanted them again.

But I didn’t want to take cookies in and out of the oven. And Scary Baby said she really liked them except for the cookie part. What a stinker.

I decided they would probably make pretty tasty bar cookies. One pan is a timesaver so I used a combination of the Tollhouse recipe and the Toffee & Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe to make these.

Turned out pretty dang good. Steffani agreed and I thanked her for helping me eat the soup that would have gone to waste because of my family of picky eaters. (I had it three times!)

Side note: They didn’t have any problem wolfing down the cookie bars. The Grunter ate three when they came out of the oven.

Perfect duo for a snowy weekend if you can get to the store to buy fresh mushrooms.

Both recipes are below.

Now I’m off to shop for our annual family Superbowl party menu and make those team colored knox blox even though I’m not a fan of either team. Have a great weekend!

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Cream of Mushroom Soup

  • 1 garlic clove, minced (I used Trader Joe’s frozen cubes – love those!)
  • 1/2 tsp dried, minced onion
  • 1/2 C butter, divided
  • 8 oz fresh mushrooms, chopped (or sliced)
  • 3 C chicken broth
  • 1/2 C all-purpose flour
  • 1 C heavy cream
  • 3 C milk
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1/4 tsp black pepper
  • 1/8 tsp ground nutmeg

In large pot, saute garlic and onion in 2 Tbsp butter till lightly browned and it smells good. Add mushrooms and saute for 5 minutes. Stir in chicken broth and simmer for 20 minutes. In another saucepan, melt remaining butter; stir in flour until smooth. Gradually stir in cream/milk mixture. Cook and stir constantly over low heat until mixture comes to a boil; boil for two minutes. Add to mushroom mixture; stir in seasonings.

The original recipe also included diced onions, celery and green pepper. Ewww…I left those out but feel free to add them back in.

My little secret: I had a few lumps in my flour/milk sauce so I put a strainer over the pot and poured it into the mushroom mixture.

Recipe inspired by Jim Cosgrove in Taste of Home August/September 1996

Caramel Chocolate Chip Bars

  • 1 C butter
  • 1-1/4 C brown sugar
  • 1/4 C sugar
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 2 eggs
  • 1-1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 2-1/4 C flour
  • 1 C caramel bits
  • 1 C semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Cream butter in mixing bowl for 2 minutes. Add eggs and vanilla and mix well. Add in sugar, baking powder and salt. Mix well and then add flour gradually. Fold in caramel bits and chocolate chips. Spread in ungreased 9×13 pan (I put parchment paper in bottom of pan for easy cleanup!) and bake for 18-20 minutes or until very light brown. I took them out when the middle was still not quite set because I like them a little gooey.

Recipe inspired by Tollhouse Chocolate Chip Pan Cookies and Toffee and Chocolate Chip Cookies
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Filed Under: Food, Friends

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