Pot Roast

I go grocery shopping every two weeks.  During those two weeks, I make a menu; I have planned meals for each night.  Recently-the last two months or so-I've switched up my menu planning by having a theme for a particular day.  One of our themes is traditional, and this go around I decided that I wanted to make Pot Roast.  I had seen Tyler Florence {on Food Network} make it & my mouth watered.

It's so neat to see how this piece of meat go from this:

 To seared up;

 To covered in yummy goodness & left to cook for a couple of hours;

 To come out all sorts of juicy & tender & smelling good;

 The roast was so good {not dry at all} & the veggies that were cooked with it were so yummy as well.  I decided that instead of mashed potatoes, I would serve my garlic green beans {yummo!} & went with my go-to roll of Pillsbury Cresent Rolls.

My husband & I very much enjoyed dinner tonight.

Here's what I did:

Pot Roast

Beef Chuck Pot Roast {I looked at the roast & found the one that said "Pot Roast"; mine was also under 2lbs because I have a small family of four}

Salt & Pepper

EVOO

Onion-sliced

2 Carrots-peeled and sliced

3-4 Garlic cloves-you can leave them whole

1/4-1/2 tsp of Rosemary

1/4 tsp of Thyme

1-2 Cups of Tomato Sauce {or a can of crushed tomatoes-I didn't have that, so I used my tomato I did have}

1 Cup of Water

Sprinkle you piece of meat with Salt & Pepper on both sides.  In a dutch oven, get it good and hot.  Drizzle some EVOO & sear your piece of meat on both sides.  Place your veggies around your meat-not on top or underneath.  Sprinkle seasoning around veggies.  Pour tomato sauce on top of veggies-again avoiding the meat.  Pour the water around on top of everything-except the meat.  Put the lid on top, turn the heat down to low & let it sit for 3 hours.  After 3 hours, take meat out & slice.  Enjoy!

My Upcycled Hat

It's been chilly these fall mornings; especially when I take my son to school.  This morning, as I was bundling up my daughter, I threw this hat on top of her head:

Although a very cute hat that my boys use to wear, I thought it was time to get her her own hat to wear.  I remembered reading about how to make a hat {with the ear flaps} from off of the I Am Momma Hear Me Roar website; so I thought, "I have extra fabric, I could totally make it".  And I did.

Cheri's tutorial was easy to follow {I mean look, I made one}and I swear it took me less than a hour to do it.  If I were to embellish it any more, I would have sewn some ribbon or bias tape along the bottom portion to make it more "finished" {and to cover up the marker on the inside of the hat}; but I don't have any of that {that matches}right now.

You should try and make your own; I think I might make some up for my boys.  Just click here for the link.

Have an awesome day!

Fall

If you've lived in Utah long enough, you know that sometimes we don't get our seasons.  I mean, we really never got spring this last year, and I almost thought that we wouldn't get to have a lengthy fall season; but luckily we're having it this week.  I'm so glad that the temps decided to go back up this week in Northern Utah.

Some things that I love about fall are: One, the colors.

It's such a neat thing to see the leafs change colors.  From green, to yellows, to reds.

Second, I love the fact that I can wear long sleeve shirts, but still wear flip-flops.

Third, because fall brings cooler temperatures, we're able to take walks in the beautiful woods {behind my parents house} without sweating to death.

Well...maybe some walking & some riding in Grandpa's red wagon.

Yay Fall!

Fancy Shmancy

Ever since I got my Canon camera, I love taking pictures.  They just turn out so much better.  I've been trying to learn the different settings, and it works sometimes.  What I've been realizing is that no matter what I do, it doesn't matter.  What I mean is, it all comes down to the editing.  Lately on some of the creative blogs that I read, they've had readers take a picture SOOC {straight out of camera}& have had them edit the picture.  Creativity.  And when I read what some people do to make the picture turn out in the end....confusing.  Maybe that's why you pay professionals to take your pictures....they edit it just right to give you a great product.

Well, I don't have fancy editing software...I use my free Picasa to edit all my pictures.  I mean, eventually one day I would like to get an upgraded software & learn how to use it, but for now, I'm content with what I've got.

It's nice to be able to play around with pictures.  When I saw this one I knew that I wanted to change it to give it a more older feel:

The Black & White w/a little bit of color temp changes the picture for me.  I definitely like the B&W better than the original color.

Corn Bread

I like corn bread.  I like really good corn bread.  Tonight I made corn chowder {courtesy of the Pioneer Woman} & instead of having some crusty bread go with the soup, I decided that I was going to make it a corn-themed night & make cornbread.

Moist...Slightly sweet....Corny.....Whole Wheat corn bread.

This was the first time that I used whole wheat flour {I usually just use all purpose flour}, and again, you never know how a recipe will turn out when you substitute in whole wheat flour.  Tonight, it worked.  I thought that the texture of the whole wheat flour complimented the cornmeal.

Here's what I did:

Corn Bread

1 1/2 Cups Whole Wheat Flour {or all-purpose}

2/3 Cups Sugar

1/2 Cup Yellow Corn Meal

1 T Baking Powder

1/2 t Salt

*Mix these ingredients up in a bowl & set aside

1 1/4 Cups Milk

2 Eggs

1/3 Cup Oil

3 T melted butter

*Whisk these ingredients up until the egg is beaten.

*Incorporate the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until everything is combined-don't mix it up too much...just enough.

*Pour Batter into a buttered 8x8 baking dish and Bake @ 350 degrees for 35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

*When you take the cornbread out of the oven, you can either: A, brush honey butter over the top.  B, brush regular butter over the top.  Or C, do nothing.  We chose B tonight:

Now, the corn chowder I made tonight was yummy.....and a little bit too spicy.  That chipotle pepper really adds a kick.  We all agreed that although the chowder was delicious, we would hold off on that pepper the next go-around.  Here's the Recipe for Corn Chowder.

 I loved that every single spoon-full have stuff.....corn, onions, bacon, chilies.  It looked very nice as well...as long as it was stirred up.  Let it sit for awhile and the oil starts separating.  This was the perfect night to have the chowder too.  It was cold today; I don't think that I'm quite ready for the cold weather yet.

Miss Madi

I may not have fancy photo-editing programs; I work with what I've got.  Back when I took my daughter's 10 month pictures, the weather was gloomy & the lighting inside my house was horrible.  I had to work with what I was given.  I love sepia-toned pictures, but with this particular photo, I first used the focal B&W function to get the flower to pop out.  I then decided to "warm" the picture & then add more shadow to get rid of the shadows in the background.  I then cropped the picture to make my girl the focal point.

What a cutie!

Save the Ta-Ta's Shirt

This past weekend I ran in the "Save-A-Sister" race in St. George.  I decided that our group of runners needed to have fun shirts to run in.  I made all the shirts (even my 10 month old daughter got one) using freezer paper stenciling.  Lots of work, but well worth it.

The handprints on the front, I traced myself & cut out. It wasn't till the day of the race that my sister pointed out that the hands should have been facing a different direction.  As they were, the handprints look like somebody else came up to you and put their hands on your chest.  If I had to do it again, I would make sure that the handprints covered the chest like your own hands were doing the job.

 Our team name, I used my Mom's cricut to cut out all the letters.  I don't think that I could have done all those shirts by hand.

Although it took some time, I'm very happy that I was able to produce something unique, to make us stand out in the crowd.