Butternut Squash Mac and Cheese

I have previously made a summer squash mac and cheese (that I don't know if I posted about it because we didn't really like it). The squash didn't blend well and it was just...stringy. I suppose I should've known but I had heard good things about mixing squash with the mac and cheese to get more veggie content in a meal. I had given up on the idea until I saw this recipe on Pinterest. It sounded promising!

So that afternoon, I roasted my squash (poke holes in squash, put in pan (foil lined for easiser clean up if you wish), and put in the oven for 90 minutes at 400). Then I scooped out all the good parts (not the seeds or little stringy parts) and mashed them in a bowl. I put it in the fridge until I was ready to make dinner.

Then I followed the recipe (for the most part). I will say that you definitely need more noodles than what was called for. There's no way you can make that much sauce for only 8oz of noodles! I used a whole 16oz box. I also have to say that the squash sauce looked heavenly! I could've just had noodles stirred into that without the cheese! I'm not necessarily a big fan of baking mac and cheese or with the bread crumbs on top but this did turn out really good.

With the squash and the breadcrumbs, David and I thought it tasted a little bit like Wheat Thin crackers. My toddler tried it and liked it too but she'll like anything if it's a noodle. I think I would rate this a 7/10. The leftovers are just as good as the first time too. And good thing for that because this makes about 6 servings (and that's generous servings).

I think I would make it again. It's fairly simple but not too quick, especially if you have to puree your squash first.

Roasted Cauliflower and Raspberry Pork Chops

For dinner tonight, I wanted to try something different. I found a pork chop recipe and modified it a little. I basically cooked the pork chops until cooked and then I added the ingredients I had mixed in a bowl to the pork chop pan. I cooked this for a few more minutes to incorporate the flavors and then served. The ingredients in the bowl were (no measuring) raspberry vinaigrette (from Ruby's!), brown sugar (about a spoonful), liquid smoke, onion powder, rosemary, and paprika.

This was a very simple recipe that took about 35 minutes. The cooking of the pork chops took much longer than expected because they were so quick. I didn't finish them off with fresh raspberries, simply because I didn't have any.

It turned out quite good and was a different recipe for pork chops than I usually make. I would definitely make this again but I might finish it off in the oven, if I use the thicker pork chops again, to make the cook time faster and more predictable. I did spend a lot of time in front of my stove top wondering why they weren't cooking as fast as the recipe said they should. It actually ended with my husband finishing the cooking process (he has more experience cooking meat than me) while I watched the kids (instead of the other way around). So if you keep in mind that the cook time is a more than it sounds like in the original recipe, this recipe is so basic and easy.

I served this with roasted cauliflower. I come across recipes all the time for roasting vegetables but they always start with raw vegetables. I'm never sure how to modify them for frozen vegetables. That's what makes this recipe unique: it uses frozen cauliflower! This recipe is also quite easy and simple. I used shredded Parmesan because that's what I had. I don't think it coated the cauliflower as well but the flavor was still there. I also left out the pepper. In other words: I coated my pan with non-stick spray, sprinkled my partially thawed cauliflower with garlic powder, salt, and shredded cheese and then threw them in the oven.

I could not believe how delicious this was! It smelled good before I even put them in the oven and when I pulled them out, they smelled even better. I'm not sure of pairing them with the raspberry pork chops but they were still good. I will definitely make this again and again and I look forward to trying it with other frozen vegetables too.

Review of Our New Mattress

We used to have a queen size lumpy mattress. David had bought it when he moved out of his parent's house and since we figured there was a good chance it would become our mattress after we got married, I helped pick it out. It was on sale for about $500 and in the store, we loved it! After he bought it, it quickly started to shape to his body...and not bounce back. He had it on the free-with-mattress-purchase boxspring but it was still saggy so he put it on the floor. Somehow, it still felt saggy even with the entire thing supported by the floor. 

When we got married, we decided to keep it since it was only a year or two old and mattresses are supposed to last 8+ years. After enduring it through being pregnant with my daughter, I knew we definitely needed a new one sooner rather than later. Ours wasn't going to make it many more years. Then I got pregnant with our son and we looked into getting a new mattress (because the third trimester is unbearable enough, even on a good mattress). They were all too expensive and it was a big decision to make because we didn't want to make the same mistake twice. 

Then (when I was no longer pregnant), David found a PuraSleep mattress for less than $500 on a daily deals site. It was a 10 inch thick, firm, all memory foam mattress. It sounded too good to be true. With the site, we had only four hours to decide if we wanted it. We justified that it wasn't an impulse decision because we had been wanting a new mattress basically since David had bought our old one. We read lots of reviews and they were all positive. Without the daily deal site, this mattress is over $2000. We debated between the king and queen sizes. Finally, we decided on the king.

We did have to rearrange our bedroom furniture to fit the king but it was SO WORTH IT! Just upgrading to a king was better. We had our own space when we wanted it and when our kids play in the bed (they never sleep with us), they can even fit sideways in between us! The extra space is just SO nice. The only downside was having to buy new sheets and build a king size bed frame (they recommend not putting the mattress on a box spring so David and his dad spent a Saturday building a simple bed frame with built in storage). 

The bed itself is AMAZING! It's firm and gives you support but still lets you sink into it. You can move around on your side of the bed as much as you want without disturbing the other person (a problem with our old bed. Every time one of us would roll over, the other person would get rocked). This bed makes it even harder to get out of bed in the morning. I look forward to going to bed (you think that's true when you have a newborn and you're always tired but our old bed sometimes made me consider sleeping on the floor instead). 

I had back pain if I slept on our old bed on my back for more than 20 minutes or so. With this bed, that pain is gone! I can't recommend this bed enough. I'm not sure if I would pay full price for it but every so often, it does come on woot.com (the daily deals site). If you get it for that price, it is SOOOOOO worth it. 

It comes vacuum sealed in a box the size of a kitchen chair and weighs 87 pounds (try lugging that up the stairs!). It takes up to 3 days to fully pop up to life and lose that new memory foam smell but we slept on it from day one anyway. These mattresses are made when you order them so it's not like it's been sitting in the back of a warehouse for years, sad and alone. 

If I haven't implied it enough, buy this mattress if you need a new one (or even if you don't!). 

Hosting Thanksgiving Year 2

Last year, I hosted Thanksgiving (see previous blog post--sorry I don't have the link. I'm not sure how to link that up). This year, I hosted Thanksgiving again. On Thursday, we went to David's side again and then hosted for my family on Friday. I should've read my previous blog post sooner than the day before because I did not remember how early to buy the supplies. I decided to buy them on Monday, the week of Thanksgiving, because I thought that might get me the best deals. Instead, I got the same deals I would've had the same week, lots of empty shelves, more stress, and less choices. Because of this, I got one of the very last turkeys. I wanted the biggest one since it was on sale and I can use the leftover meat in the future (freezer) so I found a neglected 24 pound turkey. Before checking with my previous post, I thought last year's was close to 20 pounds. Turns out, it was 15.

I started thawing my turkey in the fridge on Monday night. Turkeys take FOREVER to thaw so I knew it wouldn't thaw in time for Friday's meal around 2pm. I read that you can soak the (wrapped) turkey in cold water (such as in a sink), changing the water every 30 minutes. It takes a minimum of 30 minutes to thaw one pound. We started the soaking treatment at 3am on Friday (my wonderful husband took the first shift) and we needed the turkey in the oven by 9am, according to the package recommendations of cook time. At 9am, the turkey was still a little frozen on the inside (the downside to the soaking method is that you have to keep the turkey in the packaging but then there's no way to know if the inside is thawed or not) so I thought it would take longer than the 5-6 hours the package said for this weight.

Due to  poor planning on my part, the turkey didn't end up in the oven until 9:45am. I did the same method as last year. I started it at 475 for the first 30 minutes, then turned it back down to 325 for the rest of the cook time, covering with foil when darkening too much. It was cooked except for the very bottom of the turkey as of 1:20pm. Then I let it rest until everything else was finished cooking (about 40 minutes). I was able to cut the cook time! For the very bottom that was uncooked, heating it in the microwave will get it up to temp without overcooking the rest of the turkey.

Now, I should also mention that this turkey caused a lot of stress on my part. The night before, I discovered that none of my pans were big enough to hold my turkey. I ended up using a disposable roasting pan that *just* fit the turkey but this needs to be supported on the bottom so the turkey doesn't break through. I found my biggest, no edge cookie sheet and it wasn't big enough to hold the entire pan (but enough of the pan that it worked). I had to take my second oven rack out and lower the first rack all the way to the bottom. Even with all this, I could still barely fit my turkey (and its pans) in the oven. At the end of all of this, I bent my cookie sheet (I'm not even sure it's still usable) and I bent my oven rack slightly!

Lesson learned: never buy a turkey that big again!

(Everything else went just fine and we had more than enough food. Once the turkey was done, this was a less stressed day. Plus, I had lots of help from my mom. I don't think I could ever manage hosting a traditional Thanksgiving without her help.)

Broccoli Grilled Cheese

I needed a quick and easy dinner idea because I was exhausted and not looking for anything where I would have to follow more than say, 2 steps. We had some tomato soup (from Ruby's!) to use up so I decided on grilled cheese, tomato soup, and fries. Non of this sounded very healthy. I don't think tomato soup can count as a vegetable unless you make it from scratch. I needed a vegetable. I'm not a big fan of just eating a little pile of peas on my plate (but I do it sometimes and I do it for my toddler regularly) but I also try to incorporate a vegetable into the dinner somehow.

I considered adding something to the soup but I didn't want it too chunky since my husband likes to dip his sandwich into the soup. After hopping on Pinterest, I found this idea: adding broccoli to the sandwich! It's so simple yet brilliant. Broccoli and cheese are always a good combination. How did I not come up with this on my own?? I have added tomato slices to grilled cheese before but tomatoes are kind of juicier than I'd like and I can totally taste the tomato. With this broccoli recipe, you can barely taste the broccoli at all!

Basically, all you do is cook up some broccoli, chop it small, and add it to the grilled cheese.Do be sure to drain it well after cooking because any leftover water will make for a juicy sandwich. For the adult sandwiches, I use two slices of cheese so I put the broccoli in between the two slices so the melted cheese can hold it in while I flip it. For my toddler, I only use one slice of cheese so the flipping was a bit trickier but it still worked out (Not to toot my own horn but I should also mention I'm a pro at making grilled cheese. Everyone who has tried mine agrees that I make the best ones).

When giving the sandwich to a toddler, I cut it in half and then I cut those halves in thirds (like strips) so they can easily pick them up and eat them. However, be sure to wait a minute or two after cooking it before you cut it up so the cheese doesn't just ooze out everywhere.

Surprisingly, after watching us dip our stuff in our soup, my toddler also wanted to! She is behind in the whole toddlers-love-to-dip thing even when we have done it in front of her before. We didn't give her her own cup of soup though because that's just asking for a mess so we dipped hers in ours and she loved it! Definitely making this again!

Honey Mustard Pork Chops

Because pork chops always seem to be on sale, we have a LOT of them. We freeze them in packages of 2 or 3 (now that our daughter is eating more of our food, we actually have to account for her when I plan dinners). This makes them really easy to thaw just the right amount. I am always looking for new ways to eat them and this recipe fit the bill.

It cooks up really cook (so quick in fact, that I barely had time to finish the side dish!) and is super simple. I only cooked 2 pork chops so I tried to halve the recipe for those of you that know me, I don't really measure anything so I just made enough sauce for what looked right. I also added a little onion powder instead of onion salt. And I left out the cloves because I think they're rather...unpleasant. I served the chops with Parmesan roasted asparagus.

We loved these pork chops! David rated them an 8/10 and I rate them about a 9/10. I can't get over how quick and easy they are (common ingredients, less than 20 minutes to make from start to finish). The only thing that could make them better would be if they weren't pork chops. I'm getting kind of sick of them. But I do plan to make this again in the near future!

Toddler Color Book

I am always on the look out for new ways to teach my almost two year old new things. Pinterest is a great place for this but they can also become overwhelming and make you think you aren't doing nearly enough for your kids. Sometimes it just stresses me out with all the rainy day activities, new food recipes, potty training tips, sensory activities, and things I didn't even know existed that I'm supposed to be doing.

So sometimes I turn to other websites (*gasp!*) for when I have a specific idea. I know it's a little early, but I decided that teaching my daughter her colors might be fun, especially now that she is starting to color with crayons more. I turned to etsy for product ideas to achieve this.

I found a color book that looked very simple to make (and they were asking a significant amount of money for it) so I gathered my supplies. I used paint chips, stickers, and book rings. Basically, you decide on how you want to lay yours out. I wanted a book format so I needed two paint chips of each color. The different shades, I believe, will help the kids learn their colors faster because it's not one specific shade and then they learn that another lighter/darker shade is also called the same color. I can see how that would get confusing for them but I have no science to back this up. Then I just dotted the pages with various stickers in that color. Some things are that color in real life (i.e. a red wagon) and some things are only that color in sticker format (i.e. a blue monkey).

Here are some examples of my pages to give you a better idea

I know the pictures are kind of hard to see.  They were taken on my lap for one thing. But hopefully you stil get the idea. I will also mention that I did two book rings to make the book sturdier and more book like (rather than flipping them over the ring) but those were the only two spots where I could make holes in every page because I had poor planning when it came to putting the stickers on. So if you do one, be sure to mark where you're going to punch through so you don't put stickers in the way.

I also used (okay I made David do this part) tacky glue to glue the pages back to back so you don't have the backs of the swatches in between each color. This is pretty self explanatory once you get started assembling.

I haven't used it with my daughter yet but I plan to once she's up from her nap! Hopefully she likes it :)