Spicy Chicken Spaghetti

1/2 cup butter or margarine (I only used about a 1/4 cup and it turned out fine)
1 small onion, chopped
2-3 cloves of garlic, chopped
2-3 boneless, skinless chicken breast, cooked and chopped
1 can Cream of Chicken soup
10 oz. chicken broth
1 can Rotel
3 cups shredded cheese (cheddar, colby, mozzarella or a mix) (I only used about 1/2 cup cheese)
1 lb spaghetti

Melt butter in a large skillet and add chopped onion and garlic and cook for 10 minutes. Add cream of chicken soup and chicken broth; cook for 10 minutes. Add Rotel and cooked chicken to the mixture and cook for 10 more minutes. Cook spaghetti to desired tenderness and drain. Combine spaghetti and chicken mixture and stir until combines. Pour spaghetti mixture into 9x13 pan and cover with cheese. Bake at 350 degrees until cheese is melted and browned.

Magelby's Syrup

1/2 cup butter (not margarine)
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla ( 2 tsp)
1/2 tsp. baking soda

Heat butter, buttermilk, and sugar in a saucepan. Heat until boiling, stirring often. Boil for 1 minute, remove from heat and add vanilla and baking soda, stir until combined the soda will bubble up, so be careful.

Kneader's Carmel Syrup

1 cup brown sugar
1 cup cream
1 cup light Karo syrup

blend together and heat on stove top until sugar is smooth.

German Pancakes

in a 13x9 pan melt 6 tbls. of butter or margarine in 425 degree oven.

Blend in a blender
6 eggs
1 cup flour
1 c milk
1/2 tsp. salt

Pour into sizzling 9x13 butter do not stir.
bake 20-25 minutes

Fajita Bowls

These rice bowls are easy and so good. I got the recipe from here.

1 Lb. steak, sliced (You can also use Chicken)
1 pkg. fajita seasoning
1 onion, thinly sliced
1/2 green bell pepper, thinly sliced
1/2 red bell pepper, thinly sliced
1 pkg. Spanish rice
1 can beans, drained and rinsed (pinto or black)
Flour tortilla shells
avocado (optional)
shredded cheese (optional)

Prepare steak or chicken as directed on fajita seasoning packet. Add onion and peppers. Prepare Spanish rice according to package directions. Add beans and stir together with rice until hot. Prepare bowls by placing a tortilla inside of the bowl. (I made the tortilla bowls using my new tortilla bowls) Add rice/bean mixture to bowl. Add steak and peppers/onions. Top with sliced avocado and/or cheese.

Ritzy Chicken

Ritzy Chicken

1 c. sour cream (I used light)

2 Tbsp. lemon juice

2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

2 tsp. celery salt

1 tsp. paprika

1-2 cloves of garlic minced

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. pepper

4 chicken breasts

For coating:

1 1/2 c. Ritz crackers (blended or crushed into crumbs)

1 tsp. garlic salt

1/2 c. butter (I actually just used 2 tbsp but I think you could also use spray butter to cut down on fat. I didn't have any on hand or I would have tried that.

2 T. poppy seeds (I didn't use these)

Combine first 8 ingredients in a gallon size resealable bag. Add chicken and marinade all day or overnight. Remove chicken and roll in crumbs and garlic salt mixture.

Arrange in a 9x13 or jelly roll pan and drizzle 1/2 of the butter over the chicken. Cook at 350 degrees uncovered for 30 minutes. Spoon poppy seeds and remaining butter over chicken and cook for an additional 15 minutes.

We had this for dinner last night and it was so good. I found the recipe here.

Reindeer Christmas Cards

Lindsay made these cute Reindeer cards with her Joy School class. I thought they were so cute we would post a picture of them. They made them with their hand prints and then used their fingerprints to make the border.

Christmas Ornaments

These cute ornaments were made by my children with a little help from one of the cute ladies in our ward. She is the one that had the little Christmas Party for them the other night. We got these ornaments at church on Sunday. Lindsay and Landon were so proud to show us.
The pictures I took of them are not the greatest, but you get the idea.

Snowmen

We live in the desert and because of that, we miss out on snow. We have had a few dustings of snow in the last 7 1/2 years we have lived here, but not a real snow that you can play in and build snowmen with. So, we have to be creative when it comes to Winter fun. I don't miss the scraping of sidewalks, or driving in blizzards, but I do miss playing in the snow.

My kids and I decided to have our own snowmen night.
We started out our night reading this fun book called "Snow Friends." It is about some little animals that build a snowman to play with.


Then we had our snowmen dinner. We found some great recipes in a Taste of Home Test Kitchen cook book. We had Snowman Party Stew, and Cauliflower Snowmen.

Snowman Party Stew
1 pound of ground beef
1 package frozen veges
1 can beef gravy
2 cups mashed potatoes with a small amount of milk
16 whole black peppercorns
1/4 cup ketchup

In a skillet, cook beef until no longer pink. remove 24 peas and one carrot chunk from the stew vegetables and set aside. Add remaining vegetables to beef. Cook until veges are thawed. Add gravy; mix well. Pour into an ungreased 9 in pie plate. Top with eight mashed potato snowmen, using 1 tbsp of potatoes for each head, and 3 tbsp for each body.

Bake uncovered at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Cut the reserved carrot into eight strips. Insert one strip into each snowman for a nose, place reserved peas on each for buttons. Add peppercorns for eyes. Drizzle ketchup between head and body to form a scarf.


Cauliflower Snowman
6 cups cauliflower
1/4 cup diced white onion
1/4 cup butter
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
2 cups milk
1 cup shredded swiss cheese
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp garlic salt
1/4 tsp white pepper
10 whole ripe olives
1 baby carrot

In large saucepan, cook cauliflower in a small amount of water for 6-7 minutes. Drain.

In medium saucepan saute onion in butter for 2 minutes. Stir in flour until blended. Gradually add milk. Bring to a boil and boil for 2 minutes. Remove from heat; stir in cheese until melted. Add salt, garlic salt, and pepper.

Place half of the cauliflower in a greased 2 1/2 qt baking dish; top with half of the sauce. Repeat. Bake, uncovered at 350 degrees for 20 minutes or until bubbly. Add olives for eyes and mouth and carrot for the nose.

After dinner, we had these cute snowman doughnuts we found at the bakery at Walmart. There were lots of cute recipes for snowman treats online though too. You could google snowman treats if you don't find the doughnuts.

After dinner we made these cute ornaments. I found the idea here.

I found the red ornament at the dollar store. I painted my kids hands with white paint. Then I had them carefully place their hands around the ornament. Once the paint dried, I used sharpies and added a few eyes, nose, mouth, buttons, and a scarf to turn their fingers into snowmen. They turned out really cute.

Then after a the kids got out of their warm bath (the painting was kind of messy) we curled up on the couch to watch "Frosty the Snowman."

We had a great night, pretending we played in the snow.

Christmas Thumbprint Art

I saw a great idea here and thought I would try to make the little thumbprint trees with my kids. Then I got a Current Catalog in the mail and saw these cute snowmen and reindeer made out of thumbprints and thought we would try them too.
The kids had a blast and Daddy even went along with it. I made cards. You could also easily cut them out individually and glue them to a mason jar lid. Add some ribbon and make ornaments too.
My pictures aren't the greatest, but you get the idea. We just dipped our thumbs in black ink, and green paint. Then I just drew around it to make the snowmen and reindeer. For the trees I just used markers to draw ornaments and added a gold star on top.

Our little Snowmen Family

Our little Reindeer Family

Our little forest of Christmas Trees