Resolutions and Lettuce Wraps

I woke up this morning not feeling very nice. Everyone at this house has gone through the Christmas holiday flu and I thought that I made it through unscathed. I was so wrong.

To make it worse, when I looked on Pinterest to get my mind off of my rolling tummy, I was bombarded with pictures exclusively made up of rock hard butts and glitter (only the butts were rock hard, not the glitter) and I realized that the new year is upon us! Everyone is looking forward to their cool parties and to working off all the Christmas poundage for their New Year's resolution.

It's been a pretty long time since I've made up some resolutions so I figured I would make a simple list. So I thought about what I wanted to accomplish this next year, grabbed my snuggle buddy for a couple of pictures (he loves to look at the screen while we take them), and waited for his nap time so I could write them down. Which brings us to now:


2014 Resolutions

1. Be more outgoing.

I have always struggled with this, but now that I'm a stay-at-home mommy, I have to work harder than ever to make good friends. Before, I could easily be friends with the people that I worked with because we had so much in common anyway. Now, I have to find people that I share similarities with, or try extra hard to be friends with people who are really not like me at all.

2. Be more spiritual.

Okay, so these aren't in any particular order. If they were, this one should have come first.

I used to take my spirituality personally, but now I realize more and more how important it is for me to be a good example for my son. I want him to grow up knowing he is a son of God and that there is more to life than just climbing the next great mountain or buying the latest sports car. I want him to learn that he should show compassion to others, not just because it's what he would want for himself, but because everyone around him is his spiritual brother or sister. I want him to know that he can find peace in heeding promptings rather than escaping life through loud music or social media.

The only way I can teach him all of that is by being a good example of faith. He needs to see me take time to be spiritual every day.

3. Lose that baby weight!

I am still 20 pounds heavier than I was pre-pregnancy. I kind of feel like I'm in AA when I say that. I don't care so much about the pounds, but my selection of clothes is not so hot. I'm really trying to save money by not buying a whole new wardrobe. If I can fit into my pre-pregnancy pants before the end of next year, I will be satisfied.

4. Be more productive.

This is a pretty big goal and it's hard to measure. I mostly want to keep the house clean and stick to a cleaning schedule. When the house is clean, I want to eat and cook healthy meals, I am more motivated to work on my freelance jobs, and I feel more satisfied at the end of the day.

5. Stick to the budget.

Evan and I have made a new budget and we're pretty satisfied with it. I am in charge of most of the bills and other things, so it is really my job to make sure we are spending as efficiently as possible. We have a lot of things to save for, so this is super important!

I think those goals are big enough to keep me busy for the next year. I've realized that being a mom means your work is never done. I used to see goals as hurdles to jump over. Now goals are something that you have to start and keep up forever!

Now that you've read up to this point, I have a little recipe for you that was a big hit in our house a couple of night ago. They are Chinese lettuce wraps. I think they are similar to P.F. Changs, but I haven't had them in a while, so I don't know how close they are. All I know is that they are delicious. Enjoy!

Chinese Lettuce Wraps
Serves 4 people

2 large chicken breasts
2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 Tablespoons brown sugar
6 Tablespoons soy sauce
4 Tablespoons orange marmalade
1 to 2 teaspoons sriracha sauce
1 Tablespoon minced garlic
1 green or red bell pepper (finely chopped)
3 stalks green onion (chopped)
course black pepper
1 to 2 heads of lettuce

In a small bowl, combine brown sugar, soy sauce, orange marmalade, and sriracha and mix. Add more sriracha to taste and set aside.

Pour 1 Tablespoon of oil into frying pan and heat. Cut raw chicken breasts into small pieces, about the size of a fingertip. Place chicken into frying pan with oil and pepper and cook until done. Remove from pan and pour more oil into pan. Add garlic and chopped bell pepper and heat for 1 to 2 minutes. Add cooked chicken, green onion, and sauce and stir fry. Let the mixture simmer for about a minute and remove from heat.

Carefully remove lettuce leaves from the head and wash. Try to keep them as intact as possible since this will be your vehicle for the chicken mixture. Put a few spoonfuls of chicken into a lettuce leaf, roll like a tortilla, and eat.

Lisa

Spiced Pumpkin Bread

Happy Halloween! I know it's a little bit late, but I wanted to acknowledge the holiday, even if its purpose is a little questionable. Halloween is 1000 times better when you have a kid, I realized this year. It was so fun making all of our costumes so that we could all coordinate. I know that in two or three years he's going to want to do his own thing and it will be more difficult to all match, so this year was really fun!

If you couldn't tell, Evan was Han Solo, I was Princess Leia, and Alex was R2D2

One thing that really surprised me this year for Halloween is that the trick-or-treaters made their way around the neighborhood super early. We were completely cleaned out of candy before 5:30. Maybe it's just because I grew up in the northwest where it gets dark a touch earlier than here in Utah, but I remember always going trick-or-treating when it was dark out. I guess it's safer this way, or they get to go to more neighborhoods. But it made us feel a little awkward because we had to just shut our lights off and pretend we weren't home for a while.

But anyway, Halloween always reminds me of pumpkins and I love pumpkin pretty much anything! We busted out our first can way before October rolled around and there's no sign of getting bored of it yet. One of my favorite things to make is pumpkin bread, and here's my recipe:

Spiced Pumpkin Bread

(makes two regular or four mini loaves)

2 cups flour

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon cloves

1/2 teaspoon ginger

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup pumpkin (I highly recommend Libby's)

1 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup apple cider 

2 eggs

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine all dry ingredients into a medium bowl. Mix pumpkin, sugar, cider, eggs, oil, and vanilla together and stir well. Add flour mixture and stir just until moistened. Divide into greased loaf pans. 

Bake 65 to 70 minutes at 350 degrees or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool in pan for 10 minutes, then remove to continue cooling. 

This is a perfect gift to give out to neighbors, especially if you make them in mini loaves. It's delicious served warm with butter. Or if you're like me and love hot chocolate, you can dip it in a warm, steamy cup!

Lisa

Apple Cider

Oh Utah fall, how my Washington heart loves you! To many people, Utah has a great climate. It's hot in the summer and pretty much beautiful everyday if you want to plan ahead for a barbecue or an outdoor wedding. The winter produces fresh snow almost daily for all the skiers and snowboarders. It is the perfect weather for the person who loves to do outdoor activities.

However, I am not a person like that. I wouldn't say that I'm not "fun", but maybe I'm not the typical kind of fun that most people think of. I love sweats and books and cuddles with my little baby. And I love warm comfort foods and drinks. But I don't like to be restricted indoors either and I'm not a huge fan of snow. So this is why fall is my favorite.

It's cold enough that it brings people closer together to get cozy. It also allows you to reasonably wear sweats to keep warm as well as to hide that extra layer of winter chub. The leaves are changing and the rare desert rainy days are not so rare.

If Utah was fall all year round then I might love it as much as my Pacific Northwest home. Unfortunately, it doesn't last that long, so Utah fall will remain a seasonal dessert that I can look forward to while I cope with the other extreme temperatures.

So enough of my brain skimmings. Here's the point: I made homemade cider.


It was really easy! And the result was a house that smelled like an orchard and a quart sized jar of cider swirling with spices. Here's the recipe:

Apple Cider
(makes one quart)

6 apples (it is best to have a variety of sweet and tart)
1 orange (optional)
1/2 cup sugar
3 Tablespoons lemon juice (less if you have an orange)
1 Tablespoon cinnamon, or two cinnamon sticks
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1 pinch of nutmeg
enough water to cover

Slice apples and oranges and put them into a thick bottomed pot that has a lid. You don't have to worry about peeling or coring the fruit since you will be straining the mixture later. Add the sugar, lemon juice, and spices to the pot. Pour enough water to cover the fruit. The apples will float, so just remember where the water would have covered the fruit. You want to add enough water to maintain a good boil for an extended amount of time, but not so much that your cider turns out diluted.

Heat the mixture on the stove until it reaches a rolling boil. Allow it to boil for 30 minutes uncovered. Stir and mash the fruit as it becomes softer. Cover the pot and lower the temperature so it is a little more than a simmer. Stir and mash fruit occasionally and boil for 4 to 5 hours.

Remove from the heat and mash the fruit again. Strain through a cheesecloth, a handkerchief, or pantyhose. Taste and add more spices, sugar, or lemon juice as needed.

Enjoy!

Lisa

Food: Clean-eating sweet potato cheddar rolls

Clean eating. There are so many levels of clean eating, but what I mean be clean eating is homemade, non-processed, whole food goodness. Or, at least "kind-of-good"-ness. Because, let's be honest, when you're first starting out on a journey of clean eating there are times when you would give anything for something processed with a lot of sodium or high fructose corn syrup. But I digress...

I found these rolls on Clean Eating Magazine's website, and changed it just a bit. They're called chipotle cheddar sweet potato muffins. I photographed my journey, and have it displayed below. I have to admit, I had a horrible cold when I made these, so didn't have the best sense of taste. My husband rated them at a 4/5 stars. Very filling, but not amazing plain.

Ingredients:
1 sweet potato, peeled and cut into 1 inch cubes
1/2 cup low-fat buttermilk (I used lemon juice and milk substitute)
1 egg lightly beaten
1/2 cup shredded low-fat cheddar cheese (I used half pepper jack)
1 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
1 tsp chipotle chile powder (I only had normal chili powder, not chipotle chili)
1 tsp baking powder
1tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp garlic powder

Preheat oven to 375 degrees f. In a small sauce pot add sweet potato and cold water, and bring to a boil. Boil until fork tender, drain, then mash. Add buttermilk and stir until well combined. Mix in the egg and cheese, then set aside. In a separate bowl, mix remaining ingredients, then add half to sweet potato mixture and fold in. Repeat with second half of flour mixture. Spoon batter into muffin tins to almost full. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until inserted toothpick comes out clean. Let cool for 5 minutes, then enjoy. Store in air-tight container in fridge for up to a week.

So, I doubled the recipe, since I figured making it once would be easier than twice. Once I got the sweet potatoes on the stove, I shredded the cheese.

 Turns out I didn't have chipotle chili powder, so I thought using pepper jack for half the cheese in the recipe would be good.

The dry ingredients...

I used a buttermilk substitute, since I didn't have buttermilk or the inclination to go buy some for this recipe. 1 tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar in the bottom of a measuring cup, then fill milk to the 1 cup line and allow to sit for 5 minutes will give you a good sub.

Here are the mashed potatoes

Here they are with everything added to them

And here they are coming out of the oven! They were pretty yummy, and went very well with our salad that night. However, they are much, much easier to get out of the muffin tin if the tin is sprayed with cooking spray first. Hate to point out the obvious, but since it wasn't explicitly stated in the recipe, I didn't think to spray the tin until about 10 muffins into it, which made for a fun project once they came out of the oven.

How to Make a Braided Rug Without Really Knowing What You're Doing

I am making a braided rug. It's my very first time, unless you count the attempt when I attended an American Girl tea party when I was little, and after I finished braiding the rug I realized I wasn't done yet, so I gave up. I don't count that time, though "I'm still not done?" has crossed my mind a few times during this project. However, being the strict disciplinarian that I am, I've told myself that I can't start on any of the fun, groovy projects I have planned that will make me look awesome until the rug is done. This is how far I am:

Don't be deceived. It's not as cute as it looks, sitting on my brick patio. It's lumpy, you can see my messy stitching that took me forever to decide how I wanted to do it, and it's also still pretty small. Still, I feel accomplished, because I did most of it while watching shows and that means I was productive! Yay!

This is only my third attempt, which is about how many attempts it takes to complete a project for me. There were a couple techniques involved that I learned a long time ago, but had to re-learn for this project. For example, you can't simply tie the pieces of fabric together when your fabric strips run out. You have to do a special, small knot that won't feel uncomfortable when you step on the rug. It's hard to explain how it's done, so I doodled the instructions out for you:

First, you put the two strips of fabric, one on top of the other, matching corners. The bottom one will be the old strip and the top one will be the new one that you want to attach to your braid. See that dotted line? That's where you make a little snip with your scissors through both strips of fabric, making sure that you don't cut up to the top. You want a little hole there.

Next, take the top strip's tail and wrap it around to the back of both strips of fabric with the top strip still in its position. (P.S. Are these doodles helping at all? Blink twice for "yes".)

Finally, while holding the strips together tightly, pull the strip's tail through the hole until it forms a pretty little knot. Sometimes the top strip misbehaves, but mess with it until you have a knot. There you have it!