walk with us

Happy Independence Day Weekend!

As soon as Brady finishes his driver's ed today, we are off to my parents' for the weekend. Grilling tonight, birthday party tomorrow night, followed by a homegrown fireworks show. Yesterday I burned a couple new CDs of music for the road trip, and I'm ready to go.

Of all the holidays, the 4th of July has always been my least favorite. It's hot, and growing up we just didn't make a huge deal about it. Now that my sister and I are grown and have our own families, it's becoming more fun every year. We try to all get together, spend a bunch of money on fireworks (which I hate doing, but there ya go), and have some yummy food.

Sounds like a good way for me to spend a weekend.

See ya Monday!

Menu planning

Every summer, I devote a bunch of my free time to trying to organize my menu planning process so that when school starts, I'll be good to go. This summer, I gave up. I made a list of meals that I know my family likes, and that's as far as I'm going.

I thought it might be nice to share the list here, for those who also struggle with menu planning. I feel like I should put out some disclaimers first -- Dan dislikes onions/tomatoes/peppers, Brady doesn't eat a lot of meat, and I'm horrible at trying to put fresh foods into our diet. Our tastes run more towards Applebee's than five star restaurants.

Anyway, here's the list of our tried and true main dishes:

• grilled sausage patties and kraft macaroni and cheese for some reason, I always pair pork with mac and cheese.
• cheesy hashbrowns with ham sometimes I actually dice the ham and throw it in the casserole, and sometimes it's on the side
• skillet spaghetti
• grilled ham and cheese sandwiches hey, sometimes it's just that simple
• taco salad some tortilla chips, taco seasoned ground beef, cheese, taco sauce, maybe some lettuce and tomatoes if we have them
• ham it up crescent rolls
• farmer's breakfast some frozen hash browns, some diced ham/cooked sausage/bacon, cook until down, break 5-6 eggs into the hash brown & egg mixture, cook until eggs are done, turn off heat, sprinkle with cheese, put a lid on it for a few minutes until the cheese melts
• porcupine meatballs
• homemade pizza you can get crust mix really cheap at walmart (like 50 cents), I have a huge pizza pan so it takes a couple of mixes, add sauce, toppings and you can put on as much (or in our case, as little) cheese as you like
• burgers
• vegetable soup except usually I make this with ground beef, not steak
• popcorn chicken again, sometimes it's just that easy... we usually get ours from Schwans
• chili no great recipe here just cans of beans, some tomato sauce, ground beef and as much seasoning as I can sneak past Dan
• burger bean bake
• cheese enchiladas I've tried various recipes, but what works for me is a bag of shredded pepper jack, a bag of sharp cheddar, and a round of Mexican cheese (asadero?), throw it all together, mix in a can of enchilada sauce, put the mix in tortillas, put them in a 13x9 pan (or two) pour some fiesta nacho cheese soup over the top, bake them for 30 minutes at 350 or so
• spaghetti and meatballs
• baked tortellini
• tacos
• pigs in a blanket
• chicken cordon bleu no big secret here... I use schwans
• meatloaf
• tuna salad
• baked potatoes I like to wrap huge baking potatoes in foil, put them in my crock pot in the morning, then when I get home, I turn it off and take the lid off so they can cool a bit before dinner, when it's time, I put out sour cream, cheese, butter, bacon, leftover chili, etc.
• sloppy joes one of my favorites, but not the favorite of anyone else in the family here is my favorite recipe
• potato soup I make this in my crock pot, too
• six layer dish my mom used to make this and call it shipwreck casserole. I hated it. now I make it for my kids, and they like it. funny.
• nacho casserole
• potato topped sloppy joe casserole
• bourbon chicken
• omelettes I custom make these according to each person's taste. this means I'm the last one to eat, but I deal with it.
• cheesy rice casserole the recipe is this, except replace the broccoli with peas and add ground beef. Brady's favorite.
• taco burgers
• beef stuffed shells
• chicken salad
• cobb salad
• spaghetti pie
• manicotti
• roast oh, how much I dislike roast is balanced by how much dan loves roast. crock pot.
• chicken and stuffing casserole
• tater tot casserole I thought Mykiah loved this, but now she hates it. I don't make it often.
• BLTs
• Mexican Lasagna I loosely base mine on this recipe. Very loosely.
• spanish rice and beef casserole
• frito chili pie some fritos, canned chili and shredded cheese. kids love it.
• barbecue chicken wrap
• chicken fried rice If possible, I cook the rice in the morning before I leave for work. Put it in the fridge. Later in the day, I grill some unbreaded chicken breasts and dice. Fry the rice, chicken and some thawed mixed veggies in a hot skillet. Lately I've been using a fried rice seasoning mix for seasoning, but sometimes I just pour some soy sauce on it.
• philly cheese steak sandwiches Schwans starting carrying the steak meat and it's quickly become one of our favorite meals. I season the meat liberally with worcestershire and seasoned salt while cooking (little tip from Pioneer Woman, there).
• chicken noodle soup I don't actually put chicken in my soup. Chicken broth/bouillon, some lipton noodle soup mix, and lots of egg noodles. That recipe comes from my dad.

I think that's it for now. I find it hard to believe that after I take an hour to type up that list, there are still some nights where I wonder what I can make for dinner. Yet, that's how it goes. There's always five dollar footlongs.

July freebie: What Will You Celebrate?

July is one of my favorite months of the year. Why? Cuz it's my birthday month. That's right... I get an entire month to celebrate my birthday. This birthday is huge. Thirty. Nine.

I decided to do a spin on Disney's current theme "What Will You Celebrate?" It's quite fitting that we fell in love with this theme and it's now the theme of the album I'm creating.

Here's a preview of the kit:

You can download the kit here.

Enjoy! Scrap those stories!

Etsy finds Tuesday: The Perfect Disney bag

One question that comes up time and time again on Disney trip planning message boards is the question, "What bag do you take to the parks?"

The answer to this question involves a lot of personal choice, but one bag that is often recommend is the baggallini messenger bag. I have one, in orange, but it was too big for me. When I'm walking around the parks, I don't want to carry a bag that is any bigger than what I need. I want it as small as possible, but big enough to carry my cell phone, room key, park tickets, some form of payment, and possibly an autograph book for Chesney. That's it. I don't need to carry anything else, and I don't want to carry anything else. I've found that should I be carrying a larger bag, I somehow end up carrying all kinds of miscellaneous junk that my family gives me.

This trip, I decided I should have a bag that gave me exactly what I needed and no more. In the end, I got two bags -- one for the parks, and one as my carry-on. Here's a peek:

Once I knew I wanted something custom made, I searched Etsy for the perfect seller. I found Gypsy Rose Handbags. Seriously, this chick rocks the handbags. I'd love to have an every day bag from her. They are a little pricey, but they were very worth it. The construction is amazing. She worked with me throughout the process to make sure I had the fabrics I wanted, and the extras I wanted.

My "parks" bag was the mini messenger that is on the bottom (and that I'm modeling). I added a cell phone attachment. This was perfect.... no searching for my cell phone somewhere in my bag. I also had a small cosmetic pouch made to match, and used it for media cards and extra batteries for my cameras. The bag comes with 4 interior pockets and 2 exterior. I used the interior pockets to hold park passes, room key and photopass cards, as well as Brady and Mykiah's cell phones. In the center, I could fit Chesney's book, some pens, and my wallet. It was perfection. I never had to fumble for something.

The other bag pictured was a bag I had made that would hold both of my cameras plus my laptop. We didn't end up putting the laptop in this bag, but it would definitely fit. Since we often take weekend trips where I want to take those 3 things, I will definitely be getting a lot of use out of this bag. I also love the colors of it. I was thinking about using it as a regular purse, but it's very big. Still...

I was so happy with my bags, I just had to share. It's kind of sad that I'm looking forward to our next trip just so I can use my bags, no?

watch out... he's on the road

Last week Brady started Driver's Ed. It was a scary, scary day, folks.

He really didn't show a lot of interest in driving. In fact, in the past we've had to force him to drive a go-kart in Branson. This is a child who realizes the responsibility involved in driving and isn't sure he's ready for it. However, he's old enough (actually he had to wait a year to take it due to his summer birthday) and it's time we all took that leap.

I took him out on Friday for some practice. I was mostly OK with it. We drove around the neighborhood working on turning because that seems to be his problem area. I also needed to drop a Netflix into the mail, so I had Brady drive me down a mile to the nearest mail box. It was a wee bit scary when he turned onto the four lane street that would take us there.

It didn't really hit me until we were on a fairly isolated road on our way back home, though. My son, the same one who forgets to brush his teeth and hides pop cans under his bed causing a major ant infestation, was driving. Not only did he have my expensive vehicle in his hands, he had my life in his hands.

It was about this time I decided I probably have an ulcer.

He let me take a photo when we got his learner's permit, but he refused to pose for it. So I took a photo of the back of his head.


And just for giggles, here's a video of Brady driving the Autotopia at Disneyland. It's crooked, but hilarious.

Howard Johnson Anaheim

What to say about our hotel? We loved it. On our arrival day, we were at the hotel just before 11 am, but our room was not ready. That was OK with us... we had them store our luggage in their locked luggage room, went to lunch at Mimi's Cafe, just across the street, and then walked over to Disneyland for a bit. We arrived back at the hotel at 2:30 pm and our room still wasn't ready, even after I had called from Disneyland and been told it would be maybe a half hour. Seriously, this was the worst thing that happened to us, and not really annoying because check-in wasn't until 4 pm. Wasn't the HoJo's fault that we were tired and ready to unpack. We got into our room about 3:20, and when I walked in, I gasped. Just gasped.

Our view was magnificent. We were on the top floor of their tallest building, and framed through our windows was the Matterhorn. It seriously was wonderful to wake up in the morning, grab a doughnut and a pop, and sit in front of the window thinking about all the magic to come.

We stayed in a premium room, which had 2 queen beds with premium bedding. We had a rollaway for Brady and there was still plenty of room for us to move around the room. There was a closet for hanging clothes and storing empty suitcases, and plenty of drawer space (and believe me, I used every inch of drawer space). Our room also had a mini-fridge and small microwave. I had groceries delivered from Vons, and we had breakfast and snacks in the room every day, as well as picking up subs/pizza and taking it back to the room a few times.

One of my favorite amenities at the hotel was the pools. We spent a lot of time at the "quiet" pool. It was here that Chesney made good friends with the family staying 2 rooms from us, and they would play for hours. If you remember, it wasn't that warm while we were in CA, but the pool was mildly heated and good enough for Chesney (the rest of the family, except me, all got in this pool once or twice, too). There was also a small water park where we'd often go after our hour or so at the quiet pool. Chesney really enjoyed riding the slides and getting under the dump bucket with her friends. I really enjoyed the plentiful shade, the small tables, and the clean towels.
We walked everywhere. In addition to the Mimi's Cafe across the street, there was also a McDonald's, a Millie's Family Restaurant and a Quizno's between the HoJo and the Disneyland parks. I won't lie... our feet didn't particularly like all that walking, and we walk a lot normally. It wasn't so bad going to the parks the first time in a day, but going back for the evening... and even worse, walking back to the hotel for that second time... was not always fun.

The HoJo also has a little gift shop where you can find almost everything (except digital media cards, apparently) and a small arcade where my kids spent a ton of money playing air hockey. There was internet view ethernet cord, and an in-room safe.

The best thing about Howard Johnson Anaheim is that they honor the Entertainment Card rate for a limited number of rooms. We were lucky enough to snag it for our entire stay and only paid $79/night. I love this place so much that we'd stay again for full price. :)

Disney report, day 9, Saturday/6.13.09

Not much to say about our last day at the Disneyland resort. We were tired, we'd done almost everything at least once, and I just didn't take that many photos. In the afternoon, I packed to go home. It was semi-sad, but we were ready to come home, too. We did sleep a bit late after our very late night on Friday, and we had to get up at 4:45 am to catch our shuttle back to the airport, so we just ate dinner at Mimi's and went to bed early. We still had smiles on our faces, though.

Disney report, day 8, Friday/6.12.09

Our eigth day was a very special day... it was Brady's 15th birthday! The Disney parks are having a special promotion this year. Everyone gets free admission on their birthday! We, however, already had multi-day passes, so Brady chose the alternate of a gift card in the amount of a one day ticket. We really made this day all about Brady -- riding his favorite rides, eating at the ESPN Zone (sports and food... his 2 favorite things), and making sure he got to spend his gift card on exactly what he wanted. He ended up getting a very cool commenmorative pin set of all the "mountains" at Disneyland, a Lakers/Disneyland T-shirt, a leather football and some Vinylmation. Not all of that was paid for with his gift card, but they were all perfect things for him.

In our hotel room, I had arranged for a couple of birthday surprises as well. The hotel gift shop had arranged balloons, a cake and partyware for our family. From Disney Vacation Planning, I had ordered an Un-birthday cake made of chocolate bars, which also include birthday Mickey Ears. It was a cute little surprise to have on his special day when we were far from home.

That evening was the premiere night for Disneyland's Nighttastic offerings. I had been a bit disappointed to learn that Fantasmic and the Electrical Parade would not start until the end of our trip. However, I decided that I really wanted to see the Electrical Parade, so we went over to California Adventure about 2 hours before parade time. I claimed a bench along the parade route and the rest of the family was off to ride Mulholland Madness. I think 4 or 5 times. We had perfect seats for the Electrical Parade, and it enjoyed it very, very much.

As if that wasn't enough for our busy family, I decided that we should try to make the 2nd showing of Fantasmic. On its premiere night.

Yeah, pretty stupid.

Then again, we got to see the show. We stood for the entire 30 minute wait and 20 minute show, but we had an unblocked view.

Somehow, we dragged ourselves out of the park at long past 11 pm, stopped to get a Photopass photo to remember just how insane we were, and managed to walk back to the hotel. It was quite the night.

And before I close, I just have to share this photo I took while we were sitting in Downtown Disney, waiting for ESPN Zone to open. I just found this whole thing strange...

Disney report, day 7, Thursday/6.11.09

Today was all about fireworks. The first thing we did when the park opened was run straight to the Finding Nemo submarines. The line for this was always huge, and we waited until a morning when we thought we could get there as the park opened. It paid off, and the ride was cute. We then spent the morning re-riding our favorites, and went over to California Adventure to catch the 12:10 performance of Aladdin with the whole family. We were in the front row of the Mezzanine level and the show was just as magical as the first time the girls and I saw it.

In the evening, we went back over to Disneyland to catch the last "rehearsal" of the new Magical fireworks. We found a bench by the Plaza Pavilion and staked our spot. While Dan and I sat and enjoyed the atmosphere, my children were incredibly distracted by the fact that there were a bunch of Disney celebrities in the area. The kids got to see the entire cast of Wizards of Waverly place (including Selena Gomez) and while Mykiah and I were waiting for the rest of the family to ride Big Thunder Mountain, we got to see Mitchel Musso (i.e. Oliver from Hannah Montana) coming off the ride. To say I was a very cool mom would be an understatement.

[For those not quite Disney channel savvy, Dan and I also saw Slash from Guns and Roses with his family by the Matterhorn. We knew that the group had someone famous in it, and Dan's like, "Who is that woman?" I hit him in the ribs and said, "I think the famous one is the guy with the black curly hair." Oh yeah, he says.]

Unfortunately, after holding our spots for over an hour, we were told we had to move so VIPs could sit in our spot. Which, you know, is just not very Disney-ish. Then we went to my second choice of viewing spots and were told it was closed for VIPs, too. I finally just asked a cast member where she would sit to watch them. She suggested the area between Dumbo and the carousel, so that's where we headed. It turned out to be very uncrowded, and a good spot if you don't mind missing seeing the castle stuff. We stood in between them and swiveled to watch the fireworks that were surrounding us.

Quite a fun way to end an evening.

Thought you might also enjoy this little video clip from the fireworks show:

Disney report, day 6, Wednesday/6.10.09

Today was scheduled to be our day "off" but as the day grew closer, it was apparent to me that my family would not be happy laying by the pool or seeing a movie. I decided we should take a Gray Line tour, and because I am such a generous person, I let the family outvote me.

Our destination for today was Sea World. We arrived on our bus just before 11 am, and the first thing we did was get in line for the 11:30 Shamu show. While we waited, we looked at our map/times guide and made a plan for the day. During our approximately seven hours at Sea World, we managed to see 3 shows and all the animal exhibits we wanted to see, and added in a ride on the water ride.

It was a chilly day (probably upper 50s/lower 60s), so before we left Mykiah and I bought hoodies and blankets for the bus ride home. We got back to our hotel somewhere between 8:30 and 9 pm and hit McDonald's on the way back to the room. While I found Sea World charming and loved being able to look out to the ocean, the food was not good (actually, this was a theme on this trip). We were hungry when we got home, and McD's hit the spot. We went to bed as soon as we were done eating -- it's unusal for us to spend 7 straight hours in a theme park and we were pooped.