10/8/12 - Breaded Pork Chops & Lemon/Garlic Green Beans

Monday, back to reality. Still SUPER exhausted from our chaotic weekend.

My mother in law came to our house to watch the girls today, so that saved me some time in the morning, which was nice. Too bad our house is a DISASTER right now (well, just the basement really, but still). I just couldn’t bring myself to care enough to clean it up though (and, when was I going to do that anyway?!).

Work went well. I was pretty busy catching up from being off on Friday. I actually had a ton of work that was just sitting around waiting for something else to come in, or some issue to be cleared up, or just being held up for some random reason, and most of it seemed to come back in today and Friday so I was able to do a lot of “inbox clearing” which felt good.

The weather is still pretty cold. I’m guessing we’ve seen the last of our warm days, and I’m pretty sad about it. I used to welcome winter with open arms, but with kids, we can experience so much more life in the warmer weather, so it’s kind of a bummer now. Hopefully we’ll actually get some snow this year so I can take the girls sledding and stuff, and really experience winter.

I left early, of course, to do our weekly shopping. I’m finding that my grocery bills seem to actually be a little cheaper the last couple of weeks…less expensive processed stuff, a lot of the seasonings and stuff needed to “cook from scratch” I already have, or now have and will be set for a while. So, that’s going well. I had to buy birthday gifts for a couple of parties this upcoming weekend, so that was fun…I love shopping for presents! Then, I made my way home. The girls had just woken up from their naps, so they were a little tired/crabby still. My mother in law left right away, I unloaded the groceries and started dinner. Once the girls were a little cheerier, the evening went pretty smoothly. After dinner, Christian vacuumed out the heating vents, got the girls ready for bed and put them down while I got to work folding the MOUNDS of laundry I washed yesterday. It seriously took me forever. Laundry, ugh. It was most definitely bedtime by the time I finished! I was able to watch my Sunday shows while I did it though…my now favorite overall night of TV…Once Upon a Time, Revenge and 666 Park Avenue. Good times!

I did get our CD from our family pics this summer this weekend, so I can finally share more of those with you. LOVE THEM!

Tonight’s meal was Breaded Pork Chops, Stuffing and Lemon/Garlic Green Beans.

Ingredients:

• 4 Boneless Pork Loins, 4ozs Each (I used 3 larger, boneless pork chops, the total package was 15ozs)
• 2 Cups Orange Juice (really, I think 1 Cup would do)
• 1 ½ Cups Bread Crumbs (again, I think 1 Cup, or even ¾ Cup would do)
• 2 tsp Seasoned Salt
• 3 tbsp Olive Oil

• 1 lb of Fresh Green Beans
• 2 Cloves of Garlic, Minced
• 1 tbsp of Lemon Juice
• ¼ tsp of Pepper
• 1/8 tsp of Salt

Side:

• Stovetop Stuffing (cooked according to the package)

Directions:

Pork Chops

1. Fill a small bowl with the orange juice. Mix together the seasoned salt and bread crumbs in another small bowl.
2. Soak each chop in the orange juice. Then, coat each chop with the bread crumb mixture.
3. Heat the Olive Oil in a shallow pan. Once warm, cook the chops, 9 minutes each side.

Green Beans

1. Heat the Olive Oil in a pan, add the garlic until browned.
2. Add your washed and clipped green beans, and cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
3. Mix in your Lemon Juice, Salt and Pepper, and keep on low until ready to dish.

This was actually REALLY good. The girls devoured it too. I would recommend this one.

10/7/12 - Crockpot Orange Chicken over Brown Rice

Today was one of those days I look forward to all year long. Sever’s Corn Maze day!

I was up bright and early getting ready for the day. Much easier, might I add, without the girls running circles around me! I left the house at 9:30, stopped at the cash machine and picked the girls up from my mom’s. Of course, they had lots of stories to share about their night over at Grandma Mary’s house, and I can’t get enough of how excited they get to see me when I pick them up. It’s so heartwarming. We loaded up into the car, picked up Christian and were on our way.

We met the Altenbach’s at Sever’s and had our family fun day. Spent some time in the corn pool (my favorite activity there), played on the jumping pillow for a while (hilarious fun), hung out in “Parakeet Island” (a new feature this year, and I LOVED it), fed some animals in the petting zoo (Olivia loves feeding them, and always makes sure all the animals get some!), ate some lunch, ACTUALLY did the corn maze (our first time, and it was really fun), Olivia took a ride down the giant slide (which, she would do ALL DAY LONG if we let her) and they played on the giant tires for a while (DIRTY). They were finally exhausted, filthy and it was time to head out. Sad to think it’ll be another year until we visit again, such a great place!

Here is proof of our festivities...

Christian gave the girls a quick bath when we got home and put them down for a late nap. I washed some dishes, started laundry and got dinner going. We settled in to watch the Vikings game and relax (ANOTHER WIN, YAY!!). Dinner was ready when the girls woke up, so we ate, played for a while, watched some videos and relaxed. They were up a little later than usual, but they didn’t get up from their naps until pretty late, so it was expected. Luckily, no school tomorrow!

Tonight’s dinner was Crockpot Orange Chicken over Brown Rice. I have to say, we weren’t fans of this one. There are some things I would do differently, that would probably make it take better, but I don’t know that I’ll try this one again.

Ingredients:

• 1½ lbs Chicken (I used 3 frozen chicken breasts, I would definitely use more than that, at least 4 or 5, for this recipe, and make sure not to cut the pieces too small)
• ½ Cup Flour
• Olive Oil
• Dash of Salt
• ½ Can of Frozen Orange Juice Concentrate (make sure you don’t use too much)
• 3 tbsp Brown Sugar
• 1 tsp Balsamic Vinegar
• 3tbsp Ketchup

• 2 Cups Dry Brown Rice
• 4 Cups of Chicken Broth (basic Rule is 2 cups liquid to 1 cup rice)

Directions:

Chicken

1. Cut chicken into pieces (like I mentioned, don’t do them too small), and coat in the four (I put the chicken pieces and flour into a ziplock bag and mixed them together).
2. Heat some oil in a shallow pan, and place the coated chicken into the oil. The chicken doesn’t have to be cooked all the way through, just browned all around.
3. Mix the salt, thawed orange juice, brown sugar, vinegar and ketchup in a bowl. Taste the mix and play with the ingredients if you want to adjust the taste of the sauce.
4. Add the cooked chicken to your crockpot, and pour the sauce mixture over it. Mix lightly. Cook for 6 hours low, or 3 hours high (I would NOT recommend cooking this on high. I would definitely do it on low, and make sure to on a regular basis for readiness.).

Brown Rice

1. Bring chicken stock to a boil.
2. Add the dry rice, cover, and simmer for 45 minutes. Do not uncover, stir, etc. during the cooking process – this will make the rice sticky and negatively affect the cooking progress.

10/6/12

Today was a BUSY, BUSY day for us, with a TON of driving.

Christian ended up having to work today, basically a full day, so it was just the girls and me for the morning/afternoon. We were up early, showered, dressed and ate some breakfast. I also had to pack up their overnight bag because they’re spending the night at my mom’s. Once we were all ready, I loaded up the truck and we were on our way, after a quick stop at the gas station (thanks, Christian).

First up, we were off to a birthday party. My friend from work, Kelly, invited us to her little girls 5th birthday party. It was WAY out in New Richmond, Wisconsin, about an hour away, so we trekked it over there. The girls had a blast playing the jump houses and running around. Olivia LOVES watching people open presents (it’s so sweet), so she was really anxious for that…kept asking me all morning when Annabelle was going to open her presents.

We left the party around 2:00, and I dropped the girls off at my mom’s house. She’s babysitting while we off at tonight’s event, and we won’t be back until late, so she offered to just keep them. YAY, but man am I going to miss them! My camera died as soon as we got to the party, so I just snapped this one pic of Olivia and I with my phone...

I arrived home a little after 3:00. Christian was home and just getting out of the shower. We got ready and all fancied up, and then were off to a wedding. Tonight, a couple of old friends, John and Michelle, were getting married. It was a little bit of an awkward situation…I used to be SUPER close to Michelle (she was in our wedding and everything), but we just kind of drifted apart, especially after I had the girls. So, we hadn’t seen them, or even really talked to them, in well over a year. I was really nervous to go, but I knew that it was just a really small, intimate wedding, so if we were invited to it, it must have been important to them to have us there. We left the house a little before 5:00, picked up our friend Nate, and made the trek to Stillwater for the wedding. It was at a Bed & Breakfast, and much to our surprise, it was an outdoor wedding (I suppose you don’t really expect it to be FREEZING cold this early in the fall). The ceremony was short and sweet, and we made our way inside. The reception was super informal, no music or standard “reception” stuff. They had food and drinks out, their families pretty much sat in the “living room” chatting and hanging out. We hung out in the foyer with our friends, laughing, catching up and actually had a really great time. I was so anxious and worried about how everything would go…being around everyone again after so long. It was definitely awkward, but it was fun. I haven’t laughed like that in a LONG time, and it definitely felt like old times hanging out again. Hopefully we can all do it more often now…

We left the reception around 11:00 and made our way home. I was beyond exhausted, and climbed into bed. Christian’s friend Lorenzo was just getting off work and stopped over to hang out with him for a little while. Something tells me he is going to be HURTING for our early morning tomorrow!

Here are some pics from the wedding...