Mini Bisquit Pizza

So have you done the great promotion at King Soopers this past week and gottena BUNCH of nearly free Grands Bisquits? What do you do with all of those bisquits?????Maybe I'm the only one who hadn't thought of this before, but I'm glad I finally did! The other night I was going to make pizza dough from scratch but, to be honest, I was kinda lazy and really didn't want to. Then I remembered the 4 cans of Bisquits I just bought at King Soopers and thought I'd make Mini Personal Pizza's using the bisquits as a crust. So here's how I did it....



So these are the ingredients I used and had on hand for the pizza. I actually had to make my own tomato/pizza sauce from home canned tomatoes, and I LOVED it!!!



Here is a before and after pic of the bisquits. Just flatten out the bisquit from the can, with your fingers or a rolling pin. I just worked them around by holding them and that seemed to work well.



Spread on that pizza sauce!!



Add your cheese and fixin's. And a little tip from my Italian Mother-in-law, sprinkle a little Oregano on the top of your pizza for a little extra yum. :)



Put it in the oven and bake for how long the bisquit directions tell you to....and....ta da!!! Instant Mini Bisquit Pizza! Easy Peezy!!



I think Camden liked it. :) Renato really liked them too, although I would prefer the "real" stuff, this was a great quick and easy way to whip up some dinner.....and use up those bisquits!!!

This is my Works For Me Wednesday post!!!

Menu Plan March 28th

Well, we'll see how closely I follow this menu plan. Last week's plan was a total bust...I think I only actually followed through with my plan 2 days. But that's the beauty of a plan....at least you have SOMETHING ready to go, but if you want to be spontaneous, just scrap it for another day. :)


Monday- Renato's cooking! :)

Tuesday- I'm going to a coupon exchange, so easy Quesadillas for the boys.

Wednesday- Last week's Teriyaki and Pineapple Chicken, Rice

Thursday- Cheese Stuffed Meatloaf, Baked Potatoes, Salad

Friday- Spinach Mushroom Calzone

Saturday- Hamburgers on the grill (Foreman grill that is, until we can buy a REAL one.) :)

Sunday- Friends over for EASTER!!! YAY!!! We're doing the ham and Hot Cross Buns.

Find more Menu Plans at Organized Junkie!!

Easter Activities

***Here is Camden in Brazil dying eggs last year....you can tell it was pretty hot! :)

Easter is such a great time to do so many fun and meaningful activities with your little ones. I love that it's such a wonderful time of year, just because it's the beginning of Springs, and that we get to celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus! Instead of Easter just being about cute bunnies and colorful eggs, this year I wanted to start to teach Camden about the REAL meaning of Easter....along with doing lots of fun egg activites too. :) So here are some of the things I'll be doing with Camden this coming week to prepare for Easter.

The letter of the week that we're focusing on is "E e" for egg (and of course elephant, etc, but egg just fits in better this week!)

Monday- Letter recognition with finger tracing, along with some letter Ee worksheets to color and practice letter formation

Scissor practice-Draw a large Egg on white paper. Have child trace around egg with finger, marker, or whatever works. Then cut strips of paper in colorful "spring" colors. Then child snips at the strips to create little mis-shaped snip-squares, then glues the "snips" on the eggs to decorate it. (I did this on St. Patty's day with a shamrock, and Camden loved snipping the paper up and glueing it on the shamrock....great fine-motor skills and scissor work!)



Tuesday- Cooking activity: Eggs in a Nest (totally adapted from another recipe and then made it my own to go with this egg theme of mine!)
2 cups peanut butter
1 cup powdered sugar
1 cup light corn syrup
4 cups cereal (cherrios/corn flakes) chow mein noodles work best....
Jelly beans
Combine first 3 ingredients, then add cereal and mix to coat. Make balls, then make a "thumbprint" hole in the middle of the ball to shape into a "nest". Add jelly beans for the Eggs! CUTE!!! (can't wait to make these, then will post pics!!!)



Wednesday- Resurrection Eggs--a great way to tell about the "Easter Story"

Color sorting with Jelly Beans....matching the color of Jelly bean to plastic eggs.

Thursday- Color sorting with plastic egg halfs opened in a egg carton and small pom-poms. Using a tweezer, child pics up one pom-pom and puts it into the egg that matches the color of the pom-pom. (fine-motor skills, and color identification)

Friday- Dye Eggs!!! The best part of the week!!! We LOVE doing this!!!

All week we'll be reading Easter books from the library and talking about Jesus on the cross and His resurrection.

These are some great websites with tons of ideas for preschoolers:

DLTK's Printable Crafts

First School Preschool Activites and Crafts

Preschool Post--Bible Lessons

What We've Been Up To

We've started our "garden"!! We planted our seed starters for our outside garden, but since the weather is pretty harsh here in CO, I figured I'd try to give my little seeds a head start. Where I'm from in ND, you just throw seeds in the ground and they grow......doesn't quite work like that here. You need to do a lot of preparation, and the soil doesn't work well for planting most veggies, so we're going to build up our own garden boxes, and hopefully that will help. It'll be an experiment anyway! :)



Soon I'll have to move the cucumbers to bigger "pots" because they germinated so fast! I have a feeling I'm going to have a lot of different pots around the house until I can move them outside. YIKES!




Hmmm, what can I say about this little mess? Let's just say "someone" figured out that one of the door latches we put on our cupboards is broken. :)




This is the way I found him a day earlier, but obviously the next day he figured out how to actually open up the oatmeal. He thought it was fun! ***Note to self---Must FIX the cupboard latch!!!

Great is Thy Faithfulness

I've had the Hymn, "Great Is Thy Faithfulness", floating around in my head and heart the past few days.....

Great is Thy faithfulness,
Great is Thy faithfulness,
Morning by morning new mercies I see,
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided,
Great is Thy faithfulness,
Lord unto me.

God is so good and faithful. He continues to prove it over and over again in our lives. Our transition back into life as Americans has been relatively smooth, but of course with all transition, there have been some "stretching" times as well. Let's just say, we've been STRETCHED a whole lot in our finances the past few months, with getting settled back into a home and starting a new business. Don't get me wrong, we have been truly blessed with God providing all of our NEEDS, and I have learned a lot about how to spend wisely on our budget.

The one thing that I have been praying for is a second vehicle. We've been a 1 car family for about 2 1/2 yrs, but now that we're back in the states, and living in a suburban area, it's just MUCH more convenient to have 2 cars. Note I said CONVENIENT, not NECESSARY. Yes, it's a stretch for us to have just 1 car, but I've tried to be content with it....some days I've succeeded in being content....and others...well, let's just say I struggled with a bad attitude. But my heart's cry was just for a second car, that we wouldn't have to make payments on. So I knew, that I'd have to remain patient until we could save up and by a cheaper, older, car that met our needs for the time being.

I just had a feeling that God was going to take care of it. (I was just thinking we'd get a super great deal on a car.) But nope, not my amazing God and Father, He had other plans to blow that out of the water.

A friend of ours called us last Friday night, and said that they wanted to GIVE us their older Jeep. GIVE!!!! Like as in, NO MONEY!!! FREE!!!! They had been looking to upgrade and when they heard that we just had one car, they started praying about how they could help us, and confirmed that they should offer their Jeep to us.

Let's just say that we were (and are) blown away. We don't have it yet, because they are still looking for a replacement car, but we will soon be a 2 car family once again. And the best part.....God continued to show Himself faithful, and that He blew our socks off with how He provides for His children.

And that is why I am so incredibly Grateful today!!! Check out more Gratituesday posts HERE!!!

Menu Plan Monday-March 22nd

How in the world is it already the 22nd of March? It seems like the days and hours pass so slowly sometimes, but for some reason, the weeks and months are flying by. Here's my plan....we'll see how closely we stick to it....but at least I have a framework, and that brings me sanity. :)

Monday- We're on our own....Renato is gone tonight.

Tuesday- Build your own Chipotle Burrito (Pulled Beef, Cilantro Rice, Black Beans, Salsa, and Tortillas)

Wednesday- Caramel Apple Pork Chops, Mashed Potatoes, Salad

Thursday- Teriyaki and Pineapple Chicken, Rice

Friday- Homemade Pizza

Saturday- Brazilian Torta

Sunday- Breakfast for Dinner

Go visit Organized Junkie for more Menu Plans!!!

Menu Plan week March 15th

I'm looking forward to the new week. We have a great meal planned for friend's coming over Thursday night....YUMMMMMM!!! Then Saturday late afternoon I'm getting together with some friends and doing a Creative Cooking, Iron Chef type challenge, cooking/baking night. We have a common ingredient that we have to use in our recipe and then bring our ingredients with us and prepare our recipes together....and we keep our recipes a SECRET from each other, so we have NO IDEA what the other people are making until we get there! I'm so excited!! I'm sure there will be a lot of laughter, lots of chatting, and yummy food!!


Monday- Spaghetti with fresh Salad, Italian Cheese Bread

Tuesday- Crockpot Chicken and Dumplings (LOVE this!)

Wednesday- Sliced Beef Steaks in Garlic Sauce, Rice, Beans, Broccoli

Thursday- Gyro-Style Lamb , Tabouleh, Pitas, Grape Juice.....We're having friends over for dinner and I CAN NOT wait to have this "Middle-Eastern" food night. YUMMY!!! (Actually Renato makes THE BEST Tabouleh EVER, so we won't follow this recipe, but I wanted to give an idea of what it is and how amazing it is!)

Friday- STILL haven't done Tuna Patty Melts....tonight's the night!! :)

Saturday- Pulled-Beef Sandwiches (from freezer!)

Sunday- Breakfast for dinner

Head on over to Organized Junkie for more menu plans!!!

Menu Plan for week March 8th

This is a very simple menu plan this week, which is a good thing. :)

Monday- Fresh Burrito Bar with Rice and Refried Beans

Tuesday- Baked Chicken, Garlic Pasta, Broccoli

Wednesday- BBQ Ribs, Mashed Potatoes, Salad

Thursday- Spaghetti, Salad

Friday- I'm gone for a baby shower, so the boys get to eat that Frozen pasta dinner

Saturday- Tuna Melt Sandwiches, chips & salsa (never got to these last week)

Sunday- Breakfast for Dinner

As always, check out Organized Junkie for more menu plans!!!

OK, just stumbled upon this recipe and had to post it here. These look AMAZING....I may just go make these right now for an afternoon snack instead of breakfast. :)
French Breakfast Puffs.......mmmmmmmmm

Frugal Lacing Activity

Here's an idea I just came up with. I've been doing some homeschool activities with Camden just to keep him a bit more occupied then he would be normally. A great activity for preschoolers is lacing. I had looked in some stores and price checked some different lacing cards/activities online, and knew that I wanted to get some for Camden. He LOVES putting things into small holes/spaces, so I knew he'd love lacing. Well, I figured out a very cheap way to make my own lacing cards.

I just took a cheap paper plate, and drew on a shape. This week we're doing the letter Aa, so we've been doing a lot of apple activities. I drew a big apple onto the plate and cut it out. Then used a hole punch to punch holes around the trim of the apple. I used some markers to trace around the outside too, just to make sure it looked like an apple. :) I had Camden 1st color the apple. Then I used some yarn for lacing. (Make sure you put some tape around one end to make it harder, like a needle, and easier for poking through the hole.) I just tied it and knotted it, then had Camden lace through the holes in order. I was right, he LOVED it!



So my plan is to come up with some sort of a shape to do each week that goes along with the letter we're learning. I'm also planning on maybe using card-stock to cut out big Letter shapes, then have him lace around the letters too.

The apple we'll just use once, but you could just undo the lacing and the kids could do it over and over again....until it eventually falls apart. :)

Another thing he loves to do, along the same concept, is to make cereal necklaces. I do the same thing with the yarn, making a hard "needle" from taping around it, and at the other end making a bunch of knots. Then I just dump out a bunch of Cherrios (or whatever has holes), and he goes to town lacing through them to make a cereal necklace. Right now I'm just focusing on the fine motor skills, but soon I'll have him make color patterns with the cereal on the necklace too. And a fun snack for later! :)

So there's just a few fun, frugal activities your preschooler with love....well, mine did anyway. :) Check out more Frugal Friday ideas HERE!

Dr. Seuss's Birthday

I've been trying to do some homeschool activities with Camden, just for the sake of having an activity to do with him. Of course, he loves it, and I've had fun putting my Teaching Degree to use again. :)

March 2nd is Dr. Seuss's Birthday. When I taught Kinder and 1st Grade, I always did fun activities that day. My first year of teaching (I'll refer to it as the teaching "year from Heaven"), where I taught at a VERY small school, in a VERY small town, and had a VERY small class of only 8 students, (See, told ya, HEAVEN!) I planned a whole week of activities, including making and eating Green Eggs and Ham. The local TV station even came out and did a story on it. ("Local" meaning, 50 miles away.) So I've always had fun celebrating Dr. Seuss's Birthday, and since Camden is old enough to enjoy it too, I decided to invite a friend over to help us celebrate.

We read Hop on Pop (because I couldn't find my Cat in the Hat book), and talked about Dr. Seuss a bit. Then we made Cat in the Hat hats!

Here are Ethan and Camden making their hats.



Here they are posing with their cute hats.



Then we read the book Green Eggs and Ham. So of course we had to make Green Eggs and try them!

Ethan was pretty sceptical about eating them. He kept saying, "I don't think I'm going to like them." So cute! Camden couldn't wait to eat his, and eventually, with a lot of coaxing, Ethan tried his too, and of course liked them! (Just like the book!)



Here's a "Works for me Wednesday" tip to make the GREEN eggs. Use a couple drops of BLUE food coloring, not green, because the scrambled eggs are yellow, so the yellow eggs plus the blue food coloring makes the eggs green. :) So you have a primary colors lesson thrown in with the fun of eating green eggs. :) And with St. Patrick's Day coming up soon, you could have Green Eggs to celebrate that day too!

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!!