No Excuses 30 Minute Spaghetti and Meatballs... FROM SCRATCH!

Uh huh, you read that right.  Spaghetti and meatballs...from scratch...in 30 minutes.  Well, with the help of boxed noodles and canned tomatoes.  But still delicious and easy!  I told my husband last night after making this meal that I will NEVER buy canned spaghetti sauce again.  I love the light taste of this recipe.  

I am sick of the excuse, "I don't have time to cook!"  So the family is packed up to go out to eat or something is delivered.  And, more than likely, what is ordered is not very healthy.  More money spent and unnecessary calories consumer.

It's called MEAL PLANNING! 

Every Sunday after church, Hubster and I sit down and plan our meals for the week.  I pull up Pinterest and he looks at the flyers.  We score deals on food on sale and plan meals around that.  And now that I am home during the day, we try to plan meals that will roll over into lunches for the kids and I.  Last week, I spent less than $50 on groceries.  Yep, it was fabulous!  We had healthy, full meals all week.  Lots of fresh fruit.  (And of course I don't remember what they were...).  We have a small whiteboard with the days of the week that is on the fridge.  We write out each meal with the assigned day.  It has saved us time and money!  I know what to make for dinner.  We don't go out to eat.  And if Hubster feels like making dinner, he knows what to make.  I. Love. It.  

Ok, back to the recipe.  Simple.  Light.  Filling.  Healthy.  Serve with a crusty baguette and a simple salad to round out the meal.

30 Minute Spaghetti and Meatballs
Based off the Martha Stewart recipe

Ingredients:
1/4 c. finely shredded parmesan, plus more for serving
1/4 c. bread crumbs
2 T. Italian seasoning
3-4 garlic cloves, finely minced
1 lb. ground beef
1 T. olive oil
1 large can whole peeled tomatoes (I used my home-canned tomatoes and sauce, so I don't know what the cans weight are from the store)
1/2 can tomato sauce
1 T. sugar
1/2 T. garlic powder
3/4 lb. spaghetti

Directions:
1.  Mix together the parmesan, bread crumbs, 1 T. Italian seasoning, minced garlic cloves.  Add in ground beef and egg.  Mix together until everything is incorporated, but do not overmix!  Form into 16 meatballs.  (I use the Rachael Ray method.  I even the meat mixture into a flattened ball.  Score the meat into 4 equal sections.  Each section will become 4 meatballs.)  

2.  In a large sauce pan with tall sides, add olive oil on medium heat.  Once warm, add meatballs.  Cook for 8-10 minutes, flipping occasionally.  Add in tomatoes and sauce, breaking up whole tomatoes.  Add sugar, 1 T. italian seasoning, and garlic powder.  (Sugar cuts the acidity of the tomatoes.  You might not need this.  Taste test it prior to adding sugar.  My tomatoes were canned by myself with no salt.  They needed a bit of sugar!)  Add salt and pepper if needed.  Simmer for 10-15 minutes, or until meatballs reach 165F and sauce is reduced.

3.  While meatballs are cooking, boil water and cook spaghetti to al dente.  Once pasta is done, take out 1 c. of the pasta water.

4.  With a pasta spoon or tongs, take noodles out of pot and put directly into simmering sauce.  Add in some of the reserved pasta water to help bind the tomato sauce to the pasta.  Let it all cook together for a minute or two.  

5.  Serve and enjoy!  I plate my family's meals in the kitchen, so I sprinkled a bit more parmesan on top of everyone's serving.  If you want, put into a serving bowl and sprinkle with more pasta to serve family style.

So, what is your favorite quick and healthy meal?

-Lynsee

Tomato Cage Turkey

Hold on!  I know Halloween was 2 weeks ago, but don't put those tomato cages from your ghosts away just yet!  Why, you ask?  How about this...tomato cage turkey!

I came up with this idea this summer but had no idea how to do the feathers.  Thank goodness Hubster is pretty smart.  "Cornstalks on a trellis," he said as I discussed the idea with him in the car one day.  DUH!  Such a great idea!

I slacked on putting this together as it was my daughter's birthday last week, so I had a hard time finding cornstalks.  Someone answered a post of mine on a local Facebook garage sale page.  She had some leftover from her garden that she was willing to give to me!  THANKS!  I picked them up today and as soon as the boys went down for a nap, Sassy and I got to work.

Supplies:
1 tomato cage, upside down
2 yards of brown felt
scraps of white, black, red, and orange felt (I had leftover sheets from the craft section at Joanns)
Hot glue gun and glue
Wooden trellis (mine is 6 ft tall)
Zip ties
Cornstalks
Scissors
Flexible measuring tape

Directions:

We are going to create a slip cover for our tomato cage.  After this, you'll have the measurements needed to make all sorts of slip covers for your tomato cage!

1.  Measure around the bottom and top of your tomato cage to get the circumference.  Mine was 51" at the base and 20" at the top, around.  Then measure the height.  Mine was 42" tall.  I then divided my base and top by 4 and added 1" for seam allowance.
Bottom:  51/4= 12.75+1" seam allowance = 14 inches (I rounded up)
Top: 20/4= 5 + 1" seam allowance = 6 inches
I divided by 4 because I am cutting the felt for the body in two halves on a fold.

2.  Lay out your fabric and fold the long way.  So you'll be cutting 2 body pieces at once.  I marked on the bottom edge 14" from the fold.  Then I measured up the folded edge the height of the body, which was 42".  Then at the top, I measured and marked out 6 inches from the fold.  Then, with a white crayon, I connected my dots to create the outline to cut.

3.  Cut and unfold!  I kept my right sides on the inside.  Once cut, I moved it closer to my hot glue gun.

4.  Glue!  I kept the pieces of felt together and glued one side at a time.  I started at the top in the middle.  Peel back a bit of the top fabric, place glue about 1/4" from the edge of the bottom fabric (which will be placed on the 'right side'), and carefully place top piece back down, pressing down to adhere the glue.  I worked in about 10" sections.  BUT DON'T GLUE TO BOTTOM EDGE!  We are creating a slipcover to fit over the tomato cage, so leave the bottom open.

5.  While the glue cooled, Sassy and I worked on cutting out the eyes, beak, wattle (the red thing that hangs from their neck), and feet.

6.  Carefully turn the slipcover right side out and fit over tomato cage.  With the hot glue gun, carefully glue on eyes, wattle, beak, and feet.

7.  Gather cornstalks, trellis, zip ties, and scissors.  (I did mine in the garage.)  Lay the trellis down and then evenly divide your cornstalks.  I had 4 vertical sections on the trellis so I divided my stalks into 4 sections.  Then I took one section, bunched it up near the middle, and zip tied it to one of the vertical pieces on the trellis.  I did this to all for sections.  I had a few small pieces that didn't fit with the original bunches, so I filled in the bare spots and put the zip ties where they were needed.  Stand it up and shake it around a bit.  If needed, place a few more zip ties.  

8.  Assembly time!  Sassy and I put the trellis and stalks up against the house on the front step.  Then we placed the tomato cage turkey body right in front.  Voila!  The front step is ready for Thanksgiving!

I wish I had more cornstalks to fill thus in with. But, I'm happy with what I have since they were free!

Miss Sassy was very happy to help!

-Lynsee

My front entry

I've been working on perfecting our front entry since moving in 2 years ago.  

First I had a small bench with 2 storage cubes.  Worked nice for putting on shoes but was too small for the space.  Then I stumbled upon iheartorganizing.com and saw her front entry redesign.  I was inspired!  So off to Ikea I went!  

I originally bought 3 Besta cupboards just like she did.  We weren't sure what would fit.  We ended up only putting together 2.  Originally I wanted to put up the third but after living with it for a while, I realized 2 was perfect.  My grandma gave me some of her original blue Ball jars and I knew I had to display them here!  I filled them with fake flowers from Michael's and some butterflies that my father-in-law gave to my daughter.  The desk organizer we just had laying around.  It the perfect landing spot for Hubby's phones and iPad.  (I'm sure you noticed the cluster of cords there.  He has 2 phones and an iPad.  He's a geek.)

Inside the cupboards.  Well, you'll notice there isn't a picture yet.  There is a reason.  It's a mess.  I had it nice and organized when we first set this up last spring. But summer happened.  Then my daycare kids started.  And school started.  Both kids have a shelf for shoes (but you'll notice in the right of the picture that my daughter doesn't use hers).  We also all have a small basket inside for sunglasses, etc.  I'll get this perfected and put another post up later of the inside.  :)

The collage wall is just an inspiration from all I've seen on Pinterest.  I thought it was a perfect place to display the personalized wood carving from Hubby's great uncle that was a wedding gift, our house rules, a rosemaled cutting board from Hubby's great aunt, and our Valentine's gift from the kiddos last year.  

So far, this set up has been working great for us.  It easily becomes a landing spot for junk as we walk in the door, but it's small so easy to clean up.  

Have you checked out iheartorganizing.blogspot.com?  If not, you are missing out!  She has many great organizing tips and ideas!

-Lynsee  

1 Laundry Basket

Here is my favorite home organization tip as of recently.

Yep. I'm talking about laundry today. Now that I'm home with the kids instead of working, I'm doing more of the household duties (it was pretty 50/50 before). I quickly became overwhelmed with laundry. My kids each had their own basket and my husband and I shared a ser of colors and whites baskets. 

I. Detest. Folding. Ugh, seriously hate it. So all the clothes would stay in baskets and we would pull out what we needed when we needed. So this resulted in heaps of dirty laundry everywhere. 

I saw a post on Pinterest about 1 laundry basket for the family and loved the idea! It took some catching up (and I admit I still have clothes to fold in our master bedroom) but is working very smooth. My daughter knows to put her clothes in the family basket at the end of the day. I wash 1 load of clothes every other day (and a load of diapers on the other day). And since its a bit of everyone's clothes, I fold and sort in the living room. So they have to get put away right away otherwise the kids will destroy them. 

I picked this basket up at Target for under $15. The liner comes out easily to carry laundry up and down the 3 flights to the laundry room. 

So, now the laundry isn't taunting me in each room I go. The family basket sits at the top of the stairs, outside the bathroom and our bedrooms. So far, a much easier laundry solution! 

What is your best home organization tip?

-Lynsee

Monday Night Craft!

Are you ready for some football crafting?  It's Monday night and the Minnesota Vikings are playing tonight.  That means that my husband is hunkered down on the couch (but doing 'chores' during the commercials...yeah..he's fabulous...I don't even ask him to do them!) and after being away since Thursday morning, I was itching to get crafty.

The weather turned almost winterish this weekend.  Like, it was snowing on our way home from Duluth.  Yeah.  Great.  I love snow, don't get me wrong, but I feel like we barely had a fall!  It went from 70 to 40.  I love me some brisk fall days but that was too drastic for me!

Anyways, my daughter needs a winter hat. When I ordered her winter jacket, the website was being funky and I couldn't order the matching hat.  Then when I reordered my son's winter gear last week I forgot to look at her hats again.  Grrrr!  But, then I remembered that I had purple fleece sitting in my fabric stash.  So I went to work!

I bought an animal ear hat pattern on Etsy just after my daughter was born 4 years ago.  Check out Level Design on Etsy.  She also sells her products at TheJuneBride.  Here is the  animal ear hat pattern on Etsy.  She also has an adorable bootie pattern.  You'll see them in some of my pictures below.  I love these hats!  I made a hat for Sassy then, another for my son when he was born 2 years ago, and many others in between.  So, so simple!  (And check out Karen's website, TheJuneBride.com.  She shows off customer projects, new tutorials, and even recipes! P.S. You can score a better deal on her patterns at her personal website!!)

Sometimes, if I'm feeling extra crafty, I'll add my own embellishments to the hats.  Today I added a purple heart on the side of Sassy's hat to match the purple hearts on her winter jacket.  Even with the heart embellishment, this took less than 30 minutes.  (I got a little distracted and sewed off the bottom of the heart a bit.  Oops!  But that makes it much more special, right?!)

I'm sure Sassy will love this and be happy to rock another mommy-made hat this winter!

Here are a few others that I've made in the past.

Sassy's first hat with matching booties.

Another set made for a friend's baby girl.

The monkey hat I made for Tigster.

-Lynsee

Creamy Roasted Garlic Tomato Soup

"Nailed it" exclaimed Hubster as he finished his soup.  I am not one for canned tomato soup so I always make it myself.  Yesterday was a typical chilly Minnesota fall day and I was in the mood for grilled cheese and homemade tomato soup.  I had most of the ingredients on hand so I threw it together off the top of my head and it turned out delicious!

**This recipe can easily become vegetarian.  Take out the bacon and just add an extra tablespoon of olive oil before sauteing vegetables.  And use vegetable stock instead of chicken stock.  This is my basic recipe but go vegetarian when cooking for some certain friends!**

Creamy Roasted Garlic Tomato Soup

Ingredients:
1 head garlic
olive oil
3-5 slices bacon
1 medium white onion
1 c. chopped carrots
14-16 oz tomato sauce
28 oz whole peeled tomatoes
2 c. chicken stock 
1 tbsp. dried basil
1 tbsp. dried Italian seasoning
1/4-1/2 c. heavy cream

Directions:
1.  Preheat oven to 400 F.  Peel off loose garlic peels and chop off top third of garlic head.  Place in a square of aluminum foil and drizzle lightly with olive oil.  Wrap foil around garlic and roast in oven for 30 minutes or until soft.  Allow to cool after roasting and squeeze out the garlicky goodness into a bowl when cool enough to handle.

2. Chop bacon into 1 inch pieces.  In your pot, drizzle 1 tbsp olive oil and cook bacon until crispy on medium heat.  Pull out bacon and save for grilled cheese.  Say what??  Yah, that's right.  I put little bits of crispy bacon goodness on my grilled cheese.  YUM!

3.  Add onions and carrots to pot with bacon drippings.  Add salt and saute until soft, 3-5 minutes.  Add in roasted garlic and saute for 30 seconds.  Now, the bottom of your pot will be brown.  Don't worry!  That, my friends, is called fond.  There is a lot of wonderful flavor in there.  You WANT it there!

4.  Add tomato sauce, whole peeled tomatoes and the sauce it came in, chicken stock, and seasonings.  DO NOT ADD THE CREAM! Bring the soup to a boil and simmer until slightly reduced, about 30 minutes.  Make sure to stir a few times during the simmering and scrape that wonderful fond off the bottom of the pan.  After reduced, taste for flavor and add salt and pepper as you see fit.  I use unsalted or low-sodium products as much as possible so I can control the amount of salt going into our bodies.  (This time around, I used my own canned tomato sauce and whole tomatoes so there was no salt in those.)

5.  Turn off heat and add in heavy cream.  Or not.  This is what makes it creamy.  I thought it was pretty fabulous without the cream and considered not adding it.  But I love a creamy soup.  And Hubster bought it for this particular dinner.  So I added it.  

6.  Serve and enjoy!  Of course we served this grilled cheese.  I add the bacon pieces from the beginning of the recipe to my grilled cheese!

*This makes great leftovers.  One of my favorites, actually!  When I worked, I would make the grilled cheese the night before and wrap it in a paper towel before putting in my sandwich box.  The paper towel helped to absorb any moisture while stored or cooking in microwave. 

-Lynsee

A homemade kind of weekend

We love to cook from scratch around here.  Even my husband.  Last winter I roasted a chicken and Hubster used the carcass to make chicken broth.  It was fabulous to have on hand!  We try to use the least amount of salt as possible and he made the broth completely salt free.

This weekend was another homemade kind of weekend.  I was busy Friday night and Saturday morning at church making lefse (for those of you non-Scandinavians, it is a like a tortilla but made with potatoes).  I had some other things to do on Saturday so my husband was home with the kids most of the day.  I got a text while at church of my daughter at the counter helping Hubster make pizza dough from scratch.  I came home for lunch and not only had they made the crust from scratch, but they also made the sauce.  Best part?  He used my tomato sauce that I canned earlier this fall.  YUM!! It was, handsdown, the best pizza we had eaten!  If I had the recipe, I would post it.  I'll try to get it from him...

While pampering myself at a spa party on Saturday night, I received another text picture.  This time, they were making homemade ice cream.  A few years ago, my husband got his grandmother's ice cream maker.  He loves making it with the kids!  It has to sit for a while in the freezer so we had it after dinner last night.  We didn't have any chocolate syrup so can you guess what I did?  Yep, made it myself!  I used this recipe but didn't have any vanilla extract.  It still tasted really good!  We used it right out of the pan so it was slightly runny, but the rest went in a jar in the fridge.  It will thicken as it sets.  So yummy!! 

So, did you make anything homemade this weekend?

Lynsee

Liquid gold! Aka creamy Mac n Cheese

We are Big Mac n Cheese fans around here. And my favorite cooking blog is Mel's Kitchen Cafe. So, Saturday evening rolls around and it was pretty dreary here. Commence comfort food season!! I had been eyeing up Mel's Creamy Skillet Mac n Cheese for a while so I decided to whip it up. 

HERE is the recipe that I used. 

End result: 

Half gone skillet of Mac n cheese. "Liquid gold!" as my husband calls it. It is a very simple recipe, that's for sure. I did think it still had a slight flour-y flavor to it despite the lack of flour used, but that could have been from the cheeses. I plan on playing with this recipe a bit, adding different cheeses. 

All in all, a delicious, easy, and healthier mac n cheese than others out there!

See, Tiggy agrees!

Lynsee

Baby shadow boxes

Here it is, my first published project inspired by Pinterest! 

DIY Baby Shadow Box

Items needed:

-Shadow box (mine is 11"x14")

-Pearlized head straight pins

-Items for display (I used my kids' first outfits, hospital bracelets, and a tiny diaper, unused of course!)

Directions: (Sorry, blogger fail. I didn't take pictures. Was too eager to get them done!)

1. Take back off shadow box.

2. Iron cloth items, if needed.

3. Decide on layout. 

4. Pin! Use your pins to hold items in place. Place them on the shadow box back shallow so they don't poke out. It takes patience! I used as few pins as I could get away with.

5. I couldn't get the letters to stay in place with pins so I used regular tape to hold it in. Just rolled it, stuck it in back of letter, and stuck it on the spot I wanted it to be. 

6. Hold up your finished work to make sure nothing moves when upright. 

7. Carefully place back into shadow box frame and secure. 

8. Sit back and admire your work! Mine are going up in the master bedroom. 

**Please ignore the crummy iPhone photos. I'm having computer issues so I'm posting from my phone.**

Thanks for checking out my first project post!

Welcome!

 Welcome to my new blog! I am just beginning to decorate and make our house our home, despite living here for 2 years now. I am a stay-at-home mom to a beautiful (almost) 4 year old daughter and a spunky 1 year old son. I am a Family Consumer Science (aka Home Ec) teacher by trade but turned into a SAHM last summer when my program was cut in the district I was teaching. To keep contributing to the family, I decides to start a "mini daycare". I currently just watch one child that is two weeks older than my son, so it's great for him to have a friend over to play every day!

I admit that I'm a Pinterest junkie, so you will see alot of projects inspired from there. So, join me as I create a comfortable home amongst the chaos of my two children and mini daycare!