Gift Idea for Grandma! So cute!

how cute is this idea as a birthday present for grandma! found it on inchmark. a cute blog i happened to stumble upon. What grandmother doesn't like photos of her children and grandchildren!

it's as simple as purchasing this photo holder. Behind each day leading up to Grandma's birthday has a sweet picture! 

You could probably do the same idea in a different format...maybe just a regular album that she could reuse..or once she takes out the numbers she keeps the hidden photo in and soon the album will be revealed! I think if you had older children it would be sweet to have behind each number a photo..but also a little note saying something you love about grandma or a drawing from younger ones. I think its such a sweet idea and i want to do it...so....grandma's forget this post. haha.

visit inchmark to download the number files that she used!

Gender Reveal Party

I am loving this idea i found on partyperfect.blogspot.com!! so cute. One of my favorite blogs.. i get stuck reading one post after another!! haha.

i wish more of my family lived closer so that we could do this! I think it would be so fun to build up the suspense...maybe include some sort of prize for the correct guessers!

they had the party guests wear pink or blue to indicate their guess!

a colored gum ball hidden in the cupcakes revealed the gender and they all bit into the cupcakes at once! how fun!

babies are so fun. even in the womb. haha.

ok i'm avoiding planning our first grade retreat.. back to work! trying to find some fun craft and snack ideas.. i'll post what i end up doing for sure. It's a retreat for our CCD Class...i'm doing a retreat every saturday for each grade. (1-6) I love this part of doing ministry. but i have a problem keeping it simple. the night before i'll be making 100 cupcakes with i heart jesus on top out of fondant. haha. i'm not even joking. if you have any ideas for great craft/snacks in bulk let me know!

My Top Mama Picks - Favorite Blogs

.............................................................................

I am so excited to share with you some of these blogs that i
 just love and hope you go visit!
but first i have a purely vain request... i have about 73 subscribers 
who are awesome and read each new post!

but i only have 24 followers.. sad.

 so if you get a chance hop on over to the side of my blog
and click follow. 
i would love it! it's the same idea as subscribing.

and now...time to chit chat about some fun blogs!

1. 

i feel like i have so much in common with this girl...young wife..new homeowner. she is a creative designer and her blog is so charming! she finds lovely images of inspiration.. 

and shows off her work...
check out some of these items in her etsy shop! so cute.


2.

this girl always finds the best images to get me so inpsired! check out these nursery ideas she came across! plus i love the name... secrets of domestic bliss.

3. 

LOVE this blog.. she puts together these great color inspiration boards.

and she has a great etsy shop. i want to order everything. pretty much. hehe.

4.

first of all..how cute is she? 


this lovely lady is sisters with my roommate in college..(mammy! i miss you! "meow. kitty cat!" inside joke. i couldn't resist. haha.)


Her blog is so lovely. her posts are so real and from the heart. she is a mother (of soon-to-be-six!) and so stylish! check out these maternity clothes she found that i just love.

she recently shared my post of my recipe's for spaghetti and meatball and mozarella sticks! made me so happy. and i always go to her blog to get some encouraging mama wisdom. hehe. check her out!
www,mychildiloveyou.blogspot.com

Chicken Chili

I didn't feel like going to the grocery store and wanted to use up some stuff i had hidden away in my cabinets....found a bag of frozen chicken in the freezer........chicken chili!

1. this meal is budget friendly..you can use up all those cans and cans of beans and tomatoes that you got on sale that one time. 

2. this meal is hearty and fills you up.

3. this meal miraculously multiplies.. you can feast for days!

Ok i know...anotherrrr food post. (preggers. if i can eat something and not get nauseas i get excited.) i said i was going to post about my favorite blogs. that is coming up..i found some new favs too! o lala.

I looked up a recipe online to go from... i had made a chicken chili before but lost my fav. recipe. but i pretty much threw in what i had! I added in some potatoes (some people put in some type of pasta) but i had potatoes that i didn't want to go bad! and they were a hit with the hubby. i cooked them up a bit in water before tossing them in..they were just the right softness and soaked up all the deliciousness! 

here is the recipe you could go from....but really just throw in whatever you have..you can't go to wrong with chili.. it all cooks together. but spice wise i did what was below and it was perfect. here is how i made it...more or less.

Ingredients

4-5 Chicken Breasts, Shredded

1/2 Onion, chopped (or more if you want)

3 Cans Chopped Tomatoes (two of them had chiles in them-spicy!!- do not drain)

2 Cans of Beans

1t. ground cumin..(then tossed in a little more later on sorry. eyeball it)

1 t chili powder

garlic. (2-4 cloves..or eye ball garlic powder)

and i ended up putting in half a glass of water because the spice was kicking my butt..in a good way.

baked chicken -350 with olive oil,salt and pepper for 45 min.

in your dutch oven or large pot add olive oil or butter and saute onions and garlic.

add cans of tomatoes, beans, shredded chicken and partially cooked potatoes.

add spices. check half way through cooking time and see if you want to add more.

put lid on and let simmer for a couple hours.

remove the lid for the last half hour to let it thicken up.

serve with fresh saltines, sour cream and grated cheddar cheese

enjoy! this recipe is almost fail proof. which is always a good recipe to me. :)

my husband didn't even add spices like he normally does! that is an accomplishment! i deserve an award or some type of trophy. go me.

there are so many great chili recipes..share any of your favorites!

muffin or cupcake?

not sure how long i can last 

before i have to make these.....

i love her wording....

"I think perhaps the benefit of calling treats of this nature muffins is to ensure that they can be eaten for breakfast without the full-fledged guilt that would accompany eating a chocolate cupcake for breakfast."

-brown eyed baker

i love muffins. :)

ok i know....all these food posts. i'm totally pregnant.

 i promise the next post i'll share some of my favorite blogs! 

you'll just eat up all of their ideas and images!

Chicken Pot Pie for the Busy Mama

being pregnant..all i want is quick and easy comfort food. this recipe does the trick! The busy mama's way to chicken pot pie! ingredients and directions below!

Besides a few bumps along the way. cough..bisctuis cough.. this came together so fast!! i even have extra plain chicken to make up into something for sophia tomorrow.. and leftovers to warm up when i'm exhausted from growing a baby. i found a recipe here and changed it up a bit.


Ingredients
2 Cups chicken
1/2 cup milk
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup diced onions
2 cups mixed veggies (frozen pack)
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
salt and pepper to taste
14 oz chicken broth
1 batch of biscuits (or 1 can if you mess up like me.)


First things first... bake the chicken...or boil. I threw some tenderloins in with olive oil..salt and pepper. took about 30 minutes. 
Chop the chicken into pieces and set aside.


time to make up the deliciousness.
melt the butter at medium heat. (add onions in now if you want.. i skipped them this time. cook onions two minutes until tender.)stir in flour, salt and pepper until well blended.

gradually stir in broth and milk, cooking and stirring until bubbly and thickened.

mix in vegetables (i used a frozen pack..steam fresh. (you could probably zap it in the microwave before you throw it in..but i ended up letting mine cook together for a while.) mix in chicken.

now the part that makes this chicken pot pie easy is instead of making a crust you just throw in a batch of biscuits. i tried to make homemade biscuits.........(i didn't have the oven's heat high enough. thats my conclusion. they "looked" like my grandmother's when they went in.....haha.)

husband stepped in and saved the preggo lady by running down the street and grabbing a pop in the oven batch of biscuits. (when i pregnant lady has her mind on having something for dinner you don't want to mess up that plan. haha... we planned on going to cici's pizza the other night..i know.,.ew..gross.. and we show up and it was CLOSED! i was lost. seriously. i didn't know what else to eat nothing sounded good.)

spoon chicken and vegetable mixture over warm biscuits.

this meal is so easy, super fast and tastes like classic home cookin'.

most importantly it's husband approved.

you should try it.

while ben ran to the store to grab the biscuits... sophia was let loose on the kitchen at my feet. being pregnant i feel like i'm way more laid back with her making a mess.. i'm like...oh well...we'll clean it up when she takes her nap. haha. 

after she destroys the house she is a snuggle bug.

tempting potential buyers with baked goods

right now i will do anything to sell this house...even bake up some muffins if that makes a potential buyer remember our house!

ice water anyone??

My notes say "Thank you for stopping by! Please try these French Breakfast Puffs that i made for you. We might have snuck a few......   Good luck with your house hunting! - ben, natalie & sophia"

French Breakfast Puffs

We have some serious buyers from new york coming to see our house tomorrow and we're pulling out all the stops to get this house sold!! 

i think that these french breakfast puffs waiting for them in the kitchen will do the trick..they are delish!!

one of my all time favorite recipes from the amazing Pioneer Woman.

Our house is up on the market..we flipped it and are hoping this is going to be our stepping stone to settling a little further out of the city and closer to our parish where we work. I found a house that i LOVE. and it needs some loving thats for sure..loving and drywalling. haha. so the sooner we get this house sold the sooner we can make our move! we are wanting to use the money we make on this house to pay off bad debt..and to down the road open up a soup kitchen somewhere in the area. or atleast partner up with one! serving the poor has been a passion of my husband and mine and we would love to make that happen! but right now priority is to get our little family set up in a home we can grow in and near his job since i'll be stopping that job when baby #2 is born. i'll focus on mommy-hood and my freelance graphic and web design work. 

i think my fat free milk looks funny next to the sticks of butter and crisco. 

Ingredients
3 cups Flour
3 teaspoons Baking Powder
1 teaspoon Salt
1/4 Teaspoons Ground Nutmeg
1 cup Sugar
2/3 cups Shortening
2 whole Eggs
1 cup Milk
1 1/2 Cup Sugar
3 teaspoons Cinnamon
2 sticks butter

In a large bowl stir together flour, baking powder, salt and nutmeg.

In a different bowl, cream together 1 cup sugar and shortening. Then add eggs and mix again. Add flour mixture and milk alternately to creamed mixture, beating well after each addition. (ps i love cooking at night..you can see city lights from our window..and i have lights strung up on the back porch. the flowers were a "i'm sorry you are throwing up constantly" gift from the husband when he came home from work one night. he's a sweetie.)

Fill prepared muffin cups 2/3 full. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes or until golden. and you end up with these cute muffins! that are delicious in themselves but lets make them a little more unhealthy shall we?? yes.

In a bowl, melt 2 sticks butter. In a separate bowl combine remaining sugar and cinnamon. Dip baked muffins in butter, coating thoroughly, then coat with cinnamon-sugar mixture.

set up a little working station like this.

please say a prayer we get this house sold! we've been getting lots of traffic so we're feeling good!

i promise the next recipe will be healthy..a girlfriend of mine has some amazing recipes that she is going to send me to try out and i can't wait! but for now...this is what keeps me skinny while i eat my french breakfast puffs.......