Easy Vegetarian Lasagne

This is my go-to meal that I take to friends and relatives when they have a new baby. It's delicious, it's easy for me to make and mom to heat, and it's vaguely good for you. Pair it with some garlic bread and you're good to go. I brought it to my cousin-in-law (is that really a term?) when she had her baby awhile back and her mom has been gushing over it and asking for the recipe ever since. Since I'm super on top of things I'm going to get that right to her. It's only been 20 months or so. No big.

P.S. I totally cheat and use a jar of spaghetti sauce. Ragu actually because it's crazy cheap and delicious. And no one will know unless you tell them. Or write a blog about it.

16 lasagne noodles
4 ounces of fresh spinach, chopped
1 can artichoke hearts, rinsed and drained
1 small onion
16 ounces of ricotta
4 C mozzarella cheese, shredded
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 T olive oil
1 jar of spaghetti sauce of your choice

1. Cook noodles according to package directions, drain, and rinse with cold water.
2. Saute onion, garlic, and artichoke hearts in olive oil until onion is see through. About 5 minutes.
3. Spray bottom of 9x13 pan so your lasagne comes out smoothly later.

4. Layer noodles, sauce, cooked veggies, chopped spinach, ricotta, and mozzarella. I use my hands to spread out the ricotta because it's sticky.

I left out the artichokes because there's no way Thing 1 would eat that.

5. Repeat. Each layer uses four noodles. When you run out of noodles, you're mostly done.
6. Top the lasagne off with a little bit of sauce and mozzarella. I find it hard to ration appropriately for the topmost layer and sometimes we don't get any goodness up there. Sad face.

7. Cover with tinfoil and cook at 350 for 45 minutes. Remove tinfoil and cook for 5 minutes.

Super yum. AND miracle of miracles, everyone ate it. Even Thing 1 who is super picky.

DIY Feather Earring Tutorial

I've been coveting all manner of fancy accessories that I've been pinning on my painfully addictive pinterest lately. Today I decided to DIY some feather earrings. It was super easy. And guess what? I made a tutorial so YOU can make some too. I know. I give and I give.

Here we go:

I started with some feathers from Joanns. These came in a bunch together with a couple other odd pieces. $4.99 less 40%

Cut them to the length you desire. Remove a few of the fringies so that you can wrap the top.

Fish hook earrings and 26 gauge copper wire.

I also decided to use some wooden beads that I had from a broken necklace.
Cut two pieces of wire about 7 inches long.

Put the beads on.

Fold your wire in half, creating a loop at the top.

Insert wire through jump ring of fish hook earring.

Twist, twist, twist. The jump portion has a tiny open spot that you'll want to close with some pliers.

Slide that whole wire contraption down through the beads until your earring is about the length that you'd like it.
Add a dab of glue under the bottom bead. I used Gorilla glue, but whatever floats your boat.

Twist the wire a few times under the bottom bead, up the back, under the second bead, and then continue
twisting it all the way up until you run out of wire. I had some extra feather part that I just cut off.
Do it again so you have a matching set.

This is what I look like in my bathroom mirror. Hot, no?

Boom. Now I'm rocking it.

Can I get a green eyed baby?

I mean, I've done the charts. blue + green = such and such nonsense. But, I'm sort of the great white hope when it comes to passing on this green eyed thing and I'd like to see whether it happened or not.

The other day I was looking at pictures with my mom (only school photos because heaven forbid that my photographer dad should snap any pictures of us...geesh) and in 4K my eyes were blue! But sometime after that they went green. So there's hope yet.

I've been watching the green eye progression on my middle child (aka Thing 2) and his eyes are definitely changing. He has a hazy color around the pupil and I think we're well on our way to green. He tells me it's happening because he kisses me so much. It's true. We do kiss an awful lot. Not like necking or anything, but he's pretty smoochable.

Thing 1 is definitely staying blue. No changes there.

But the other day my girlfriend said, "I think the baby's eyes are changing." And my heart pretty much broke. A green-eyed girl??? Is it possible? I guess only time will tell...

Halloween Lanterns

I've been super busy in poppyland: sewing costumes, back to school, not going insane while my husband is gone for days at a time, and starting up a new business. But we've also been doing some crafting.

It's my favorite time of year...holiday time! Seriously from October 1st until January 1st I am all a tizzy with crafting and the joy of the season." But wait!" you say, "It's not even October 1st yet." That's right. This year the kids caught the first whiff of Fall and decided it was time to decorate for Halloween. Despite my protests that I didn't want to decorate and am far too lazy to carry the Halloween bin from the basement, the house got decorated in a hurry. Somehow they lured their father up from the deep recesses of his woodshop and conned him into carrying the bin up for them. I bet they told him there was candy or something.

So, two days have passed and several decorations have already been broken and/or commandeered to the boys' room. The boys have been begging for more decorations, but the Summer of Cheap has transitioned nicely into the Fall of Cheap (and I'm sure the Winter of Discontent...zing!); we're making our own decorations. Squee!

Super easy and super cheap...pumpkin lanterns made with jars, orange tissue paper, white glue, and ribbon.

Varying sizes of jars...baby food, spaghetti sauce...whatevs. Here we've accessorized with a
shrunken head in a jar and an antique book of Grimm's fairy tales.

What I did:

1. Cut up strips of orange tissue paper
2. Thinned white glue with water
3. Glued paper to clean jars
4. Affix ribbon to the top of jar with glue or tape or whatever.
5. Optional, but you could put black construction paper letters on the jar and make them say "Boo!" or "Halloween" or "Knock, knock, motherfucker" or something cute, but I have OCD and I just know my kids will rearrange them and make them say, "oob!" or some nonesense thus compelling me to get rid of the entire display.
6. Modge podge those babies.
7. Put some tea lights or those fake tea light things in them and enjoy!

Unbearable things happen

I haven't blogged in awhile. I can't say that it's a been a deliberate choice, but when I sit down at my computer to share the types of things that I usually want to share with you I freeze up. And I know why. A month ago, my husband's Auntie Kris died...and it was unbearable for a really long time. She was a wonderful perosn and now she doesn't get to even BE anymore. How does one come to grips with that? So every time I thought, hey I made something nice and I should share it with you...I thought of Auntie Kris and I felt like my blog post was somehow making light of the tragedy of what happened. But that is the antithesis of Kris. Some people say a funeral is closure, but to me this is closure.

I first met Kris shortly after I met my husband (aka manfriend). He brought me home to meet his family the week after we met. When we pulled into his aunt and uncle's driveway, they were all on the roof of the house pulling off shingles. I was slightly intimidated, but I like to think that I put on a brave face.

A year and a half later my husband and I were engaged and I was looking at wedding dresses. I found one that I loved, except for one small amd important detail. My future mother-in-law said, "Just ask Kris. She'll make it for you." Um....what? Ask her to make the most important piece of my wedding day (aside from my husband of course)? I had no questions in my mind about whether she was capable, but rather would she want to do it? Why would she want to do it? But, I asked her and she rejoiced at the opportunity. You might think I am misusing that verb, but then you would be misunderstanding Kris. Because at the heart of her was someone who gave.

Over the years Kris was an inspiration for me. She sewed, she knit, she cooked, she gardened...and on top of it she was a loving mother to her kids. She was able to meet one grandchild, though I'm sure she'll look down from heaven on many more.

This is the dress that Kris made for me. She also made all of my bridesmaids' dresses and my junior bride's dress.

Even now I feel like this post is too light hearted and doesn't convey the sheer amount of grief and emotion that has been poured into every word. But, grief is intimate. and unbearable. and so we go one.

Good Girl

We got Zion as a puppy from a farm about eight and a half years ago. She had the most incredible red brown coat, violet eyes, and an incredible demeanor. When my husband proposed to me just a few weeks later, he tied the engagement ring to her collar and cued her come out and lay her head in my lap.

Zion never barked, never nipped, never left the yard...She was a good hunter and a good friend.

Earlier today we had to put Zion down. She had been sick for a few months with a disease called autoimmune hemolytic anemia. She was treated with a several rounds of heavy steroids and antibiotics, but in the end, her body couldn't take it and she was suffering. She will be missed.

Camping; It's like a vacation, but with manual labor

The manfriend and I took the kids camping this past weekend. That's right. All 3 kids in a tent. And I'm totally counting it as a vacation, which is pretty sad when you compare an actual, stay in a hotel-type vacation with camping. But guess, what? Camping is cheap. Let's take a look, shall we?

Hotel Vacation                                                   

• Sleep in a bed on sheets with a nice thread count that is magically remade by someone else every morning.
• Enjoy luxurious room service menus or free continental breakfast made by someone else.
• Poop in the privacy of your hotel room bathroom which is cleaned and magically restocked by someone else.
• Enjoy sandy beaches.

Camping Vacation

• Sleep on the ground in a body bag that your 5-year-old magically creeps into every night.
• Bring everything that everyone might possibly want to eat for 3 days and make it on a picnic table.
• Poop with 500 strangers in a semi-private bathroom that sometimes has toilet paper.
• Enjoy sand everywhere...on the beach, in your tent, in the baby's diaper, in the bag of shredded cheese.

I'm only (half) kidding. We went with about 10 other families who all had similar aged children. It was a blast, and the kids had a great time. Here is some photographic evidence:

Campfires

He thought being on a boat was akin to visiting the dentist.

We didn't catch any fish, but Thing 1 caught a nasty sunburn. That's what you get when you're a pasty white redhead.
Don't worry though, the burn has faded back to his natural alabaster skin tone.

The second that we walked on the campground the baby got diarrhea.
Here, she's going au natural to try to beat her diaper rash.

Locked up in baby jail.

Of course it rained, not just a shower but a torrential downpour that filled
fire pits. Luckily my manfriend dug a moat around our tent, so we were fine.
Do you see in the lower left corner a large bus like thing? Yeah, that's what our
neighbors were staying in.

Sunbathing

Pudgie pizzas are the best camping food. EVER.

There were some alternate titles I had for this post. I'd like to share them with you now.

• It's all fun and games until someone gets stung in the lady bits.
• Where's Chloe? (don't worry, she was found)
• Wait, the kids are doing the non-alcoholic Jell-o shots, right?
• If I were the neighbors, I'd totally hate us.