Purple Mountain Girl

Ikea has these great one inch thick photo frames for $1.99 so I bought 4 for my kids' photos.








However, I didn't look very closely at them during my shopping euphoria and therefore, didn't see that hanging these was not going to be a simple task.









I looked through my toolbox and found some size 8d 2-1/2" nails and #8-10x1 plastic anchors.  I popped a hole in the drywall by hammering an #8 screw in.  I hammered in the anchor then hammered in the nail.  I had to hammer the nail in to pop it through the anchor.







I found that if you don't hammer the nail all the way in as far as you need it, there's room for your hand behind the frame as you try to fit the nail head into the bracket.  After you make that connection, gently push the frame against the wall.








Very easy, it only took me 10 minutes to hang four frames!  If you try this, let me know how it works for you OR if you have another idea, please share~Happy Hanging! 

Every Friday night is breakfast night at our house.  My family of three guys really look forward to it now that it's an established routine.  I would enjoy it too, if I didn't have to become a short-order cook every time we have anything with eggs.  We're part of an egg co-op and get a LOT of eggs so most Breakfast Nights, we have eggs.  Ergo, most Friday nights, I am a short-order cook.

One week, my kids asked for omelettes and I said yes, as I inwardly groaned.  As I was preparing to stand over a hot pan for the next 30 minutes, I had an idea: why not bake them in the oven.  Of course, there are expectations for the appearance of omelettes so dragging out my trusty parchment paper, I 'crafted' a method to make semi-circles just as if I was working at a diner.

After you've made up your 'omelette batter' with eggs and milk, grab a large round pan.  The one I use is a stoneware baker and has a diameter of about 12 inches.  Tear off a piece of parchment paper about three or four inches longer that the pan.  Fold it in half, then settle it in the baking dish, making sure that the edges go up the side of the pan. 



You should have a high ridge through the middle of your pan.  This acts as a separator for your eggs, also creating a lovely semi-circle shaped omelette.



I actually pour the egg mixture into each side, then add each person's preferred ingredients, gently mixing them.  Figure out what works best for you but I figure the less dishes to clean, the better!

You shouldn't need any oil or butter; the omelette comes right off the paper.  Bake these at 350° for about 12-15 minutes, they don't take long at all.  I also tried doing this with aluminum foil and it just doesn't work.  The omelettes stick and fall to pieces when you try to get them out.  I don't like to cook with aluminum foil anyway.



I bake all four omelettes at once, with everyone's order and I don't have to slave over a large frying pan.  I guess there's also something to be said about the lower calories and all, but that just means I can add more cheese to mine.

We've started making smoothies in our house.  Well, my husband started making them. And when my husband makes food he doesn't worry about superfluous things like flavor or texture.  It's all about nutritional value and using up whatever's in the fridge.  Since this was my kids first experience with smoothies, they weren't very excited.  Neither was I...

Until I started buying frozen fruit at Costco!  I've been trying to get rid of processed food in our house and had heard that frozen was better than canned.  I made a frozen pineapple smoothie and WOW! did it taste good!  So now, my boys and I are not afraid of smoothies anymore.  I actually made one for breakfast today and, since the (super-picky) 12-year-old approved,  I thought that you might also.

Here it is:

Pineapple Cherry Smoothie

About 15 1" pieces of frozen pineapple
About 15 frozen cherries
1 smallish banana
1/2 cup almond milk
1-2 tablespoons flax meal

Throw it all in a blender and smoothie it up.

CAVEAT: Don't drink this too fast.  Brainfreeze!

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You're gonna laugh when you find out what it is, you really are...

Today, I did not eat breakfast.  When my husband came home around noon, he grabbed a bag of tortilla chips and salsa.  I wanted some, but I hadn't eaten breakfast yet.  If you're one of those lucky people blessed/cursed with OCD, you'll understand.  I needed to have breakfast food before I could eat snack food.  So, I thought I would scramble some eggs real fast, then have some chips and salsa.

Microwave Nachos are one of my favorite snacks.  My kids love them too.  Hey, they're better than a jelly doughnut, right?  My brain put this together with breakfast and ~voila~  Scrambled Egg Nachos!

My 12 year-old son walked in while I was making them (which took all of 6 minutes) and called them The Invention of the Century.

I scrambled two eggs, threw some chips on a plate, grated the cheese, microwaved it all for a minute and had tasty nachos that lasted all of 20 seconds between myself and the 12-year-old.

So today, oddly enough, my 16-year-old son dragged himself out of digital-land long enough to create these extremely tasty s'mores bars.  We had a bonfire one night and had tons of stuff left over so he was playing around with it, making a dip, etc.  The bars were the end result of his experimentation and I'm writing a blog post about them to keep myself from sneaking back into the kitchen to have another one.  I did sneak a small bite as I took the picture, but don't tell anyone...


S'mores Bars
6 regular-sized Hershey's Milk Chocolate Bars
(I'm assuming you know exactly what size I'm referring to)
8 large marshmallows
1/2 cup of milk
12-14 graham carckers, broken in to 1/2" pieces.

Using a double boiler, melt the chocolate bars and marshmallows, stirring continuously (very important.)  These kind of things take special attention otherwise you end up with a dried up fresco painting.  After everything is nice and gooey, add the milk and let it all mix together.  I kind of zipped in and out of the kitchen during this part and he was being very attentive!  I also helped him break the graham crackers up into pieces.  I try not to hover, but that was just too much for my OCD to handle.  I'll let you manage yours on your own...BUT be sure not to get them too big, and try not to squeeze them so that all you have is fine dust instead of small cracker bits and you really do have to break them by hand, no putting them in a zip-loc and smashing them.  Ok, now I'll let you manage it on your own...

Spread butter over the bottom and sides of a pan, not too big of a pan because this doesn't make a huge amount. 

I left the house at this point to deliver the other child to an activity.  I came home and opened the fridge and there they were...waiting.  They taste exactly like s'mores minus the charred marshmallow (which I love btw.)  So I would say this recipe would make about 8-10 medium sized bars.  I really don't know because, during this past hour, we've all been sneaking into the fridge and cutting off bite-sized pieces and acting like we were just looking for something...

WOW! Is this good!  Just made it tonight and plan on making for every overnight guest we have for the next 10 years...

Click the photo to visit the magazine that delivered this goodness to us!  However, just in case, I've included the recipe below.

It's super easy, but I would encourage you to read the entire recipe before you start.  I didn't do everything exactly right and though it turned out awesome, a read-through would have saved me some time.  ENJOY!




SAUSAGE & EGG BREAKFAST PIZZA

Ingredients:

• 2 packages (8 ounces each) refrigerated crescent rolls
• 1 pound bulk pork sausage
• ⅓ cup chopped onion
• 1 small green pepper, chopped
• 1 envelope country gravy mix
• 6 eggs
• 2 tablespoons milk
• ½ teaspoon salt
• ¼ teaspoon pepper
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1¼ cups sliced fresh mushrooms
• 2 cups (8 ounces) shredded cheddar cheese
• 1 cup (4 ounces) shredded pepper jack cheese

Directions:

1. Separate crescent dough into 16 triangles and place on a greased 14-inch round pizza pan with points toward the center. Press onto the bottom and up the sides of pan to form a crust; seal seams. Bake at 375 degrees for 11–13 minutes or until golden brown.
2. Meanwhile, in a large skillet, cook the sausage, onion and green pepper over medium heat until sausage is no longer pink; drain. Prepare gravy according to package directions. Stir into sausage mixture; set aside.
3. In a small bowl, whisk the eggs, milk, salt and pepper. In a large skillet, heat butter over medium heat. Add egg mixture; cook and stir until almost set. Spread gravy mixture over crust. Top with eggs, mushrooms and cheeses. Bake 5–10 minutes longer or until eggs are set and cheese is melted. Cut into wedges.