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Great Baking Soda Tips!

With three littles around the house, I like to use safer cleaners, so I tend to use vinegar and rubbing alcohol to clean as much as possible. I've also used baking soda for a few things around the house. Mostly scrubbing the oven and balancing the ph of the laundry once I use vinegar. But I found a GREAT list today of some pretty good uses for baking soda! My favorite? The giraffe. With three little kids, I definitely have my fair share of "surface wash only" stuffed animals laying around! Some have even taken up permanent hibernation in our laundry room because I couldn't get them clean. So, yay! So glad to find another way to clean them!!

http://theartsyfamily.com/2011/07/27/cleangiraff/

           

Construction Theme Birthday Party Ideas

Last year for C's 3rd birthday party, we did trucks and tools and since those are still his favorite things we're going to do the same theme this year. We didn't get to do as much as we had wanted last year so I'm hoping to get to have a little more fun with the theme this year.

I thought I'd share some of the ideas I have with you in case you would also like to do a construction themed party.

• Fun construction hats
• Little trucks for goody bags
• Reshaped truck & tool Crayons for goody bags. Here's the how (best directions I've seen so far). Here are some molds to use.
• Themed cookies or brownies cut out with these
• Dump truck cake (I'm planning on doing cupcakes since I'm not good at icing cakes.)
• Chocolate cupcakes iced with "mud" (chocolate icing with finely crushed oreos mixed in)

Angel Food First Impressions

Got our Angel Food boxes today! They look so yummy! Quality looking stuff too! My husband was definately surprised how far the money we spent for the food went. We got the Bountiful Blessings Box and a popcorn chicken special.

Each location is a little different I'm sure, but at our location we just drove up, told them our name, and they loaded the food in our car. As we drove away my husband said, "Do they offer this service for groceries?" It was definitely the quickest shopping trip ever, it was awesome!

My husband already had plans to meet a friend for breakfast this morning so me and the boys ate some waffles and breakfast links. The links were from the angel food box and yummy! C decided to just eat the waffles but O ate both of the boys links! I was surprised once I got them that the links were chicken, not sausage like I've seen before, but they tasted the same! The texture inside was slightly different, but not TOO noticeable.

I'll let you know more once we get a chance to cook some more of it! So far we're definately planning on doing this again!

           

Yummy Homemade Vegetable Soup

Did I mention this is so yummy! My husband had a taste (thinking it would be bland) and said, "woah, this is tasty soup!"

I used the recipe on the back of the Kroger 14 oz. can of vegetable broth for a guideline but I tweaked it with what I had on hand and LOVE the outcome! Here you go:

Ingredients:

• 3 bags (12 oz.) frozen "vegetable soup mix" (Kroger brand)
• 3 cans (14 oz.) vegetable broth
• 1 can (29 oz.) tomato sauce
• 1 can (14.5 oz.) crushed or diced tomatoes (if diced, run them through the food processor before adding to recipe)
• 3 tsp. dried parsley flakes
• 2 tsp. dried cilantro
• 3/8 tsp. garlic powder
• 1 tsp. dried basil
• 1 tsp. dried oregano

Directions:

• Add everything to a large pot (I used a pasta pot with the strainer removed)
• Turn the soup on high to boil
• Once boiling, reduce to medium heat and cover. Stir occasionally.
• Remove from heat once the vegetables are done (and your preferred softness).
• Remove 1 - 1 1/2 cups of vegetables from the soup along with 1/4 cup liquid and put into the food processor. Pulse until veggies are somewhat pureed. Add back to pot of soup and mix thoroughly.

This makes at LEAST 10 cups. We ate a few portions ourselves before I divided it out to freeze and still ended up with just under 8 cups to freeze. So the amount could even be closer to 12 cups! I'll add the exact amount next time I make it. Until then, just know it's a lot! This is a great soup to make ahead to freeze for nights that you don't have time to cook or to bring to someone who is needing friends to bring food to them.

Price:

This is a fairly cheap soup as well. The bags of vegetables are $0.88 a piece at Kroger. I forget how much the broth is but I don't think it's more then $2.00/can. In fact I'm thinking it's closer to $1.50/can. The tomato sauce is definitely under $2.00. And the diced tomatoes always seem to be hanging around my house even though I have nothing to use them for! Well, until now!!! Everything else is just seasonings we always have on hand.

Enjoy!