Author Archives: katherine

About katherine

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More like Mary or Martha?

I don’t talk a lot, or even at all, about my faith, religion, beliefs, etc. on the blog. I don’t know why, but I’ve just never been one to “evangelize”. It’s been on my heart for a while I don’t really feel like my place is in a church right now, I don’t know why, I can’t explain it, it’s just how I feel. It’s really foreign for me to even write that considering I grew up in the church and how involved I was just a few short years ago. But, I’ve still had it on my heart to connect, make some time for worship and reflection.

Anyway, that being said, I was given the opportunity to take part in a focus group for Sarah Mae author of the e-book “31 Days to Clean, Having a Martha House the Mary Way.” It’s a 31 day book that has day-by-day reflections, Mary and Martha challenges, motivating relevant bible verses and a daily cleaning list. It’s all based on the bible story of when Jesus came to Martha & Mary’s house. Sarah Mae has new Martha challenges that aren’t a part of the current e-book so she wanted to get some readers together to test them out and give her feedback on them.

So, my plan is to follow the 31 day plan and blog about it here and there along the way. I’ll have a new tab up there with the rest of them if you want to keep tabs on my journey. It starts June 6.

The more I skim through the e-book, the more I am really excited to get started on this!

Sound like something you’re interested in? Sarah Mae has told me I can share the download code with 3 of my family or friends. Just let me know if you’d like to go on this journey with me!

Recipe: Really awesome dip that has no official name

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If you’re in the market for a new BBQ/pot-luck/football game friendly crowd-pleasing appetizer you have come to the right place! My mother in law is pretty much famous for this Mexican Dip and is pretty much shunned if she doesn’t bring two pans of it to the annual 4^th of July Bash we attend every year. It’s that good. She shared the recipe with me a few years ago, and ever since Andy and I have been taking it to pretty much any BBQ we attend!

Now, before I go sharing this recipe, you have to promise me one thing…just because you have this little piece of awesome, you still have to invite us over for BBQ’s. Deal? Seriously…not joking. Andy wanted me to make sure and point this out. Ok?

Ok, now that we’ve got that out of the way…

Officially, we have no idea what the name of it is.

Unofficially, we call it “Mom’s Mexican Dip”.

Seriously…try it. You will love it. And you will thank me.

Ingredients:

1- 28 oz Can Refried Beans (or 2 regular size cans. Whatev.)

1 lb Ground Beef

1 Pack Taco Seasoning

1- 7 oz Green Taco Sauce (or ½ the 14 oz jar if you’re like us)

16 oz Sour Cream

Cheese, shredded

Olives, sliced

Brown ground beef, and prepare as instructed on taco seasoning packet. While the meat is cooking, spread beans in the bottom of a 9×13 pan. In a medium bowl, mix together sour cream and taco sauce. Once meat is ready, spread evenly over the top of the beans. After that, spread the sour cream mix. Then top GENEROUSLY with cheese. Seriously…error on the side of A LOT. Sprinkle with sliced olives. Cover with aluminum foil (remember to spray the foil w/ non-stick spray!). Bake at 350 for 20 minutes.

Serve with tortilla chips and enjoy. BOOM.

Ok it’s your turn…what’s your favorite go-to dish for BBQs?

The one that solidified the Type-A CRAZY {Keeping a Working Mama Sane}

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I don’t claim to be the master of anything. I’m ok at crafting and scrapbooking. Gardening? Ehh…questionable. I handle my own in the kitchen. But there’s one thing that I like to think I do pretty well. Ummm…most of the time anyway.

As a working mama/ double career family, I think we’ve got our routine down pretty well. We get home and I made dinner. This happens nearly every night. If I’m not the one making dinner, it’s Andy. We rarely eat out. Maybe…m a y b e once a month.

I’ve had some discussions with some other working mamas wondering how I come up with dinner ideas. How do I find time to make dinner every.single.night. So I thought I’d share some of my tips, tricks and go-to recipes.

First off I’m not going to lie…we eat tacos once a week and sometimes? we just eat hotdogs. There I said it.

Now that I’ve got that out of the way…

By the end of the month my calendar
looks like this…and yes it’s color coded.
Type-A…remember?

Every Saturday morning while Rylee is eating breakfast, I sit down with the weekly food ads to my left, the calendar to my right and start my weekly meal planning. I figure out what we we’re going to eat each night the rest of the weekend through to Friday. Once I’ve got that figured out, I make a grocery list accordingly. Having it actually written up on the calendar reminds me what I need to take out of the freezer so it’s actually defrosted and ready to cook…amazing concept, I know.
I go grocery shopping once a week. Occasionally, if we’re having spaghetti on a Wednesday, I’ll have Andy swing in to grab some garlic bread, but that’s about it.
There are certain things we always have on hand. Like a jar or two of spaghetti sauce. Or a box of pasta. Or canned green beans. Or tortillas, cheese and black beans. We eat tacos a lot. And in a pinch? Cooking up frozen ground beef always seems to be the easiest thing to do.
I buy things when they’re on sale and I buy a lot of it. I’m not any kind of super-couponer or anything, but if boneless, skinless chicken breast is on sale for anything less that $2 per lb, I buy at least 10 lbs of it, then vacuum seal it in 2 breast packs. I do the same thing with pork chops. And bacon. And we buy beef a 1/2 cow at a time so I always have a freezer full of meat. (that’s what she said)
I try to plan on leftovers and what I’m going to do with them. For example: I know that Andy and I can never finish a whole roasted chicken. Since they normally take way too long to make on a week night, I will make it on a Sunday, then after our meal, debone the rest of it and then I’ll use the leftover chicken to make homemade fettucini Alfredo on Monday!
Kraft Foods has some really great, easy recipes. Like…

Caribbean Jerk Chicken It’s also great for broiling or baking. I serve it with jasmine rice and salad.

Foil Pack Chicken Fajita Dinner

Homemade Chicken Nuggets

Cheeseburger Joes I use real cheese as opposed to the Kraft singles stuff.

You can even type in ingredients you have on hand and it will give you suggestions. However, while browsing, be prepared for a lot of dressed up Kraft mac-n-cheese. A lot. Oh and also casseroles. Ew.

Ok, so for those of you dyeing to know what our magical meal plan is, I went ahead to put it all into iCal for you. You can click on the image to make it larger. Before you do that though, I think it’s only fair I am able to note a couple of things first: 1. We do NOT normally eat tacos that often in a month…I swear. 2. We actually had more family dinners away from home this month than normal. My sis was in town from Chicago for Mother’s Day! 3. It’s really not that exciting. But it meets my requirements: mostly healthy. affordable. fast.

What kind of tips and tricks do you use? What’s your favorite go-to weeknight recipe? I’d love to hear!

And you people wonder why we call her monster…

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You guys? There’s a reason we’ve been calling Rylee “Monster” since she was just a wee baby.

When she was just about a year old, I came home from work one day to find Andy spent all day teaching Rylee the now infamous “Who’s the Monster!?” party trick.

We got mixed reactions with that one…most everyone would respond with “Oh, she’s not a monster!”

Hate to break it to you people…she is.

And I really actually mean that in the best way possible. It’s what makes Rylee Rylee. She’s got spunk and panache. And she’s full of piss and vinegar. I love it.

But seriously, you cannot watch this video and still wonder why we call her Monster.