At Home My Way

I used to work in a daycare center when I was in about eighth grade.   I really enjoyed it!  I enjoyed spending time with the kids and also enjoyed getting a little bit of spending money.  It was not my first job since I had done lots of babysitting throughout the years, but it was my first job where I got an actual, regular paycheck!  Woo hoo! I remember the large batch meals that the cook made for the kids as always being VERY delicious (unlike some of the processed, microwaved food that is put out for kids these days ugh)!  So sad it's come to this....   Anyway, for breakfast, we often had a recipe she called "Six-Week Bran Muffins".  Basically it was a muffin batter made from bran cereal and kept in the fridge for up to six weeks (although I've never kept it that long).  You scoop the cold batter into prepared/sprayed or paper lined muffin tins and bake.  The muffins are lightly sweet, dense, and very moist.  I love them! I...

I had some leftover ham from our Easter dinner in my fridge.  It made some killer ham salad!  Talk about looking forward to lunch! I haven't made a whole lot of ham salad.  My husband's aunt used to make her version of "ham" salad with bologna, and it is equally as wonderful, but since I did have some ham that was languishing in the refrigerator, I decided to give it a go.  It was easy, used only three ingredients and made just wonderful sandwiches!   Ham is such a great thing to have around the house.  We bake a big, bone-in, ham that we get in the meat department of our local grocery store.  We ask that it be "sliced and tied" so that after we bake it, the ham is pretty much ready to serve.  The butcher slices it in thick slices, leaving it in the shape of the ham, and ties it with twine.  We bake it with the twine on.  Ham is one of our favorite family dinners when the entire crew is home, cousins, aunts, the whole bunch! A...

Early this afternoon I saw a Facebook post from the sister of one of my daughter's grade school friends.  She is a young mom who is working very hard to make a nice home for her husband and her children.  This young lady posted that she was making freezer meals for the month of May and today alone she prepared 14 freezer meals, made chicken salad for the week's lunches, boiled eggs to top green salads, and made homemade pizza for their Sunday lunch.   I was feeling "mama proud" for this young lady!  If a young working mom of two very young children can get a game plan together, surely someone as experienced (read "old") as I am, can do it, right! I decided to get off my bum and get something done today to lay the groundwork for my own busy nights of getting home late, tired and hungry! I thought posting a Sunday Game Plan cooking day might be a good idea.  We all need a little inspiration sometimes. Here's a few th...

My Aunt Donna has made an Easter bunny cake for Easter dinner for as long as I can remember.   Since I miss my Florida family so very much, I decided to make a bunny cake myself so that I could feel a little closer to home!   You can make an Easter bunny cake with a cake mix and canned frosting or your own favorite cake/frosting recipe.  I decided that since my family prefers chocolate cake and chocolate frosting, to make a completely all chocolate bunny cake.  Pretty cute, huh?   I used my always good, stand-by Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake recipe found HERE .  I used my homemade Chocolate frosting recipe also, recipe found HERE .  (I added a little more powdered sugar to my frosting to make it a tad thicker - like 1/2 cup more powdered sugar than the recipe calls for) for making my cake. Here's how I made our family's favorite Easter Bunny Cake AT HOME MY WAY: Easter Bunny Cake Cake mix for a two layer cake, your favorite flavor a...

My mom used to make these cookies for my brother and I when we were growing up.  They continue to be our favorite cookie!  Typically she made them during the Christmas holidays but we love them any time.  They are great for summer treats because you don't have to use the oven.  They aren't super healthy, but with ingredients like oatmeal and peanut butter, I have determined (ha!) that they aren't such a bad choice.  Certainly they are a better choice than boxed cookies, right? I have made another recipe for these cookies.  Recipes for this cookie are all over the place.  The last recipe I made was a flop!  They didn't set up.  That was so disappointing!  I decided that, "Mama knows best" and dug out my mom's recipe for these cookies.  I followed her instructions to a T and they worked like a charm.  Definitely do it exactly like it says.  Who wants a flop recipe?  Not me! The only thing that I chang...

I really look forward to St. Patrick's Day because of one reason, pretty much.  I LOVE cabbage!  I grew up eating lots of cabbage.  It was a staple at our house.  My husband, however, does not like cabbage.  He can't even stand to smell it cooking!  Grrr... But he overlooks this aversion on St. Patrick's Day, being that he loves me so much. LOL. This St. Patrick's Day I was all set to go to my parents' house for dinner.  My mom was making corned beef and cabbage.  I was so looking forward to it!  Well... wouldn't you know that I would get sick on St. Patrick's Day?  I could have went ahead and gone to my parents' for dinner but, I didn't want them to catch my cold.  It was miserable being so sick! My sweet husband drove me around our small town trying to find a restaurant serving corned beef and cabbage, but we had no luck!  We ended up at our local A&W restaurant, ... which was good, ... but it wasn't corned...

I wanted to share a couple of the food/book combinations that we used at my niece's baby shower.  I bought the baby a new bookshelf and we used books as the theme.  We all had a great time and the new mom welcomed a great assortment of children's books to add to her bookshelf.  My niece is super smart and I credit some of that to the fact that her mom started reading to her as an tiny infant.  I remember Jill perched in her mom's cross-legged lap, staring intently at the pages of the books my sister-in-law read to her.  I think before she could even hold her own bottle, she tried turning the pages of the books.  My sister-in-law set a great example for me.  My girls were born after Jill and I knew immediately I wanted to start off reading lots of books.  My niece, herself, suggested that instead of cards at the shower, we all give her children's books (since they are about the same price these days!) but we also decided to decorate ...