January 28, 2012

Making Cooks Out of My Kids!

A few weeks ago, the kids decided they wanted to make the supper, from appetizer to dessert on Thursday nights. This week, my oldest tackled the main course, Emma the dessert and my youngest the appetizer. Liam entertained us with his bubble making abilities. There was a task for everyone!


I didn't get a picture of Jake's creation but he, very proudly, made us toast with peanut butter & jelly.

Q picked out his own recipe, Shepherd's Pie, did his research, got his ingredients together and made us this....



Here's What You'll Need
1 lb. (450 g) lean ground beef
2 cups hot mashed potatoes
60 g (about 1/4 of 250-g pkg.) Cream Cheese, cubed
1 cup Mozza/Cheddar Shredded Cheese, divided
2 cloves garlic, minced
4 cups frozen mixed vegetables, thawed
1 cup beef gravy

Here's What You'll Do
1. Brown the ground beef
2. Mix the mashed potatoes, cream cheese, 1/2 c shredded cheese, garlic until well blended
3. Combine meat, vegetables, & gravy and put into a 9" sq baking dish
4. Cover with potato mixture & remaining shredded cheese
5. Bake at 375F for 20 mins or until heated through

As soon as Q's Shepherd's Pie was in the oven, Emma got to work on her dessert, Easy Lemon Cake.


What You'll Need
1 pkg. (2-layer size) lemon cake mix
2 pkg. (4-serving size each) Lemon Instant Pudding
1-1/2 cups cold milk
3 cups thawed Whipped Topping

What You'll Need To Do
1. Prepare cake batter and bake as directed on package for 2 (8- or 9-inch) round cake layers. Cool in pans 10 min. Remove to wire racks; cool completely.
2. Beat pudding mixes and milk with whisk 2 min. Stack cakes on plate, spreading each with half the pudding mixture.
3. Frost with Cool Whip.

Voila!


They can't wait try something new next week! Thursdays are going to be a fun family night! I believe it's part of my job as a mom to teach them basic life skills and along the way their confidence grows. I'm making cooks out of my kids. I have some very responsible, very cool kids! You wanna see how cool? Watch Liam's video, "The Bubble Master" and be prepared to be amazed! lol :)

January 25, 2012

Searching for #EqualCanada on Rollback at Walmart | #cbais

I sent my hubby out on the hunt for Equal sweetener as part of a shoppertunity for Collective Bias, a social shopper marketing company.

His mission.... Find Equal at Walmart on Rollback.


It wasn't too hard to get him to go into Walmart, he does the majority of our grocery shopping and a few times a week he's in Walmart because of their prices, selection and hours that they're open. Not to mention, it's a few doors down from the fitness club he goes to... so needless to say, he was the perfect person to do this assignment.

There are a few reasons he's the one who does most of the grocery shopping in our family, the biggest one being he is a flyer flipper, coupon clipping, bargain hunting machine. On Thursdays the flyers get delivered, he scours them to see what is on sale where and we plan our dinner time meals around that. The second biggest reason... we are down to sharing a vehicle these days and our time with the car isn't exactly "equal", no pun intended!

When I do the shopping... I get distracted by every red sale sign and suddenly I.MUST.HAVE.IT. squirrel moments occur! :) I should probably do like what my mom did, make a list and keep to it!

Although my assignment was to go specifically to Walmart and find Equal on rollback, this mission feels incomplete. The only container they had was this one...


So with Equal in hand...


he headed out of the store.


From what I'm reading online, on other blogs, like My Wee View, Equal does have a large yellow canister that "should be" on rollback at Walmart for $7.97 {as compared to $9.97}. I couldn't find Equal on their website or in their electronic flyers. If you see it on Rollback will you please tell me? Thank you! :)

You can connect with Equal Canada on Facebook and Twitter.

Disclaimer: This has been brought to you by Collective Bias #CBias - All experiences are my own, well... my hubby's anyway!

January 24, 2012

Wordless Wednesday ~ What's in your Purse?


The problem with having a rather large bag for a purse... is the stuff it tends to collect. Yes, those golden crumbs are Corn Flakes!

It's like an episode from I Spy! What can you find?!

It's Wordless Wednesday time, link your WW post up and hop around to see what else is going on around the world!