Meatless Monday: Homemade Wheat Thins

 Obviously everyday is meatless for us but I thought that once I week I would share a recipe that we've made. Now that I'm back working I tend to not want to cook anything once I get home. So I am hoping that this will help me to stay motivated so we eat something besides tuna fish and burritos :) I'm trying to cook something new at least once a week, I'll share what I make with you, good or bad! Maybe you'll be inspired to go meatless on Monday's as well ;)


I LOVE Wheat Thins. They are my favorite cracker, I like them with cheese, tuna fish, hummus, everything! The recipe for the homemade version seemed easy enough, and I had all the ingredients so I thought that I'd give it a go and see how they turned out. I was way surprised at how good they are. They taste just as good, if not better than the processed kind. Seriously, if you're a fan you should give these a try!

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 cups 100% whole wheat flour
• 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt, plus extra for sprinkling on
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• 4 tablespoons butter
• 1/4 cup + 2 tbsp water (or a tiny bit more if dough is too dry)
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla

 

Directions: 

1. Preheat oven to 400 F.  Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or a non-stick mat.

2. In a large bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, paprika, salt).

3. With a pastry blender (or two forks if you don't have one!), cut in the butter into the flour mixture until crumbly. Now mix together the water and vanilla and then pour into the flour and butter mixture. Stir this mixture until it comes together. I got in there with my hands and really squeezed the dough to help it come together. If it appears dry add a touch of water, but you don’t want it sticky.

4. Split the dough in half. On a floured surface or on a non-stick mat, roll out one half of the dough very thin (1/16th inch). Using a pizza cutter, cut into whatever shape you desire. Using a spatula, place the crackers on the prepared baking sheet. Repeat as necessary. Sprinkle with more salt and sesame seeds if desired.

5. Bake for 8-10 minutes, watching closely. Half way through baking rotate the pan to ensure even baking. My crackers took 8 minutes. Be careful because they burn quickly. Cool completely. Makes about 64 crackers for this full recipe. Store in an air-tight container.

Do you have a favorite homemade version of something that's just as good as the original?

"Relaxing"

After I got home from work Friday afternoon my plan was as follows: Eat something fast and easy then relax on the back patio and work on my tan :) It was going to be very unproductive, very lazy, and very awesome. Chad however, decided that he wanted to go mountain biking and that I was going to go too. Our bikes are finally up and running after the bent bike rim and multiple other problems. We hadn't really been out on our bikes since I last hurled myself over my handlebars and bruised my ribs.

We went over to the same trail that tried to kill me last time, Bear Claw Poppy. The downhills are a little crazy and out of my league in the beginning, but after I rode down/walked down them I was good to go. It was perfect weather and a nice long ride.

We got to the turn around point and Rukia decided that she was done. Seriously DONE. In the beginning she runs around all crazy and excited. She sits and cries if we stop. Well, this time she was laying down and crying because she didn't want to run anymore. Poor pup. It was really pathetic. At one point we let her lay down and rest and squirted a bunch of water all over her out of our camel-backs.

It was only when we got home when we realized that we had taken her out too far and she had cut up her front pad on her paw pretty good. She was too tired to move. She drank a bunch of water and laid down. She then proceeded to throw up and lay in her puke like a drunk college girl. Poor thing. Chad cleaned her up and then we doctored her up with a nice little bandage. She was too tired to even try to get it off. She's soooo sore now, hobbling around all over the place. Just a mess. I brought her food bowl over to her so she could eat where she was laying down. She was too tired to eat though and instead has just guarded it against the cats all day long. At one point Chad was just talking about her food and picked up Penny saying, "lets go eat Rukia's food". Rukia jumped up and "ran" over to her food and immediately started eating it. I don't know how she knew what was happening but she did, too funny.

Crazy Satan Eyes

Sunny and her were adorable this morning. Rukia was laying down licking her foot and Sunny decided to help out. He circled around her and cuddled in and was helping her clean off her paw. Awwww. My animals are super cute and awesome. At least I felt that way until Rukia decided she was too tired to wait to go outside and took a giant poop on the carpet. How's that for cute?

Awkward and Awesome Thursday!

Let's start out with something both awkward and awesome! We were watching the new Newlywed Show, or whatever it's called, while eating dinner one night. One of the questions was basically, "not being able to do ______ makes my wife angry/crazy/psycho". Every single one of the husbands said not being able to clean. At one point or another during the episode every single wife made some comment about their husbands leaving trails of clothes and debris behind them as they come home from work or needing cleaning robots. Chad and I tend to play along and answer the questions as well, and our answers were completely opposite than everyone on the show. I am the one constantly leaving a trail of socks and shoes, sweatshirts and scrubs, as I come home. I also have no problem being messy. Chad was the one who right before we ate cleaned the kitchen, did the dishes and put in a load of laundry. LOL. Super Awesome that Chad helps to clean/does all the cleaning and picking up :) Super awkward that I am a messy man.

Awkward:

• Some teenage girl taking my dressing room at TJMaxx. I was modeling a skirt for Chad and when I came back I couldn't find my room. After knocking on a few dressing rooms some girl told me to hang on a second and a few minutes later opened the door wide enough to hand me my purse. Um, hello? There are like 10 other dressing rooms. And I need my pants back. I of course assumed she was trying to steal all of the no money in my wallet and frantically went through my purse to make sure she hadn't stolen everything. She hadn't. And yes, I am still bugged by this.
• Running out of deoderant. Thinking it would be better to chance it rather than using Chad's and smelling like a man. Realizing that smelling like a great smelling guy is much preferred to smelling like a sweaty, sweaty girl. Lesson learned.
• Speaking of being a sweaty mess. It's hot here. And those who know me know that I get hot fairly (VERY) easily. I am SO hot at work! So good or no good on making cutoff scrubs and showing up in them and flip flops for work when it's 90+ degrees outside?
• Just in case you missed this - there's NOTHING awkward to report about church this week! Mostly because we didn't have church this week! Chad is at Mutual right now though so this could change in a matter of minutes :)

Awesome:

• While working out to Chopped on Sunday I look over and Chad is eating angel food cake and lifting weights at the same time.
• Our AC in our car is "fixed" for the time being
• We are successfully working out EVERY day! We take off one day a week as a rest day/date night and that's it! We're very proud of ourselves!
• Hawaii in 2 weeks! Swimsuits and Coverups have been bought!
• While in Las Vegas on Friday shopping for said swimsuits and coverups we got hungry, and like last time we were too cheap to stop and eat anywhere. So rather than stop at a restaurant we stopped at Walgreens on the strip and got swiss rolls, some other krispy carmel hostess things, granola bars, white cheddar popcorn, goldfish crackers and gummy bears. (I said we are trying to be better with the junk food!) So we didn't look like we were binge eating on junk we dumped out all the packages that we could into our shopping bag. There is nothing better than walking around with a shopping bag full of purchases and junk food to fuel you!
• Our radishes are here and delicious! We grew food! Success!!!

Tasty?

We get on food kicks. Chad especially, usually with junk food :) It started with Swiss Rolls, then Oreos, Nutty Buddies, and Sour Patch Kids (still trying to break this one). We've done pretty well at cutting out most of the junk in our diet, especially the processed junk. When we want something sweet or salty we try to at least make it ourselves now, and only on our declared "Dessert Sunday". We are recently in a love affair with Strawberry Shortcake with home made Angel Food Cake. Pretty "healthy" as far as dessert is concerned. We've also got a whole bag of popcorn kernels to make our own stove top popcorn that is soooo much tastier than the microwaved stuff!

Now that dessert has been cut down to once a week our kicks center around macaroni and cheese, pizza and burritos. As you know pizza had to go as well. We still reserve the right to have pizza once a week as a treat when we (I) don't feel like cooking anything. Our most recent food addiction? Tuna fish sandwiches. Super easy, cheap, and kinda tasty.... Chad is much more into this one than me.

At Costco this weekend we thought it would be best to just buy our tuna fish in bulk and be done with it. They had a few kinds and after comparing prices we went with this:


The biggest and lets be honest, grossest can of tuna fish ever. Chad's got to have hard boiled eggs and dill pickles in his tuna sandwiches so of course we had to buy the biggest jar of the biggest pickles ever to go along with our disgustingly huge can of tuna fish. Here they are again with Chad's hand as a reference :)


As soon as we got home we mixed up the whole can with 6 eggs and 6 pickles. It was awesome and nasty all at the same time. You better believe that the cats were freaking out! The smell of tuna was very strong. Of course we shared with them!


We mixed it all up and it's stored in our fridge, making lunches and a couple of dinners very easy to put together! Because making tuna fish sandwiches is soooo difficult to begin with right?

It's Always Sunny....

Today was super productive and relaxing and wonderful. First, it was actually Stake Conference this weekend! So today was our free Sunday! I worked out in our garden for a hot second, pulled some weeds, watered and replanted some things that weren't wanting to grow. I was really only out there a second though because it is HOT! 99 degrees today my friends. We stayed inside today though and kept our windows open and it was really nice. Step outside though and be prepared to melt. Get into our car (our A/C isn't working) and it's like you've stepped inside Hell itself. OMG it is H-O-T in our car. Chad's taking it to the mechanic on Wednesday and we're hoping that it won't be outrageous to get it fixed. BJ has already warned us that it might, keep your fingers crossed.


Second, it was my cooking/baking/preping day for the week! I was on a role. Not only did I get a bunch of things cooked, but I did ALL dishes as well! Boom! Take that dishes! While this may not be something to brag about for normal, responsible people, it is for me!

Enchilada Sauce

Bran Muffins

Greek Salad with Cous Cous

Black Beans

YAY!!!

Third, hello Dessert Sunday! Chad and I made our beautiful Angel Food Cake. Drool.... We added some orange zest into the cake itself and Chad rocked out the homemade whipped cream as usual. Our big plan for the night? It involves watching The Killing, Mad Men, and Chopped. Oh, and eating as much angel food cake, strawberries and whipped cream as we can. To make ourselves feel better we will be working out while watching that ridiculous amount of TV :)

Hope your Sunday was as awesome as ours ;)

Awkward and Awesome Thursday!

Since starting my new job my weeks have been less and less awesome or awkward. Back into a routine and not a lot out of the ordinary happens as much. I'm thankful for work though and thankful that it doesn't involve that stupid carosaul, which may have led to some stellar stories but would have made me want to beat my head against the crazy painted horses I'm sure. While life isn't super exciting right now we've still got a few stories for you as always :)

Awkward:

• Chad and I were super stoked this past weekend because it was Stake Conference! Which means it was gonna be a free weekend with no church for us! (don't judge us!) I was planning on baking muffins for the upcoming weeks breakfast, prep some other food for the week, go hiking, work in our "garden", enjoy the sunshine and relax! Saturday afternoon Chad gets a text from his Young Mens president telling him that he will email him the lesson for tomorrow as soon as he gets home. Still fully confident in the fact that it's Stake Conference Chad tells him that we don't have regular church meetings this Sunday. The President texts back and says that he just checked with a bishopric member and we have normal meetings tomorrw. BOO! I felt like one of my primary kids and wanted to throw a fit. Chad was super stoked that he needed to prepare a lesson for all the young men after recieveing the lesson Saturday night. Way to be organized Young Men. I was super stoked that I would have to abandon my beautiful, relaxing Sunday to spend 2 hours babysitting screaming, crazed children. Whine, whine, whine. We are fully confident in the fact that Stake Conference is in fact this weekend! Cross your fingers!
• One of the little girls in our nursery came in on Sunday with marker all over her body. I'm not just talking hands and arms, but all over her face too. It was a lovely blue color which make it look like she had been beaten. It was faded a little, clearly by trying to scrub it off, but to no avail. This made it real fun when adults would come into the nursery and look at her and then look at me and my partner like we were the worst teachers in the world and snidely remark, "looks like you've been having fun with the markers today huh?" or "maybe markers weren't the best idea today?". Well, thanks for your kindness and your welcome for watching your crazed lunatic children for two hours on my day of rest! And no, we did not attack the child with markers, that was how she came to us, maybe you should direct your comments to her parents, I'm sure they would appreciate your input. Blah! Really need to work on changing my attitude about nursery!
• Ok, how about I stop ranting about my awkward church experiences this week and move on huh? It rained a lot this past week. Which was actually great, it was cool, and I didn't have to water my garden! I recently moved outside my little pots of basil and cilantro and was planning on moving them into bigger pots. I had the little pot of cilantro just sitting in the bigger pot for the moment which turned out to be a huge mistake. The big pot filled up with water and drowned my poor little cilantro. Try, try again I guess. Nevermind that it was dying anyways... too much sun maybe?

Awesome:

• Why hello there Mr. Paycheck, so nice to see you again. We've been apart far too long!
• Chad convinced me that we needed to buy some new socks for running. I though that our old, strectched out, holey ones were fine but clearly I was not thinking straight. We picked up a few pairs and they are amazing to run/workout in. Seriously. You need to go out and buy some workout socks that DO NOT have cotton in them. Your feet will thank you, and then you can thank Chad!
• I have been lusting after this awesome dress at TJMaxx for a while and when I got home on Monday there it was!!! Chad's the best! Bonus, it's another long maxi dress that doesn't require shaved legs for those busy Sunday mornings... ok, those Sunday mornings when we sleep in way too late... whatever.
• While I still miss my old job and all the seriously amazing women that I worked with, there is one thing that here that just can't compare to my other job... the views from the patient rooms are awesome!

Boo Ya!!!

What's up Utah! Chad and I totally kicked your butt (last night) when we ran all over you! That's right, I'm talking about Chad and Danielle, the two who lasted almost 10 minutes the first time we attempted to work out in your high altitude dryness. Last night we ran 5 glorious miles! Trail running to boot. Uphill, through a gorge, over boulders and through sagebrush. We ran and we finally beat you! Chad managed to do it with much more grace and finesse (and let's just be real, he could have ran for a long time more), but we both beat you! So take that Utah!

Awkward and Awesome Thursday!

What has been both awkward and awesome this week? The new job!

Awkward:

• We'll start out with the usual church awkwardness. I received a phone call on Saturday morning waking us up. Now this isn't an unusual occurrence since we like to sleep in, but this time my visiting teaching reporter lady decided that 8am on a Saturday morning was an appropriate time to call for my report. I was half asleep still as I answered the phone and swore she asked me if I had my wisdom teeth taken out. Confusion! I asked her to repeat herself and she got quite the attitude with me, soooory... how dare I ask you to say something twice when you've woken me up out of a dead sleep at a ridiculous morning hour. Boo early morning church calls!
  
• Attempting to do a push up when my ribs were still bothering me. I went to hold myself up in plank and then proceeded to face plant into the floor, whimpering. Fortunately the ribs are now better and I am (almost) back to normal!
• Patients be crazy!!! It's nice to know that wherever you go there's crazy waiting for you there. Our new patient quoted bible verses to me for a half hour as he filled out his paperwork. He quoted them super fast, almost under his breath while staring at me and would then ask "Cool, ain't it?". Huh? First, you talked WAY too fast, second, you mumbled everything under your breath, and third, where did all of your teeth go? All of his upper teeth were missing except two which made him look like a vampire. Not cool.
• Cockroaches. There are cockroaches in our house because we live in a desert apparently. You would think that one of our three animals would eat/kill them. Nope, they all just want to bat it around and play with it and then watch it slowly die. I guess it's better than nothing.
  

Awesome:

• Getting to quit the parks and rec carousal job before I even started! woot woot!
• Cheryl and Charlotte showing up at our house one morning to say hi! It was great to see some familiar, friendly faces.
  
• 99 cent cones at the Marble Slab! Let's be real, it's no waffle cone Wednesday, but it's close!
• I'm back to wearing scrubs (pajamas) all day!!! Is there anything more comfy? I love that I am required to wear my comfy scrubs and a ponytail :)

Date Night

When I came home from work and saw graham crackers, chocolate and marshmallows I knew that it was gonna be a good night! Chad found an awesome spot to have a date night when he was running on one of the bluffs near us.

After we got to the bluff we had to hike up to our spot, about a mile and half, hauling a bunch of wood and food. The promise of smore's was a good enough motivator though and we finally made it up the steep climb to the edge of the bluff. It was gorgeous!


The best part was the ridiculous amount of time it took to build a fire. In Michigan we are used to struggling to get a fire going. The wood always seems to be wet and nothing wants to light. It's taken the boys a long time to get fires going. Not here! It was super crazy easy with all the very dry wood. It lit up real fast, and then proceeded to burn real fast as well. Lucky for us someone had used that spot to build a fire before so we were able to "borrow" their stash of wood.


We had a great night snuggling by the fire, roasting smore's, seeing the full moon rise, watching Rukia run around and explore, and taking lots of pictures.

Easter Love

We're still here, I promise! This past week has been full of new jobs, fun dates, lots of church, and some Easter fun!


Saturday was spent prepping for our talks on Easter. We were told to each take 10 minutes, easy right?! For some reason we had the hardest time trying to get something together. We literally spent all Saturday trying to get our talks together. There was lots (and lots) of candy, popcorn and red bull involved. There was absolutely no real food involved at all. We figured we were basically writing a paper and whenever I wrote papers in school I used candy and caffeine to fuel my brain! I finally finished writing my talk around 7:30. We do not have a printer yet so I figured we would just run up to the library at Dixie State and print it off, no biggie. Except the library closed at 6. BOO! So then I spent the next hour or so hand writing my talk. Chad finally finished his talk at, oh I don't know, 6 am or something ridiculous. He just put his talk on his phone. It was then we decided that we should probably get an iPad. Just kidding. But seriously...

It was only once we got to church that we realized that we were the only 2 speakers. What?! Oh gosh. Yeah, we were in trouble. Our talks we literally only 10 minutes each, and if you know me at all you know that there was no way I was going to be able to improvise anything to make it longer. It was all on Chad. I gave my 10 minute talk, holding my janky, handwritten talk up super close to my face so I could read my handwriting. I sat down and it was maybe 1:40, maybe. Chad was a champ as usual and stretched his talk to 20 minutes. He is seriously a natural at public speaking and was awesome! We managed to go until 2:00 and then the bishopric member spoke for a few minutes after us to wrap it all up.

After sacrament meeting the bishopric member who asked us to speak, the one who spoke a little after us, was talking with us when Chad mentioned that we were only prepared to speak for 20 minutes max. That's when he decided to fill us in and let us know that since there's hardly any youth in the ward they just ask 2 people to speak for 10 minutes each and then whoever is conducting prepares something as well. Well that would have been nice to know!

After our talks I gave the Easter "lesson" in the nursery. I really tried to pump myself up and get excited but it didn't really work. I don't know what to do with a bunch of kids that age.They just want to run around and throw things. One boy looked right at me and told me that he hated me. What? I just met you 15 minutes ago you little turd! I must have made quite the face at him because he quickly changed his mind and told me he hated the table. Nice recovery slick. Luckily we have Stake Conference this week and I won't have to deal with the little angels.

Awkward moment of my Sunday, getting out to the car to go home and upon seeing my reflection in the car window I see that my dress has slipped down and you can now see my pink patterned bra on one side through my very white see through shirt. Sweet. No idea how long that was peeking. Thanks nursery children. Love you to death! The most ironic part of this is that usually we dash out of church pretty quick, so normally this wouldn't have been a big deal. Not this Sunday, everyone wanted to talk and chat with the new girl who gave a talk... and whose bra was showing to the whole ward. Love it. It will be a miracle if I make any friends here.

Once we got home we just relaxed and enjoyed our day! We ate leftovers, tunafish and burritos. Not quite my mom's Easter dinner but it made for some easy cleanup. Once we got hungry enough for dinner we attempted to order pizza, every place ended up being closed for the holiday so we had to improvise and decided to go with red bull and candy again! :) Happy Easter to us!

Happy Late Easter Everyone, we hope that you all had a wonderful holiday!

Carny no more!

I got a phone call bright and early Monday morning from a Dr.'s office offering me a job!!! I don't think I can even tell you how excited I was!!! I don't have to stand outside in the 100 degree weather this summer working a carousel? Awesome! I am super pumped about this job, the office is small but busy. The hours? Perfect! Monday thru Thursday 9-4 and some Fridays from 9-12. Hello awesome hours! I start on Thursday to get my feet wet so I don't mess everything up when I'm there alone for a day or so next week! I will be channeling Noelle as I get used to working the front desk as well as in the back!