Five Things {Pinterest got right} Friday

It's waaaay hit or miss on Pinterest if you ask me. You don't have to take my word for it, check out Pintester, I laugh out loud every single time I read it. While I have had a LOT of flops, there have been a few successes, so I thought I'd share.

1. Use Vinegar as the rinse aid in your dishwasher. Our glasses aren't as filmy looking and everything looks much better in general. Super easy, super awesome.

2. Wrap up celery in tin foil to help it keep longer. By longer, I mean weeks people! We got 2 bunches of celery in one of our Bountiful Baskets a couple weeks ago. There was no way we could go through that much celery before it got all limpy and gross. Tin foil to the rescue! Wrap it up and it stays fresh and very crisp!

As a side note, who the heck needs this much celery?
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 3. Zig Zag paper streamers. Easy, Fast, and they actually look cute. Score.

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4. The easiest, tastiest, PB cookies ever. Seriously. Make them right now. No lie, the internet will be here when you get back. While your at it, throw in some chocolate chips ;)

Last but not least...

Because if nothing else, I can usually find something to make me laugh, and sometimes that's what you need to make it through the day!

Happy Friday everyone, Have a rockin' weekend!

What Pinterest successes have you had?

Meatless {& Toothless} Tuesday: Tortilla Soup

This past weekend we kicked it into overdrive and got a lot of things done.

Clean the whole house? check
Bath for the pup? check
Haircut for the pup? check
Go through paperwork accumulating on top of fridge? check
Clean appliances that are sitting and acculmulating dust? check
Laundry? check
Put Laundry away (always the part we suck at)? check
Pay Bills? check :(

As per our usual routine we watched movies, ate too many donuts, and stayed up waaaay too late. Monday mornings are not kind at our house.

This morning I got my last widom tooth pulled. True to my character I was freaking out. It's what I do and I do it well. After a little happy gas I was feeling much less nervous :) A few minutes later my tooth was gone! Check! Now I get to eat ice cream, pudding, and jello to my hearts content!

If you happen be able to eat solids let me recommend this little beauty for you...

OMG Tortilla Soup!!! Is there anyone who doesn't like love tortilla soup? I had been hesitant to make any since our venture into vegetarianism, all the chickeny broth and shredded goodness seemed to really make up the bulk of it in my mind. Then I decided to give it a whirl. What's the worse that could happen? Throw it out and order pizza instead? Not the worst outcome ever.

I hopped onto one of my favorite recipe sites OhSheGlows, and found a recipe. I tweaked it to what I had and what we liked and OMG SO GOOD! It was spicy and delicious, even without the chicken ;) So if you're in the mood and are looking for another way to use up all the veggies that are quickly going bad in your fridge, give this a try. You won't be sorry.

Oh, before I forget, don't get lazy on me and skip out on making the crispy tortilla strips. They're bangin'. Seriously, so good. Like, eat all of them off the pan before they make it to your bowl of soup good.



Vegetarian Tortilla Soup

Ingredients:

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1.5 cups chopped onion
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 bell peppers, chopped
• 1 zucchini, chopped
• 1/2 cup green onion, chopped
• 3 tbsp ground cumin
• Two 28-oz can crushed tomatoes with chili peppers
• 3 cups vegetable broth
• 1.5-2 cups cooked black beans (or beans of choice)
• salt & pepper & crushed red chili pepper, to taste
• Fresh lime juice, to garnish on top
• avocados
• cheese
• sour cream
• Tortilla strips (FLOUR tortillas with chili powder, garlic powder, olive oil)

Directions:

1. In a large pot over medium to low heat, add the olive oil, onion, and garlic. Sauté for about 5 minutes. Preheat oven on medium broil setting.

2. Meanwhile, chop the peppers, zucchini and green onion. Add the veggies into the pot and sauté for another 5-10 minutes.

3. Add in the crushed tomatoes, cumin and broth. Stir well and season with salt and pepper. Simmer on low-medium heat for 25-30 minutes. Stir in drained and rinsed beans just before serving.

4. Meanwhile, make your tortilla strips. Use flour tortillas kids. I tried corn ones the first time since that's what I had and they were meh. The flour ones however, rocked my world. No lie. Slice flour tortillas into long skinny strips. Place in a small bowl and drizzle with olive oil to coat. Sprinkle on garlic powder and chili powder (to taste) and mix well with hands. Place on a lined baking sheet and broil for up to 3 minutes on medium. Watch very carefully. Let me repeat: VERY CAREFULLY. It too me two tries to not burn these little guys. When golden, remove from oven. Try not to eat all of them before you get to the actual soup.

5. After the soup simmers, ladle into bowls, and top with chopped avocado, fresh lime juice, cheese, green onion, sour cream and  tortilla strips. Serve immediately.

All photos from Oh She Glow. We tore into this soup as soon as it was done and devoured it before I could even think about taking pictures.

Work it Out

I haven't been in school in September in a couple years now. I would be lying if I said that I miss the tests and homework, studying and papers, boring lectures that would drag on forever, and the stress of it all.

I do however miss the fresh start that the school year would bring. The newness of it all. The clean planners and new notebooks, shiny pens and organizational materials up the wazoo. Well, I may not be starting school it's still a great chance for a fresh start. I've already got my shiny new calendar up in our kitchen and now it's goal time peeps. Why wait until January? There's nothing better than new goals to kick your butt into gear and start fresh! And it's a good chance to review the resolutions that I made at the beginning of the year. Some are going awesome, some have died, and some just need to be revamped.

Fall Goals:

• Wake up at a reasonable hour to get ready for the day, eat breakfast, and relax before the crazy starts. Are you sick of hearing about how we can't wake up in the morning? We'll see if we can't fix that. I wouldn't hold your breathe though.

• Take more pictures! Chad's all over this but I want to get better at photography as well.

• RUN! I looked into some half marathons around here, there are plenty. Problem, they all cost around 50 bucks a pop. That's $100 for the two of us, aren't you glad I'm here to do the math for you. That just ain't gonna happen. Having a race to run is a great motivating factor but I guess we'll just have to run to run.

The Color Me Rad run takes place in a month and I wish I could run in it, doesn't it look like a blast?

• Keep the kitchen CLEAN. Evey night, clean it up girl! Because there's no way I'm making dinner the next night in a dirty kitchen. And since our "grocery budget" doesn't allow us to eat at Cafe Rio every night I need to keep this goal. 

• Look cute on the weekend. I'm hoping this will get easier as we ease out of the 100 degree weather. It's impossible to look cute when you are drenched in sweat. I pull my hair into a high ponytail, ditch the makeup, and wear as little clothing as I can. And I don't care what the heck that looks like. I'm gonna attempt to channel my inner style blogger and see if I can't jazz up my weekend look a bit.

So basically.... I want to become a early rising, well dressed, put together photographer who runs marathons and keeps a spotless house. That shouldn't be too hard right? HA.


Yesterday I managed to be sleepy, late, scrub wearing runner with a spotless kitchen with dinner on the table. And while there were no pictures of said events I think 2 outta 5 really ain't too bad for a Monday. Plus, I only said I was going to look cute on the weekends :)

Do you have any goals? Are any as ridiculous as my goal to get dressed on the weekend?

Cleaning with Pinterest

I L-O-V-E Pinterest. Just like everyone else. I have a board full of clothes that I will never own, desserts that I will (hopefully) never eat, at least not all of them, and one for the baby that is no where near existence.

I also have a board for cleaning. I hate that I'm supposed to have a cleaner for everything. One for the windows, one for the kitchen, one for the counters, and so on. I never seemed to have any of them and ended up cleaning everything with windex.

So I started pinning cleaning tips and how to make your own cleaners. Sooo much easier I thought. Except that they all called for things that I didn't have or really want to try to find. People said they were expensive but worth it because it made so much, and really cheaper in the long run. I'm looking for cheaper in the short run folks. At this point I'll just stick with my windex thank you very much.

Then I found my solution! Check it out! Vinegar. Hydrogen Peroxide. Baking Soda. Olive Oil. Done. I already have it all and it's cheap. Bonus.

I've got my vinegar solution that will clean anything, my hydrogen peroxide for the bathrooms, along with the Baking Soda if I need some extra scrubby power, and Olive Oil to polish up the few wooden pieces that we have. They work awesome!

So if you are looking for a way to cut chemicals or cut costs or just simplify the number of bottles hiding under your sink, give these a try!

Vinegar

          For 3 cups of water I put in 4 Tablespoons of Vinegar. This solution is fantastic, It cut through   and cleaned things up that other chemicals we've got hadn't touched. Who knew? I even sprayed it all over the floor and went over it with my Swiffer, sparkling clean floors!

Hydrogen Peroxide

 Buy a bottle of regular ol' Hydrogen Peroxide and replace the cap with a spray cap. I've used this on mirrors, the bathtub, and toilet. I wasn't so sure this would work as well as my beloved Windex on my mirrors but it's a champ and worked great!

The only thing that I couldn't get clean was the toilet. We have been cursed with gunky, gross, dirty apartment toilets. Hydrogen Peroxide just ain't gonna cut it. It your toilet hasn't been used and abused by dirty apartment folk it will probably do the trick though. 

Baking Soda

When the Hydrogen Peroxide just isn't cutting it use this! Sprinkle this around and scrub away. It'll help to get rid of any stuck on stains or problem spots!

Olive Oil

I was most impressed by this trick. I put a little Olive Oil on a rag and used it to polish up our coffee table and desk. They look great. All shiny and beautiful. Super easy. Who doesn't have this already in their pantry? Just remember that a little goes a long way! 

What about you? Help us all out and share any tricks you've picked up along the way!