Let's Talk About Rice

Does anyone remember those skits from Saturday Night Live? I always thought those were so funny. And the Svety Meatballs! Ha I loved that one. Last night I made fried rice for dinner to go with our lemon chicken. I was thinking while I was cookin that I should let people in on the fried rice secret. You know how when you like something, how you come home and look up recipes so you can learn to make it? I did that with fried rice oh so long ago... I can't even believe how long it took me to figure this stuff out. Every recipe I tried turned into something that looked like malt-o-rice mash.
So here it is...
Use leftover rice! Yes its that simple. Easy peazy as Kass would say. When ever I cook rice I always cook twice what we need. The leftovers go in the fridge for fried rice later in the week. You don't even need a recipe, but here's what I do.

First of all the egg. Oh the yummy yummy egg. This is done in a wok. In a bowl, whisk 3 eggs while the wok is getting hot. Coat the bottom in olive oil. My pan is nonstick so i think that may help. Pour the egg in and swirl the wok around so the egg coats the pan in a thin layer.(You actually have to pick the wok up to do this) Don't let the egg sit in there long enough to get brown, browned egg is not yummy. It should slide right out of the pan. You can then cut it in to thin strips. That's that.

Next Saute up 3 to 6 cloves of garlic depending on how much you love the stuff... add a bit more oil for the rice which comes next. Add the rice and saute for a few minutes (maybe 4 or 5 cups of cooked LEFTOVER rice) Then all you do is add soy sauce, the amount depends on the amount of rice you cook but, you'll see it gives it that fried rice look you love. start with 4 tablespoons or something and add more if you like. Taste it as you go... then i add frozen peas and carrots (and of course the yummy egg) and turn the heat to low and put a lid on it while I'm cooking whatever is going with it.

(FYI...you can add all kinds of other things you want like chicken, pork, onions, whatever! It's what YOU like! Be creative!)

Which bring me to something else... Notice how all the Chinese recipes you love call for frying the chicken???? Here's my thought... Skip that step!!! Who says it has to have a fried coating to be good? No way!! It's the sauce that you really love, and pouring it over sauteed chicken will be just as good and plenty healthier! Yes Katie this recipe is for you since you are the only one who reads my blog! Enjoy!!

Big Day Ballet

So we had a big day today. The girls started ballet. Something they've been wanting to do for a long long time, and I've been putting it off. I have a hard time with the whole rushing from one thing to the next. It seems to me there already aren't enough hours in the day. But this is so good for them I wish I didn't put it off so long. We stopped at grandma's house on the way so they could get dressed. Oh how cute they looked...

As you can see! I don't know why they wanted their picture on the rock but they went straight for it. Pretty sure of themsleves.

Kassidy tried out 2 different classes, which now I am totally confused about. She came out of the second one saying "whew! that was hard!" but it was supposed to be the easy class. I noticed when I went to pick her up there were way older kids in there so maybe I will have to ask and see whats up. In any case they both had fun.

And then there is Lucy... what a pill!!! Let's just say I am not looking foward to taking her every Tuesday night. She was all over the place. I told Chad that she's stronger than me, and he said, "oh I dont know about that" but let me just say that she can wrestle me a lot longer than I can wrestle her.

I did get these two totally cute pictures of her though. What a doll. She truly is a fun little girl.





I thought this picture was so totally cuteski. I love it. It just has Sass Queen written all over it. What an amazingly fun and busy day we had.

Falling Fairy

A little while ago I got this fantastic idea to take fairy photos of my girls. It was alot of work getting all the stuff ready. I made a bunch of fairy crowns and little leafy looking things to go around the top of their dresses. We curled their hair up and then we were off to Natural Bridges where I was hoping there would be a speck of green. There was. Yay. Soooo we got them all dressed up and hiked them down a few different trails, I figured we'd get a few odd looks as we went, but as luck would have it there was no one there that day! I couldn't believe our good luck. Anyway Natalie was crossing one of those watery areas that had stepping stones to get across. The first step was actually a log and it rolled when she stepped on it and it just kept rolling. So lucky for me I had the camera ready to go and captured the whole moment to remember forever. Now I can look at it and chuckle when ever. Its so great.

Like So Many Others...

I LOVE photography. What could be more fun or rewarding? I take way too many pictures of Lucy... well, not too many for me but sometimes I feel silly posting all my pictures of her. She's so cute I can't help myself. Not that she's a willing subject... sometimes she just runs and runs. It's ok though because I get practice taking pictures of a kid on the run. I look at all my pictures of Kassidy and Natalie when they were babies and I feel a little sad that i didn't think to try to take better pictures of them. And those cheesy (no offense to anyone I hope...just not my style) Sears, and Kiddie Kandid and all those mall photo places I used to take them are a little silly looking to me now. I have always wanted to have a studio in my home but we are a little cramped for space as it is. Chad won't let me hang lights from the celing in our great room. Why not I say... be who you are.

First Blogs Are Weird

Since this is the first blog I think it should say absolutly nothing. It's weird to write the first one so I'm just going to skip over this one and go straight to the next one.