Bryce Canyon July 2010

 

We loved Bryce Canyon! It’s a great place to take kids.  All the look outs count as “hikes” but they’re short with a great view at the end.  We hiked a little into the canyon to see the Hoodoos—hot and fascinating.

The kids signed up as junior rangers.  One of the requirements was to pick up garbage on the trail which was almost a deal breaker for Ben but he rallied.  He found a Capri Sun straw wrapper!  Riding the “shovel” bus and swimming at Ruby’s Inn were highlights too. 

Personally I can’t get enough of the red rock, contrasting green trees, and blue blue sky.  The temperatures were dreamy for mid July.  Sign me up for Goblin Valley come April (grin, sigh).

    

Easy Alfredo Chicken

I got this recipe from Kim Crapo in my frozen food trade group. It's easy and rich. I personally like grilled chicken but really any meat or even leave it meatless--it's still great!

Easy Alfredo Chicken

1/2 cup butter
1 cup milk
3/4 cup Parmesan cheese
8 oz cream cheese
1/4 or more garlic salt
1-2 cups grilled or cooked chicken (or a can of canned chicken)
vegetables

Melt the first 4 ingredients together then stir in garlic salt. Add chicken and veggies and serve over bow tie pasta--or any pasta. Here are some good veggie combinations: onions and sliced carrots, frozen peas, onions, & red peppers. Any onion, pepper or carrot would need a little cooking before, but dump the peas right on in.

Updates

Pregnancy: Still itchy hips and incredible despondency. My normal now is pulling a book into bed and reading rather than going for a ride or walk in the mornings. Plus some veins have arrived (I cannot be surprised) which makes riding rather bunched in the knickers.

School: We’re out of school, Hooray! Bed time is lucky before 10 and we’re planning a trip to Bryce Canyon next week.

Media: The Smurfs. Remember them? We started watching episodes on Hulu, and now we have the DVDs from the library. It’s clever and brings back memories of crowding around the TV on Saturday mornings. Why is there only one smurfette?

Chickens: We’ve used up our first bag of feed that came with the girls. In the six weeks of hen adoption I’d say we gathered around 10 dozen eggs. Could we be more fortunate? We have run into a few soft shells that they crack when you pick them up—apparently they need more calcium. We need to give them grit or rocks for their digestion and they’ll be able to get calcium from the the feed.

We’ve had eggs at least once a week for dinner in various forms: french toast, scrambled, over easy, english muffins with ham. The chickens are really our pets now as well as protein producers. They come when I call, with scraps, or to go back into the pen. Ben’s the most attached, hauling them all over the back yard.

When this brown egg on the left came, it was an Olympic moment cracking it. Two Yolks! Twins. Reading up, the statistics are one out of every 1000 eggs. I see it as auspicious and Addie thought it was delicious.

I found my camera but it was lost for three weeks. I missed Paige’s birthday and the 4th. Have you ever staged cupcakes and candles just to get a picture?

Jamie’s Easy Microwave Carmel Popcorn

My neighbor, Jamie Chinn, from across the street made this and I can not stay away from it.  And in the microwave it couldn’t be easier.  Beware one batch won’t last more than an hour—well that’s the way it is around here.  It’s a really soft and chewy popcorn but more than a day out it’ll crunch too.

3 bags of microwave popcorn (old maids tossed)

1 cup butter

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup corn syrup

2 tsp vanilla

1 tsp baking powder

In a bowl melt butter, sugar, and corn syrup for 3 minutes at 70% power in the microwave.  Wisk well and cook 4 more minutes at 70%.  Wisk in vanilla and baking powder and pour over popcorn.  Mix and let cool, or spoon some into a bowl and eat it with a spoon hot. 

Notes:  I rarely have microwave popcorn on hand but I always have regular popcorn and Robyn’s cast off Whirly Pop (if you ever see one of these at a yard sale or thrift store, and you have room to store one more pan, BUY it).  I usually make about 1/2 cup of regular pop corn with vegetable oil, and salt it as salty as microwave popcorn. 

I mix it all in a really big bowl, Jamie mixes it in two bowls.