InstaFriday 11

I'm back again for InstaFriday, hosted by Life Rearranged.   I'm growingto4 on Instagram if you want to follow me.

Happy Fourth of July

Found a mouse in the garage. We let him go in the woods.

Indiana Beach with my best friend.

We saved probably 75 tadpoles from someones pool and released them in the creek 

Zeus loves the muddy creek, He doesn't love baths though

Headed to Mishawaka for Sonic and shopping

She swims every day and makes me watch every trick she does

He learns from his sister. 

Picked up a balance bike for Mason for $3. 

Our backyard view.

Thanks for stopping by! See ya next week!

GrooveBook

I'm sure everyone out there takes a lot more pictures with their phones than a regular camera. It's just a lot more convenient.  I have more photos of our everyday life on my phone, but I do take my camera if we're going somewhere special.  I stumbled across this app on my phone called GrooveBook and decided since the first month was free I would give it a try.

Each month you upload 100 pictures and they send them to you in a little book with a designed cover.  It's only $2.99 a month!!  Each photo has a perforated edge so you can tear them out and it also has the date you took the photo stamped on the edge. 

Depending on your camera settings some fill the whole page while others have a white border on them.  I don't care about that, but I've read some comments that people don't like that, but you can change your phone settings to fix that I guess. 

If you don't have 100 each month you can order multiples of certain photos and then just tear them out. You can also order additional books each month if you have more than 100. 

 I keep all mine in their books and just stick them on the book shelf with all my other photo albums.  

If you want to try them out, just download the GrooveBook app on your phone and use my coupon code below to get your first month FREE!  

*This is not a sponsored post. I was not paid for my time or my review of this product. I just like it and thought I would share my opinion*

We're ENGAGED!!

I shared back in this post that we got engaged. Here's how it all went down!

A few weeks before Mother's Day, Mike had talked about buying a four wheeler from a guy at work. I was definitely okay with this decision so I was all excited and wanted to pick it up asap.  He would casually talk about it here and there saying he wasn't sure and all this other stuff. When he finally said we were getting it he said the guy works the night shift so we can't get it until Tuesday (after Mother's Day)  Fast forward to mother's day.  We wake up and since it's my day to do whatever I want, I decide we'll take a trip to the zoo.  We spent a few hours there and then we head to the outlet mall. While at the mall Mike tells me to buy whatever I want from any store.  I guess I was mentioning this a lot lately but I said, "I can't buy my own engagement ring"  Right there in the middle of the mall Mike drops to his knee and starts to say will you... I grab his hand and pull him up and call him a jerk. I'm thinking he's just playing around cause I'm being a brat lol.  He then gets up and I joke with him about how you can't propose in the mall and not to embarrass me in public.   We do some more shopping and then head home.  We just hang out at home and later my brother and his fiance text to say they want to come see our new house.  They come over around dinner time and hang out for a while. Then Mike says, "they're going to watch the kids while we go to the beach to watch the sunset."  In my head I'm thinking 'well, that's rude, they wanted to come see our house and us and we make them watch the kids' so I was kind of hesitant to go, but they said they were okay with it.  So we left and headed to the ice cream shop for shakes and head to the beach.  While driving there it starts to get really dark and thunder.  Once we got to the beach it was a full on lightning storm.  We hurried out onto the beach to watch the storm coming in.  

I took the pictures above with my back to Mike. As I turn around to say lets go since it was at this point starting to rain, he pulls out the ring and says, "before we go will you marry me?"  I immediately say yes, and hug him and start crying. Then I slap him on the arm and call him a jerk.   

We head back to the car and head home.  It's on the drive home that he mentions we aren't really getting a four wheeler, that was his cover story for why he was taking money out of the bank. I was actually a little sad about this, and said can we still get one?    And he really did have the ring while we were at the mall and he was being serious while I thought he was just trying to embarrass me. I felt really bad when I realized that. OOPS!  When we get home I realize also that my brother and his fiance were in on it too and that's really the whole reason they came over. They're so sneaky!  I also called my parents, of course, they knew that Mike was going to ask.  

I had no idea at all that he was going to ask me. We've been together for 7 years and he always said he doesn't see the point in being married, so I was figuring we would never get married. I am SO SO SO glad he changed his mind on that though.  

So now, let the wedding planning begin!! *Edit* Here's the first of our wedding planning.

Mexican Cornbread Casserole

One day while searching pinterest I decided to search for cornbread casseroles. I found and ton and pinned them all. I really like corn bread, probably more than I like just regular biscuits.  This recipe was the first on my list to make.  

1 box corn muffin mix

1 egg

1/3 cup milk

1/2 lb ground beef

10 oz. can rotel original diced tomatoes & green chilies, drained

1/2 tsp ground cumin

1 c shredded cheese (I used nacho & taco)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Spray baking dish with non stick spray.  In a bowl, stir together corn bread mix, egg, and milk.  Spread onto bottom of baking dish. 

Brown and drain ground beef.  Stir in tomatoes and cumin.

Spread ground beef mix over corn bread in dish.  Top with cheese. Bake at 375 for 15-20 minutes or until cornbread is done. 

InstaFriday 10

Since I overloaded you with pictures from the last 6 months last week, this week only has a few pictures.  Please follow me on instagram. My name is growingto4.

My parents moved out of the house they've lived in for the last 20 years.  

Throwback Thursday photo of me and my grandpa.

Found this guy while moving the pool after all the water leaked out. 

We bought a hammock.  Best money ever spent. Wishing we would of got the bigger one though but I'm watching the sales for it to go on clearance.

We've had massive amounts of rain lately and the yard is full of these tiny baby toads.  

Using his Mickey rug as a blanket. He even talks to the mickey on it. He's silly. 

Kid's Pirate Party

Marley turned 6 at the end of March and Mason turned 2 at the beginning of April.  With us moving and my parents also moved I decided to wait until June to have their birthday party.  Marley decided she wanted a penguin party, then it was hello kitty, then something else, and then I finally talked her into having a pirate party.  We only invited family this year so the party was a bit low key compared to previous years, but we all had fun and the whole family got to see our new house too.  

I got all the party supplies at Party City and Meijers.  I put the table cloth on the counter and wrote what everything was with arrows. Thought it was sort of like a treasure map?  I made cannon meatball sandwiches, ranch bean dip, fruit kabob swords, deviled egg pasta salad, veggie pizza, and goldfish and chips.  

I got the cupcake toppers on clearance for 50 cents, what a bargain! I made strawberry cupcakes with butter cream frosting, and white cake with s'mores frosting. I used crumbled graham crackers to make the X on the cake. 

We played ladder ball, catch and the kids swam. It was a great party and the kids got lots of great outside toys like chalk, bubbles, and pool toys.  

I can't believe my babies are so big already. =(  Time to start planning next years party. =)

BBQ Cola Crock Pot Chicken

Now that it's summer I've been looking for some good crock pot recipes so I don't have to turn on the oven, thus turning on the air conditioning. It's a vicious cycle.  This recipe was super quick to throw together and was apparantly quick to be eaten too because I didn't even get a chance to get a picture. OOPS! 

Chicken

1 bottle of bbq sauce

1 onion, cut into quarters

12 ounces of coke

Place chicken and onion in bottom of crock pot. Pour bbq sauce and coke over top. 

Cover and cook on high for 6-8 hours. 

We just ate our chicken pieces whole, but you could also shred them and serve them on buns. 

Macaroni Au Four

When I came across this recipe on pinterest I thought 'oh that looks amazing'  Then I read the instructions and was a bit overwhelmed.  It had a lot of steps and while it looked good I wasn't sure if I would really ever make it.  I did eventually decide to give it a try and while it may have looked good in picture it wasn't my favorite dish I've ever made. I did leave out a few ingredients from the original recipe so not sure if that's why, or if it just wasn't my cup of tea.

1/2 C. unsalted butter 

2/3 C. all purpose flour

9 cups milk 

1/2 t. ground nutmeg

salt

1/4 t. black pepper

1 egg

2 lbs. lean ground beef

2 lb pasta

In a large pot, melt the butter. Once melted stir in the flour. Cook for about 2 to 3 minutes. Increase the flame to medium-high, and slowly whisk in the milk. Keep whisking until the milk comes to a light boil. Reduce the heat to low and cook for about 5 minutes, whisking every so often. Add in the nutmeg, salt and pepper, whisk a bit, then allow to cool.

Once cooled a bit, beat the egg in a small bowl and beat in about a 1/4 cup of the semi-cooled butter flour mix.  Once mixed, pour it into the pot with the rest of the butter flour mix.

Brown and drain ground beef. Cook pasta al dente'.  Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Place half of noodles on bottom of baking dish.  Spread meat evenly over top.

Place remainder of pasta over meat and then pour butter flour mixture over top of entire dish.  Bake at 375 degrees for 1 hour.  Allow to cool for a few minutes before serving. 

Chicken Fingers

It's no surprise that I like chicken.  If we go out for dinner and I can't ever decide what to get, I resort to chicken fingers. You usually can't mess those up.  This recipe for homemade chicken tenders caught my eye on pinterest so I made them asap.

3/4 cup Bisquick mix

1 teaspoon paprika 

1/2 teaspoon salt 

1/2 tsp garlic powder

8 chicken breast tenders

2 eggs, slightly beaten

Preheat oven to 450°F. Cover cookie sheet with foil; spray with cooking spray.  Stir Bisquick mix, paprika and salt in a dish. Dip chicken strips into eggs, then coat with Bisquick mixture. Place on cookie sheet. Repeat with other pieces.  Bake 12 to 14 minutes, flipping halfway through, until no longer pink.