Jenny's Journey

I have made this recipe before, but tonight when I went to make it the usual thing happened to me AGAIN!  I think I have an ingredient and I don't!  I swear planning a meal for me lately has become quite the adventure - by either finding a substitute or going without.   After I attempted (and I don't know why) to see if the little market in Ixonia had Hoisin sauce, I thought I would find a substitute if there was one.  I was thrilled when I found a Hoisin sauce substitute or actually a recipe to make your own, and believe it or not I had everything the recipe called for!  And it tasted and smelled like I remembered it should! Sweet!  Dinner wasn't a disaster after all. Homemade Hoisin Sauce 4 tablespoons soy sauce 2 tablespoons  peanut butter 1 tablespoon honey 2 teaspoons rice wine vinegar 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder 2 teaspoons sesame oil 10 drops hot sauce 1/8 teaspoon black pepper Wisk all ingredients together. * I only made...

I don't know about you, but I have always wanted to make cinnamon rolls.  Haven't you too???  No? Well the other day my Mom sent me an email with a recipe that was supposed to be as good as a certain cinnamon roll maker we all have seen in at the mall, and most of us, I am guessing have tried at least once before.  I mentioned to her that I had always wanted to try making cinnamon rolls, but it seemed like a daunting task.  One I was not sure I was up to tackling.  (at least by myself...my kids don't count...they usually make anything I want to do in the kitchen a little bit harder...but still I like to include them anytime I bake - Jadyn is an egg-cellant egg cracker!)  I collected all of the ingredients I needed for the recipe and the 4 of us made cinnamon rolls with cream cheese frosting!  Let me tell you - they were delish and pretty darn easy - for cinnamon rolls.  How could that be, you ask?  Well the dough is made using a bread make...

Well tonite I attempted yet another recipe I recently pinned from Pinterest.  When my husband heard we were having salad for dinner, he wasn't too impressed. Though once I made it he said "looks nothing like I thought it would" and "looks good!"  It was good.  Lots of ingredients I thought, but the fact that I worked today, went grocery shopping after work (all by myself!!!) and then came home to cook dinner may be reasons why it seemed like a lot of work.  Really it wasn't. Lots of chopping.  I had the chicken already cooked and frozen so that helped out a bit.  In the end we all like it.  Even the girls.  James even tried it on a soft tortilla and said it made a good filling for a wrap.  It turned out to be a nice meal for a hot summer day Southwest Chopped Chicken Salad adapted from : Laurenslatest Ingredients: 2 cups diced chicken 1 red pepper, diced 1 can black beans, drained and rinsed 1 can sw...

Being that it is June in Wisconsin, it is also Dairy month! I did not know until recently that farms throughout Wisconsin did this, but they host a breakfast and then have farms tours and other fun things. I visited http://www.dairydaysofsummer.com/ and was surprised to see that a farm, I am not kidding you, 1 house down the country road(so like 1/4 mile) from my in laws was chosen to host the Dodge County Dairy Day on June 24th! Too cool! We had to check it out. I am glad we did. The eggs and pancakes were actually very good! Tractor ride to tour the farms Inside the barn that holds 185 cows! Jadyn got to milk a goat! Cute kitty at the petting zoo. We were there for about 2 1/2 hours and the weather was nice.  I am glad we checked it out and I will have to remember to go again next year. They had lots of recipes and such promoting dairy products.  Of course, I like new to try new recipes, I took a bunch of them home.  I to...

This past Sunday I ventured out with my girls to Kirschbaum's Strawberry's in Beaver Dam.  I had wanted to go to Jelli's Market, which is basically down the road, in country terms, but they were closed because they needed a day or two to let the berries ripen.  Due to the strange spring we had they lost much of their berries to frost. After about a 45 min drive, we found Kirschbaum's.(I only stopped once at a Kwik Trip for directions!)  On our way to the strawberry fields! Let the picking begin! Back in the day I would imagine this is how all Moms worked! It was hot and sunny but well worth it because the strawberries were so sweet!  I believe they taste 100x better then any berries bought in the store.  Sure ours were smaller,  but right off the vine with that hot summer sun, they were oh so good! The girls and I ended up picking 10 lbs of strawberries!  I could have picked more, but I had to remember...

Well it is official!  I have a 2nd grader in my house.  Jadyn did a great job in 1st grade and brought home an excellent report card with many many nice things to say about her! I was amazed to see that see was only sick 2 times the entire school year!  Wow, that is impressive. Jadyn came home from school today and said she would miss her teacher; Mrs Timm.  I will too. Jadyn excelled in reading but struggled a bit in math (just like her Mom....memories of my Dad and me came back to me whenever Jadyn started crying over Math homework!)  We worked on it daily...money, telling time, adding.  And she did improve! Yeah! To keep Jadyn up on her excellent reading (she is reading at a K level...I know you don't know what that means but it is good) and keep her up on her math I made a deal with her.  For every day that she does both a math worksheet and reads, I will give a $1.  At the end of summer we plan on going to Chicago to visit American Gi...

  June 1, 2002 It is hard to believe that James and I are celebrating our 10 year anniversary.  It’s amazing how fast the time has gone and we both agree that its been a good time had by both.  We are proud of these last 10 years (15 if you count the years we dated) and think we have made a pretty nice life for the 2 (or 4) of us.  We have had our share of ups and downs but we agreed that 90% of these last 10 years has been very enjoyable. We have been through a lot together, and I was looking thru old photos to add them to this post but I had a hard time narrowing the pictures down.  We have experienced so much together.  College graduation, building our house, vacations, the births of our 2 beautiful daughters – the list could go on and on.  We have fun together, laugh alot together (mostly at me) and don't take life to seriously.   So Happy Anniversary to my husband. I have had a wonderful time with you these past 10 y...