Grilled Asparagus

Hi! It's Jilly. Our favorite way to eat asparagus at our house is GRILLED! It is quick, easy, and delicious.

First, break off the bottom of each stalk and lay in a shallow baking dish. After breaking off the ends drizzle with olive oil. (And, please ignore the stuff everywhere at my house. We had a yard sale last weekend, and my house has not fully recovered. Eep!)

BTW, did you know that the best way to store asparagus is standing up in a little bit of water? We usually just put it in a pitcher and pop it in the fridge. It stays fresh for at least a week or more that way.

Now for the secret ingredient! Sprinkle the asparagus liberally with GREEK SEASONING! I know, it might sound like a strange thing to put on top of asparagus, but believe me...it's the best.

Now use your hands to make sure all the asparagus is covered with olive oil and Greek seasoning. Yes, your hands. Don't worry. They are washable. ;)

Place asparagus stalks directly on the grill. Grill on low for 4-5 minutes, then serve immediately.

 Enjoy!

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Branching Out

Hi! It's Jilly. Last week was our city's Spring bulk garbage pickup. Does your city do that? It's kinda nice. You can put all your trash, branches, old furniture & appliances, etc. out on the street in front of your house, then they come and haul it all off for you!

Our yard needed some desperate attention, so the hubs and I got to work!

He clipped/chainsawed? the branches, while I dragged them out to the street. We "pruned the hedges of many small villages", at least it seemed that way. (leave me a comment if you caught that movie reference!) 

While we were working, the kids had a fun time jumping on the queen mattress our neighbor put out. I was, like, "Why are you guys having such a fun time jumping on that old mattress?! We have a trampoline in the backyard!" It must be the fact that they aren't usually allowed to jump on beds. :)  (BTW- most of the pictures in this post were taken by one of my six-year-olds, Girl B. She loves to take pictures!)


When we were done the yard looked MUCH better. You can see the house now! It made me think of how you always feel lighter after you get a haircut. The front of the house feels lighter, like it can breathe! It's amazing the difference it made.

 We ended up completely cutting down a mesquite tree, a Bougainvilla, all the branches halfway up the other tree, and trimming down all the other bushes & palm trees. Phew! One step closer to getting this house ready to sell or rent!

I forgot to take a "before" picture, and this is the best one I could find of the front of the house. It was taken when we were putting in an offer on the house 3 years ago! But, it looked pretty much the same, except the Bird of Paradise (the one in the front on the right) was a wee bit shorter before we started.

Here's another "after" shot to compare.

Phew!  That's better! We still have a little work to do, like rake the rocks to make them more even, and make a little "stream" with some river rocks, but definitely a marked improvement! (Although, I must say, I am not a huge fan of "desert landscaping". Rocks, rocks, rocks! Blah! Excited to move where there is more GREEN!)

What have you been up to lately? Any fun landscaping projects? Let's hear about them!

Linked up to Tackle It Tuesday  at 5 Minutes for Mom.

Kid-Made Superhero Masks

Hi! It's Jilly. My kids love to grab blank paper from the office and make some...interesting...things. One day they decided to make superhero masks. They were SO darling! I wished there was a way to keep them from getting trashed. I'd like them to be able to play with them more than one day, ya know?! Then it hit me...LAMINATE! So, I ran their little masks through the laminator. Easy peasy!

Here is Spideman. Ta da! Not too bad for a six-year-old, I say.

I loved this Batman mask. SO cute!

The possibilities with these masks are endless. I left them the way they are, but you could easily punch holes in the sides and string ribbon or yarn through so the kids can tie them on, or glue them onto popsicle sticks. Have fun!

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Featured!

I'm SO excited to be featured today on TWO blogs! Visit these ladies and give them some bloggy love! 

Shaken Together

and

Organize With Sandy

Homemade Easter? I Tried...

Hi! It's Jilly. Every time a holiday is coming up, I get these wild ideas that I am going to sew dresses for the girls. And, every time I don't make anything. This year I gave up the idea of making the girls Easter dresses. Things have been too busy lately.

But, I wanted them to have SOMETHING to wear for Easter, so I decided to make flower clips for their hair.

How-to:
1. Take two fake Gerber daisies and rip them off of their stems. Remove the center part, and detach all the petals from each other.
2. Layer the petals, alternating between the two colors. I used a pink one and a white one.
3. Apply some hot glue in between each layer to help it stay together.
4. Glue a big button or rhinestone thing to the center of the flower.
5. Dig through your "stash" to find some ribbon or fabric to place between the back of the flower and the alligator clip. Be sure it's at least 11 o'clock at night and you are not in your right mind. This helps you choose the weirdest fabric available, like something white with pink swirls on it.

6. Glue a piece of fabric or ribbon to the back of the flower. Then sandwich the clip between that fabric piece and another fabric piece of the same size. Glue in place. Don't forget to burn yourself at least twice and stifle your screams of pain because the rest of the house is asleep.

All done!

After I made the girls flowers I felt bad that Boy C didn't have anything new to wear for Easter, so I decided to make him a little bowtie. What was I thinking?!? It was already way past midnight at this point. So, after a few attempts I finally made something that looked remotely bowtie-ish. I used elastic from Girl B's Halloween costume last year for the part that goes around his neck. I figured it should fit.


WRONG.


Easter morning was...less than ideal, you might say. Here's a breakdown.
a) The girls' skirts that I bought on clearance at Wal-Mart Friday night and put in their Easter baskets did not fit. WAY too short to be church appropriate.
b) Boy C's bowtie, that I stayed up until TWO AM making, didn't fit around his neck! I didn't think about the fact that it would be going under his collar, not around his actual neck. Oops.
c) I had to iron the girls Easter dresses from last year for them to wear. Strike that...I TRIED to iron the stinkin' dresses, but was having no luck, so my hubby had to iron them. Me=lame housewife.
d) I was supposed to be there half an hour early for choir practice, but we didn't get there until after church started.

So, uhm, yeah...it was awesome. I was in the BEST mood when we finally got to church. ;)

Oh! Oh! One more thing. Girl B noticed that the fabric on the back of the flowers was from my stash! She said something, like, "The Easter bunny made these hair bows and used some of your fabric, Mom!" Yeah, that's it. He totally did that. ;)

Linking up with THESE awesome parties.

Clothesline Photo Display

Hi! It's Jilly. At Christmas-time I strung some jute up in front of the niche in my kitchen slash living room to display my very thrown together advent calendar, which was just different activities written on pieces of red and green scrapbook paper. After Christmas I was too lazy was busy with other things and didn't take down the jute.

Then, Girl A was Star Student of the week and needed to take 10 photos to school. So, I dug out my printed pictures and found some she could use. While sitting at the table I glanced up at my sad-looking piece of jute and clothespins.

Then, I had an idea! Why don't I pin some of my pictures to the "clothesline"?! Instant photo display, and oh so cute! Plus, it is super duper easy to switch out the pictures. No frames to mess with!

Here is the {ridiculously easy} tutorial.
1. Use push pins to attach a piece of jute along the wall or across an opening, like a doorway or art niche. Jute is fairly inexpensive. I got this whole roll of it at Joann's forever ago and have used it for lots of projects.

2. Hang photos, momentos, quotes, or anything else you like, on the jute with clothespins.

3. Easy peasy!

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Lunch in a Bag

At our house (well, in the car) we have what is known as {'lunch in a bag'}. Sometimes we'll have somewhere we need to be that falls right in the middle of lunch time. Introduce-- lunch in a bag.

For some reason this has become  a novelty, and something they get excited about and request. All I do is make a half-fold PB & J and put it in a little lunch baggie, along with a stick of string cheese, some crackers and fruit (if I have a less messy variety like apple slices or grapes). I think they like it because they each get their own individual little bags. At least, that'smy best guess. All I know is it gets food in their bellies and they like it. Works for me.

Coming Soon!

Hi! It's Jilly. My hubby will be graduating in JUNE (Yay!), and we just found out last week that he will be doing his residency 2400 miles away! So, stay tuned for lots of projects and fun stuff as we pack, get our house ready to sell or rent, move across the country, and explore our new surroundings! I hope you'll join me on this adventure!

View The Big Move in a larger map

Organizing Ponytail Holders

Hi! It's Jilly. I had a hard time keeping my girls' ponytail holders together for a long time. I'm not sure if I thought of this, or saw it floating around the interwebs, but now I keep them all on a carabiner.

 They all stay together, and you can easily get off the ones you need. Plus, they are easy to grab and go in case you are running out of the house late and have to do your girls' hair at your son's football game...not that that's EVER happened to me. ;)

What do you use to corral hair things? Have you done your child's hair in an interesting place? Let's hear it!

Spatchcocking a Chicken

Hi! It's Jilly. Yesterday my husband wanted to grill a whole chicken on the barbecue. But, it would need to marinate during the day while he was at work, so I was tasked with preparing the marinade. That involved spatchcocking the chicken. What's that?!?! Yeah, I didn't know either. Don't worry, it's nothing dirty...although your hands get pretty dirty while doing it, so I take that back. ;)

Basically, you are cutting out the backbone and breast bone so you can lay the chicken out flat. I followed the directions found in How to Grill by Steve Raichlen, but I found a pretty decent tutorial at Cook Think if you are curious.

I am not the best cook by any stretch of the imagination, but I felt REALLY intimidated when one of the "tips" in the book said, "If you're not a great surgeon, simply removing the backbone is enough." Aah! A great surgeon?! I'm no surgeon at all! In fact, it's my husband who is the surgeon! Why isn't HE the one doing this?!

But, in spite of all that, I think I did a pretty okay job, if I do say so myself...and I do. ;) Here's a photo of the finished job. Not a bad spatchcocking, eh?

Btw, isn't "spatchcock" kind of a funny word? I think I'll say it a few more times for good measure. Spatchcock. Spatchcocking. Spatchcocked.

Ok, I'm done. What feats have you attempted in the kitchen? Ever tried to make a risotto that would knock Gordon Ramsey's socks off and keep you from getting kicked out of Hell's Kitchen while being called a donkey? Share your culinary adventures!

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