The Pizza Bubble

The Pizza Bubble is one of our new favorite recipes. I found it on a website contest for 7 ingredients or less and the cheapest you can make a recipe. This was the winner. I never follow the recipe exactly, but here is the basics.

1 can pillsbury rolls
6 ounces turkey pepperoni
1 jar pizza sauce
1 can fat free cream of mushroom soup
pineapples
green peppers
onions
2 cups mozzarella cheese

Mix the cream of mushroom soup and pizza sauce. Cut rolls into fourths, add them in, cut pepperonis into fourths, add them in. Mix in pizza ingredients (you can use whatever you like on a pizza...onions, peppers, pineapple and pineapple happen to be what we like). Mix in 1 cup mozzarella cheese. Bake at 350 for 40 minutes in a 9x13 pan. Top with another cup of cheese, bake til melted.

Soooo good, and the leftovers are really good too! Super easy and fast to make. As you can see, pretty cheap, especially because a lot of the ingredients go on sale.

Mya's birthday

Casey's girlfriend, and future wife, Mya turned one on Sept. 11th. We went to her birthday party at Keewaydin Park in Kennewick. Casey has never had any real sugar, and I figured we would wait until his 1st birthday, when he could have his very own cake to play in. But when April and Mya asked Casey to strip down and eat cake together....we couldn't say no!

Casey, Mya and Mya's cousin all stripped to their diapers (Casey was super relieved he was wearing his cool Huggies jeans diapers) and we put them on a blanket with the cake. Casey dove right in! He absolutely enjoyed his cake, he is like his Mom! At one point, in an attempt to get closer, Casey sat in the cake! I think he has a good idea...cake should be a whole body experience! At one point, Mya's cousin got too close to the cake, and Casey- full of green frosting- pushed her away, with a trail of green across her chest. Then it was just down to Casey and Mya....eventually Mya started crying because April put a party hat on her, and Casey was the last man standing, or sitting, in the cake. He just kept eating! He was pretty serious about the cake, and looked at it in wonder. When he was done, he went after some party hats and ate those too.

We tried to wipe him off with baby wipes and got nowhere fast, so we washed him under a faucet at the park, just good enough to get him home, where he got a full bath before the CSA party.

CSA Farm Party

On Saturday, September 11th, we headed out to our CSA's Farm Party. We missed the party Memorial Day, so we were excited we could make this one. There was a farm tour, BBQ potluck and bonfire. Schreiber and Sons Farm is in Eltopia, just outside of Pasco. It is 156 acres, which makes it tiny, according to the farmer, Allan Schreiber. We loaded up on tractors and hay to tour the farm. They have organic land, conventional land, and lots of research land. Research is where they make all of their money. The farmer has a PhD in entomology from WSU, and used to teach there as well. I guess that makes him Dr. Farmer Schreiber. He started the CSA for fun, and this year, there are 353 members. We saw where they make our boxes up. He told us a lot of interesting things about the culture of the Mexican workers they use. They have been using the same family, from near Guadalajara, for almost 20 years. They have their own space on the farm to grow peppers and things to sell at farmers markets and the flea market in Pasco. They grow peppers that are 100x hotter than jalapenos...and would send us gringos to the hospital:)

We toured all the fun pumpkins we will be getting! They are growing Casey a giant pumpkin (50+ pounds), and we will get the cool gooseflesh pumpkins that look like they have warts, Indian corn and squash and pumpkins of all sizes. Makes me look forward to fall:) Casey took a little nap during the farm tour...I tell you that kid can sleep anywhere!They BBQ'd chicken, turkey and duck on a huge BBQ thing. Everyone brought a side dish. Even though we were last to get our food, there was still plenty. While in line, Casey provided the entertainment...by laughing at everyone who looked at him. People would laugh back and that makes him laugh even harder. He is quite the comedian. We got many comments on how he was the happiest baby they had ever seen, and they had never seen a baby laugh that much. That's our boy!We also were able to grab a bunch more veggies and watermelon, cantaloupe and apples to bring home.

We didn't stick around for the bonfire and smores, we had been on the go since 6am, and while Casey had been a trooper all day, he needed to get to bed! We loved the party, and seeing how our food is grown, and hearing all the statistics and thought that goes into running a farm. It was fascinating to me. They had a huge turn out, so many people and their families and kids playing together. It was a really neat experience. I can't wait for the next one!

Enjoying my knife time....

I am getting pretty good with knives these days. With our CSA box, we are getting so much stuff that needs to be cut, chopped, sliced, diced and all the other terms I don't know. We have come to the realization that our knives suck. A lot.

*Hint, hint, wink, wink* to anyone who may want to get Ryan and I a birthday (Ryan will be 30 on Oct 9, and so will I on October 16!) or Christmas present....we need knives!

My Dad is amazing with knives, as he was a chef. I may need to take some lessons.

Last night we made a salsa/pico de gallo thing with:
Green, yellow, red and purple peppers
Jalapenos
corn
black beans
onions
tomatoes
avocados
cilantro
juice of one lime

We chopped all these up into little pieces, and put it on tortillas with some cheese and sour cream. We also had some tostitos scoops to put in on. So good, colorful and flavorful!! Lots of prep work to wash and cut up everything, but well worth the effort! We have made a variation of this a few times over the last few weeks. I even made something similar with cucumbers as the main ingredient.

Benton Franklin County Fair

Ryan and I were so excited to take Casey to the fair and see all the animals! He loves his dogs, so we figured he would like all the other weird looking "dogs". And yes, he did! We visited all the 4-H animals, and all the 4-H exhibits. I showed in the fair in 4-H with many projects, but mainly dogs, so I love to look at all the stuff.

We got to see a little bit of the dock dogs, those were fun to watch, ours don't enjoy the water all that much. I tried to sneak democrat stickers on Casey's stroller, but they were rejected by Ryan....rude! Just for that, I ate his candy, ha!

Casey liked the petting zoo, he got to pet goats, sheep and ponies. I loved the look on his face, sheer amazement and utter curiosity...priceless.

Some how, among all the noise and hustle bustle of the fair, Casey managed to sleep over an hour in his stroller. We watched the arm wrestling championship...pretty dumb, but kinda like a train wreck that you can't help but stare at.

We were really excited to go to the Luke Bryan concert....but realized well before that, it was just too loud for Casey. The warm up was soooo loud. So we headed to the rodeo!! Our favorite is the mutton busting...Casey will be competing just as soon as we can strap the kid to a sheep. Something tells me my fearless kid will enjoy it! I guess we can practice on the dogs.

And we are off!

We left the house this morning at 8:05...not bad for loading 2 dogs and a baby! However, we made it a car length out of the driveway before stopping to fix the bikes. We then made it to the stop sign at the end of the cul de sac when we realized we forgot the GPS. We turned around, grabbed it and headed out of the neighborhood! Then we found a garage sale...and stopped to buy an armful of games and a baby beach recliner chair with frogs on it, all for 2.75! The games were totally meant for Casey, in fact, his name is already written on them! I took that as a sign. So, we had to go home again, to drop everything. Then Ryan had to go to the bathroom. At 8:30 we hit the road for real.

Our first destination was Multnomah Falls, to do some hiking. We hiked up to the bridge at the falls, but it was crowded, and so many kids and dogs, we decided to drive down a few miles to find some better falls and hiking trails. We hiked about 2 hours, with Ryan carrying Casey in his backpack, and we had the dogs. It takes a lot to tire out McKenzie, but we did!

Next we headed to the Portland outlet malls.....Carters, Gymboree, Baby Gap...I did some shopping! Casey is fast outgrowing his 12 month clothes, and most of what he has is summery, so I got some cold weather outfits. I could shop forever for clothes for Casey...but I have a hard time buying anything that is not seriously on sale or clearance.

We found our hotel and headed to Billygans for dinner...you can throw your peanut shells on the ground...so they didn't seem to notice the large mess Casey made with watermelon, peas and a biter biscuit. We gave him some bites of the rolls, they were very sweet tasting and I think Casey got some sugar....he starting doing his "HA-HA" laugh at all the ladies. As we left in the stroller, he Ha-ha'd at every single table, so loud, he got a lot of laughs, which really only made him laugh harder. He is such a ham and such a flirt!!! Later, he played in the stroller, squealing and laughing and playing with his balloon. He played "How big is Casey....Soooo big!!" putting his arms over his head. We are ready for bed, and ready for the dog show tomorrow!

9 months

Casey is 9 months! So crazy...time goes by so fast. While we haven't done our 9 month well child check up, Casey went to the Doctor last week for a cough, and weighed 20.1 pounds! While we hasn't gained much in 3 months, I think when he gets measured next week, he will have grown a ton! He is such a long baby. Casey is getting more and more independent. He is crawling like a mad man. When he first figured out how to take 1, then 2, then 3 crawl steps....it was over. He is a zooming machine. He also pulls himself up. He likes to stand at the baby gate and shake it! He looks like a prisoner....especially when his hair is all over the place and he is chattering....so funny! He is really liking finger foods and feeding himself. He is eating watermelon, cantaloupe, avacados, eggs, and puffs and biscuits by hand. He gets lots of veggies that are pureed. He tried chicken for the first time too, and liked it. But, lets be honest, Casey loves to eat everything!

Casey is go-go-go until he crashes and naps. He plays hard, and is never sitting still. If he is sitting in one location, or is in a highchair or his bike trailer, he is constantly kicking his feet, over and over. When he starts getting sleepy, he is very cuddly:) There is nothing better than cuddling with Casey....and his Daddy, better include him too!