Seafood Stock

Instant Pot seafood stock.

Here's a an easy seafood stock to make whenever the stock bags in your freezer get full. You have stock bags right? Labeled seafood, beef, chicken, veggie... pork? If not start some. Put vegetable scraps, stems of cilantro and parsley in them. Chicken bones, beef bones. Once full, pull them out and make a stock.
Things I don't put in there

organ meats

broccoli

cauliflower

potatoes

onion skins

asparagus

peppers

cabbage

There's probably more, but I can't think of any right now.

How To Cut A Pomegranate

 How to cut a pomegranate in three easy steps and avoid wasting any of the precious seeds. So simple, and easy.

Chinese Egg Noodles (Philips Pasta Maker)

Chinese Egg Noodle Soup, noodles made in the Philips Pasta Maker

Not too long ago my husband purchased a Philips Pasta Maker for me. I wasn't sure how I would like the machine, originally I just wanted something to roll and cut noodles for Khao Piek Sen. Nothing fancy. I have been using this machine for all sorts of noodles, curry flavored, black pepper, Italian basil, etc. It's really easy to use and it's pretty fast. Ten to fifteen minutes a cycle. For regular pasta I use one cycle and my water is ready and boiling on the stove by the time it's done. I have made the Khao Piek Sen in this machine also, I'm pleased with the results. I did have to tweak my original recipe and got help from other pasta machine owners. That's a whole other post though.

Freezer Tip: Tomato Paste and Yogurt Starter

How to freeze tomato sauce in bags do you can easily break of portions.

Quick freezer tip. When you have extra tomato paste or want to save small portions of yogurt starter for next batch of yogurt freeze it in a zip top bag. Then squish it flat. Score lines with a chopstick or wooden spoon. Freeze the bags flat until they are completely frozen. After that they can be stacked easily. When you need a portion just open up your bag and break off a piece.

This method also works for ground beef and other ground meats.

2016 Let Them Eat Cake- Cherry Vanilla Bean Cupcakes

These cute little cupcakes are some of my favorite. The vanilla and cherry are so good together, and well, these are just cute. Pixie requested cherry cake for her birthday, so I came up with these. The pipettes were too long, but I guess that just meant more cherry juice. I have found shorter ones but these were fun.

Beans and Legumes, Cheap Fall Vase Fillers

Happy Fall Y'all!! I thought I'd share what my vase fillers are. I was trying to figure out something to fill them with that was 

1. Cheap

2. Reusable

3. Something I don't have to change out until Christmas, or ever. So neutral.

SO, candy corn and candies while cute could potentially be expensive and draw ants. That and they are more specific to October I think. Coffee beans were on my list, but they are definitely not for the frugal! I decided on lentils and beans. Cheap, and they last and last. There are SO many varieties and colors. Black beans are pretty,  black eyed peas, orange lentils, so colorful.

Freezer Tip: Flash Freezing

Hello! Just thought I would do a quick post on Flash Freezing. I'm not certain that's the correct term, but I use it a lot. I also use this method of freezing quite a bit for items I don't want to freeze stuck together. That way I can use one or two pieces at the same time, but they can all be stored together.

Blue Box Mac and Cheese (Instant Pot)

 So, I grew up eating boxed Mac and Cheese. It was an "American" food, so my mom didn't make it from scratch. It's still a comfort food for me. My youngest however, LOVES THIS STUFF. She really does. We have it about once every other month at most, but it's still a treat. We all like it really. It's so easy to follow the instructions on the box and do this on the stove top, but if you have an Instant Pot. I'm going to save you the trouble of washing a colander also. Because you won't need to drain this at all. I have done up to two boxes in my Instant Pot using a method that someone posted on the Instant Pot Community page. It's just so simple.

Happy Birthday Jesus!

I know it's Take It Tuesday but Jonas brought 30 inches of snow, at least! So no lunches to post, sorry about that! But I thought I would share the cake I made for Christmas this year.  We usually make a cake for Jesus every year, it's usually the same recipe also. This whole wheat carrot cake. It's the only carrot cake recipe I'll make. It's just that good. I made it without the cheesecake layer, then slathered it with a cinnamon cream cheese frosting. For decoration I printed out a line drawing of Jesus, Joseph and Mary then topped that image with wax paper. I melted some chocolate and outlined/traced the picture. I also did some sheep and a shepard free hand. 

The gold stars are sugar stars I found. It came out pretty cute I think. The kids thought it was cool. I've used this method for cupcake toppers and it works beautifully.

I hope you all are having a wonderful New Year. My children are enjoying a 7 day weekend, and I'm loving every moment we're being blessed with! Did you get a lot of snow?

Thanks for reading Give Peas A Chance!

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Christmas in the Kitchen

Joyeux Noël. I made this sign reversal, and hung it with hooks so that I could change it out with the seasons.

Getting closer to Christmas! I really am a little confused with this warm weather we've had lately! Where's my SNOW!? Sigh... I had these visions of being snowed in, sitting by the fire, and snuggling with my family. Oh well, we're still snuggling by the fire! I can't wait until school is OUT for the year! What about you all? How's the weather where you are?

Secret Garden Christmas Tree

I have to admit this is probably one my second favorite tree in the house right now, aside from our main tree. This one is in Diva's room. She didn't really choose the theme. But it goes very well with her room. It's very romantic, muted, and just elegant, on a $20 fake tree from Target, using clearance flowers and $1 ornaments from the craft store :).

I'm not a decorator so we really just did the best we could when putting this one up, the lights are white. We used ribbon that I had lying around from a sale of Christmas past.

Under Bed Lego Tray

So, I've been busy trying to get unpacked and set up our new home. One of the projects I really wanted to do was to make a Lego tray, this one is an under bed Lego tray. But it can be used for so many other toys. Because I wanted it to be useable for other toys I did not glue any Lego building plates to the bottom of this. Originally I just wanted to get an aluminum drip pan and put something under it to slide it under the bed. Then there was the problem of sliding stuff across wood floors. How sturdy the tray would be if we just glued felt to the bottom, would it work if it wasn't flat? Stuff like that. My mother in law was here visiting and the more we talked about it the more ideas we had. That tends to happen a lot, we have tons of ideas, and some of them come to fruition. When they do, they are awesome. It also helps that she's really good with stuff like this. I mean, really, I wouldn't even try to attempt something like this without her. Funny thing is, she helped build one  90% of the way and had to go home so I had no choice to finish and do the second one! I couldn't believe I actually built it! I'm so glad it happened that way because now I have a little more confidence, maybe I'll hang some pictures on the wall or something. Who knows.

Valentine's Day Gifts and Cards

WOW. Talk about waayy behind right? I still wanted to share the Valentine's that the kids gave to their friends this year. 

Pixie handed out these little make your own Snowmen kits. It's funny, because I just happened to have these and the movie Frozen came out so Snowmen were perfect for an Olaf card. I had the pack of the Snowmen from Target's Christmas clearance. The pack of 20 was originally $5, and I got it for $1.25 I made the printable in black and white because I figured the kids could color it in if they wanted to.

Diva gave out these great pencils that have tongue twisters on them from Super Duper Publications. I found the Ventricular, is that the word? Where the image changes when you move the item? These little stars "wink" when moved. Anyway. They were a steal, I found them at Target for 75% off at the Dollar Spot! There was maybe 12 in each bag too! She wrote on the back of each one.

Piglet is BIG into robots and robotics right now, so these sticker packs from Target were PERFECT. She just opened up each one and wrote a message on them for each of her friends.

So those were our Valentine's this year. Simple but still fun, and NO candy!

Etched Glass Tutorial- Doctor Who

Okay, ya'll I'm a glass etching fool. I want to etch everything in sight. I know there are tons of tutorials on Glass Etching out there, but this is the method that works best for me, so I thought I would share it with you all. Now, this may not be the method that works for you. you may have a better method (feel free to share it in the comments section) but this is what works for me. A friend of mine sent me the vinyl decals, so I can't tell you how to get or make those. She used a die cutting machine, and if you google "Doctor Who Silhouette Vinyl" some free designs will come up.
I try to choose glass items that have straight sides. Sometimes imperfections in the glass will show through or be highlighted by the etching cream.
Here is another project I did, a Doctor Who vase. I LOVE LOVE how it turned out.
I want to do some casserole dishes and such, but I don't have a die cutting machine yet. I have heard it's harder to etch on Pyrex, some tutorials say you can't do it. I haven't tried so I can't help you there.

Weeping Angel

 TARDIS

 Dalek

 K-9

Adipose

So, here's how I etch glass. You can scroll past all these pictures for an easier to read version.

Items I used (not all are pictured above)

1. Glass Etching Cream
2. Something to etch- I find that items with straight sides works best. Also it should be smooth on the surface where you are etching
3. Vinyl decal - I got these from a friend, just get the removable vinyl if you have a choice. 
4. Contact paper
5. Old hotel key, gift card or credit card
6. Paint brush
7. Alcohol wipe or alcohol and cotton swab
8. Scissors
9. Tweezers
10. Disposable gloves
11. Damp rag

You may want to cover your work surface also, with some paper or work above the a sink, note that the etching cream works on CONTACT. So any drips or drops on glass and it's there for good. Read the bottle. Don't get  it on your skin. Safety first, you know the drill.

1. Take the tweezers and remove any area on your vinyl that you want to be etched. Any vinyl left on there will not come in contact with the cream. In this case, I left the panel's on the Tardis, but took off the window panels. Leave the backing ON the vinyl.
I also accidentally took panel out. On the right side there. Oops. Once you've removed the areas that you want etched just give it a once over to make sure you like where all the white areas are. Because that is is what will show up as etched.
2. Take a piece of contact paper. Remove the backing and place it on top of the vinyl. Careful not to get air bubbles under it.
3. Take the gift card and smooth out the contact paper, rubbing over the small detail areas of your design. I had to do this where the black panels I left were. This is to make sure those details stick to the contact paper.

4. Clean the surface of the glass with the alcohol wipe. Let it dry. After this step be careful where you place your fingers/hands. You don't want the natural oils in your skin to leave prints where you etch your design.
5. Remove the backing from your vinyl. Leaving the design, and outline attached to the contact paper.
6. Place the contact paper with vinyl onto the glass surface. This needs to be a smooth application, any wrinkles or bubbles and etch cream will get under there. I find it easiest to place one side of the vinyl/contact paper down, and smooth the rest down with the gift card.

7. Rub the gift card over the design to make sure that when you lift the contact paper off, the designs will stick to the glass. Make sure the application is smooth.
8. Carefully peel off the contact paper.

9. At this point you can use a damp towel to clean the design area, just do not use alcohol. the vinyl will come up. I don't always do this step, it just depends on my mood.
10. Take contact paper, the same piece you just peeled off if you'd like. Tape all around the outer edges of the vinyl with the contact paper, you can use tape too. I just use the contact paper. Waste not, want not right?.ANY area that you don't want etched on accident, should be taped/covered. You can see that this Tardis has a good perimeter around it, I still put contact paper on the bottom.
11. Put the gloves on. Open the jar of Etching Cream. Stir it with the paint brush.

12. Dab a generous amount of cream over the design.
13. Wait 5 minutes.
14. After five minutes take your brush and move the cream around, making sure the whole surface is covered. Check the underside to see if you have good coverage.
14. Wait another 5 minutes, or ten...
15. Take your paint brush and scrape the excess etching cream off of the glass and put it back into the jar. Close it up for later use.
16. Wash the remaining etching cream off in the sink with cold water. Use the paint brush to loosen the cream if needed.
17. Remove vinyl and any tape and wash your jar well. The design will show up better once the glass is completely dry. Hot water makes removal of vinyl very easy.






Give Peas A Chance Glass Etching Tutorial

Materials-

1. Glass Etching Cream
2. Something to etch- I find that items with straight sides works best. Also it should be smooth on the surface where you are etching
3. Vinyl decal - I got these from a friend, just get the removable vinyl if you have a choice. 
4. Contact paper
5. Old hotel key, gift card or credit card
6. Paint brush
7. Alcohol wipe or alcohol and cotton swab
8. Scissors
9. Tweezers
10. Disposable gloves
11. Damp rag

*You may want to cover your work surface also, with some paper or work above the a sink, note that the etching cream works on CONTACT. So any drips or drops on glass and it's there for good. Read the bottle. Don't get  it on your skin. Safety first, you know the drill.

To etch your glass surface-

1. Take the tweezers and remove any area on your vinyl that you want to be etched. Any vinyl left on there will not come in contact with the cream. In this case, I left the panel's on the Tardis, but took off the window panels. Leave the backing ON the vinyl.

 Once you've removed the areas that you want etched just give it a once over to make sure you like where all the white areas are. Because that is is what will show up as etched. 

2. Take a piece of contact paper. Remove the backing and place it on top of the vinyl. Careful not to get air bubbles under it.

3. Take the gift card and smooth out the contact paper, rubbing over the small detail areas of your design. I had to do this where the black panels I left were. This is to make sure those details stick to the contact paper.

4. Clean the surface of the glass with the alcohol wipe. Let it dry. After this step be careful where you place your fingers/hands. You don't want the natural oils in your skin to leave prints where you etch your design.

5. Remove the backing from your vinyl. Leaving the design, and outline attached to the contact paper.

6. Place the contact paper with vinyl onto the glass surface. This needs to be a smooth application, any wrinkles or bubbles and etch cream will get under there. I find it easiest to place one side of the vinyl/contact paper down, and smooth the rest down with the gift card. 

7. Rub the gift card over the design to make sure that when you lift the contact paper off, the designs will stick to the glass. Make sure the application is smooth.

8. Carefully peel off the contact paper.

9. At this point you can use a damp towel to clean the design area, just do not use alcohol. the vinyl will come up. I don't always do this step, it just depends on my mood. 

10. Take contact paper, the same piece you just peeled off if you'd like. Tape all around the outer edges of the vinyl with the contact paper, you can use tape too. I just use the contact paper. Waste not, want not right?.ANY area that you don't want etched on accident, should be taped/covered. You can see that this Tardis has a good perimeter around it, I still put contact paper on the bottom.

11. Put the gloves on. Open the jar of Etching Cream. Stir it with the paint brush.

12. Dab a generous amount of cream over the design. 

13. Wait 5 minutes.

14. After five minutes take your brush and move the cream around, making sure the whole surface is covered. Check the underside to see if you have good coverage.

14. Wait another 5 minutes, or ten...

15. Take your paint brush and scrape the excess etching cream off of the glass and put it back into the jar. Close it up for later use.

16. Wash the remaining etching cream off in the sink with cold water. Use the paint brush to loosen the cream if needed.

17. Remove vinyl and any tape and wash your jar well. The design will show up better once the glass is completely dry. Hot water makes removal of vinyl very easy.

Free Friday- Game Night Tip

I posted this the other day on Facebook. It's a picture of Pixie and a broken brush with her UNO cards set in there since she has a hard time holding the cards. I thought it was a nice thing for her, I didn't think anyone else would care, but quite a few people though it was a neat thing to do. So I thought I would share it with you all in case you hand little ones who have a hard time holding cards during games, too. See? It's not just about food here on Give Peas A Chance :P 

American Girl Ice Cream Social- Birthday Party

I tell you. The girls strung the signs so that H that's so far away from the "appy" is kinda bugging me. Yes, I'm a firstborn. Sigh, not that it matters. I'm so glad the girls helped and had fun.

I know that today is technically Take It Tuesday, but I haven't packed but one lunch. School is starting though, like next week. I'll pack some then. Today I want to share Diva's American Girl Ice Cream Social birthday party. We love our parties here on Give Peas A Chance. She was allowed to invite just a handful of girls to join us for an afternoon of crafts, carousel rides, glitter tattoos, and ice cream social madness. I kid, it wasn't madness it was really fun! I can't believe I have a NINE year old though. I'm old. Happy Birthday sweet girl!! We're so blessed to have you in our lives.
This post is going to be picture heavy, so get ready for it.

Let's start with food. Really though, there wasn't food. Just ... sweets.

 I forgot the platter I was going to put her "cake" on... and the candles. Will I ever remember the candles? So Diva, just like Piglet, did the "pretend to blow out the candles" thing. Oh well. Anyway. The cake was three cupcakes, and a sugar cone that  I tacked down to the lid of ... I don't know what that lid is from? Anyway. I tacked down the sugar cone, and cupcakes with frosting. Put the cupcakes and cone on top of the frosting. Then I grabbed a jar of sprinkles and dumped it in there. (This party was not here at home, or I would have found a platter, I was improvising.)

 So we had vanilla ice cream. Just vanilla to keep it simple. 

Toppings and such 

Fruity Pebbles
Mini Chocolate Chips

Sprinkles of all sorts
Mini Oreos

Teddy Grahams
Cherries

Strawberries
Red Hots
Mini Biscotti
Magic Shell
Whipped cream

Sugar cones
Mike and Ikes
Marshmallows (both the Mike and Ikes and Marshmallows were for the favor bags too, I didn't want to take any sweets home with me)
I also avoided gummies, caramel, nuts, and stuff like that because of Diva's braces and allergies.

Dr. Seuss Party

I may have mentioned that it's birthday month around here. Or birthday season. As I'm sitting down to write this hurried post, I realized that all the posts I've had scheduled have already posted. That means I have nothing scheduled tomorrow, soooo I can sit down and procrastinate. I can put this post up real quick instead of making the banner for Diva's American Girl Ice Cream Social. Which is tomorrow.

I had a ton of fun putting this party together for Piglet. I found some printables on My Paper Lily. I made some labels, props, word bubbles in photoshop. I also had a ton of Seuss items from Target's 75% off $1 bin stuff. I have Seuss stuff coming out of my ears y'all.

 Piglet turned 7 in early July. WHaaattt?! Click that link. Seriously. And then just let it play a few times, then you'll know how I feel about birthday's this summer. Everyone is growing up too darn fast. I mean Pixie's going to school this year. Sure that means I'll get a "real" job and join the working world again but. She's my baby! Sigh.

Moving on. The room we had this party in is so TINY. Like 10x15 maybe? I mean for a party it was tiny. I just wasn't thinking we'd be IN the room. I figured we'd be out, riding the train, the carousel etc. I'm serious sometimes I wonder if I think things through, or if I just block stuff out. Regardless we did stay out of the room and we were able to just use it for food, and cooling down.

I didn't get good pictures, I was so rushed. We had 20 minutes to set up before the party. Then I was just busy. One of my favorite things was the photo booth pictures. I got such cute pictures of all the guests. I'm glad that Pixie was messing around and I got a picture to post so you at least get an idea of how the pictures turned out. No? Not really? Sorry. Just take my word for it. Cute.

I printed the props and laminated them. This is how I feel about my laminator-

Happy Birthday 'Arry... yer a wizard. Wand Tutorial.

For the complete tutorial (more detailed) see the original post on Give Peas A Chance HERE. These are so easy to make you can get them done in time for Harry's birthday on the 31st.

It's funny that I have a post for this, because while I am a nerd, we won't really be doing anything HP related. Maybe I'll have a Butterbeer Frappuccino? If I have one I'll post the picture below. Want one too? Head on over to your nearest Starbucks, ask for a

Breve coffee frapp with a shot of toffee nut and a shot of caramel syrup.

OK, you don't have to ask for it breve, but it's good.  Be sure to give them a good wizard name while you're at it.

These are Instagram photos.

Then you can come back here and thank me. 

Free Friday- Best Mother's Day Gift Ever

The new "Little Black Book".

**Another update!! I won the NerdWallet Contest for Best Overall entry! I was so surprised! Go check out the other amazing entries. Check out the write up Nerd Wallet.
**It's not Friday, but I just didn't want to wait to post this, just in case you want to run out and get a book of your own ;) **
It's almost Mother's day. I wanted to share with you all the best gift ever. See that black book up there? It's a little worn looking. But, that's it. The best gift ever I mean. I know it doesn't look like much, but didn't your mother teach you not to judge a book by it's cover? ;)

Let me tell you about this book. About how a black,  9x13 inch (ish), less than $15, blank book could be the best gift ever. I haven't had this book for long, since about 2011. But every holiday, birthday, or anytime my girls want to get me a gift they use this book. They draw pictures, write letters or poetry for me. They fill the blank pages with their artwork and thoughts. I get to see their writing improve, their pictures get more detail.  I get to look back and see what they are "into" at the moment. Princess flying unicorns, snakes, peacocks, and more. On some pages the girls have just traced their hands. At the beginning  my oldest girl had to help my youngest by writing her name and date for her. Now my youngest can write her own name. *sniff*

I love my book. It's very special to me. When it's full, I'll add another. It's perfect, there's no wondering what to get mom, there's no need to spend money on trinkets. There's no cards and papers scattered all over the place.

May The Fourth Be With You... (Star Wars Nerdiness)

ANNNND I didn't even get a post up for today. I had meant to but I never got around to it so here is a quick post before "soccer Saturday" starts around here. It's May 4th, I had been thinking about it since April! Yes. I am a nerd. Yes I do have a Star Wars shirt on right now.

Anyway, thank goodness for late games this weekend.

Above is a Sugga Sugga cookie, as are the ones below. BEST Sugar Cookie Recipe EVER. I don't use any other recipe here on Give Peas A Chance.

Here are a couple of recent lunches, you can find more here.