"Hawaiian" Chicken in a crock pot.

Well, I fell on the "Hawaiian Chicken in a Crockpot" bandwagon. Everyone on pinterest seems to be doing it. It's simple and cheap, so why not? Before I go on, let me add that I can't believe I am sharing crock pot recipes, I am officially a MOM. I have a dust buster too....and I just cut my hair short....and I drive a Chevy Tahoe...alright, enough stereotyping.

Ingredients:
4-6 frozen chicken breasts (I prefer thighs, but I did use breasts)
1-bottle Archer Hawaiian BBQ sauce
1-20oz can crushed or diced pineapple (drained)

Dump it all in your crock pot. Cook for 6 hours on LOW. In the last 10 mins, shred the chicken with a fork so it can really absorb all the flavors. That's all folks.

I served mine on top of brown rice with a salad on the side.

It was good, not great. Not sure what all the hype is about on pinterest. The chicken tasted like dark meat, it was so tender and juicy, but the sauce lacked something. It was sweet and that's it. No spice, no smokiness, no real defined flavor. If you decide that you MUST try this, than add some flavor to it. Maybe some cayenne or ginger. Or, if you have simple palate, then this just might be the recipe for you! 

Stenciling

I discovered how easy stenciling was when I was decorating my daughters nursery. I wanted to put something pretty on the wall above her crib, but I was too scared to hang anything in the event it might fall on her while she slept. I know, I'm super paranoid. So, I looked around and found wall decals, and stencils. I've heard that wall decals come off the wall easily, especially if your wall is textured, so stenciling was the obvious choice.

After shopping around, etsy once again came to the rescue. I found these awesome lotus stencils.

I ordered the medium size, got it in the mail a few days later, and went to town! It was stressful at first, making sure the paint didn't run out of the lines. But, in the end, it came out really beautiful, both times! Since we just moved, I used the stencil for her new room too!

Here are some tips:

1). The instructions say to use a roller brush, but the guy at Lowes suggested a ponce brush. That way you can literally "pounce" it on. It was only $7 so I gave it a shot. I'm glad I did, it made the job so much easier.

2). It's hard to get the stencil to lay flat against the wall. So, along with double-side taping it in various places, I held down each section with my hand as I painted it.

3). Don't put too much paint on your pounce brush, it can cause bleeding. This happened to me the second time I did it. At first it bugged the crap out of me and I had plans to fix it with a tiny artist brush, but realized you couldn't notice the imperfections from far away, so I left it.

Wa-la! Your stenciling is complete, and your room looks fabulous! If it doesn't just paint right over it, and start again!

Bioluminescent Bay, P.R....Go here A.S.A.P!

Glow while you float, or float while you glow!
Whatever, just do it!!
It's the craziest, coolest thing ever.
It's cheap to fly to PR, and travelling around is easy breezy.
Plus, PR has some of the most beautiful beaches in the WORLD!
Okay, have a safe flight.

I did not take this photo. Frank Borges did. 

This is not me, but I'm sure this is what I looked like.

The best place to swim/kayak with the bioluminescent, is at Mosquito Bay on Vieques Island, P.R. due to it's high concentration of these tiny little organisms. Click here for more info.

For more Puerto Rico pics, click here.

Wanna see a Favela? As in, a slum, in Rio?

Now you can! I was in Brazil a couple of years ago, and this American dude, who had lived in Brazil all his life, was offering tours of Rochina, a favela in Brazil. I couldn't believe it. The only thing I knew about favelas was what I had seen in the movie "City of God." The movie was named after an actual favela in Brazil, the rival favela of Rochina! So, when a lad at my hostel asked me if I wanted to tour the favela on my birthday, the obvious answer was, "hells yes!"

The slums were exactly how I pictured them to be, dirty, smelly, and dangerous. Yes, there were young men walking around with pistols in their pants. Yes, everything was stolen, including their electricity. Yes, it was scary, and intriguing, and WAY better than seeing Cristo Redentor!

If you want to see more pictures of the favela, Rochina, or my time in Brazil, click here!

Fia and the Cookie Monster!

I haven't yet had professional pictures taken of Fia, but I have this, and this just rocks. Makes up for all the money I haven't spent on photos!

Wish I could say I just happend to "capture" this photo, but it was staged, and took me numerous shoots with my Canon Rebel! 

DIY Christmas Cards 2011

I love how our Christmas cards came out this year. They look so professional, even though they are so not! After looking through pinterest for ideas, I decided I wanted to do black and white with red highlights. This is what I came up with.

We took our Canon Rebel XSi with our 50mm lens to Town Lake, and started playing around with the setting and lighting. Once I liked what I saw, I asked someone walking by to take this picture of us.

I took the picture home, cropped it, turned it into black and white, and then sent it to my friend who highlighted the bow with saturation in Photoshop. I then added the template on Costco.com, and wa-la, super duper cheap, yet professional looking Christmas cards! 

Whole Wheat Blueberry Pancakes, with Almond Milk!

My fiance made these for me a couple of months ago. They were freakin' delicious and totally reaffirmed why I said yes when he asked me to marry him. If you don't feel like mixing, you can buy the pre-packed whole wheat mix, just use almond milk instead of whole milk.

We use a cast iron griddle to make our pancakes, but of course, you can do it on a stove top skillet as well. We had bananas and organic blackberries laying around, so he threw those on top. And of course the syrup, we like the all-natural kind without the high-fructose-corn-syrup. Target sells the "Archer" brand for cheap, seems to be expensive everywhere else. Enjoy!

• 1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 egg
• 1 cup almond milk
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon agave nectar
• 1/2 cup organic blueberries

Blue Quinoa baby food

I found this recipe at Wholesome Baby Food but made some modifications to it. It turned out great, and it's super nutritious for babies. Well, for anyone really!

Ingredients:

-One pint organic blueberries, make sure to use organic as blueberries are a dirty dozen.

-One large sweet potato, potatoes are a dirty dozen, but sweet potatoes are not.

-One cup quinoa

1). First, I brought my quinoa to a boil in 2 cups of water then covered and simmered for about 10 minutes. Like rice, quinoa is done when all the water is absorbed. Set aside.

2). Then I washed, peeled and chopped my sweet potatoes. They cook faster as chunks, and it's best to discard the peel before cooking since you will be using the water you boiled them in for the puree. Boil potatoes in pot for 10 minutes or until you can pierce through with a fork. Do not drain. Keep water.

3). There are several ways to soften blueberries. First pick through to remove all stems, then either simmer them, or put in a glass bowl in microwave for 15 seconds. I used the microwave because it's fast, and with a 7 1/2 month old baby, you ain't got much time!

4). Put cooked sweet potatoes, blueberries and about 1/2 cup of the water you used to boil the sweet potatoes in, in a Baby Bullet or blender. If you don't have a Baby Bullet, get one, it rocks. Puree to desired thickness, adding more water as you need.

I then poured this deliciousness into my Baby Bullet storage containers (which have date dials on the lids for freshness), and the remainder into the freezer containers. Remember, baby food is good in the fridge for 3 days, and freezer for 3 months!

WE ARE NOT DONE YET!!!

Remember that yummy quinoa??!! Well, I put it in a freezer bag and stuck it in the fridge. Like this...

So, all I have to do when Fia is ready to eat, is pull out one of my Baby Bullet containers and top it with some quinoa! Also, keeping your quinoa separate allows you to add it to whatever you are feeding her/him, not just the blueberry, sweet potato puree. Genius, simply genius, if I do say so myself;)

UPDATE: So, this might be TMI, but Fia was pooping out quinoa, in it's full form. Like, it looked like it did when it went in her mouth! So, worried she wasn't getting the nutrients out of it that she needed, tonight I milled the quinoa before boiling it. I milled 1/4 cup and boiled, while constantly whisking in 1 cup water. Looks like baby cereal. I will add this to her meals instead, and hopefully she will reap the benefits.

Quinoa, the Peruvian super food

I've always loved quinoa, but it wasn't until my trip to Peru in 2009 that I realized I couldn't live without it. Packed with amino acids, iron, fiber, magnesium, and with a protein content of 18%, it almost seems silly not to make it part of my daily life! It's a great, nutritional alternative to rice as well, although there are some things that just taste better with rice!

I buy my quinoa at Costco. Not only is it super cheap, $7 for a big bag, but it's also organic. It's not on the dirty dozen list, but if you can buy organic for the same price as conventional, then why not? This is what it looks like, just in case you find yourself looking for it...

So now that my daughter is almost 8 months, I've decided to include it in her diet too. I make a cup, which yields about 4-5 cups once cooked, put it in a zip lock bag in the fridge, and add it to whatever I'm feeding her that day. So far she loves it. 

Cooking quinoa:

Add 1 cup quinoa and 2 cups water to a small pot. Once boiling, cover and simmer for 10 minutes, or when all the water is absorbed. It's a good idea to stir it every couple of minutes. 

Quinoa Recipes:

Blue Quinoa

Kale Chips

I'm sure y'all have heard all about them by now, but have you mastered them yet? Believe or not, these easy, nutritional snacks are hard to perfect. You need just the right amount of cook time to get the perfect crunchiness! After several trials and errors, I think I've got it down.

-First start with a bunch of organic kale. Don't forget to buy organic, kale is listed as one of the "dirty dozens."

-Wash, chop and dry the kale thoroughly. Wet kale causes uneven cooking.

-Lay kale on cookie sheet and sprinkle with sea salt and olive oil. I then like to toss the kale to make sure each piece gets coated.

-Place in preheated oven at 400 degrees for 10-15 minutes. I've found that 11 minutes works best in my gas oven. Check it frequently, it cooks fast. When the edges of the kale are brown, your kale chips are ready! They should be crunchy, if they are soggy, they were either not dry enough or over seasoned with oil.

When done right, they taste like potato chips and are impossible to stop eating once you start! Get creative and use other seasonings if you like. I think something spicy on them would be delicious. Next time, I might use sesame oil instead of olive oil to add an Asian flare!