Chocolate Chip Quinoa Muffins

We love these muffins!

 

 Chocolate Chip Quinoa Muffins

• 1 cup quinoa, rinsed
• 2 cup water
• 1/4 cup applesauce
• 2 cups flour
• 1/2 cup brown sugar packed
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup chocolate chips
• 3/4 cup rice milk
• 1 egg substitute
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium saucepan, bring quinoa and water to a boil. Reduce to a simmer; cover, and cook until water has been absorbed and quinoa is tender, 11 to 13 minutes.  It works best to let the quinoa cool, so it doesn't melt the chocolate chips.
2. Oil muffin tin (we like to make mini muffins).  In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, chocolate chips, and cooked quinoa (double the amount of uncooked, so 2 cups if you cooked 1 cup); reserve any leftover quinoa for another use.
3. In a small bowl, whisk together applesauce, milk, egg, and vanilla. Add milk mixture to flour mixture, and stir just until combined; divide batter among prepared muffin cups.
4. Bake at 350 25 to 30 minutes. Cool muffins in pan, 5 minutes; transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
   

They do have brown sugar and chocolate chips, but the quinoa makes them not so bad, right?

Our New "Schedule" and Kitchen Fun

Today we start our new schedule/guide/plan, whatever you want to call it.  I typed it up and hung it in the kitchen, so the girls would know what we were doing.

* Monday- Make Something Monday- I pinned this pretzel recipe on Pinterest the other day and I thought it would be fun to try.

* Tuesday- Thinking Tuesday (I know it sounds much better-Thinking Thursday, but I go to the midwife on Thursday this week, so I had to switch these two.)  I thought we could set some goals or brainstorm things the girls are interested in.  This way when we go to the library I can suggest books or they might want to start some sort of project that we can work on together.

* Wednesday- Work in Progress Wednesday- I plan to help Lyric update her blog and continue sewing Story's stuffed animal.  Also, if anyone is interested in starting a project we can do that.

* Thursday- Take a trip Thursday- We will spend most of the day going to the midwife.  We are finally going to get to hear the baby's heart beat, so it should be a fun morning!

* Friday- Fresh and Fun Friday- Valentine Craft- Simple Window Design.

So, yesterday I posted the plan for the week.  The girls asked what it was and I explained it.  This morning they were all in their room playing after breakfast and I asked if anyone was interested in making pretzels or if they wanted to wait until later.

Cadence and Story jumped at the idea, but Lyric decided to go outside instead.

We watched a video from the blog and then made the dough.

It had to rise for 30 minutes, so they ran off to play while I did the dishes.

I also went outside to see what Lyric was up to.  She was busy in the mudpie kitchen.

After our dough had risen, the girls came back to the kitchen to make the pretzels.  Lyric decided to join us, too.

The weren't really interested in making traditional pretzel shapes, so we had some pretty interesting looking pretzels!

Lyric was too busy playing Webkinz to try them when they were done, but Cadence and Story thought they were pretty good!

After I cleaned up our pretzel mess Story came back to the kitchen to help me make cornbread for lunch.  She really wants an American Girl doll and  is into anything American Girl.  She checked out an Addy (her favorite) American Girl cookbook from the library and wanted to try the cornbread. 

 Devon made a pot of beans yesterday, so I thought it would make a good lunch.

We had a busy morning in the kitchen!

Trying Something New

Lately I have been feeling like I need a little more structure in our lives.  With me working in the afternoons, I feel like some days the girls are busy doing their thing and I'm doing my thing and we aren't really connecting.  I need a little more structure.  I discovered this schedule on Pinterest and I decided I would modify it to fit out needs.

She used this for the summer, but I thought with a little tweaking I could make it work for me.  Here is what I came up with:

* Make Something Monday- I plan to do a cooking or craft project on these days.

* Take a trip Tuesday- We will go to the library, zoo, shopping...

* Work in Progress Wednesday- We can work on ongoing projects this day.  Lyric has her blog that we rarely update, Story and I have been working on sewing a stuffed animal or the girls can start a project that they want to continue over time.

* Thinking Thursday- Research, science experiments, basically anything the girls want to work on

* Fresh and Fun Friday- I will plan for us to do something from Pinterest.  I have tons of pins that I would love for us to try

Of course, these are not the only things I will be doing on a daily basis with the girls, this list is just to give me some sort of plan.  I also, do not plan to force anyone to do anything on the list.  If I pick something for us to do and the girls don't want to do it they won't have to do it.  

I plan to start this tomorrow, so we'll see how it goes:-)

Little Chef

Cadence was helping me peel potatoes tonight, but soon decided it was too hard for her.  She asked if she could make a fruit salad because, "I'm really good at cutting fruit and Lyric even taught me to cut the leaves off of strawberries!"

She got the fruit out that she wanted in her salad- an apple, a banana, strawberries, blueberries and blackberries.  Daddy washed it for her and she got to work.   I used the apple slicer for her, but she did everything else.

 One proud little girl and a yummy fruit salad!

Pogo Sticking

The girls have been practicing with the pogo stick quite a bit lately.  Today when Story came running in the house saying she hit a new record-90, it made my heart smile.  I don't think I have told the pogo stick story here on the blog before, but if I have-here it is again.

Christmas 2010, right after the transplant, Story REALLY wanted a pogo stick for Christmas!  Devon said, "Absolutely not!"  She still had the tubes sticking out of her chest and he thought it was too risky!  I disagreed and said we should ask the doctor if he thought it was okay.  So, at Story's next clinic appointment we asked her doctor his thoughts.  He said it would be fine, but she needed to have at least 50,000 platelets before she could use it.  At the time of us asking I think she had around 10,000.  Well, that Christmas Grammy bought her a pogo stick.  The big question every time we went to clinic was "How many platelets do I have today?"  Months and months went by without enough platelets, but finally one day we went in she had reached the magic number, 50,000.

She was so excited she could finally try out her pogo stick.  We got home and I held it up for her, she climbed on and quickly discovered she didn't weigh enough to make it bounce.  Poor baby had waited all that time on her platelets, but she was too skinny for it:-(  We laugh about it now, but she was pretty disappointed at the time!

Luckily today we don't have to worry about platelets and she weighs enough to make it bounce!

Enjoy the video, hopefully Lyric's filming doesn't make you too dizzy!

 

Afternoon at the Park

I took Lyric and Story to the park this afternoon.  Cadence was too busy watching the new Scooby Doo movie the girls checked out from the library, so she stayed home with Daddy.

 

History Club

Today was the first day of History Club for the new year.  Cadence has decided to give it another try.  The girls all looked so cute this morning.

Little Chef Lyric

Lyric made her own breakfast this morning.

She had apples, blackberries and scrambled eggs.

I love the way she set the table with her cloth napkin and fork, but she didn't bother to clean the stuff off of it;-)

Story's Letter to the Tooth Fairy

Story lost another tooth today.  Devon helped her write a letter to the Tooth Fairy.

Dear Tooth Fairy,

I would like you to bring me money or a present just like you did for my little sister.  Please do not take my tooth.

Love,

Story

 On the back of the letter was this:

P.S. Bring something for my sister Lyric too.

Love,

Story

No, this is not Story's writing and no, she did not write it.  Her clever big sister was trying to get in on the loot:-)

Happy Anniversary

Happy Anniversary to the best husband and daddy!

Lots of people thought those two "kids"were crazy for getting married so young after being together for only a year.  Which was probably pretty true, but it's been the best 14 years I could have asked for.