I've been French Fried...

My little Wee Man woke up this morning not looking or feeling the best.  He kind of looked like this:

At first, I thought he was getting pink eye, cause that's been making it's round in our house, but no it's not.  It's just a good old fashion cold and he is teething (molars).  Wow I feel like I dodged a bullet!  But I had to laugh, I gave him some pain relief and he wanted to use it as a spoon for his cereal.  Oh to be creative like that!

On a completely different note, I made french fries last night.  Homemade french fries that I found on....well lets just say you know where I found them!  This lovely lady gave some wonderful directions but I did them a little bit different...not much but a little. 

When making food for your family, you want to have fun with it and make it from your heart.  Your family will tell if you liked what you made or if you didn't like what you made.  You don't want to want them to turn on you and get this:

MAD FACES

(Matt didn't want to play so he sat in the background...and Nick was mad the wrong way...Actors, huh!)

Or this:

SAD FACES:

Then they won't want to eat and then they will depressed and then they will starve and then the school will notice and then....well we don't want to see any of this do we...

So, these French Fries that I found magically are called Oven Baked Parmesan Seasoned Fries.  And I found they are on this website, http://playwithsugar.blogspot.com.   And they are to die for!


Oven Baked Parmesan Seasoned Fries my way:

Seasoning:
Olive Oil drizzled on top bout 1 to 2 T.(meaning eye ball...but be careful to add to much it will get greasy)
 4 T. Parmesan Cheese (Grated kind)
3/4 tsp. Old Bay Seasoning (never heard of it until now and love it!)
1/2 tsp. Garlic Powder
1/4 tsp. Dried Rosemary
1/2 tsp. Dried Thyme (always in my cupboard)
1/2 tsp. Marjoram (only cause I ran out of Oregano...but other than that I would have used Oregano...but this tasted soooo good!  Could also use Italian Seasoning just make sure it's a 1/2 tsp.)
1/8 tsp. Ground Red Pepper (Cayenne)


Preheat oven 425 degrees.

 1.) Take 5 washed medium russet potatoes and peal the potatoes.  I like to have a grocery sack right besides me when I do this so I can just throw it away. 

2.) Take your potatoes after you peel them and cut them.  I like mine thin but you can do them however thick you want them to be.

3.)  Then slice them again to make them look like fries.  Again I like them thin.  You make them as thin as you want.

4.) Here is where I did something different than her.  I like to soak my potatoes.  I don't know why I do this, I think because somewhere along the lines of my life I heard on Food Network that you should soak your fries, so I am.  Another reason is because of the next picture.

Look how dirty this water is.  The longer you soak them the better.  I wished I soaked them longer.  You can certainly skip the step of soaking.  It is not necessary, just something I do. 

5.)  After you take them out of the water bath place them a large towel and dry them.  Make sure you dry them completely.  Again, wish I would have dried them more last night.  But they were still very good!

6.)  For this step I forgot to take a picture of, but while the fries are drying you can mix up the seasoning.  Again this is part is a little different from her blog because, I don't know, it's how I was feeling last night.

7.) Her idea is to toss them in a big Ziploc bag and put on a greased pan.  I would have done this too if I had a big Ziploc bag.  I would have done it if I had a sandwich size Ziploc bag.  But I didn't.  I just drizzled olive oil on the fries, then sprinkled the seasoning on top and tossed with my hands.  I did use tin foil because my cookie sheets don't look the best and because I don't have parchment paper (recommended) Grease it down either way before you add your fries to the cookie sheet.

Place them in the oven at 425* for about 30 minutes.  Toss them around half way through.  And then after the 30 minutes are up turn off your oven and cook for another 10 to 15 minutes. 

When they are done they will look like this!  I do like it more crispy this is where I think if I would have soaked it longer and dried them longer would have helped.  Any who, they were to die for and the kids greeted me with this:

Happy Faces!

 Sign of Success!

And the pan greeted me with this:

I hope I got everything...let me know if you got any questions!

Happy Baking!!!

Lisa

  

Dishes...Check...Kids Alive...Check!

I will start with just a few things:

1.  It is hard to discipline your oldest when you turn around and your youngest child has his arms crossed and is mimicking you.

2.  It is hard to keep a straight face when in the morning, you wake your daughter and asks to sleep in and says she doesn't like school but doesn't like winter or snow days or hot days or her feet, or short hair, or long hair, or a paper cut, or a booger flake, or thinks a lady bug is her pet.

and 3. I laughed so hard that I had tears in my eyes at my husband when he stubbed his toe on our foot board and acted like he got shot in the back almost 7 years ago.  I still laugh hard about it.  I'm laughing now about it.

I don't know if I have mentioned lately, but I have spent sometime on pinterest.  Okay fine, Mike is thinking about sending me to PA (Pinterest Anonymous), it's gotten that bad.  But really there have been some really great finds on there.  Like my Laundry sign I wrote about this last Tuesday. And now my latest a check list that I got from a website that I can't remember but she first got from this wonder of a woman. She goes by, http://simplemom.net/tools/downloads/ .  And like the second mom who saw these wonders, I redid them to fit my way of life.  I got onto Microsoft Word and fooled around and made these babies:

Sorry for the pictures...I'm new at this and can't figure out how to put my file on here.  Any suggestions to give me, let me know. 

 Anyways.  There are 3 papers that I got my husband (the miracle worker) to laminate and I got a expo marker with spray...it just doesn't work without the spray.  It is a daily, weekly, and monthly checklist.  A basic brake down of what to do in one month.  For my brain to work, I need the basic day to day stuff that can come easy and natural for most people, broken down in the most simplest way so that I don't get overwhelmed that I shutdown.  This is not good for my family.  I will sit in the corner and just stare in space and say " bubb bubb bubb buubb."  I play a young Goldie Hawn in Overboard. It has everything from the days schedule to 1/2 year's cleaning chart.  Whats for supper tonight to did I drink enough water?  I started them yesterday and I love them.  My next project is a laminated Menu planner.  Hope that works.

  I'll leave you with this,

Does this not just scream "I just got caught!"

If I can do it, You can do it too Tuesday…

These last couple of weeks have been tough on the Frangenberg household.  With me being unable to do so much, I spend way to much time on the computer and the doctor has told me I need find ways to reduce stress.  Fine if I didn’t have 4 kids and these are not just any kids, but they are 4 of Mike and Lisa kids.  Tornado’s.  I think I’ve mentioned this before.  So, sometime before I was told to reduce stress, Pinterest entered my life and I’ve never been the same.  I’ve turned into a pinning maniac.  But I thought I would show that I’m doing what I’m pinning and how I do it.  I follow directions but I don’t follow directions.  You follow?  Good!  My first projects were food.  I didn’t take pictures, but they were good!  Last night we had bacon wrapped jalapeño cheddar brats with caramelized onion and peppers on top. My life was never the same. Things hurt today, but it was worth it.  It was so good!   Along with the food, Mike built me a little work area for my wood working and sewing stuff.

Here’s my work station.  Don’t be afraid to use scraps or other peoples left over’s, people.  Mike got the benches from work that couldn’t be used and were going to be thrown away.  The other wood was from our walls in the basement that we are redoing anyways.  So it worked.  I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS AREA!

 

 

My first project that I did on pinterest I got from

 www.ana-white.com

Love this site by the way…

It’s a sign that didn’t take me all that long and I found some really good deals around town that allowed me to finish it.  And lucky my wonderful husband Mike had some tools on hand.

So it started like this.  I got a pallet….Okay Mike got the pallet from work, but what does it matter.  Okay he’s great!  I get it!

He also got me a hand sander while we are at praising Mike, it was on sale (I’m helping him go Dutch..I’m Dutch…so this is a good thing!)  It worked great!

Back to this…I got pallets.  He gave me a handy tool that I don’t have a picture of and don’t know the name of but I will in the future.  It was great.  I supplied a hammer.  Yes me.  I got tool kit for a graduation gift over 10 years ago and it was one of the best gifts I got.  I , me, all by myself, tore apart the pallet and it was wonderful.

**side note on this…wear ear plugs.  I couldn’t hear for a day.  It was good and bad..good cause I couldn’t really hear kids fighting and bad cause my ears rang.

It felt great, taking out anger on this poor pallet.  When I got done I found the piece I wanted and went to town

 

 This is what we call a redneck painting stand. I used Black spray paint that you can buy at Wally World or pretty much anywhere.  I got mine at a local hardware store.

 

 

 

 

 

Spray paint one good coat over one side of the board and along the sides.  And it looks like this when its done. Let it dry quick, it doesn’t take long.

 

 

 

 

I then got some Valspar Antique White Eggshell at the same hardware store.  And painted 2 coats over the board and it looked like this:

 

Again this is a redneck paint stand.  I like to use my imagination and local products. This one in particular is Pizza Ranch..I believe it was Pepperoni and Cheese.  Go crazy!

 

 

I went to my computer and printed out the words Laundry in the font of Times New Roman, to fit my board.  Cut out the letters and traced them on the board.

I made a little mistake on the “N.”  Don’t look, okay look.  I traced it upside down.  I fixed it and I was nervous that it was going to show in the end.  See if you can see at the end.

 

 

Next I took black craft paint that we’ve had in the house for almost 2 years and painted in the letters.

This is what it looked when done painting the letters.  I was happy but then I got to use power tools.  I felt the inner me roar….

 

 

 

The end result looked like this:

I am going to hang it above my laundry door using pop can tabs as holders. We’ll see if this works!  I did this all because a girl feel in love with pinterest.  I think it turned out good.  Now you go make one!