• These kid-approved Zucchini Fritters are perfect for those times when you have way too much Zucchini on your hands!
    Breakfast,  Dinner,  Garden,  Lunch,  Recipes

    Zucchini Fritters

    My kids can always tell when I’ve added zucchini into a recipe! No matter how sly I think I am, they know! Sometimes a recipe comes along and there is just no hiding the zucchini. This recipe for zucchini fritters is just such a recipe, but once they taste the zucchini fritters, they happily clean their plates…sometimes they even ask for seconds!

  • road trip essentials
    Desert Southwest,  Great American Road Trip,  Quick Tips,  Summer,  Travel

    Top 10 Things to Bring on a SW Desert Road Trip

    Little Essentials to Make Your Road Trip to the Desert States More Enjoyable Prior to our recent road trip, I tried to be mindful of all the things that might come in handy for my family who would be spending a large amount of time in a very dry environment. I kept watching the forecast to see the temps for the Las Vegas, NV and St George, UT areas and they were both consistently over 100 degrees for days on end. The average temps were around 106 degrees. As a native Oregonian, our summers are very comfortable, usually in the mid 80’s. We typically top out at 100 degrees, but it only…

  • Birthday,  Celebrations,  Summer

    Surf’s Up Dude! — The Perfect Summer Party for the Surfing Enthusiast

    That moment when you overhear one of the party guests tell his mom “Can I stay longer, I’m having the time of my life!!” Three hours into the party, I was feeling pretty tired and just as I was starting to lose steam, his comment was just the thing I needed to hear to let me know it was all worth it! This Surfing Party was a fun theme for my son who just discovered surfing during our spring break trip to the North Shore of Oahu, HI. What a fun adventure! I couldn’t believe my eyes when my little nine-year-old boy got up on his first try. It was…

  • Celebrations,  Summer

    Beachy Graduation Party

    8th Grade Promotion Luncheon Just days ago my baby girl had her 8th grade promotion ceremony and is now moving on to high school in just a few months! This calls for a celebration! For her luncheon, we decided on a soup bar. I served salmon chowder and French onion soup with crusty bread sticks, croissants, spinach artichoke spread, shrimp and krab. About a month ago, I found these cute seafood forks at Tuesday Morning. It’s not entirely clear in the photo, but they have a crab at the top. I thought they were perfect for serving up the krab. Here is my trusty tiered server that I use for…

  • Dinner,  Paleo

    From Scratch Marinara Sauce

    Tomatoes are being harvested faster than I can use them up. My refrigerator was stocked with my homemade salsa and I needed another way to make use of the abundance of tomatoes coming my way, so I went looking for an easy marinara  sauce. While I pride myself on cooking from scratch, the one thing I never really tried to make from scratch was pasta sauce. The stuff you buy at the store tastes fine enough and if you read your labels, you can find pre-made organic sauce without sugar or or other unwanted ingredients. It worked for me, but last year I tried making my first ever attempt at…