A look inside my kitchen

Is it normal to have a song come to mind when you think of your kitchen? I'll pretend you said yes...Does "Broken Road" ring a bell to you? Well, that's how I feel when I look around! There were a lot of "broken roads" aka F'd up kitchens in my life before this one. It's not just any kitchen. It's the kitchen I've been waiting for, it's the kitchen my husband so lovingly made sure was perfect when we remodeled our new home. This room is where the magic happens! I love to cook and a great kitchen inspires me to create some great meals for my family and friends. It's not a huge space or gourmet chef's dream, but it is my happy place. When we bought our house this room was pretty closed off and dark. Kevin let me take over with the design, we even had a wall taken down to make sure my dream vision came to life in here. We updated everything in my path! The cabinets are white, counters a beautiful quartz that sparkle like a diamond! The best part was when he had a gas line installed for my new range, with a double oven!

My kids think I'm crazy because I am constantly wiping the counters and gray subway tile down. In my defense, I did a lot of crazy things long before this kitchen came into my life! That's another post for another time though...

I find myself excited to cook again! One thing I didn't take the time to do over these last few months was to plan meals out for the week. During my most recent pregnancy I couldn't stand to look at raw food, or the awful kitchen of our rental. Cooking became a chore, which for me was frustrating. So imagine my excitement when I remembered pan sauce while I planned this week's menu!

This is something so easy to make, but my husband and oldest daughter usually think I'm pretty bad-ass when I do it. Tonight I'm using boneless chicken thighs, because that was what I had in my freezer. After they thawed I put them in a storage bag with olive oil and sea salt & fresh pepper, and then back to the fridge until it was time to cook. That step was done in the morning. Once it was time to cook them, I just warmed my pan on med-high heat with a bit more EVOO. Now the chicken goes in. It needs to brown on each side for a few minutes, how fast it cooks depends on the type and size of meat. I like to check the temperature of the chicken with a meat thermometer, boneless chicken should be at least 165 and juices will run clear. Now for the fun part! Remove the chicken from the pan and keep it warm. For the sauce you can use a dry white wine, I prefer to use chicken broth. I like to grate some garlic into the broth, I'm using 2 cloves. With the pan still hot, pour in about a cup of broth and scrape the bits off the bottom of the pan. Squeeze in the juice of a lemon, stir it in and let it simmer. Once it looks well combined, about 2-3 minutes, add some butter. Let the butter melt and carefully add your chicken back to the pan. Let your sauce reduce a bit, it will give it a great consistency. Now just turn the burner down to simmer and make sure the chicken is fully cooked and coated in sauce. It's time to eat!

This dish was delicious! I served mine with some roasted red skinned potatoes and steamed broccoli. I am just a home cook, my recipes are not at all professional. I just enjoy cooking with fresh ingredients and trying new ways to do that. I often find a generic recipe and/or method and tweak a few things to make it my own. I allow myself to just have fun with cooking!

What I used:
1-2 pounds of boneless chicken thighs
3 tbsp EVOO (2 in the bag, 1 for the pan)
salt & pepper to taste
1 lemon (use half if you like less citrus)
2 garlic cloves (or to taste)
1-1.5 cups chicken broth
2 tbsp of butter
*most of my measurements are to my desired taste or consistency. again, I'm not a chef:)


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My weekend

After a very long, overwhelming week it was nice to finally greet the weekend. My husband surprised me with staying home Friday! We had lunch and did some grocery shopping, the usual fun stuff we enjoy doing these days. Since I'm new to this blogging stuff I stayed up a bit late moving things around, and we had quite the struggle getting a few kids to calm down. I don't know what you like to do to unwind, but I love to do my nails! Let me tell you, I really needed to unwind. So, at midnight I poured a glass of wine and did a fresh gel manicure. It was glorious!! Check them out! Not bad for being exhausted and uptight, huh?

I was looking forward to waking up to the smell of homemade sausage gravy and biscuits, just like my mom always made me after a long week. Here's the issue, I'm a big girl now and Mommy lives an hour away. It's a good thing I actually like to cook because I whipped up breakfast for the family quickly so we could get outside. The weather here in Michigan is finally getting warmer! The kids and dogs needed to burn some energy, and I needed some down time to just look around. It's funny, all week long I wait for Kevin (my husband) to be home so I can fit in some time for myself and get some work done. Then a sunny saturday shows up and I can't seem to stop watching my family run around, laughing and enjoying each other. I sat there for a while and reflected on the week I just had, because after all, "I" had a long week. I realized that when I am having a bad week, chances are it's because somebody else here is having a hard time. I struggle to keep calm in a complicated situation, I'm easily overwhelmed. Life with a big family is very rarely underwhelming, especially when everybody has a very different personality. I'd like to think I have a good handle on our life 24/7, and I probably do more often than I give myself credit for. It's the weeks like this that really test my skills as a mom, a "special needs" to be more specific. Our oldest son is severely multiply impaired, which means quite often he is probably feeling the overwhelming challenge of life as a teenage boy. He too had a rough week, and we all reacted to it. As a family we tend to play off of what everyone is feeling in the moment. There were a lot of stressful moments over the week that carried into the weekend, but there were also a lot of great moments too. We got through it and we chose to enjoy our time together! Dinner here brings us together to remind us that we are a family, even if we don't like the chaos that took over. Cooking is something we all like to do, even the toddler gets in on the action! We made a great dinner together and ate outside. I didn't get any work done, but I got what I needed. Family time, fresh air and a chance to start a new week! Here's to hoping this week brings more smiles and less stress!

I'm looking forward to getting my work done for my Jamberry event next weekend! I'm also working on the last session of potty training for my little guy. You know, the part where you don't have to chase them around frantically asking if they need to go again... He's yelling for me now!! Have a great Monday!

Let me introduce myself...

So, I decided to start a blog! I’ve been tossing the idea around for quite some time now and figured I should just get it going! Stay at home Mom is my “official” title if you ask the world, but I am pretty sure that title doesn’t really tell you who I am. Which brings me to the reason I’m starting this next adventure in my life!

I started my adult life as a paraprofessional at a school for children with Autism and other special needs, I left my job of 7 years to go to cosmetology school. I earned my license and worked at a few salons. Shortly after that my husband and I decided we wanted to add more kids to our blended family. That brought us to where I am today, a stay at home mom! This was an exciting time for me, I was looking forward to this SAHM experience. I did still love everything about the beauty industry, so I became an independent consultant for Jamberry nails.

But wait, there’s more! I have so many things on my “love to do” list that it was hard to decide what I would focus on for my blog. That’s why I decided to write about a little of everything! I would love to let you in on how I manage to stay calm, cool and collected while I care for my 5 kids, 2 dogs, a house, my husband and sometimes even myself! Except, I haven’t figured that part out yet! I’m not always the best at the calm and collected, and I’m not sure I know what cool is anymore! I can talk about my life raising a big family, ramble on about the things I think make the world more enjoyable (cooking, crafts, make up, nails, product reviews) and all the chaos in between! Now I just need to decide what to talk about first!