The Bussis Stop: March 2014

We are trying to eat a little healthier over here. Well, I should say I am trying to eat a little healthier and since I'm the cook, the rest get to too. :) I wouldn't go so far to say these potatoes are healthy :), but they're a little better for you than the mashed potatoes I make because they don't have any butter in them. But they are full of flavor from the turkey bacon and green onion. And oh my goodness do these leftovers make amazing Baked Potato Soup! So I make a big batch of these potatoes as a side and then use the leftovers in place of the baked potatoes in my soup recipe (you also then don't put as much sour cream and cheese in the soup since there's already some in the casserole). It's absolutely delicious :). So the great thing is you get two yummy dishes when you make these. :) To make it on the lighter side I used turkey bacon, 2% evaporated milk and light sour cream. Enjoy!

Ingredients: Potatoes, Cheese, Bacon (I used Turkey), Sour Cream, Evaporated Milk, Salt & Pepper, Green Onion

Peel and dice the potatoes

Cover them with water and bring to boil. Boil for 15 to 20 minutes or until tender

In the meantime cook the bacon...

And chop it up

And dice up the green onion

When the potatoes are done drain them and add 1 cup of evaporated milk...

1/2 a cup of sour cream

1 tsp of salt...

And 1/2 tsp of pepper

Beat with a hand-held mixer until nice and smooth

Add 1 1/2 cup cheese

And the bacon (I used 6 slices of turkey bacon)

Stir together until all combined and the cheese melts

Place into a greased casserole dish

(I should have used the next size dish, this one was very full and it puffs up a bit :))

I had a few helpers for this dish:

Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes

Stir it...

Then top with green onions (notice I only put it on half the potatoes because my silly husband is not a fan of green onions)

If you want you can also top it with some more cheese, but we were trying to make it not so terrible for you, so we didn't :)

There you go, yummy baked potato casserole. It went great with Cauliflower-Cashew Salad and Turkey Meatloaf Muffins

Micah's a fan

As were the twins

Baked Potato Casserole

8 medium potatoes, peeled and diced

1 cup Evaporated Lowfat 2% Milk

1/2 cup light sour cream

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1 1/2 cups shredded cheese

6 slices of turkey bacon, cooked and diced

Sliced Green Onions

Place potatoes in a large saucepan, cover with water and bring to boil. Cook for 15-20 minutes or until the potatoes are tender. Drain potatoes and return to pan. Add evaporated milk, sour cream, salt and pepper. Beat with a hand-held mixer until smooth. Stir in cheese and bacon. Place in a greased casserole dish and bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Top with green onions.

I don't know if you picked it up or not but last week Wednesday I was pretty exasperated by my children :). After I posted my blog I did this:

Baked a double batch of Banana Muffins and a batch of The Pioneer Woman's Orange Muffins (which are amazing by the way). I felt much better after my nice quite baking time :)

On a totally different note, do you see the bulletin board in the background? I put up all the Christmas Card pictures we get on there so we can enjoy them all year long, or as long as it takes me to put up the next years :). Last year I redid them in July; I am happy to report this year I changed them in March!:

By Sunday night I was pretty tired of watching basketball :) so I decided after the kids were in bed that it was a great time to change the pictures over. I'm always excited when I fit them all in. But notice this year I actually have some space left (due to a few of our family/friends not doing picture cards this year and some of the pictures were smaller). So if you don't see yourself up there but think you should be, I have room. :)

So Thursday I decided we just couldn't spend another morning in the house driving each other nuts. So I did something I have not done in a long time and for sure since the twins were running around, I went to the mall all by myself. Normally a lady from church goes with me, but she is gone for 2 weeks :(. But I had some Kohl's cash and a $10 off $10 at JCPenny's that I wasn't going to let go to waste so I loaded up the boys and here is our adventure:

This is how you cart 3 boys around the mall

***Funny story- so Thursday we went to the mall in Grandville. Then yesterday I met some friends at the mall in Grand Rapids. As I was walking through the Grand Rapids mall this guy who worked at one of the Kiosks stopped me and asked if I had been at the Grandville mall a few days before :). Busted! He said he has a kiosk there too and he saw a stroller just like this and thought there couldn't be too many of those around. So yeah, we're quite a sight going through the mall.

After some quick shopping (got the boys a few spring clothes if it ever warms up) we went to the children's play area. Oh my goodness that place is crazy! Kids running around not paying attention to the little kids, parents not paying attention to their own kids, it's just nuts! But the boys loved it, especially Micah:

After the playground Micah reminded me that I had told him he could ride the "horsey" (aka the Carousal). I hadn't thought that one all the way through given that I had all 3 boys and was by myself. But I had decided we were there to have a good time (since we had had a lousy couple of days before), so here's how we did it:

After that we had some lunch:

David thoroughly enjoyed his mac-n-cheese

And since we were there to have a fun time I let Micah talk me into letting him ride the helicopter (I know, I'm a softy :))

We had to pick up a few things at Costco and no trip to Costco is complete without Frozen Yogurt. :) So that was our shopping trip. There were times that I literally was sweating chasing them around and getting them all set on the Carousal :), but it was a great time and they took great naps :)

Friday was a little bit nicer weather (as in not totally freezing) and once again we just had to get out of the house for a little bit, so we went for a walk around town. Again, I am so thankful for my stroller:

Another way to entertain your child is have your piano tuned. Micah seriously watched him the entire time, it was great :)

I found this in my washing machine :) I guess one of the twins thought he needed a car wash

Speaking of those stinker twins, yeah, they're stinkers :)

After a couple days of not terrible weather we woke up both Monday and Tuesday to this sight :(

Micah continues to love to help me in the kitchen. Here he's "making" our Crescent Rolls

And then he thinks he's funny and drinks out of my water and given the fact that we keep passing colds around this house, I was not ready to share my water :)

Here he's "making" himself some mac-n-cheese and for some reason thought he had to keep getting a new fork or spoon out everytime one got "dirty" He thought he was pretty funny

And here he's helping me make some apple crisp

But as much as he loves making food...

He is a TERRIBLE eater. He takes absolutely forever. Here he is after sitting down to dinner for a good 45 minutes. The rest of us are done, the table is cleared, dishes put in the dishwasher, twins are out of their high chair. And seriously, he doesn't care. He did eventually eat all the food, he just takes FOREVER

Here's some pictures of my silly boys:

Jonathan

David

Jonathan

Sunday while I was getting lunch ready Micah decided it was time for some check-ups

Micah loves getting to read his Children's Bible Story book. It's so fun to hear him explain the Bible stories

My boys are very up with the times- they like to take "selfies":

Like I said earlier yesterday I met up with two of my roommates from college who live in the area. Between the 3 of us we have 7 children and Micah is the oldest, so it was so much fun to get together. Unfortunately we were having so much fun talking that I forgot to take pictures with any of them. :) But I did take pictures of my boys when we went back to the play area after having lunch. :)