Jennifer's Berry & Green Protein Shake

This is the recipe I use for my daily protein shake. I know it's good for my body and I enjoy drinking it. I often bring the ingredients and my blender with me even when I travel.

3/4 C. Water
3/4 C. Crushed Ice
3/4 C. Almond Milk - (Silk brand unsweetened 30 calories per cup, found at Target) - 23 calories
1/3 frozen banana - 25 calories
1/2 C. Mixed Berries (I use Target's Market Pantry Frozen Triple Berry Blend) - 40 calories
1 large handful of fresh spinach, collard greens, or kale - 5 calories
2 teaspoons Flax Meal- 40 calories (aka "ground flaxseed meal" – grocery baking aisle)
2 teaspoons Smucker’s Natural Peanut Butter - 66 calories
1 scoop Designer Whey Protein French Vanilla – 100 calories



Put all the ingredients in a blender, berries last, and blend. Drink right away. This makes a very large shake. I try to talk one of my kids into drinking some of it. It will NOT be good to save for later.

299 calories



This shake has it all -- greens, berries, fiber, protein, good carbs, and good fat. I use Smucker’s Natural Peanut Butter because it’s the only one I can find with only peanuts and salt for the ingredients. I buy it at Target or Reasor’s. Other peanut butters include oils, like palm oil, that I don’t want. I try to keep ingredients as natural and as raw/unprocessed as possible. I use Designer Whey protein because it is one of the “cleanest” protein powders available in that it doesn’t have harmful chemicals many cheaper products have. The French Vanilla tastes great. I bought it at Akins for years, but just found a 4 lb. container on Amazon for $49 (which is only $8 more than Akin’s 2 lb. container). I buy a large container of organic baby spinach at Sam’s. It’s so much cheaper than buying spinach at the grocery store.

There you go. I drink this shake every single day and just switch up which fresh greens I use (spinach, kale, or collard greens). I’ll be honest, the kale is horrible, but the spinach and collard greens are great.

Thrift Store Steals

These are the fabulous finds I purchased at a local thrift store today.

Saks Fifth Avenue gorgeous wool pants perfect for fall. They appear to be brand new. - $4.99.

Banana Republic Jeans -- on sale due to the weekly tag number - $3.50

Large Gilded Mirror - $12 (It still needs to be dusted and I'm not sure where I'll actually hang it.)

Girl's White Ballet Costume - $5 (I picked up the blue dress at a consignment store last week for free because I traded my "new" cosigned clothes for store credit.)



I enjoy dressing myself and family in quality clothing and take full advantage of local thrift stores and consignment stores to do so. We save so much money and buy mostly brand new items. Have you visited your local thrift store lately? What is your best find yet?

Dining Room Transformed with New Curtains

Ten years ago I sewed these cafe curtains for our breakfast nook area. Although I liked the rust-colored fabric, it always felt heavy and dark in this space.

We lived with those curtains for many years even though they were too short. I ended up adding a complimentary fabric to the bottom so they would be the proper length. I also replaced the glass table with a larger wooden table and recovered the chairs with matching fabric.

After having these curtains for so long I was ready for a change. I wanted the breakfast nook to look brighter, lighter, and more updated. I was looking for something less traditional but still keeping within my original color scheme.

While looking at hundreds of fabrics at Joann's it was actually my five-year-old, Sophie, who picked out the fabric for our new curtains.

This fabric is heavy-duty indoor/outdoor fabric which will not fade. It was easy to work with too. For those reasons I decided not to bother lining them. I sewed four simple panels and used rings with clips to attach them to new curtain rods. The curtains rods were made from electrical conduit (really cheap and very sturdy) from Lowe's. My husband sprayed painted the rods and cheap unfinished wooden finials a gorgeous metallic bronze color. Our traditional, dark, and heavy breakfast nook was transformed into this:

The new curtains on the left and the old cafe curtains on the right

I love them! Our space seems so much brighter, lighter and more modern.

Before

After

Girls' Bathroom Upgrade

While perusing the aisles at Bed Bath and Beyond, I fell in love with this fabric shower curtain by Amy Butler in "Sari Bloom". It was discontinued (though you can still buy it from Amazon and Ebay), and was on sale. By using a coupon, I ended up only paying about $10 for it. The shower curtain provided the color scheme for the girls' bathroom.

Judd framed out the builder's grade plain mirror and painted it with Benjamin Moore paint in Dove White.

The bathroom used to have just a standard, plain, chrome-colored towel bar similar to this:

We wanted to make the bathroom user friendly for the girls, so Judd built them a shelf with towel hooks. He also painted it Dove White. Then, I purchased some picture frames from Target and dry brush painted them with Bubble Gum pink acrylic paint. The framed photos identify whose towel is whose.We picked up some pinkish-red towel sets from Target in Lollipop Red.

Not pictured, is the plush blue bath rug I picked up at JC Penny's home store several months ago which matches the blue in the shower curtain.

Their bathroom ended up looking like this:

I really need to buy a new camera. This looks like the towels clash with the curtains, but they don't. Hopefully, you get the general idea. Easy changes upgraded and personalized what once was a boring standard bathroom.

Entryway Coat Rack and Storage Bench

There are many things I love about my home, but there had been a bare space in the entryway I never did anything with until now. I had been pining over this Pinterest pin from a creative mom over at theidearoom.net. I thought her bathroom towel rack shelf would make a great coat rack in my entryway.

I decided to have my hubby make the coat rack shelf with crown molding for me because I couldn't find anything with the right dimensions online or in stores. I wanted the coat rack to be substantial and to be hung above a 3-drawer storage bench. I purchased this bench when it was on sale at Target.

I recovered the plain cushion with ultra soft cheetah fabric found at Hobby Lobby.

Judd built the coat rack using this tutorial, but altered the dimensions for a custom fit for our space. Next, we primed and painted the coat rack shelf with the same products we used on our kitchen island (shared in my post here) It's a deep, rich, rusty-red color. It only appears bright in this picture because I used the flash on my old camera. In reality, the color is more of a brown-red.

We attached these coat and hat hooks from Home Depot, and our entryway space ended up looking like this:

The girls each have their own drawer in which to keep their shoes. They feel a sense of pride in having this responsibility and Judd and I enjoy fewer tripping hazards left on the floor.



Bye-bye empty space; hello stylish organization.

DIY Tooth Fairy Pillow (Tutorial)

Sophie starts Kindergarten this fall. When we toured the classrooms at Kindergarten Roundup earlier this spring I noticed a chart listing all the teeth various students lost during their Kindergarten school year. That poster brought up all sorts of questions from Sophie. Will it hurt? Who is the Tooth Fairy? Why does she want teeth? Does she pull my teeth? Can she give me prizes instead of money? (The Tooth Fairy will be more than happy to give prizes instead of money).

When I was a child my sister and I both had special Tooth Fairy pillows. After realizing I could make at least three pillows (one for each of my girls) for less than the price of purchasing one pillow from Etsy or ebay, I went into DIY mode.

I let Sophie choose the fabric. I really like the print she chose for the main pillow portion. I personally would have chosen a different print for the pocket, but Sophie loved these two prints together. My only "rule" was that she could NOT pick any licensed fabric (e.g., Disney, Hello Kitty, etc.). I'm not a fan of highly commercialized cartoon images and feel prints and solids create a boutique quality product.

Items Needed:

• Two 6” x 6” squares of fabric for pillow
• One 4” x 5” contrasting fabric for pocket
• 27” of 5/8” grosgrain ribbon (12” for handle and 15” for bow embellishment.)
• Initial badge pin (Hobby Lobby $.99) 
• Poly-fil or pillow stuffing of your choice

Directions:
For the pocket, fold over all four edges, WRONG sides together 1/2" and sew.

Pin the WRONG side of pocket to the center of the RIGHT side of one pillow square (so both the pillow square and pocket are RIGHT side facing you). Sew sides and bottom of pocket to pillow square.

Pin 12” of grosgrain ribbon on the RIGHT side of the same pillow square at the 1” and 5” locations. Make sure your ribbon handle is pinned DOWN from the top edge looping down toward the pocket. Make sure your pins are lower than your seam allowance so you can remove them once you turn your pillow right side out.

Sew the pillow fabric RIGHT sides together leaving a small opening to turn the fabric right side out. Remove pins which held the ribbon in place.

Stuff the pillow with poly-fil, fabric scraps, recycled plastic sacks, or whatever you wish to use as your stuffing. Sophie enjoyed getting to do this part. Hand-sew opening closed.

Add the initial badge pin to the pocket and hand-sew a bow (made from 15” of 5/8” grosgrain ribbon) onto the pillow at a diagonal.

The back looks like this...



Sophie, Piper, and Riley love the way their Tooth Fairy pillows turned out. It was a fun and quick little project in which they could participate. Now I better let the Tooth Fairy know she needs to stock up on prizes rather than money for the teeth in this household.

Our Summer Visit to the Hatch Farm

My in-laws live on a farm in northwest Nebraska just 18 miles from the South Dakota border. Last week we made the 13 hour drive so we could spend time with them on their farm. Because Judd's dad, Dave, is recovering from shoulder surgery, we extended our visit so Judd could help out around the farm with all sorts of chores and projects.

Judd was able to get much accomplished and couldn't have been happier fiddling around with manly man equipment and tools [insert manly grunts here]. He used a backhoe, built the roof on a very large outdoor dog kennel, assembled a new swing, organized a garage, replaced light bulbs in the barn, leveled the front door and replaced the handle. Judd hauled and placed heavy metal cattle panels to secure cows in a pasture in South Dakota. He repacked wheel bearings and grease in a tire from the cattle trailer. He used an air compressor, drill, electric screw driver, files, hammers, etc. throughout the week. Judd shot rifles and pistols (more manly grunting) and had a fantastic time. You'd never know he spends most of his days in an office building as a financial adviser in the the city of Tulsa.

We took the girls swimming at the same pool Judd worked at as a lifeguard when he was 17 years old.

The girls took turns driving the golf cart while Judd played played 9 holes.

We visited lots of family members and played several card and board games. There was an official Hatch family reunion and an unofficial DeWitt reunion. We had a picnic at the park, a large fireworks display (courtesy of cousins Jason, Jana, and Paul), and attended the Gordon fireworks display at the fairgrounds as well.

Sophie, Piper, and Riley danced with their cousins Elyse and Graham in the gazebo at the park.

I was able to get to the old high school track to run a couple of miles on a few of our mornings. I also ran in the town's "4k on the 4th" memorial race. It was a last-minute decision to and I ended up still parking my car when the race started. Because it was small-town Gordon, I just turned off my car, left my keys on the floorboard, and took off running down the street to join the others already in progress.

We love to ride the 4-wheelers when we visit the Hatch farm. Originally, we tried pulling the girls in a tiny trailer, but the trailer tires kept going flat. So, we unhooked the trailer and I took one girl at a time for rides on the 4-wheeler. It was fantastic. All three girls loved going fast and yelling "Wee! Wahoo! Best day ever!"

Sophie - 5 years old

Piper - 3 years old

Riley - 3 years old

We had many other activities and visited lots of people. It was a wonderful trip.



The Hatch girls enjoyed their summer visit to their grandparents' farm.

Happy Mother's Day

This is just a quick post for my friends and family (and anyone else who is interested) to see pictures of us from today, Mother's Day.

We attend an incredible church, Church on the Move. They created adorable backdrops for family photo ops at church today. They also gave moms chocolate, shoulder massages, and foo foo coffee drinks. I love my church.

When Piper and Riley turned one, I made these pillowcase dresses for all three girls. I love how they can wear them for years as the dress becomes a top as they grow.

Judd snapped this picture of Piper and I just before we headed off to church.

Judd took us out to eat at the Cheesecake Factory. The girls had never been there. Instead of eating lunch, I saved up my calories to split the chocolate Blackout Cake with Sophie. It was so rich, we were able to take half of it home. I think I hear it calling my name from the fridge.

Riley looks like she's being stubborn in this picture, but actually, she's just trying to pose like a model. Riley keeps us laughing all the time.

I am Mommy to our three precious girls and couldn't be more thankful.