Mama’s Blissful Bites – Featured Friday

Happy Friday!!! Guess what??? Psst………Featured Friday is baaaaaaack!!! I’m a little nervous this time around because I can’t seem to get as many blogs on board 🙁 Sad face, I’m not really sure why, maybe I just need to keep reaching out but I have a few lined up and I’ll just keep on trucking for now and share with you what I do have. I can’t believe how much I’ve missed this Feature, and I’m so happy to kick it back off with one of my favorite Mama’s!!!

I featured this blog back in August of 2012. Wow can you believe I’ve known this Mama for a year??!!! Amber from Mama’s Blissful Bites so graciously wanted to be Featured again!! Thank you Amber! Can you believe we’ve known each other a year? Yes me and this girl will text each other at all hours of the night asking technical/blogging questions to each other, well we used to, until my pregnancy and little guy came along, but it’s OK, I still have your number Mama!! Amber is one of the great relationships I’ve picked up through the blogging world. She is a sweet sweet person and one of the best Mother’s I’ve ever known, maybe we should meet one of these days! 🙂

Well let me fill you in on what’s been going on over at Amber’s blog because a lot has changed for her too. She has recently decided to homeschool her two kiddo’s. You can read about why she made this big decision here. God bless this Mama, I think it’s hard work and must take a lot of dedication but she is the girl to do it, one because she loves her kids more than anything and two because she’s constantly bored, (yes Amber you admitted that on your page teeheee) though bored, she loves to learn new ways to educate herself and her children using the everyday things around her. You can even check out the cute room she put together in her home for a classroom her kids will be in everyday. She introduced me to Sensory Bins, yup you did girl. Check out some of the great idea’s she has, I need to get over my “sense of messiness” and let my baby girl dive into this madness you call Sensory bins, don’t worry guys, I don’t let my need for “clean” get in the way of teaching my kids, I do give in and my daughter does go to Pre-School three times a week too! I’ve always been a big fan of doing crafts with my daughter because she does love them, I used to just do them on holidays and special occasions like birthdays and such but now that she’s almost three she is learning a whole lot so my brain is reeling on things I can do with her. I’m on Pinterest daily looking for crafts that will teach her, the other day we made leaves, snowmen, flowers and suns to learn the 4 seasons together (we are still working on it LOL). Amber has some great crafts on her page, I’m going to try the Play Dough recipe  (Maddie LOVES LOVES LOVES play dough) and I love the homemade colored pasta sorting idea, what a great way to play with colors with your kiddos. Bonus you get to even make pasta jewelry with them! Love it. Amber also has a few homemade products you can check out too, they make great gifts!So Amber and I were talking not to long ago and one of things I love about this girl is she goes to great lengths to make her blog successful too, she even started running and blogging about that, she said she got a lot of audience that way, maybe I should think about that to get this leftover baby weight to go bye-bye! She is a lot like me, loves her family, loves to cook (not so much bake) and loves loves loves staying home with her kids no matter how difficult some days can be, because let’s face it, everyday is a challenge however like me, Amber faces each day with a smile and a new attitude of how she can make that very day as special as she can for her kids, plus have you seen her kiddo’s, they are super cute!! She’s also done a lot of reviews too all different kinds of products and foods!! I remember when I first found Amber’s blog she did a few video’s talking about “Mama” things, challenges we face as mothers, those kinds of things, I remember thinking WOW, she just sits on her couch (sweats and slippers) and talks to the public……..and looks fantastic while doing it!!! I miss those video’s! So check out her review on her local TV program. Oh Amber your daughter doesn’t look like you at all (no no no!) LOL.

Ok so what did I cook up from the list of yummy Recipes that Amber has over on her blog, well believe it or not I chose a sandwich LOL, don’t laugh because I’ve always wanted to make Guacamole and when I saw this sandwich it made ME WANT TO TRY IT!! I actually ended up making two things from Amber’s list of healthy goodies because my funny story for this week is I bought my Avocado’s and everything I needed and when I tried to make it for it lunch on Monday my Avocado’s were rock hard 🙁 I never realized how much I liked Guacamole until recently, actually I never realized how much I like Avocado’s until I really started to cook healthier. I finally found the trick to getting the Avocado perfect for “mashing” Monday was such a disaster that I went to a different recipe of Amber’s, however I left the one Avocado I had left out on my counter, I just happened to squeeze it this morning and it was nice and soft!! It was PERFECT, it was finally time to make this yummy lunch!!

She calls it her Loco Guaca Grilled Cheese Sandwich, how yummy does that even sound before you look at my pictures!

It was everything I thought it was going to be. Actually the only thing it needed was MORE cheese! I didn’t have sliced Colby-Jack cheese, I had shredded Monterey Jack Cheese, I just should have used more!!! Tomorrow I will be, yes I took her recipe and cut it in half since I only had one Avocado, however it was enough for two sandwiches so guess what I’m having for lunch!!

The other recipe I made was her Banana Nut Breakfast. I chose this one because I always wanted to try “rice” for breakfast, call me crazy but I have. Not only that but I was looking for something filling to last me the afternoon and it had “Fall” written all over it! I wasn’t disappointed AT ALL. I never really had rice cold before, well I warmed it up for like 20 seconds just to get it to unstick a little but other than that it’s the simplest dish you could make, I always make brown rice or quinoa at the beginning of the week so I always have something like this on hand!! Thanks for a delicious breakfast Mama!! The only thing I did differently with this one was the pecan’s. I didn’t have any on hand however I did have a bag of Maple-Pecan granola on hand so I used a bit of that, which was perfect!!

Well I hope you enjoyed Featured Friday this week, I’m so glad to be back at it again because I had no idea how much I missed it until this week! Stay tuned because I have some pretty awesome blogs lined up for the next few months! Now go visit Mama Amber over at Mama’s Blissful Bites, don’t forget to tell her I sent you!