Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins - ONLY 3 Ingredients!

     

     The name says it all, and 3 ingredients makes it even better and better for you! I think these muffins are great and you can even freeze them for later in the week for school and they are as moist as if you made them fresh!! My Daughter LOVES them! My son on the other hand, is a picky picky eater. I told him that they were chocolate chip muffins and he sat down and began enjoying them. My husband then comes in and I began telling him all about it and what was in these tasty and effortless muffins and all of a sudden my son chimes in. I don't like these. (he had already eaten 3/4 of the muffin) So as a parent of a picky eater, I turned to him and told him, you eat everything that is in these muffins and the only reason you don't like them is cause you heard me telling daddy about the recipe and to finishing his muffin. He did with no problem but from now on I have to make sure he doesn't hear anything I say because he swears he does not like chocolate chip muffins now, only blueberry! As long as you don't have a super picky eater your children will love them and they are a perfect treat!

Whatcha Need:
-3 or 4 bananas ( I used 3 & I thought it was perfect)
- 1 box of yellow or white cake mix
- 1 cup of Chocolate Chips
-1 cup water

    Heat oven to 350 degrees,  peal all of the bananas and place into a bowl, mash bananas, add box of cake mix, 1 cup water  and cup of chocolate chips. Mix well and fill, well sprayed muffin tin. Bake for 9 to 10 minutes or until browned on the top.

I did not use a regular muffin pan for our muffins, I used a little mini muffin pans. I made two batches of these and froze one set for the next week. When we took them out they were still just as fresh! I think I will be making some more today for the kids for school these next few weeks! :) for breakfast & Snack!


 

Seasons Fun Checklist for the Family!

     The first day back to school is tomorrow! can’t believe how quick Summer has flown by. I’ve really enjoyed having my son home and getting to spend time together and him having some relaxing time and getting to do some fun stuff he wants, like build Legos, play outside all day and get dirty,and of course have time for his video games.  My daughter is starting school this year so I wanted to make this Summer a fun one. Before school was even out for my son, I was making a list of all the stuff we can do, boating, beach days, ice cream runs, etc. I was looking on Pinterest one day (don’t even say anything, yes everything comes from Pinterest nowadays) and I saw a fall checklist and though that would be great to follow up after our Summer List. So I decided to make a board that would go into our kitchen and every season we would make a checklist that would consist of all the stuff we wanted to get done during that season. My kids loved the idea and I had the perfect place for our board to go.
     Our kitchen is all wood, with a country décor, and a olive green and maroon décor to go with the wood. I decided that our board should go along with the décor of the kitchen and every season we would just use chalk colors that go along with that season.  Here is how we made our Seasons of Fun Checklist:

What we used:
-1 piece of Plywood ( my husband is a Carpenter, so there is wood  and pieces lying all over his shop.
-Trim
-Nails
-Hammer
-Chalkboard Paint
-Paintbrush
-Paint (in your desired color for the trim)
-Chalk
     Choose your wood to be your desired size. I painted the plywood first with the chalkboard paint, and then the trim with the color paint you have chosen. Nail the trim to the edges of the Board to create a framed chalkboard. Make out a list of “to do’s” with your children. Mine really enjoyed coming up with ideas to do over the summer. We also explained that just because they are going on the list does not mean that all of them would get done. This takes the pressure off the big stuff that kids add to the list like water park, which some may not have a water park near, the money, and/or the time.
     I wanted to add a little more decoration to our checklist so I decided to go through all the family portraits that we have had done and all the kids pictures we have bought and took out wallets from the time they were born all the way up to now. I placed them in order from birth to now and modge podge the pictures of the kids down one side and then family pictures of my husband and I and the kids on the bottom. I am very happy with how our checklist turned out!! Get Creative when you make your Checklist and decorate to your style.

Disney - Where Dreams Began & Ours are Booked!

   
     Disney—where dreams began!! – That is absolutely the truth! Our children, just like us watch those timeless Disney classics, and learn to dream and believe just as we did. I still to this day at 26 years young enjoy Disney movies; old ones, new ones, anything with Disney on it. I have been to Walt Disney World 3 times in my life, once as a child and then, so far, twice as an adult. We absolutely love Disney! We went for my honeymoon, & we took our First Family Vacation in 2011 and of course we went to?? Yep, you got it. Walt Disney World! :) At that time, my children were 6 & 3. My daughter didn’t do a lot and my son did as much as he could handle before he was completely exhausted! We were only there for Four Days and tried to cram 3 parks into those Four Days and Downtown Disney.. Well we recently decided we are going back, but this time our trip is going to be a whole lot different than it has ever been and were going to have BLAST!!
     This Walt Disney World Vacay when we started planning, we thought was going to cost a small fortunate. We started out planning for it to be Our Family of 4 ( Husband, Son, Daughter,& Myself) & my momma (aka. Yaya). We wanted to stay at a hotel and got to thinking one room or two and then with all the other options of park hopper, waterslides & more, all week tickets.. only 6 day tickets, dining,.. and on and on.. the price kept going up and wasn’t coming down. So we got to thinking well should we try to stay off park property! Now this is where I draw the line!! If I am going to Walt Disney, I want the whole Walt Disney Experience, and that means everything, so I had to get to thinking of ways to save some money. My husband and I discussed it one afternoon and he said we need to get a Camper and go down there and enjoy Disney as we normally would, and of course how adventurous! I was immediately excited!
    I started checking out prices right away at Cruise America and at the Ft. Wilderness Campground on Walt Disney Property. We live in Alabama, out in the country and on Perdido Bay, we spend a lot of our time outside and on the water anyways and we love outdoor activities. The more I got to looking at everything that was offered at Ft. Wilderness I was hoping that it would be cheaper to take the trip this way. We did some brainstorming on what we should do and it was going to be very expensive to pick the RV up locally and drive to Orlando and we were not trying to make the trip cost anymore then if we were getting two hotel rooms.  *LIGHT BULB*  Lets see what it cost to pick up the RV in Orlando and we will get a rental car, drive down and pick up the RV, drive to the park & RV for a week in Disney! It was an awesome idea & now I just had to hope that we could save some money of some kind by doing it like this. My fingers & toes were crossed! I knew this would be such an exciting and bonding experience for us all! So I checked all the prices and it turned out we would save about $590.00 doing it this way instead of getting two hotel rooms.. Our package includes: 7 nights, 8 days at Walt Disney World Ft. Wilderness Resort, We chose the Magic your Way Package with Dining, 6 day park tickets, no park hopper, and no waterparks and more. This savings includes adding RV, car, and estimating gas. The original plan was everything listed minus RV, car, and gas and I was going to be spending MORE…way more.
     I couldn’t have been more excited about our new plan and our Disney Adventure that we were going to be going on. The Ft. Wilderness  Resort is absolutely beautiful and has a lot to do there. It has everything that any hotel would. My mom was very worried about the space.. and us all being crammed together..and not happy if it rained and we were all stuck together.. However, as I explained to her, there are many places we could take shelter and not have to be all cooped up together..I think we will all be fine. Luckily my husband likes his mother in law C: and my mother likes my husband.

     We told the kids about our new plans for our Disney Vacation and showed them all the pictures online and showed them the RV and they were just as excited as we were.  At the Ft. Wilderness Campgrounds there are all kinds of activites for the children to do and places for them to play and run off some of the excitement they will have. We also get to see the boat show every night and will be able to see some Fireworks as well! I think it will be such a great experience for us as a family. My husband did not travel or go on any type of family vacaitons when he was younger.. it wasn’t something they did and I traveled a lot and went on lots of vacations. So its important to me that we do that he gets to expeience stuff too. I think we are all so excited because this  is something I have never done either. So its new to all of us. This will be our last trip to Disney for a while. We want both our children to enjoy Disney at different ages and stages in their life.. They will be 8 & 5 when we travel this time and I think the next time we go the kids will be 12/13 and 9/10 years old.  We want them to experience different vacations each year in between! Now if I can afford to go to Disney every year that will be something we do!
    I must say that yes Disney can be a expensive vacation if you make it that way. In order to plan the perfect trip look at all of your options. Consider everything. It could save you a lot of money if you do take the time to look. If you don’t have time to look around, take a afternoon or morning, if you prefer and visit a travel agent or your local AAA office and get information on a trip.
    I think this trip is going to be the best one yet because we know what were planning for, we will be there a full week, and we are going to have an amazing bonding time!! Look for more updates and ideas that may be just right for you and your family as well, when traveling to Disney!!

Walt Disney World – We can’t wait to see you real soon!