Before I get to the recipe, I just noticed that I have 2001 page views! Where are all you people coming from? If you are not someone that I have met in-person, I would love it if you left a comment and introduce yourself!
Onto the recipe.
Growing up, my mom always made this Homemade Bisquick Recipe that she found in a Taste of Home magazine. Bisquick is pretty expensive, and this is a pretty cheap alternative. One batch absolutely lasts longer than a box of Bisquick and the biscuits are just as tasty. Probably healthier too, but that is just an educated guess.
Homemade Bisquick:
9 cups of all purpose flour
1/3 cup of baking powder
1/4 cup of sugar
3 teaspoons of salt
1 teaspoon of cream of tartar
2 cups of butter flavored shortening (I am pretty sure my mom just used regular old Crisco...)
In LARGE bowl, combine dry ingredients. Cut in shortening until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Store in an airtight container, in a cool, dry place for up to 6 months.
And here is a biscuit recipe that uses the homemade biscuit mix:
3 cups of biscuit mix
2/3 cup of milk
Mix ingredients together until combined. Turn out dough onto a floured surface and knead 10-15 times. Use a biscuit cutter (or a drinking glass!) to cut out biscuits that are 1/2 an inch thick.
Cook at 425 degrees for 12-14 minutes.
You can also add 1/2 a cup of sharp cheddar cheese for cheddar biscuits. Cook for the same amount of time, and when they are done, brush with a mixture of garlic salt and melted butter. SO GOOD. :)
Enjoy!
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Friday, July 6, 2012
Moving...
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I am switching back to my old blog - kenzieandgarrett.blogspot.com.
I haven't posted there in over a year, but if you would like to read about how I planned a wedding in less than 4 months, hop on over there. I'll hopefully have a more recent post up there within the next day or two.
There will still be posts about cooking and crafts, but more posts about real life.
Please come and follow me there!
I am switching back to my old blog - kenzieandgarrett.blogspot.com.
I haven't posted there in over a year, but if you would like to read about how I planned a wedding in less than 4 months, hop on over there. I'll hopefully have a more recent post up there within the next day or two.
There will still be posts about cooking and crafts, but more posts about real life.
Please come and follow me there!
Saturday, June 23, 2012
Peach Scones
It was brought to my attention today by my best friend Megan, that I haven't posted a blog post in awhile. Ever feel like you don't have anything to blog about? That's about where I am. I go to work, come home and watch TV with my best friend. Every day. See? Not much to write about. Luckily, this week one of my favorite bloggers, Joy the Baker posted a recipe that I knew best friend and I would both love! Peaches are best friend's favorite fruit. In the summer, we go to the local Farmer's Market almost every Saturday and stock up on peaches for the week. We went this morning, despite the fact that it was already baking outside. We found a booth with ready-to-eat peaches that were perfect for this recipe! I love it when best friend and I can bake something together. I enjoy baking all the time, and he always makes me laugh, and I like teaching him different things about baking. These peach scones are delicious! They would make a great breakfast, or they would be delicious with some vanilla ice cream. Check out the original recipe at www.joythebaker.com.
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
In large bowl, mix together 3 cups of flour, 1/4 cup of sugar, 3 Tablespoons of baking powder, and 1/2 a teaspoon of baking soda. Add in 1/2 a cup of cold, cubed butter, and 1/2 a cup of shortening. Incorporate with a fork, breaking down the big chunks of butter as much as you can.
In a separate bowl, mix together one beaten egg, 3/4 of a cup of buttermilk, and 1 teaspoon of vanilla.
Pour the bowl of wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. Mix well. Put dough on floured cutting board, form into a disk shape, and roll out until the dough it 1/2 an inch thick. It's ok if the dough is flaky!
Pour 1/4 of a cup of buttermilk into a small bowl, and mix together 2 Tablespoons of sugar with 3/4 of a teaspoon of cinnamon into another bowl. Brush some buttermilk over half of the rolled out dough. Top with one thinly sliced peach. Sprinkle 1/2 of the cinnamon/sugar mixture over the peaches. Fold the remaining dough over the peaches, and push the dough together to seal the edges.
Slice the dough into 8 equal (ish) pieces and place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Brush remaining buttermilk over each piece, and sprinkle cinnamon/sugar mixture on top. Cook for 15-18 minutes.
They expand quite a bit in the oven, so make sure to put them a good distance apart from one another.
Mmmm...enjoy!
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Our Love Story
Lately, I have been noticing a growing trend in the blogs I follow. Many of them have a page that tells their love story. I always love reading other people's stories, so I decided to post our love story on my blog!
Enjoy!
The story starts with a conversation between me and my good friend Grace. We had been friends since the first semester of our freshman year of college. She and her husband Tim had been really good friends to me and had always been around through good times and bad. I mentioned to her that I really wanted to go to Alpha's (a club at OC) banquet to a medevial fair, because a lot of my friends were going and I thought it would be fun. She pretty much went on a mission to find me a date. She worked with Garrett in the IT department and decided that he was the guy! She bugged him for WEEKS ... but he kept saying that he wasn't interested in dating, or going to banquet, or anything. So, I didn't get to go to that banquet. It was ok though, because Grace didn't give up. In May of 2009, she told me that Garrett had to go on a blind date with me. I knew who Garrett was because I was always getting my computer fixed and had done a lot of activities with his club, but we hadn't even spoken to each other, and he had no clue who I was. We went on a double date with Tim and Grace on Memorial Day to see Terminator Salvation and then went to dinner at Cracker Barrel. I thought he was nice, but he and Tim talked about video games basically the entire time, so I didn't get much information out of him except his name and his major.
Later that summer, I posted on Facebook something about never having seen the Star Wars movies. He responded to my post asking if he could lend me his copies of the movies. We planned a time for him to come over and drop them off. I told my roommate Josh about it, and he insisted that I HAD to invite Garrett to stay and watch the first one with me. I remember feeling really nervous, which I thought was weird because at that point we had only met once and I didn't know enough about him to really have any feelings for him yet. He stayed and watched the first one with me, and I honestly think that we talked most of the time because I don't really remember the movie. We hung out in a group setting one other time that summer. School started and a bunch of us had made plans to go see a movie called District 9. At that point, I had a crush on Garrett which is pretty much the only reason I agreed to go. The day we went to the movie all our friends bailed and it ended up just being the 2 of us. (Turns out that was the plan all along.) After going to see the movie and talking for awhile afterward I knew I definitely liked him. After that, we started hanging out almost every night. He had a bunch of tv shows that I had never heard of, so we would meet in the library every night and watch a couple episodes, and then he would walk me back to my apartment. Every night my roommates would say, "Did he ask you yet?!"
FINALLY after an ETERNITY - ok maybe a month and a half - we went to a movie and dinner on a Saturday evening. After we got back, we went on a long walk around campus, and he finally asked me to be his girlfriend. When I got back to my apartment my roommate Meredeth screamed ... which was followed by a text from Garrett asking if she knew that he could hear her from outside. That was October 25th, 2009.
That Christmas, I got snowed into Oklahoma, and spent Christmas Eve night at his house. I had a blast with his family and I thought it would be fun to get to spend lots of future Christmases with them. (Later I found out that Garrett knew he wanted to marry me when he woke up to me at his house Christmas morning....awww....)
After Christmas, we really started talking about getting married. On April 4th, we decided to tell his parents that we were going to be getting engaged soon. We ended up not telling them on that day, because his brother called during lunch to tell his parents that he was engaged! It was very exciting!! We ended up telling them a couple days later. We got engaged on April 24th at a lake on OC's property. It was perfect!!
We got married August 20, 2010. So, if you are doing the math - we got married 10 months after we started dating. It was CRAZY - but we were in love and couldn't wait to be together. Our wedding was perfect, our honeymoon in Chicago was perfect, and he has made everyday since then perfect! I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with him. :)
Enjoy!
The story starts with a conversation between me and my good friend Grace. We had been friends since the first semester of our freshman year of college. She and her husband Tim had been really good friends to me and had always been around through good times and bad. I mentioned to her that I really wanted to go to Alpha's (a club at OC) banquet to a medevial fair, because a lot of my friends were going and I thought it would be fun. She pretty much went on a mission to find me a date. She worked with Garrett in the IT department and decided that he was the guy! She bugged him for WEEKS ... but he kept saying that he wasn't interested in dating, or going to banquet, or anything. So, I didn't get to go to that banquet. It was ok though, because Grace didn't give up. In May of 2009, she told me that Garrett had to go on a blind date with me. I knew who Garrett was because I was always getting my computer fixed and had done a lot of activities with his club, but we hadn't even spoken to each other, and he had no clue who I was. We went on a double date with Tim and Grace on Memorial Day to see Terminator Salvation and then went to dinner at Cracker Barrel. I thought he was nice, but he and Tim talked about video games basically the entire time, so I didn't get much information out of him except his name and his major.
Later that summer, I posted on Facebook something about never having seen the Star Wars movies. He responded to my post asking if he could lend me his copies of the movies. We planned a time for him to come over and drop them off. I told my roommate Josh about it, and he insisted that I HAD to invite Garrett to stay and watch the first one with me. I remember feeling really nervous, which I thought was weird because at that point we had only met once and I didn't know enough about him to really have any feelings for him yet. He stayed and watched the first one with me, and I honestly think that we talked most of the time because I don't really remember the movie. We hung out in a group setting one other time that summer. School started and a bunch of us had made plans to go see a movie called District 9. At that point, I had a crush on Garrett which is pretty much the only reason I agreed to go. The day we went to the movie all our friends bailed and it ended up just being the 2 of us. (Turns out that was the plan all along.) After going to see the movie and talking for awhile afterward I knew I definitely liked him. After that, we started hanging out almost every night. He had a bunch of tv shows that I had never heard of, so we would meet in the library every night and watch a couple episodes, and then he would walk me back to my apartment. Every night my roommates would say, "Did he ask you yet?!"
FINALLY after an ETERNITY - ok maybe a month and a half - we went to a movie and dinner on a Saturday evening. After we got back, we went on a long walk around campus, and he finally asked me to be his girlfriend. When I got back to my apartment my roommate Meredeth screamed ... which was followed by a text from Garrett asking if she knew that he could hear her from outside. That was October 25th, 2009.
That Christmas, I got snowed into Oklahoma, and spent Christmas Eve night at his house. I had a blast with his family and I thought it would be fun to get to spend lots of future Christmases with them. (Later I found out that Garrett knew he wanted to marry me when he woke up to me at his house Christmas morning....awww....)
After Christmas, we really started talking about getting married. On April 4th, we decided to tell his parents that we were going to be getting engaged soon. We ended up not telling them on that day, because his brother called during lunch to tell his parents that he was engaged! It was very exciting!! We ended up telling them a couple days later. We got engaged on April 24th at a lake on OC's property. It was perfect!!
We got married August 20, 2010. So, if you are doing the math - we got married 10 months after we started dating. It was CRAZY - but we were in love and couldn't wait to be together. Our wedding was perfect, our honeymoon in Chicago was perfect, and he has made everyday since then perfect! I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with him. :)
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Relay For Life!!
Hello Everyone!
Garrett and I will be participating in Relay for Life this coming May. We are doing it in honor of Garrett's sister-in-law's sister Rebecca, who passed away in March at the age of 20 from cancer. Relay for Life is a "relay" that starts early evening and goes until sunrise because "cancer never sleeps." Part of being on a Relay for Life team is raising money for the American Cancer Society. If you would like to donate, you can do so by going to relayforlife.com.
Once you are one the home page, you will see a purple box that say "Sign up or Donate by Finding an Event." In the box below, type the zip code 73013.
Our event is the first one listed on the next page - it's May 10th at University of Central Oklahoma. Click the "donate" button underneath our event.
On the NEXT page that loads, there is a purple box on the right side of the screen with the option to donate to support a participant or to support a team. You can search for Mackenzie Keck or Garrett Keck - or you can search for Purple Warriors (our team name.)
Hopefully that is not too confusing! Let me know if you have any questions!
Thanks,
Kenz and Garrett
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
The Un-American Diet
Today I started and finished reading "French Women Don't Get Fat" by Mireille Guiliano. In the book, the author, who was born and raised in France, points out that even though French women eat 2 or 3 course meals 1 or 2 times a day, they never seem to gain weight. The author was a skinny woman herself, until she did a one year exchange program in high school and lived in Boston. During that time she gained 20 pounds and was embarrassed to come home. She now lives in America, but still manages to practice a French diet. The book is geared towards people who need to lose up to 30 pounds, and not for emergency medical reasons.
The first thing that the author mentions is that the American diets obviously don't work. Once you have quickly lost weight, it is easy to gain back. Her French "diet" is a lifestyle change and more of a "slow and steady" diet. It works because it is not "one size fits all" like many American diets, and it doesn't contradict itself! One minute there is an American diet book out about how carbs are bad, and it is quickly followed up by a diet book that says that all you should eat are carbs.
She encourages the reader to start off their new lifestyle change by keeping a diary of everything that they eat, including where and when. When she did this, she found that she was eating a lot in the middle of the day, while she was walking to and from class, because she would pass several pastry shops or bistros along the way. The scent of the French food would always get to her, and she would order a pastry. While she was looking at her food diary, she was able to pick out "problem" foods. For her, the problems were sweets. After you have kept the food diary for 3 weeks, you spend 3 months resetting your body's cravings for food. She starts you off by drinking leek soup broth for 2 days, which sounds pretty disgusting to me, but I think maybe you could skip that part.
Anyways, for 3 months, you find different ways to cut the problem foods out of your diet. She suggests doing one "treat" on Saturdays. She suggests different things like never eating standing up, never eating out of the carton, and really considering how much one "portion" weighs (about as much as an apple.) For example, if you are eating 1/2 a pound of meat with your meal, that is TOO MUCH. Apparently, after a few bites of a food, your taste buds basically "tune out" so your portion really only does need to be a few bites, and you should eat one thing on your plate at a time so that you can fully appreciate the full flavor of the foods that you are eating.
After 3 months has passed, you should be half-way to your goal weight. If so, you can slowly start to give yourself more "treats," but she says that you will often find that you no longer desire them. She suggests that if sweets are your weakness, you could maybe have a small piece of good quality dark chocolate as a little treat in between lunch and dinner. If you haven't reached the half-way mark yet, look for more ways to take the problem foods out of your diet.
There are so many other things I could say about this book, but I don't want this to turn into a novel. You should read the book! It's an easy and quick read. I am definitely going to try out the diet concepts that are talked about.
The first thing that the author mentions is that the American diets obviously don't work. Once you have quickly lost weight, it is easy to gain back. Her French "diet" is a lifestyle change and more of a "slow and steady" diet. It works because it is not "one size fits all" like many American diets, and it doesn't contradict itself! One minute there is an American diet book out about how carbs are bad, and it is quickly followed up by a diet book that says that all you should eat are carbs.
She encourages the reader to start off their new lifestyle change by keeping a diary of everything that they eat, including where and when. When she did this, she found that she was eating a lot in the middle of the day, while she was walking to and from class, because she would pass several pastry shops or bistros along the way. The scent of the French food would always get to her, and she would order a pastry. While she was looking at her food diary, she was able to pick out "problem" foods. For her, the problems were sweets. After you have kept the food diary for 3 weeks, you spend 3 months resetting your body's cravings for food. She starts you off by drinking leek soup broth for 2 days, which sounds pretty disgusting to me, but I think maybe you could skip that part.
Anyways, for 3 months, you find different ways to cut the problem foods out of your diet. She suggests doing one "treat" on Saturdays. She suggests different things like never eating standing up, never eating out of the carton, and really considering how much one "portion" weighs (about as much as an apple.) For example, if you are eating 1/2 a pound of meat with your meal, that is TOO MUCH. Apparently, after a few bites of a food, your taste buds basically "tune out" so your portion really only does need to be a few bites, and you should eat one thing on your plate at a time so that you can fully appreciate the full flavor of the foods that you are eating.
After 3 months has passed, you should be half-way to your goal weight. If so, you can slowly start to give yourself more "treats," but she says that you will often find that you no longer desire them. She suggests that if sweets are your weakness, you could maybe have a small piece of good quality dark chocolate as a little treat in between lunch and dinner. If you haven't reached the half-way mark yet, look for more ways to take the problem foods out of your diet.
There are so many other things I could say about this book, but I don't want this to turn into a novel. You should read the book! It's an easy and quick read. I am definitely going to try out the diet concepts that are talked about.
Monday, March 12, 2012
Tested
This blog post is going to take the more personal route, and it's a little long-winded, but I think it's important to share.
One thing that I know I have always wanted to be is a mom. My mom wasn't the perfect mother, but I always admired her. Well, not really in high school, but let's skip that part. My mom started home daycare when I was born. When I was in 6th grade, she quit that and started homeschooling me and my siblings. We had home cooked meals EVERY MEAL. Never ate cereal for breakfast, except on Sundays. She had dinner on the table every night when my dad walked in from work. She never missed a night (thank goodness, because I think my dad can only make eggs.) Made us elaborate, homemade cakes for ever birthday. I swear that woman could make a cake for every theme we came up with. I wanted to be her. Still do.
I love my jobs, but I don't necessarily feel committed to them because they aren't actually what I want to be doing. Even before I met Garrett, I always knew that I wanted to start having kids as soon as my future husband was ready. Garrett and I met on a blind date, and I instantly fell for him. I didn't know how he felt, but I knew I wanted to be more than friends. It took awhile to get there, but after awhile I knew he liked me too, and after what seemed like an eternity (but was actually only 3 months) he asked me to be his girlfriend. 6 months later we were engaged, and 2 months before our 1 year dating anniversary we got married. It was fast. People gave me funny looks. My parents were happy I found someone, and they loved Garrett, but they still thought we should wait. They had only met him once, and they didn't meet his family until the wedding. But I knew it was right and I have yet to regret the decision.
Well, Garrett and I can't have kids naturally. When I found out, it was hard. I knew that being a mom was something that I always wanted to do. Obviously, there are other options, but I had no idea how expensive those other options were. Let me just say - EXPENSIVE. Some people might say that the inability to have children would be a deal breaker for them. But not me - I knew Garrett was the right guy and that God would provide for us. Don't get me wrong - even knowing about it, it's still hard to believe that we can't. I was hoping the doctor was wrong. But 19 months later, it's pretty obvious that he wasn't. Sometimes I get jealous of other people who are having babies. I know A LOT of pregnant people, and as excited as I am for them, I would be lying if I said I wasn't a little jealous.
Recently we found a grant for in-vitro that we could apply for, and I threw myself into getting all the paperwork together. Having to rely on other people to get the paperwork we need SUCKS. I think I am more of a control freak than I realized, and we aren't exactly working with the world's fastest people. The application is due this week and we are still waiting on some paperwork. At first, it really pissed me off that people weren't getting things to us as quickly as a wanted. And maybe we won't get all the paperwork in time and maybe we will have to wait until next year to apply for the grant again. At first, that really upset me. Then this weekend happened.
Garrett and I were both not feeling well Thursday and Friday, and so we took the days off work and had a 4 day weekend. It was GLORIOUS. It was just what we needed. We watched all 8 Harry Potter movies, because, well...when else are we going to have the time to do that? We left the house a few times, but mostly stayed home. IT. WAS. PERFECT.
Many times, I have only wanted my identity to be found in being a good, Christian wife and mother. Now, I'm thinking that I could be happy without that mother part. Obviously, I still want to try and have a kid. But, spending the rest of my life with someone who I am head over heels in love with would be a pretty awesome life. I am really happy that God lead me to that realization this weekend. I am so much less stressed about getting the application in, and just more laid back about having kids in general. If it happens, it happens. And I will be ecstatic. And if it doesn't, it doesn't ... and I will spend the rest of my life traveling the world or spending weekends having movie marathons with my best friend - and I will be the happiest woman alive.
All this just to say, that God knows what He is doing. I think He is using Garrett to show me that I am not in control. I had "a plan" for my life, and I am starting to see that God's plan is a little different than mine. I love Garrett so much and I can't wait to see where God takes us.
One thing that I know I have always wanted to be is a mom. My mom wasn't the perfect mother, but I always admired her. Well, not really in high school, but let's skip that part. My mom started home daycare when I was born. When I was in 6th grade, she quit that and started homeschooling me and my siblings. We had home cooked meals EVERY MEAL. Never ate cereal for breakfast, except on Sundays. She had dinner on the table every night when my dad walked in from work. She never missed a night (thank goodness, because I think my dad can only make eggs.) Made us elaborate, homemade cakes for ever birthday. I swear that woman could make a cake for every theme we came up with. I wanted to be her. Still do.
I love my jobs, but I don't necessarily feel committed to them because they aren't actually what I want to be doing. Even before I met Garrett, I always knew that I wanted to start having kids as soon as my future husband was ready. Garrett and I met on a blind date, and I instantly fell for him. I didn't know how he felt, but I knew I wanted to be more than friends. It took awhile to get there, but after awhile I knew he liked me too, and after what seemed like an eternity (but was actually only 3 months) he asked me to be his girlfriend. 6 months later we were engaged, and 2 months before our 1 year dating anniversary we got married. It was fast. People gave me funny looks. My parents were happy I found someone, and they loved Garrett, but they still thought we should wait. They had only met him once, and they didn't meet his family until the wedding. But I knew it was right and I have yet to regret the decision.
Well, Garrett and I can't have kids naturally. When I found out, it was hard. I knew that being a mom was something that I always wanted to do. Obviously, there are other options, but I had no idea how expensive those other options were. Let me just say - EXPENSIVE. Some people might say that the inability to have children would be a deal breaker for them. But not me - I knew Garrett was the right guy and that God would provide for us. Don't get me wrong - even knowing about it, it's still hard to believe that we can't. I was hoping the doctor was wrong. But 19 months later, it's pretty obvious that he wasn't. Sometimes I get jealous of other people who are having babies. I know A LOT of pregnant people, and as excited as I am for them, I would be lying if I said I wasn't a little jealous.
Recently we found a grant for in-vitro that we could apply for, and I threw myself into getting all the paperwork together. Having to rely on other people to get the paperwork we need SUCKS. I think I am more of a control freak than I realized, and we aren't exactly working with the world's fastest people. The application is due this week and we are still waiting on some paperwork. At first, it really pissed me off that people weren't getting things to us as quickly as a wanted. And maybe we won't get all the paperwork in time and maybe we will have to wait until next year to apply for the grant again. At first, that really upset me. Then this weekend happened.
Garrett and I were both not feeling well Thursday and Friday, and so we took the days off work and had a 4 day weekend. It was GLORIOUS. It was just what we needed. We watched all 8 Harry Potter movies, because, well...when else are we going to have the time to do that? We left the house a few times, but mostly stayed home. IT. WAS. PERFECT.
Many times, I have only wanted my identity to be found in being a good, Christian wife and mother. Now, I'm thinking that I could be happy without that mother part. Obviously, I still want to try and have a kid. But, spending the rest of my life with someone who I am head over heels in love with would be a pretty awesome life. I am really happy that God lead me to that realization this weekend. I am so much less stressed about getting the application in, and just more laid back about having kids in general. If it happens, it happens. And I will be ecstatic. And if it doesn't, it doesn't ... and I will spend the rest of my life traveling the world or spending weekends having movie marathons with my best friend - and I will be the happiest woman alive.
All this just to say, that God knows what He is doing. I think He is using Garrett to show me that I am not in control. I had "a plan" for my life, and I am starting to see that God's plan is a little different than mine. I love Garrett so much and I can't wait to see where God takes us.
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