Chicken Potato Spinach Soup Recipe - Cooks in a Vitamix!

Did you know that you can cook in a Vitamix?  Seriously, it can heat up soups and other recipes just by running its powerful motor.  Amazing!  From smoothies to soups I'm impressed.  One of the first recipes I tried after bring my Vitamix home was this soup. 

Chicken Potato Spinach Soup

Ingredients

1 cup chicken broth

1 1/2 cups milk

1/4 cup chopped onion

3-4 medium red potatoes (or 3 russest potatoes) 14 1/2 oz total, baked, halved, cooled and divided

1/8 tsp dried rosemary

1 tbsp spinach, cooked or frozen, thawed

5 oz skinless, boneless chicken breast, cooked and diced

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp pepper

*green onion for garnish

1. Place broth, milk, onion, two potatoes and rosemary into the Vitamix container in the order listed and secure the lid.

2. Select variable 1.

3. Turn machine on and slowly increase speed to variable 10, then to high.

4. Blend for 5 to 6 minutes or until heavy steam escaped from the vented lid.

5. Reduce speed to variable 3 and removed the lid plug.

6. Add spinach, one potato and chicken through the lid plug opening.

7. Blend an additional 5 to 10 seconds.

*Serves 2 adults and 1 child.

note: Blend times are for for room temperature ingredients, if using freshly cooked (hot) ingredients blend times may be reduced.

So easy, so yummy.  I still can't believe my blender can cook!

6 Other Uses for a Beverage Bucket

Do you have a beverage bucket?  Where do you keep it?  We bought our first bucket this summer for get-togethers and I decided that instead of storing it in the garage I'd put it to use around the house.  

Here are 6 ideas I came up with:


1. Photo Prop - Full of water or even empty a beverage bucket can make a great photo prop.  If you have a tiny tiny baby you can fill the bucket with blankets and put the baby (newborn) on top.  If they're a little bigger you can have them sit up in the bucket, so cute!  

The bucket is perfect for a baby, toddler or even a bigger kid!

2. Water Play - Even if you don't have your camera out the bucket is perfect for water-play!  Just add a few toys, cups or boats and your kids can go to town.  Easy clean up too.

3. Dog Bed - This next one surprised me I have to admit.  We had the bucket in our living room 4. Storing a Blanket for us and one day I saw our dog had ended up here.  So I grabbed my camera and took a photo of course.  Naturally this isn't a good fit if you have a regular sized dog, but if you have an Italian Greyhound or other small breed (or perhaps a bigger bucket?) they'll fit just fine. 


5. Toy Bin -  We decided to keep the bucket in our toy room for now as a toy/storage bin.  We keep it in the corner and have stuffed animals in it.  It would work for many different toys though including blocks, cars and dolls. 



6. Creative Play - A few times now I've discovered my kids playing in the bucket.  They pretend it's a boat, spaceship, bed, you name it!  It's great for creative play.








So go ahead, get your bucket out of the garage and put it to use somewhere around your house!

*I bought my beautiful bucket at Target.

Fisher Price Friday - Bossy Bell

Moo.  It's Fisher Price Friday and I have a sweet little pull toy to show you, it's the Bossy Bell #656. This is an oldy but a goody, made between 1959-1964.  I believe my version is the original one made in 1959.  Later versions included a green plastic hat and green wheels.

Bossy Bell is wood with lithographs on all sides.  She has wooden wheels but a plastic tail and horns.  Each side of the cow has the same lithograph, a furry cow hide, small pink udder (she's a mommy), blue butterfly and a wreath of flowers and fruit around her neck.  She also has big blue eyes and a nice smile.

Bossy Bell has a flower in her mouth and is pulled by a blue (or yellow) plastic string.  She has a metal bell attached that makes a lovely tinkly sound when she's pulled along.

Bossy Bell has curly hair on the top of her head, her name and the older FP logo.  Her plastic tail turns around when you pull the toy.

Isn't she adorable?

For more pull toys check out:

Queen Buzzy Bee #444

School Bus #192

Little Snoopy #693

Chatter Telephone #747

Mighty Tractor #629

Happy Little Helicopter #498

Bitty Baby House Party

I was lucky enough to hostess another House Party today!  It was a super fun Bitty Baby Doll (American Girl) party, perfect for my friends and all our littles!  Check out these faces, how cute are these tiny people?  We played with dolls, read a Bitty Baby book ate lots of snacks and had a good time.

A fabulous (FREE) prize-pack came for the party that included gift bags for my friends and a Bitty Baby with book/clothes, and a stuffed bear/book for my girls.  However, we decided that it would be more fun to share the doll/bear packages with our friends, so we did two drawings.  More on that in a bit.

The kids were ages 1-5 and they all brought babies or stuffed animals to our party.

The prize packs included a puzzle, coloring sheets, star activity, coupon and a few other goodies.  

These lucky girls won the doll and bear packages.  Look at those smiles!  

Even the kids that didn't "win" still had fun though.  Here are two of our bigger girls doing the star activities and coloring pages.

If you haven't heard of House Party check them out.  Everything is FREE and if you are selected to host a party you get a big box of goodies to share with your friends.  I highly recommend them!

Other House Parties I've Hosted Recently:

Barista Coffee Party

Gevalia (Coffee) Party

*Note: I do not get paid to talk about House Party, I just like them!

Super Easy Vitamix Almond Milk Recipe

I recently started to make my own almond milk.  I've been trying to find alternatives to dairy milk and so many of the store brands add too many extra (non-nut) ingredients to their nut milks.

I found a recipe online that was pretty easy, although you have to soak the almonds overnight.  Once I bought my Vitamix I found an even easier recipe.  This recipe is so simple that I had to share it with you!

Almond Milk 
3 cups of water
1 cup of raw almonds (unsalted!)
sugar to taste (I used 1 tbsp sugar)
*optional: 1/2 tsp vanilla

Directions
1. Place all ingredients in the Vitamix in the order listed.
2. Select variable 1.
3. Turn the machine on and slowly increase to variable 10, then to high.
4. Blend for 2 minutes or until consistancy is the way you like it.
5. Strain milk to remove sediment unless you like a fiber-rich thick milk. :)

Seriously, how easy is that?  No soaking, no switching out water.  Lovely.  

You're welcome.