I love happy accidents, especially when they involve food.

The other day my family was grumbling about being hungry. The problem was, I hadn’t been to the grocery store in awhile and the pickings for ingredients around our house was pretty slim.

I decided to scrape up whatever I could find and turn it into a meal. The result was this Bacon and Chipotle Cheddar Linguine recipe that has sense become a family favorite, requested multiple times over this past week, even!

The very best thing about this recipe is that it’s so incredibly simple. Stupid simple. So simple that each time my family requested it over the past week, I made it. It is seriously no sweat to make. …

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Sometimes I think my mom’s generation had it easier when it came to cooking.

All you have to do is look at an old recipe book and you’ll see really doable at home recipes. Not over the top creations, but simple ideas that came out of necessity versus the need to out do or out “Pinterest” someone else.

I love it when I find simple recipes from old magazines and cookbooks. They tend to be classics…without a lot of fuss, but a whole lot of appeal! Those old recipes always provide a neat glimpse into what I assume were the trends from when I was growing up.

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Before I start my post, about how much I love Kansas Farmers and share this fabulous Bacon Cheddar Bay Beer Bread Biscuit recipe with you, I wanted to pass on this bit of news with you…

See that banner? Yes, the one that says you can win BACON for a year? Well click on it and find out how to enter the Show Us Your Bacon contest the Kansas Pork Association is hosting over on their facebook page. Can you imagine winning a years supply of bacon? Oh the goodness that will be coming from your kitchen with that much bacon is unimaginable! If you win, you’ll have to share with me, ok? 🙂

Now that you’ve entered the contest (right?), is it possible for me to wrangle you back in with some talk of bacon recipes and how blessed we are to have hard working farmers in our lives?…

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Friends, I currently have two dilemmas in my life. #1 school starts in less than 2 weeks. #2 I am currently swimming in zucchini.

School starting in 2 weeks makes me sad. I love having my kids home during the summer and I really enjoy the more laid back schedule. We are trying to implement the “school time schedule” this week, but it isn’t going so well. After a couple of months of eating dinners late, staying up until the sun is more than set, and just kind of flying by the seats of our pants, the school schedule adjustment is going to be brutal. Brutal, I tell ya!…

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Everything is better with bacon, right?

I was recently challenged by Kraft to create a new appetizer using their Fresh Takes Cheddar Jack and Bacon cheese and breadcrumb mix. What could make a Cheddar Jack and Bacon better? More bacon, of course! …

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I love pizza. If I could alternate Chipotle Chicken Burritos and Pizza, every other day, I’d be an extremely fat and happy camper. Happy being the keyword there… because happy is what matters most, right?

You know what I love even better than pizza? Putting my kids to work making dinner. Nothing better than sitting back, eating bon bon’s, watching the servants I birthed slaving away making dinner. It’s pretty wonderful.

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Weekends at our house are a time for more leisurely breakfasts… things that require more effort than the opening of a box and pouring of cereal and milk into a bowl. Weekends are for stirring, sifting, baking… the smell of bacon or sausage wafting up the stairs, rousing the kids enough that they come into the kitchen and eagerly ask “what are you making for breakfast, mom?”…

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This post has nothing to do with this recipe for Bacon and Egg cups, which you can find here, but since I’m talking about back to school, I at least wanted to share a delicious and quick breakfast recipe with you!

This giveaway is now closed. The winner, chosen by Random.org, is Comment #277 – Laura from Vegetarian Hausfrau. Congratulations Laura!

Those of you who are friends with me on Facebook or follow me on Twitter, may have noticed that I was having just a bit of a meltdown moment yesterday. You see, my kids started back to school today and yesterday morning, when I opened up my fridge to get out the milk, I noticed our “Things to do this summer” list tacked up on the door. I realized as I was glancing through the things on the list that very few items were checked off. Looking through that list of unchecked items really hit me hard.

This summer went by so quickly. I’m going to be 100% honest with you when I say that I have had a very difficult time balancing things this summer. My “real” job with HireBetter, that I am lucky to have, has kept me busy. Freelancing opportunities are continuing to flow in at a great pace. Blog trips, events and activities are in abundance. Things, professionally, are going very well.

The truth of the matter is though that my #1 job is to be the mom of my four kiddos. It has been my goal since my first baby was born to stay at home with them. I’ve been blessed enough to work from home part-time for some pretty amazing companies, but even so, I feel so torn sometimes about how I can balance my professional life and nurturing my goals with my life of being a stay at home mom. Is it possible to be able to do both well, without feeling like one thing or the other getting neglected?

This has been the summer of the professional me, and because of that, I have a horrible amount of mama guilt about not doing enough with my children this summer. Time is slipping away, and sometimes I feel like I need to just shove the whole career thing aside and focus 100% on my family. But would I be happy then? Who knows. Who knows…

Anyway, after my meltdown and some peptalks from some of the most amazing family and friends around, I began to reflect on the summer. I was searching through pictures and found actual proof… proof that my kids and I had a fabulous summer together. We vacationed, we played, we had lazy days, we swam, we visited family… we did so many things that will hopefully be embedded in their minds as part of the great summer of 2010.

I also have more proof. I took some really fun videos of my kids using my Flip Video Camera. Can I just tell you how much I LOVE my Flip Camera? I got it right before Leah was born when I was doing some work with the Chevy Traverse and it is the must have piece of equipment for Moms everywhere. If you are horrible about capturing things by video because you never have your video camera with you, you need a Flip cam. Lucky you, because this week, I’m giving you the opportunity to win one! I believe that every person on the planet needs to have one of these great cameras. Since I’m not Oprah Winfrey, I don’t have Flip’s to giveaway for every person on the planet, but I do have one to giveaway to a lucky Dine & Dish reader.

The details:

Up for grabs us is one white & silver Flip video camera, brand new in the box, with 4 GB of Memory. Enter to win by:

• Leave a comment, including a way for me to contact you if you win, on this post anytime between now and midnight CST on Friday, August 20th.
• For an additional chance to win, become a friend of Dine & Dish on Facebook. Come back to this post and leave an additional comment letting me know you did so. If you are already a friend of Dine & Dish on Facebook, thank you! Just leave an additional comment on this post to let me know!
• And you know what, I’m easy. If you don’t Facebook, which I know not everyone does, and you want a 2nd entry, just leave a second comment on this post telling me just that.
• Winner will be drawn by Random Number Generator and announced on Saturday the 21st.

Disclosure: This blog post contains affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

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