Orange Chicken Recipe

I love chinese food, but the the only decent place around us is very expensive.

Between trying to save money and eat healthier, we've been eating home.

Lately I've been craving orange chicken, but I've done good an not caved.   I decided to see how hard it would be to make some at home.  I found a great Panda Express Orange Chicken recipe on food.com.  It wasn't as complicated as I thought, so I gave it a try tonight.

The kids loved it.  With Warrior, who is not normally a chinese food kind of person, that's saying a lot.

Next I'm going to attempt to make honey walnut shrimp.  

Warrior's Graduation

Thursday Warrior graduated from 8th grade.  It was a very hard day for all of us.

The day did not start out good.  The social worker from Stanford called wanting to know if I was able to go up that morning to sit down with the surgeon to get the autopsy results.  I told her Robbie was graduating that afternoon and I refused to ruin  the day.  So I have to wait until Monday to find out when everyone is available to sit down and talk.

Then Warrior's plans for after school were changed, which he made sure everyone knew he was not happy about it.  Thankfully after he found out what the surprise was, he was calm and enjoyed himself.  Some parents in the class got a limo for all the boys.  They rode around town in it, and had a pre graduation party in it.  Thankfully that was what Warrior needed to calm down and relax and enjoy the rest of the night.

Graduation was great.  I cried throughout it because Tin Man wasn't there with us and we had an empty seat in our row which was a huge reminder.  There was a memorial tribute to the 3 parents that have died over the last 6 years from that class.  Which was very sweet, but hard to see Tin Man on it.

Overall graduation was really nice.  The teachers talked to each of the kids (only 28 of them) and what they enjoyed the most about each of them.  Then the kids got up and thanked the parents for supporting them through their school years.

Warrior's speech was something like "I want to thank my mom and everyone else for buying me things, being there for me, but especially all the support they've given me in the last few months.  I love you guys!"  He said he felt bad that he didn't mention his dad, but he knew he wouldn't be able to do it without crying.  I told him it was ok, and that dad was there with us and he was so very proud of him.

The thought of summer vacation scares me.  I'm not emotionally or mentally ready for this.

Cooking From Scratch - Mac and Cheese

After my husband has his transplant he can't eat any preprocessed foods.

We've been trying make more things from scratch now so it won't be such a shock after transplant. This also helps us control his sodium intake too.  Preprocessed foods are NOT low in sodium.  Some of them are more than half of his daily allowance.

The kids have been begging for mac and cheese, so I gave in (I am not a fan) and we made some homemade mac and cheese.  Let me tell you, this was really tasty.

Ingredients

• 8 ounces uncooked elbow macaroni
• 2 cups shredded sharp Cheddar cheese
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 3 cups milk
• 1/4 cup butter
• 2 1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour - we used
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs
• 1 pinch paprika

Directions

1. Cook macaroni according to the package directions. Drain.
2. In a saucepan, melt butter or margarine over medium heat. Stir in enough flour to make a roux. Add milk to roux slowly, stirring constantly. Stir in cheeses, and cook over low heat until cheese is melted and the sauce is a little thick. Put macaroni in large casserole dish, and pour sauce over macaroni. Stir well.
3. Melt butter or margarine in a skillet over medium heat. Add breadcrumbs and brown. Spread over the macaroni and cheese to cover. Sprinkle with a little paprika.
4. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 30 minutes. Serve.