• Home
  • About
  • Travel
  • Fitness
  • Photography
    • Birth
    • The Story of You
  • Disclosure and Privacy
facebook twitter instagram pinterest bloglovin Email

This day I love.......

There were no tricks only treats for our Halloween celebrations this year.  Unfortunately we had left it too late to carve a pumpkin but we certainly had plenty of other treats in store.  Having been on holiday the week before Halloween I had been a little disorganised in terms of costumes and decorations, but thanks to a last minute shop on boohoo.com the girls costumes were sorted on a next day delivery.


I was really surprised as I was not aware that boohoo.com did kids clothes but they have a huge range with everything from everyday wear to clothes for occasions and all at the same great prices and quality as the adult range.  I even picked up some items for the girls for Christmas.  Little Man I wanted to dress up too, but be a little different.  I know many boys dress up as superheros, and as a superhero mad family I could not resist this temptation.  However I wanted to do things differently, so in a world filled with spider man, captain America and Batman, he had to be Robin.  I found his outfit on amazon and could not pass it by.


The girls got changed straight from school but we had a little bit of time to wait for our friends to come over.  We had decided to go together as a group, not only for safety but also it is more fun trick or treating with friends.  Whilst waiting the girls watched their BBC Children in Need DVD.  This kept them occupied whilst I saw to Little Man, as it is full of all their favourite shows. [For more information visit my Facebook page].

We headed out into the cold, dark, spooky night and were very surprised at how quiet it was.  Last year almost every house was decorated but this year they seemed few and far between.  We have a rule of only knocking on houses that are decorated or have a pumpkin so we seemed to visit more streets than last year.  Perhaps it was due to a school night? Either way we all still had lots of fun and returned home with cold hands and buckets filled with sweets.

My eldest daughter made a point of counting her sweets out, 56 in total.  No idea why she wanted to count them but she did.  Little Man loved that he got to stay up with his sisters and enjoyed all the attention from people we passed.

As we had missed out on the run up to Halloween we continued our celebrations on the 1st November.  1st November marks the beginning of Day of the Dead; the Mexican holiday celebrated with festivals, parties friends and mouth-watering food and drink.  Unlike the name suggests it is actually about celebrating life and is an occasion to be joyful.  

The girls were allowed to celebrate with beginning to eat some of their trick or treat sweets, and of course it gave us an excuse to eat Mexican food, which in itself is a cause for celebration.  


We used Santa Maria’s kits to help us prepare a quick and tasty Mexican dinner that was enjoyed by the whole family.  Even Little Man enjoyed his Taco!

There of course cannot be a celebration without chocolate in our house.  My birthday this year happened to fall during National Chocolate week so even before Halloween we had a house full with chocolate.  To aid in our celebrations we melted down the chocolate to make a dipping sauce.  Using different flavour chocolates can create different flavour sauces.  I like to add a dash of lime or ginger into mine, whereas my youngest likes to add sprinkles to hers!  

Using some of the Halloween treats we made dipping sauces and dipped our Halloween treats and some fruit into the sauces.  I even used  my Thomas J. Fudge’s Florentines to dip into the sauce too.

It is safe to say we have had a fun few days celebrating and Little Man has enjoyed his first spooky celebrations!

This day I love treats, no tricks and the day of the dead.





Share
Tweet
Pin
Share
No comments
This Friday 16th September marks Mexican independence day. Which gives us a wonderful excuse to have a fun filled fiesta packed full of fantastic Mexican food!

We love our Mexican food and with the help of Santa Maria are able to make quick and tasty food. Their kits contain everything needed and quick and simple instructions enabling an evening meal to be ready quickly and one the whole family enjoy together.


A family favourite has to be fajitas, the girls love they can choose how much goes into each one. My personal favourite is burrito. This Mexican Independence Day we will be having Taco along with dips. Taco are a great fun food, the girls think they are having big crisps for dinner. We like to give them a variety of options to put in their taco along with the meat. Both girls much prefer this style of eating.


Whatever your favourite Mexican food, Santa Maria have a range which makes Mexican cooking easier. What will you have this Mexican Independence Day?


Santa Maria provided us with Taco and Fajita kits for Mexican independence day
Share
Tweet
Pin
Share
No comments
It is certainly getting colder outside.   The girls were having dinner with Grandma and Grandad so I decided to turn up the heat a little in the kitchen.  Using some Old El Paso BBQ spice mix and Old El Paso tortillas I made the quick and simple fajitas

Old EL Paso selection

As you can see from the image above we love fajitas in our house.  We have normal fajitas seasoning, crispy chicken and BBQ.  As well as a Taco mix.  We have however never tasted sweetcorn relish and so wanted to give this a try.  Everyone in our house [even the girls] enjoyed sweetcorn relish.

The Sweetcorn relish worked really well with the BBQ seasoning, which is what we had for dinner tonight.  It balanced the flavours really well.  I think we will be having the crispy chicken seasoning over the weekend, as it is one the girls enjoy.

It might be cold outside but we can still turn up the heat in the kitchen.

We were sent a selection of Old El Paso to review, all words are my own opinion. 


Share
Tweet
Pin
Share
No comments
Discovery foods really do make Mexican meals easy.  We have enjoyed them in the past and so when they contacted me to tell me they had launched a new Instagram page and to celebrate they were running a competition, well I had to enter.

All you have to do is get creative with Discovery foods and create a Mexican meal.  Share the beautifully presented Mexican meal using Discovery foods with Discovery on their Instagram Page.  You will then be in with a chance of winning one of 10 prizes to the value of £25 every week for 4 weeks.

I created Cajun Pirate boats.

I followed the recipe on the Cajun Chicken season sauce, to make my Cajun chicken.  I then filled the Discovery Taco with the Cajun chicken and sprinkled on top some grated cheese.  I placed two slices of red pepper to create a mast and half a baby tomato to create a ships wheel.  

cajun pirate boat

I finished off by decorating the plate with Discovery foods Garlic and Herb soured cream, which I made to look like the whites of the waves as the boat sails along the plate.

I also made the girls treasure chests, which was a taco filled with peppers, grated cheese and a small amount of the chicken,  I then used another taco on top to form a lid, which looked like a pirate chest.

I would love to see what you create so feel free to tag me in the picture on instagram too, I am thisdayilove.




Share
Tweet
Pin
Share
No comments
Its almost time for the Mexican Cinco de Mayo celebrations and Discovery set us a challenge to help celebrate the taste of Mexico.

goody bag

We dived inside our Mexican goody bag to Discover

The Perfect Fajita Kit 
Cajun Chicken Mix
Soured cream Garlic and Herb

yummy Mexican selection

All very yummy!  So the first thing we did was to cook the perfect Fajita Kit.  We followed the instructions on the box, cooking chicken, pepper and onion and sat down to enjoy our perfect fajitas

fajita

The thing I really enjoy about Mexican food and in particular Fajita is that it gets the family talking, or at least it does at our table.  Its about sharing and passing the food around, helping each other make the fajita and having a good giggle if it all falls out the end.  The seasoning was just right for me it wasn't too hot, and it was also great to finally see a fajita mix that did not clump together in the pan when cooking.  The garlic and herb soured cream was a great way to cool things down.  My youngest really enjoyed it spread onto the fajita bread, as it tasted like the garlic and herb butter dips you often find with dough balls.  

enjoy fajita

I made us a non alcoholic Latin limeade to go with our dinners.  It was incredibly easy to do:

1 cup lime juice - I squeezed 4 and half limes
4 cups crushed ice
4 tbsp dark brown sugar
2 cups cold water

Mix everything together.  We found the limeade was really refreshing and went really well with our dinner.

For another dinner I made Mexican hats.  The girls really loved these they thought they were very funny.

How to make a Mexican hat

1. Follow the directions on the Cajun Chicken cooking sauce from Discovery
2. Heat up wrap from discovery according to instructions.
3. Place a spoonful of chicken into the middle of the wrap

chicken and wrap

4. Cut a wrap in half, use one half to wrap around the chicken creating the centre part of the hat

taking shape

5. Heat up the salsa and mix with a can of chopped tomatoes
6. Place salsa/tomato mix round the base of the hat

red stripe

7.  Add garlic and herb soured cream from discovery onto the salsa to create a red/white stripe 

stripes

8. Add Pepper and any other veg you like to add colour to the hat, I thought about adding grated cheese but I had none in 

FINISHED HAT

















9. Heat in oven at 190c for 5 - 10 mins
10.  Serve and enjoy

enjoying dinneryummy


















We had a lot of fun making our Mexican hats.  The girls got involved making there own hats too before tucking in and enjoying their creation.  The Cajun chicken was a little hotter that I was expecting but it was still very tasty, luckily the soured cream garlic and herb was available to help cool things down.

Enjoy the fabulous Mexican Cinco de Mayo celebrations this weekend!
Share
Tweet
Pin
Share
2 comments
Older Posts

About me

About Me

Welcome to This Day I love.

My name is Leyla, also known as Mum to my 3 humans and dog Mum to J. I have a passion for the outdoors and love to run. I can often be found off road exploring the trails and fells and covering distances all the way up to 50 miles. As a family we love travelling and discovering new adventures, as I try and run around the world!

Follow Us

  • facebook
  • twitter
  • instagram
  • Google+
  • pinterest
  • youtube

Popular

  • Lamaze toy bundle
    Lamaze toy bundle
  • Win a Doc McStuffins Pet Vet Bag
    Win a Doc McStuffins Pet Vet Bag
  • Win the ultimate potty training kit with HUGGIES® Pull- Ups®
  • Deep Heat Muscle soak range
    Deep Heat Muscle soak range
  • Win a family ticket to Disney On Ice presents Worlds of Enchantment
    Win a family ticket to Disney On Ice presents Worlds of Enchantment
(c) thisdayilove . Powered by Blogger.

Brands



Ambassador Badge Tonka Orchard toys Hotter shoes Forests Nuby BritMums - Blogging with Integrity

Created with by ThemeXpose