Domestic Arts

Kale Mushroom Rice Noodles

This recipe is vegetarian and delicious! Plus my toddler loves the noodles!! He went back for seconds. We are still working on him eating the mushrooms and the kale.

I saw this recipe on the Giada at Home show. Click here for the original recipe.

We’ve made this dish a few times now each time making it our own. That’s what I love about cooking! Once you get the gist of a dish you can tweak it to the ingredients you have or prefer. For example, if your family needs to have meat to feel like it’s a complete meal… like if I was making this for my dad, I would add some thinly sliced marinated and grilled beef.

This original recipe calls for white sugar and we try to avoid refined sugar, so I substituted the sugar for honey. Also it calls for sweet potato vermicelli noddles- I used rice noodles. I used regular Bella mushrooms and white mushrooms because that’s what I had on hand.

Here is my version of the recipe.

Ingredients

Sauce:

1/4 cup honey
1/3 cup tamari
1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar
1-1/2 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
1-1/2 teaspoon peeled and grated ginger

Noodles:

Himalayan sea salt to salt the water for noodles
12 oz rice noodles straight cut. I used a A Taste of Thai brand,they have vermicelli rice noodles too. (The package is 16 ounces. I made the whole package and made extra sauce, since my son only eats noodles and sauce.)
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 ounces baby Bella mushrooms sliced into 1 inch pieces
4 ounces white mushrooms sliced into 1 inch pieces
1 large shallot chopped
1 red bell pepper cut into 1/4 inch strips
2 cloves garlic minced
4 scallions chopped
6 leaves of kale, cut into 1 inch pieces (remove the stem from the center of the leaf and discard stems)

Directions

In a small bowl combine all ingredients for sauce. Whisk together till honey dissolves into other ingredients. Set aside.
In a large pot of salted water boil your noodles according to cooking instructions. When cooked Drain and rinse with cold water and set aside.
In a large skillet heat olive oil to medium high heat. Add the mushrooms and cook for five minutes stirring often. Till mushrooms begin to brown.
Add the shallots and 1/4 teaspoon salt and cook for another 2 minutes.
Add the red pepper, garlic and scallions to the pan, reduce the heat to medium and cook for an additional 3 minutes, or until the peppers are beginning to soften.
Add the kale and the cooked noodles and saute till kale wilts about 3 minutes.
Add the sauce and toss.

A Place for a Baby Girl

This blog post has been at least 8 months in the making. A month before my now almost seven-month-old baby girl was born her nursery was finished. I had every intention of posting about it back then, but it turns out the transition from one child to two under 2 is a tad bit more difficult than I had daydreamed!

Before Aila was born, I absolutely felt an urgency to have her room completed, even though, she wouldn’t need her room till months after. If I am honest, we only use her room for playtime, diaper changes, getting her dressed and some nursing sessions- she sleeps in our room. But to me the nursery was a labor of love to literally prepare a special place for her. It was calming to nest-I guess that’s why we naturally organize and wash everything before baby comes. With so many uncontrollables during pregnancy, preparing every detail of her room made me feel as if I had some type of control and readiness.

Here are pictures of her room- I hope it inspires you.

Entry table

Hello my name is Mireya, and I am a Pinterest addict. First of all I love window shopping and paging through magazines gorging my eyes full of inspiration…So naturally I would be addicted to a website where I can do both of these things in my pj’s!

I am constantly being inspired by decor-once I have multiple ideas in my head, I like translating and creating something all my own.

I was very inspired by this entry table I found on Pinterest from Mydomaine.

I absolutely love the brightness an orange entry table brings and not to forget to mention orange is my favorite color.

Here is the entry way I created for our home.

The orange table and the frames on the left are from Ikea. The mirror, basket frames on the right, and bull sculpture are from Homegoods. The lamp is from Pier One Imports. The bowl for our keys and orchid were gifts.

At our previous home the entry wall was grey, and the mirror made more of a statement. Our current home is a rental, so the hubby doesn’t want us to put in the work of painting only to have to repaint everything white again. Maybe I will paint my white mirror. For now, this is the little section of our home that greets you as you come in.

Under The Sea Sweet 16

Nothing matters more to me than family! 16 years ago my first niece was born. I was only 12 years old but meeting her overwhelmed me with tears. She turned 16, SIXTEEN!!! this December and I can’t believe it!

Something you have to know about her is her middle name is Ariel, and with that name she carries an utter obsession for anything Little Mermaid! I’ve never seen a 16 year old be more excited to purchase a Little Mermaid snow globe bubble bath. It’s so cute! I hope she never outgrows her obsession…and now I know I am embarrassing her like a true aunt should …gushing over her niece haha!

Anyway, I knew I wanted to help make her Sweet 16 dinner special. I committed to make all the decorations, “Under the Sea” theme of course, and help my mom host her sweet 16 dinner… I can’t say it was easy to execute my “always realistic” and “easy” hand made ideas alongside spending my days with an almost 2 year old and battling morning all day sickness. Sounds reasonable right?! Again with my “realistic” ideas of hand twisting thousands of feet of streamer to resemble seaweed, hand dyeing over 1000 coffee filters to create a photo back drop, then using a circle cutter to handcut circles for dot garlands, folding tissue paper into perfect pom poms, converting paper lanterns into jellyfish, stringing glass spheres into strands of bubbles, covering mini fish in glitter, then designing centerpieces, developing a menu with my mom and then making an appetizer… “P I E C E O F C A K E”… I also enlisted the help of my ever so helpful and perfectionist husband who said that if I want to make a habit of party planning I need a different assistant haha! Sure babe until the next party where you will help measure and install my creations hehe

But seriously all sarcasm aside, I really do enjoy this party planning thing. Everything came out great! Most importantly my niece loved it. The dinner of salad, breadsticks, lasagna and chicken fettuccine alfredo was satisfying! As were the many available desserts of mini upside down pineapple cakes, macaroons, chocolate dipped pretzel rods and marshmallows, and mini cup desserts like lemon and s’more flavored. Guests also enjoyed hot chocolate with whipped cream sprinkled with peppermint or toffee chips, got to take picture in front of a backdrop with mermaid props and got to take home a little box of candies they filled from the candy bar.

Here are the photos that show the details I took care of for the Under the Sea Sweet 16 dinner…

View of the dinner space

Jelly fish and hand twisted streamers

Outdoor dinner space

Paper pom poms and dot garlands

Spinach dip appetizer

Table setting, teal table runner and clear dinner plates

At every table there were Little Mermaid characters in glass vases with stones or sand

Here is Ursula

Here is a close up of the details of the tables. At the center was a bigger rounded glass vase styled to resemble coral life.

Another close up

Ariel

Each table had two tall candles and some tea light candles

Another table view

Photo backdrop bubbles and tiny fishes are visible

$photo backdrop made form hand dyeing coffee filters \[$

photo backdrop made form hand dyeing coffee filters \[

Another view of the photo wall

A super talented friend from my Middle school days made this cake.

I also wanted to show you the other details of the party taken care of by my super talented sister in law, brother and niece. My brother and sister and law made the many mini desserts to fill up the cake table. My sister in law made everything for the cake table and the mini candy bar. My niece made the props for the photo booth and the frame for the coffee and hot chocolate bar. The cake was made by my talented friend from my middle school days.

Cake table

Macaroons made by my older brother and sister in law

Mini desserts

Mini upside down pineapple cakes

Hot chocolate and coffee station

Candy bar favor table

Photo Booth props

Gender Neutral Nursery

In April 2014 we had our first baby. When the hubby and I found out we were pregnant we both had this “grand” idea of waiting to find out the gender till the baby was born. I say “grand” idea because I am very impatient and bad at being surprised. I practically helped my mom plan my 18th birthday surprise party, and anytime Jimmy (my hubby) has a surprise for me he ends up telling me.

So, I was pretty cooperative with this surprise enjoying the journey, but…You can imagine by week 40 of my pregnancy, and still no baby, I was begging Jimmy to let me call the doctor to find out the gender. Of course he didn’t let me! Come on!! 40 weeks is a long time to wait for a surprise and not to mention the little rascal didn’t come till 9 days after my due date!

But anyway, since the baby’s gender was a surprise, I wanted to create a cozy gender neutral nursery.

I was inspired by beautiful nurseries that I found on pinterest like these:

From this nursery from Things That Sparkle blog, I was inspired by the luxurious cozy feel with the cremes and grays and the different fabrics.
I loved all the natural elements of dark wood mixed with the softness and comfort of all the creamy neutrals from this nursery featured in Nursery Notations by Estee Stanley
I was in love with this type of rocking chair that was used by Little Green Notebook
Along with all the other elements I’ve already mentioned that inspired me, I also really liked how this nursery, found on Decor Pad, incorporated animal prints.

I set out to create a nursery that contained all the elements I loved. Here is our gender neutral nursery, and once our little boy was born we added his name over his crib. Please click on the images for a full description.

We chose a pale green color that mimicked the color inside a cucumber to add a neutral but natural feel. The gray crib is from Babies R Us. The white cozy shaggy rug is from Homegoods.

The mobile was handmade by my sister in law and niece. We found the painting at Homegoods. The nicknacks on the shelf where gifts, The letters that spell out the baby’s name where from Hobby Lobby.