Simple as That

Making Everyday Beautiful

Blog

Easy Chicken and Stuffing Casserole

This creamy and cheesy casserole is comfort food at it’s best and it’s so easy to throw together!

This creamy and cheesy casserole is comfort food at it's best and it's so easy to throw together!

I shared a peek at what we were eating for dinner the other night on instagram and I had so many people asking for this simple and delicious dinner recipe, I thought I’d share it here!

This creamy and cheesy casserole is comfort food at it's best and it's so easy to throw together! This creamy and cheesy casserole is comfort food at it's best and it's so easy to throw together! This creamy and cheesy casserole is comfort food at it's best and it's so easy to throw together!

I love that this Easy Chicken and Stuffing Casserole is one of those meals that you can throw together in a pinch. I  usually have all the ingredients on hand in my pantry and freezer because it’s such a family favourite!

This creamy and cheesy casserole is comfort food at it's best and it's so easy to throw together!

Easy Chicken and Stuffing Casserole
 
Print
Ingredients
  • 3 cups boneless chicken (cooked and chopped)
  • 1 package of Stove Top Chicken Stuffing mix
  • 1 cup grated cheese
  • 1 package (approximately 1½ cups) cooked broccoli
  • 1 can of cream of chicken soup
  • ½ cup milk
Instructions
  1. Prepare stuffing mix according to package directions.
  2. Mix together milk and cream of chicken soup.
  3. Combine chicken, soup mixture and grated cheese.
  4. Pour into a 9x13 inch pan sprayed with cooking spray.
  5. Spread out mixture then add broccoli.
  6. Top with stuffing.
  7. Bake at 350 degrees until bubbly.

This creamy and cheesy casserole is comfort food at it's best and it's so easy to throw together!

It certainly isn’t anything fancy, but this recipe has been in our meal rotation for years! Another reason I like this simple meal so much is because it freezes well. I’ve got an upcoming trip planned and have been stocking up the freezer with a few meals for my family while I’m gone and this is one of the things I made for them. I knew the kids would all eat it and it is easy to pop into the oven straight out of the freezer. I hope you enjoy this family favourite as much as we do! 

This creamy and cheesy casserole is comfort food at it's best and it's so easy to throw together!

If you enjoyed this post you might also like…

Rustic Italian One-Pot Chicken and Rice

Rustic Italian One Pot Chicken and Rice

Southwest BBQ Chicken Salad

This Southwest BBQ Chicken Salad with Creamy Lime-Cilantro Dressing is a quick dinner option that's full of healthy ingredients and so packed with flavor your family will asking for it again and again!

Open-Face Swiss Bagels

Topped with swiss cheese, avocado, bacon (and more!) these open-face swiss bagels are perfect for breakfast, lunch or snacktime!

Family Fun | Phoenix Color Fun Fest 5K

Last weekend our family participated in the Phoenix Color Fun Fest 5K and it was such a blast! It was the first race we’ve ever ran together as a family and it was such a positive experience for all of us! The race itself was a lot of fun, but working towards our running goal as a family was invaluable!

We’d been looking forward to this family-friendly event for weeks and the kids were working so hard to get ready for the race! Their school recently started a running club that the three oldest have been involved in and they love it! They have over 75+ kids participating in Running Club and they get together twice a week to run laps and earn these fun foot charms as they reach certain running milestones.


Running Club is coming to an end this week and participating in the Phoenix Color Fun Fest 5k was such a positive note to end with! The staff made the race so fun and exciting! It was an event the whole family loved and will remember for years! Running together and seeing my kiddos cheering eachother on was the best thing ever!  I’m so glad I was able to get some fun photos with my phone as we ran. The crazy coloured powder was of course the best part, but it definitely wouldn’t have been best for my big camera. I have a LifeProof case that has protected my phone on all kinds of outdoor adventures, I couldn’t live without it!

This was such an awesome experience and if we have the opportunity, we’ll most definitely run in the Color Fun Fest again! Check out all the other cities on the Color Fun Fest 2014 tour! 

For more information about Color Fun Fest go here:

Volunteer: email [email protected]
website: www.colorfunfest5k.com
facebook: www.facebook.com/ColorFunFest

twitter: @colorfunfest

instagram: @colorfunfest

A little excerpt from my 6 year olds kindergarten journal this past week. One of the first things she wanted to write about after heading back to school from spring break was the Color Fun Fest of course!


Simple Things Facebook Chat Tuesday

Hey everyone, I hope you’re enjoying a wonderful weekend! Don’t forget, we’re kicking off Simple things Sunday 2014 with a live Facebook chat this coming Tuesday March 25th at 10pm EST. Come chat with us about photography and have your questions answered by Stacy and I live! You can share your favourite photos on the Facebook page and enter to win some FABULOUS prizes while you’re there! It’s going to be a fun evening, we’d love for you to stop in and say hi!

A special thank you to the official sponsors of this weeks chat!




Jo Totes Camera bags

The Vintage Pearl: 
Big Picture Classes:
Click over to the Simple as That Facebook page on Tuesday at 10pm EST to join the conversation! I can’t wait to meet you there!

If you’d like to learn more about Simple things Sunday see this post for all the details!  Stacy of Kids Stuff World and I will be hosting this weekly photo meetup starting next Sunday. We’re thrilled to be on this journey to capturing the simple things in 2014 and I invite you to join us, it’s going to be amazing! #SimpleThingsSunday

Butter Tart Slices Recipe

I took a little trip down memory the other day when my oldest daughter dug this recipe out of one of my binders and made these butter tart slices to share with a group of her friends. I hadn’t made them in ages, but they were just as delicious as I remembered them!

My Dad and I share a love for butter tarts. I remember making them often as a child, they were one of my favourite things to bake in the kitchen. I still love making a batch of butter tarts for my Dad on his birthday or other special occasions. In all these years, I never realized that butter tarts are a unique Canadian treat!

Today I’m sharing a recipe for butter tart slices. They are such a yummy and simple alternative to my favourite butter tarts.

BUTTER TART SLICES

1/2 C. butter
2 Tbsp powdered sugar
1 1/2 C. flour
1 1/2 C. brown sugar
2 eggs
1 Tbsp vinegar
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 C. melted butter

DIRECTIONS

Cream 1/2 C. butter and powdered sugar. Blend in flour. Press mixture into a 9×9 inch pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 5 minutes. Remove from oven. Combine the remaining ingredients and pour over base. Optional: add raisins or chopped pecans. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes or until set.

Click here for a printable version of this recipe.

If you enjoy this delicious Canadian recipe, you may also enjoy some of our family’s other tried and true recipes.

Applesauce Muffins

Pizza Buns

Easy Microwave Caramels

Potatoe Cakes/Norwegian Lefse

Spring Kids Craft | Tissue Paper Baby Chicks

I don’t know what the weather’s like in your neck of the woods, but here in Arizona I think its safe to say that Spring has sprung! If you’re still holding out for sunshine, here’s a simple craft that’s sure to get you in the mood for Spring! I made these Tissue Paper Baby Chicks with my kids last year and they loved them!

Supplies you’ll need to make your own Tissue Paper Baby Chicks: yellow or orange cardstock, orange pipe cleaners, yellow tissue/crepe paper, feathers, scissors, glue, goggly eyes



Once you’ve gathered your supplies the first thing you’ll do is cut a medium-sized circle out of the yellow cardstock for the chick’s body. Next cut your tissue paper (or crepe paper) into small square pieces. 



Now cover the yellow paper circle with glue. Next, take your little yellow squares of tissue paper, scrunch them up and stick them on the yellow paper circle. Keep doing this until the whole circle is full of fluffy pieces of paper.



Next make some legs for your baby chick out of pipe cleaners. Cut two pieces of pipe cleaner for each leg, one longer one and one short one. Take the two pieces and twist the small one around the longer on near the end to make the chicks feet. Attach the legs to the back of the chick using glue or tape.


For the finishing touches add googly eyes, a small triangle cut out of orange paper for the beak and feathers for the wings.



After your chicks are all done you can talk about their fluffy feathers, their smooth beaks and their soft pipe cleaner legs with younger kiddos. All my kids enjoyed making these little chicks and had just as much fun playing with them afterwards.

Follow Rebecca – Simple as That Blog’s board kids crafts on Pinterest.

For more fun ideas for the kids this Spring check out these posts:

28 Kids books for Spring + Easter

















Spring Lei












Rainbow Color Mixing








Egg carton Bunny + Chick




Silly Fingerprint Shamrocks

We had fun with this little St. Patrick’s Day craft over spring break! We did some fingerprint stamping and made some silly shamrocks! My two youngest, ages 4 and 6, spent almost an hour working on their creations and were so pleased with the finished results. It was just the right amount of messy play for this mom to handle and for the kids to thoroughly enjoy! Make your own silly shamrocks by following the steps below.

Step 1: Gather your supplies. You’ll need cardstock or construction paper, green and white craft paint, a paper plate, a small paintbrush and a black sharpie. This activity is a little messy, so you may also want some newspaper to cover your work surface and some paint aprons or grubby clothes to wear.

Step 2: Pour some green paint on your paper plate. Dip fingers in green paint. My girls used their thumbs, pointer fingers – anything goes really. Be sure to dab fingers off on the paper plate to get some of the extra paint off. Note: you could use a green stamp pad instead of paint.

Step 3. Stamp your fingers on your paper and create the first leaf for your shamrock. You may need to dip in the paint again for each leaf. Stamp three leaves for each shamrock.

Step 4: Once you’ve stamped all the leaves for your shamrocks, time to add a stem to each one. Using a paint brush paint a small stem at the base of the three leaves.

Step 5: To give our shamrocks a little personality we decided to add some eyes and a mouth to each one. Squirt some white paint onto the paper plate, dip the top of the paintbrush (the hard tip) into the paint and then put two dots on each shamrock for the eyes.

Step 6: Once the paint is completely dry use a sharpie to add eyeballs and a mouth to each shamrock. That’s it! You can create a page filled with silly shamrocks like we did or turn your fingerprint shamrocks into cards, tags or stamp a gift bag. The possibilities are endless. This makes a great last minute St. Patrick’s Day craft for kids!




Looking for more St. Patrick’s Day fun? Check out these posts:

St. Patrick’s Day Journaling + Filler cards

17 Simple St. Patrick’s Day Ideas

Follow Rebecca – Simple as That Blog’s board St. Patrick’s Day on Pinterest.c6af3cc5679aad5a397e3bf6babd315c57bcc53588074ab9ab

14 Fresh Fonts for Spring

I’m a bit of a font junkie and am always on the look out for trendy new fonts to add to my ever growing collection. It’s always fun to share some of my favourite font finds on the blog once in a while and today I give you 14 Fresh Fonts for Spring! You’ll find the links to download all of these 14 Fresh Fonts for Spring below!

14 Fresh Fonts for Spring

sofia | bebau neue | bright and beautiful | weston light | porter | grand hotel | geared slab | bless your heart | mission script | airbag | market deco | simplifica | skinny jeans | marmellata

What do you use fonts for?

I use fonts all the time when I’m designing free printables and adding text to my photos. Fonts are one of the most fundamental design tools and they can add so much to whatever it is you’re creating!

I use Photoshop in all my design work, but I always recommend Photoshop Elements to those looking to start out in design and photo editing. It’s an amazing program! Another great option if you want to start creating with fonts is to try out PicMonkey. Picmonkey is a free online photo editor. You can use it to fix your photos, add beautiful filters and text and it’s really easy to use!

If you enjoyed this post you might also want to check out these 18 Elegant Fonts for Easter that I shared last Spring.

Follow Rebecca – Simple as That Blog’s board spring on Pinterest.

Spring Photo Inspiration

From planting the garden to soccer games and Easter celebrations, there are so many photo opportunities that come with Spring! A few years ago I shared my printable Spring photo checklist and I decided to give it a little facelift. It’s available to download for free, you’ll find the link below! It’s filled with 50 photo ideas and photography prompts to give you a jumpstart on capturing meaningful Spring photos!

50 photo ideas and photography prompts to give you a jumpstart on capturing meaningful Spring photos!

Want to download our FREE Spring Photos Checklist Printable? Become an exclusive Simple as That member and get instant access! Click here to join for free.

If you enjoy this fun freebie please take a moment share on Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter. 🙂 Spring is one of my favorite times of year to take photos. After a cold winter I’m bursting to get outside and photograph all the details of this beautiful season. Here’s a little bit of Spring photo inspiration for you!

You can also purchase printer friendly versions of all my photo checklists in the Simple as That Digital Shop. These checklists are filled with 400 photo ideas and photography prompts to jumpstart your own creativity and help you capture meaningful moments all year long! Read more about them here.

About the checklists:

  • There are 8 checklists in the set
  • They come in 8.5 x 11 and 5.5 x 8.5 sizes
  • They coordinate with the Crystal Wilkerson 2013 planner
  • They come in PDF + JPG format
Want to download our FREE Spring Photos Checklist Printable? Become an exclusive Simple as That member and get instant access! Click here to join for free.

Follow Rebecca – Simple as That Blog’s board spring on Pinterest.

17 Shamrockin’ St. Patrick’s Day Ideas

Are you getting ready for St. Patrick’s Day? The holiday is pretty low key at our house, but we do enjoy a few simple St. Patrick’s day crafts and eat some fun green treats during the month of March! My favourite thing about St. Patrick’s Day has got to be the shamrocks! From the crafts to the decor – shamrocks just make everything cuter! Today I’ve rounded up 17 shamROCKIN’ St. Patrick’s Ideas for you! Enjoy. 🙂

Thumbprint Shamrocks // Zakka Life

Stained Glass Shamrocks // Rust + Sunshine

Shamrock Shake // Living Locurto

Shamrock Straw Toppers // Lia Griffith

Shamrock Bunting // Simple as That

Lucky in Love Printable // Lolly Jane

Shamrock Pinwheel // Lisa Storms

Shamrock Lei // Simple as That

Shamrock Bracelet // The House that Lars Built

Shamrock stamps form TP rolls // Prudent Baby

Shamrock cootie catcher // A Subtle Revelry

Shamrock tortilla chips // Spiced Blog

Shamrock bouquet // Simple as That

Shamrock gift tags // A Little Claireification

Shamrock Garland // Doodles and Jots

St. Patricks’ Day Shamrock Treasure Hunt Free Printable // Snap Creativity

Shamrock Rice Krispie Treats // I Heart Naptime

Looking for more St. Patrick’s Day fun? Check out these posts:Rainbow Color Mixing Activity

St. Patrick’s Day Journaling + Filler cards

17 Simple St. Patrick’s Day Ideas



Follow Rebecca – Simple as That Blog’s board St. Patrick’s Day on Pinterest.

Capturing the Simple Things in 2014

Hello friends! I’ve been missing our Simple things Sunday photo meet up and I think its about time we get things rolling again, don’t you!? I’m thrilled to announced that STS will be back SUNDAY MARCH 30th! Stacy of Kids Stuff World and I, have been brainstorming ways we could make Simple things Sunday even better and let me tell you, we’ve got some exciting things in store!

Simple Things Photography Facebook Chat:

We’re kicking off Simple things Sunday 2014 with a Facebook chat on the Simple as That Facebook page Tuesday March 25th at 10pm EST. Come chat with us about photography and have your questions answered by Stacy and I live! You can share your favourite photos on the Facebook page and enter to win some FABULOUS prizes while you’re there! It’s going to be a whole lot of fun! Keep tabs on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram where I’ll be posting reminders as it gets closer.

What is Simple things Sunday

Back in 2010 I was in the thick of mothering 4 young children ages 8 months to 8 years. I found myself struggling to find joy amidst the dirty diapers and other daily challenges that life with little ones brings. I wanted to treasure the details that made this stage in my life beautiful and unique, but some days it could be so hard. As a photographer, I did the only thing I knew how to do. I grabbed my camera and I began to search. As I sought out photo opportunities in my regular day, I began to see my life in a different light, and I gained a deeper sense of appreciation for the seemingly mundane. When viewed through my lens, the simplest moment could be transformed into a magical image that took my breath away. Seeking out these simple moments each week helped me as a mother to find more patience and be more aware of the blessings that surround me.


Sharing your Simple things Photos With Us:

Simple things Sunday is about slowing down and capturing life’s everyday details. Taking joy in the simple things is the focus and Sunday is the day we get together to reflect on our experiences from the week and share our photos with each other. You can share by linking up on mine or Stacy’s blogs, you can share on Instagram using the #simplethingssunday hashtag. You can even stop by the Simple as That or Kids Stuff World Facebook pages to share your photos with us! Whatever works best for you, works for us!

We want Simple things Sunday To Be:

A simple and easy way to share your favourite photos with others on a weekly basis

A place to find inspiration in photographing real life moments

A community of friends that gather together to share, encourage and uplift each other through a common love of photography

A collection of beautiful and inspiring photos

A way to encourage eachother to look for joy in each day and celebrate the simple moments in life

I’m so happy to be back on this journey to capturing the simple things in 2014 and I invite you to join us, it’s going to be amazing! #SimpleThingsSunday

Follow on Instagram

Instagram has returned invalid data.