Lasagna is usually such a labor intensive process so I usually don’t make it, you have to cook the meat, boil the noodles, make the tomato sauce. and then assemble and bake for what seems like forever. I really was not feeling all those steps so I decided to make crock-pot lasagna because I knew it would be a much easier process. I  could  leave my dinner and come back and everything would be ready!

Ingredients

• 1 pound hamburger, sausage or turkey
• 29 ounce tomato sauce
• 9 ounce tomato paste
• .5 teaspoon dried oregano
• garlic powder
• Italian seasoning
• onion chopped or onion powder
• mozzarella shredded cheese
• 2 cloves of garlic minced
• 10 oz. ricotta or cottage cheese
• 9 ounce box of no cook lasagna noodles

makes 6-8 servings

Adapted from Taste of Home Slow Cooker Recipes here

Directions

First cook your hamburger with the garlic and onion. After it is cooked drain off the excess fat leave it in a strainer.

While the hamburger is draining add your tomato sauce to you pan with the tomato paste and warm through adding oregano and other spices(Italian seasoning and garlic powder) till it reaches your desired taste. Keep tasting till you get it how you like it. Add the hamburger back in with the tomato sauce and combine.

In a separate bowl add the ricotta and a good handful of shredded mozzarella and mix to combine.

I added a crock pot liner to my crock-pot but you do not have to use one. It just saved me from the clean up.

First layer add 1/4 of the meat and sauce mixture to bottom your crock pot

Next add a layer of noodles then add a layer of cheese on top.

Finally add more meat sauce and keep repeating layers until everything is gone.

I had a lot of noodles left over and I think my crock pot is  a 7 quart crock pot.

Cook on low for 4-6 hours or until the noodles are cooked and everything is heated through.

Will serve 6-8 people

when your serve top with extra shredded cheese.

Do you like to make lasagna? Have you ever tried crock-pot lasagna?

Healthy Pumpkin Muffins

Pumpkin muffins are a recipe you can feel good about eating! The pumpkin muffins are super moist and so easy to whip up!

Only 2 ingredients

spice cake mix

1 can of pumpkin (regular size can)

Directions

Simply mix the two together. Do not add anything but the pumpkin to the cake mix.

The batter will be thick.

Try to get out more of the clumps out of mix than I did.

Bake at 325 F

for 15-20 minutes until done. You can insert a toothpick and make sure it comes out clean to determine they are finished.

Strawberry popiscles are another exciting recipe for you and your kids to make! My little cousin was over so we decided to whip some up the other day.

She was so excited, I think she asked me 50 times if they were ready yet!

I recommend doing these the night before because they take a while to freeze. You can avoid the “are they ready yet?”

Ingredients

1 container of ripe strawberries

optional sugar, honey or stevia

Supplies

popsicle mold or cups to freeze popsicles in

food processor, blender or fork

Directions

First wash your strawberries then cut off the stems.

Add the strawberries to the food processor and blend. I left mine with a little bit of texture because that is how I like them but feel free to get them to a liquid state. You can strain the mixture if you do not like seeds.

Taste the mixture and add a much sweetener as you need. I added less than a tablespoon of sugar because my strawberries were already sweet.

Fill you popsicle molds and freeze in the freezer and be patient. We waited about 6 hours but the popsicles were not completely frozen and did not want come out of the mold so 8-10 hours would be best.

I did not have a whole container of strawberries so this made four popsicles for us.

If you want another recipe you and your kids will have fun making be sure to check out How to make you own gummies! Your kids will be so excited to eat them!

Strawberry lemon sorbet is another refreshing recipe you can try as well.

What is you favorite type of cold treat?