Saturday, December 11, 2010

Yummy! Cranberry Orange Cookies!

I found this recipe off of allrecipes.com.  You can find the recipe here.

These are GREAT! No wonder the recipe is a 5 Star recipe!

Enjoy!

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Thanksgiving Picnic

Aunt Nyla, Tawnya, Bronson, Aunt Carole, Shara

Grandma, Aunt Carole, Aunt Nyla, Jennifer, Camilee&Jase, Amy, Tawnya&Bronson, Shara, Jessica, Katie&Ryker, Marsha, Kaitlyn, Alexis


Our Wonderful Grandma


Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Chicken Parmigiana

I may be the only person on the planet who's never made this before and boy have I been depriving me and my family of a very delicious meal!  When Shara said she had requested it for her birthday dinner I added it to my 2 week menu and finally did it last night (although this is not her exact recipe).  I didn't get any pictures before we devoured it, but just picture something yummy!

Chicken Parmigiana
4-6 Chicken Breasts
Parmesan Cheese
Mozzarella Cheese
Bread Crumbs (I added Italian seasoning to them)
Pasta

Sauce (this is actually our recipe for pizza sauce, but it worked great for this too)
2 T. olive oil
5 garlic cloves minced
1 28oz. can crushed tomatoes
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. oregano

Saute garlic in olive oil and add remaining ingredients and heat until thick and bubbly.

Heat oven to 400 degrees.  Combine the bread crumbs and some of the Parmesan cheese in a bowl.  Cover each side of the chicken breasts with mixture.  Place in baking dish.  Cook for 30 minutes.  Remove and pour sauce over top.  Sprinkle the Mozzarella Cheese and the rest of the Parmesan cheese over top.  Place back in oven and cook for the remaining 20 minutes or until chicken reaches 165 degrees.

Serve over your choice of pasta.

SO GOOD!

Saturday, October 30, 2010

WORMS











Ingredients:




100 flexible plastic straws with the bendable neck




1 package (6 oz.) raspberry or grape flavor gelatin




3 envelopes unflavored gelation (Knox)




3 c. boiling water




3/4 c. whipping cream




12 to 15 drops green food coloring




waxed paper








Instructions:




Combine gelatins in a bowl and add boiling water, stir until gelatins completely dissolve. Chill until lukewarm, about 20 min.




Meanwhile, gently pull straws to extend to full length; place in tall container with the neck end towards the bottom. ( I used a tall drinking glass, the recipe says to use a cleaned 1 qt. paper orange juice carton). Wrap together with a loose rubber band to hold straws together.




Blend cream and food coloring with the lukewarm gelatin mixture. Carefully pour into container, filling straws. (The mixture will fill up the straws as well as on the outside of the straws)




Chill until gelatin is firm, at least 8 hrs. or cover and chill up to 2 days.




Pull straws from container, then pull straws apart and wipe off the outside. Run straws under hot tap water for about 2 seconds 3-4 straws at a time. Starting at the empty ends push worms from straw with rolling pin, or use your fingers.




Lay worms on waxed paper-lined baking sheet. Cover and chill until erady to use, at least 1 hour or up to 2 days. Worms will hold at room temperature fro about 2 hours.




Saturday, October 2, 2010

One Step Closer

My countertops are Oak and they are beautiful! We got them oiled today - we'll have to sand and oil them again to get some of the rough spots out.
My sink is huge! It'll be nice to bathe babies in it!


I have a laundry bar by the washer and dryer - I think I'm going to love it!
...yes my house is still a total wreck! I give myself two weeks to get it put back together - we'll see....




Thursday, September 23, 2010

DIY Crib Sheet

My husband has been set on a Camo themed nursery from day one...BOY or GIRL!

Good thing we're having a boy.

I found this great tutorial from MADE.

It's EASY!

No one makes a Hunter Orange crib sheet...except me I guess. I would have had to spend lots of $$ to buy a custom one.

Thanks MADE!

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Kitchen Overhaul

Thought I'd put up a few pics of what's been going on in my world (without a kitchen!)
We started this mess the middle of August -
Before the demolition of my kitchen
Jed and Mark hard at work - (lovely green linoleum and layers and layers of wall paper!)
As of this week - I'm loving the way it's turned out so far! Lots of work though! ( Katie, Jed and Roy have helped us a ton - thank you very much! )
We decided to go through IKEA for most of the stuff (cupboards, floor, microwave, MY FIRST DISHWASHER, sink (not in), countertops (not in) and I'm very pleased with them so far!
If you care to see the "work in progress" go to my blog. (nobuckaroos.blogspot.com)




Saturday, July 31, 2010

Earring Holders

While our boys were camping:



And the finished products, complete with our earrings:






As soon as the boys are back, we'll have Steve pound some nails for us to hang these things up with.

We went to the dollar store and bought a meat/grease strainer thing. We decorated it with ric rac, flowers, buttons, ribbon, etc. They turned out cute and easy to make, too.

Friday, July 30, 2010

Necklace T-Shirt




I made these T-shirts this morning for Callie. Our boys are camping, so we had to do some fun "girlie" things. I used puff paint and the end of a pencil, tinker toy, and paint brush for the necklace T-shirt, and just dipped and dotted. For the other t-shirt, it's just iron ons and ric rac. Quick, easy, and fun.

Fried Ice Cream


Marsha made us this yummy dessert for FHE while she was visiting. She got it from her friend, Mindy. It's REALLY GOOD!!!
3 C. Rice Krispies
1 C. Brown Sugar
1 C. chopped pecans
1 1/4 C. coconut
1/2 C. butter
pinch of cinnamon
Preheat oven to 300. Melt butter and stir in the rest of the ingredients. Bake in a 9X13 for 30 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes. Take out of oven and cool. Take half of it out of the 9X13, leaving the rest for the bottom layer. Layer with softened vanilla ice cream. Put the other half of the mixture on top. Squish down to hold it in place. Put dessert in freezer to harden. Cut and serve. You can top it with honey, caramel, chocolate, or any kind of topping.
We topped it with blueberry pie filling. It was delicious.

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Sweet BBQ Chicken Kabobs

Tawnya found this recipe from the sisterscafe.blogspot.com website and they were delicious.
We added zuchinni, yellow squash, and onion chunks.


Jed was gone to Scout Camp all week so we met at Katie's for a couple of days.


Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Pesto Bruschetta


My favorite appetizer at Oregano's is Pesto Bruschetta - if you ever go there, it's not on the menu, but you can still order it (don't ask me why.) The other day, Jen and I tried to recreate it and I think we came pretty close. It is Italian bread topped with pesto, diced red onion, sliced tomatoes, and a blend of Italian cheeses (or whatever you like), and then broiled in the oven.

Jen made the Italian Bread - click here for the recipe. I have made this Italian Bread recipe since then and it is pretty easy and DELICIOUS! The pesto is a recipe Jen found and has been using from The Sisters' Cafe, and they got it from the Barefoot Contessa.

Give this a try - Jen and I loved it so much that we could eat it for dinner, not as an appetizer.

Here are the simple steps:

Slice your bread horizontally, and spread pesto on it. Sprinkle chopped red onions on top.


Put sliced tomatoes on top of the red onions.

Sprinkle the Italian blend of cheeses (or whatever cheese you want) on top,
and broil it until it looks good to you.

Friday, July 9, 2010

Car Cozies

Here's another project Camilee and I made over our sewing weekend. They turned out to be so fun. The boys have been playing and playing with these. We mass produced these because of all of our boys. We made 8 altogether.

We got the pattern from Homemade by Jill.









The pattern said to put piping all the way around, but we found that it's too bulky that way and we liked it better on just the top and bottom. Also, it would work just as well to use denim or duck cloth for the outside and just cotton on the inside. It is VERY STURDY the way we made them, with denim and duck cloth all the way through.

And this is after a weekend of sewing.






Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Lunchbags, Placemats, Kleenex Pouches

I was able to go to Camileee's for the weekend and have a sewing fest. It was so much fun. We made some cute stuff. The first project we did was lunchboxes for Madison and Callie. We got the pattern from here. We did make a few changes, like not using a pillowcase like the pattern says to use, but regular fabric and not using the iron on vinyl. We've heard that stuff doesn't wash up well. We wanted these to be machine washable. This was our first time with appliques, and we know how to do it better next time. We will use interfacing on the back so it doesn't pucker.

To square off the corners, we put the two bottoms of the bags together and sewed across the squared part and did them together, instead of squaring separately and then hand sewing the two together. It was easier this way.

This flower is from a tutorial we found here. We did add some purple netting stuff in between each layer. And we just used a hair alligator clip thing on the back to clip it to the handle, so it can be removed to wash.


Next time we aren't going to use twill tape on the casing for the strings. It was a mess to work with. It would be just as good and easier to just hem it under with a rolled em.


We used fusible fleece on the back side of the lining. It was fun. I defintely want to use this stuff again on something. And instead of hand sewing the lining to the outside of the bag, we topstitched with our machines.


This pattern came with a placemat tutorial. How cute! They won't have to put their lunches on the yucky cafeteria tables.











And what little girl doesn't need her own matching Kleenex pouch for her backpack? Here's the tutorial for that.





Thursday, July 1, 2010

STARS


Marsha made these very pretty and fun stars for the 4th of July. I love how they turned out.
The only thing she did different is that she didn't use a succer mold. She just used a candy mold.
Here's the link to where she got the idea from and how to do it.
If you suck on them slowly, you can feel the pop rocks working. Cool, huh? I wish I was there to
test them out! I love pop rocks.

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Child Leash

I've seen lots of "mommy handles" on craft blogs lately. I'm sure they work great if you have a sweet little girlie that likes to mind and never tries to run away. But my BOYS are different. I need something more like a LEASH. So I cut a strip of material 5 inches wide and made a belt and a handle. I ironed the strips in half and then the edges inward towards the fold, then sewed down both sides. On the belt I put a D-ring on one end and a hook-clippie thing I got in the jewlry section at JoAnn's. Then on the handle I put another clippie thing on one end and a wrist loop on the other. We'll see how this works.

Of course he has to model it on the kitchen counter since it's his favorite spot in the house.


He's been playing doggie all day, and also "tying himself" to things all over the house.






Here's a picture of the belt D-ring and hook. The handle hook just clips right to the D-ring, also. Too bad I had to mix gold and silver. No JoAnn's in Thatcher.

4th of July Oreos


My Visiting Teacher brought me these yummy cookies. Oreos dipped in white chocolate and sprinkles with colorful sprinkles. She stuck a skewer in the cookies and put them into baggies and tied with ribbon. So cute. Of course, the kids all had to have one, so I ended up eating one and Steve didn't get any. Oh, well.

Monday, June 21, 2010

Peanut Butter Popcorn

Isn't this picture just too wonderful?! Erin wanted her hand in the picture.

Madelyn came over to help me out the other day, and she asked if she and Erin could make peanut butter popcorn. I said sure, thinking that I wouldn't eat much of it myself. But I was wrong - it was delicious! I kept snitching some here and there.

Here's the recipe:

PEANUT BUTTER POPCORN

2 qts. popped popcorn (one bag of microwave popcorn worked well)
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. light corn syrup or honey
1/2 c. chunky peanut butter
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Cook sugar and corn syrup to a rolling boil. Remove from heat and add peanut butter and vanilla. Stir until melted and smooth. Pour over popcorn, stirring to coat. Serve as is or form into popcorn balls.

And what would a recipe post be if I didn't say ENJOY! at the end.

Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Peanut Butter Balls


These were yummy. Next time I make them I am going to add chocolate chips to them.


I doubled this recipe because I knew they would go fast.


1 cup quick oats

1 cup peanut butter

1 cup non-instant dry milk (cannery kind), or 1 1/2 cups instant dry milk

2/3cup honey

1 tsp. vanilla

1/2 cup coconut flakes


Mix all ingredients and use a cookie scoop to make balls onto waxed paper. Chill in refrigerator.

Remember-Letters by Allison




Allison and I swaped crafts. I sewed some flour sack towels to match her new kitchen curtains and she made these fun letters for me. I love them. Thanks Allison!