Handkerchief Skirt

Rayelle loves to model for me now. 

Isn't she just the cutest little model though?! 

It was a while back now, but I found this super cute tutorialonline for one of the cutest skirts ever!

So I put it on my to-do list that is a mile long in hopes that I would get to it soon.

I got around to finishing one for Rayelle about a year ago.  I got another one sewed together but never got around to sewing the elastic on it.  Until today that is!  

This is the one I made last year.

(too small for her now probably, I should try it on her)

With the pink skirt, I used two bandannas that I found at the dollar store.  They even have two-packs!

The black one I used regular fabric that I cut to the size of a bandanna.

Goes to show that this pattern can be adapted for any size.  Just makes it easier to use a bandanna for little girls.

One of the cool things about this pattern:

If you use two fabrics that show on both sides the skirt can be reversible. 

~Ashley

Perfectly Peel Boiled Eggs

Can you perfectly peel a boiled egg?

You betcha!

I LOVE deviled eggs, but I hate peeling the eggs because it takes forever and they always, always turn out ugly.  Why ugly?  Because there always seems to be chunks missing from the eggs as a result of the peeling process.

Well not anymore!

So here's the way you too can get perfectly peeled boiled eggs.

1. Place the eggs in a pot and cover them completely with COLD water.
2. Put them on the stove to boil.
3. Once the water comes to a rapid boil, set a timer for 20 minutes. (leaving the burner turned on)
4. When finished boiling, turn the stove off and let the water calm down.
5. Pour the water off the eggs and refill the pot with cold water and wait a few seconds.
6. Pour the water off and refill it again with cold water.  Let it sit for about 5 minutes.
7. Pour the water off the eggs.
8. To crack the eggs, tap it on the counter and then using your palm, roll the egg on the counter till the whole egg shell has been cracked.
9. Start to peel the shell off and it should basically fall off.

I'm not sure if I'm the only one who didn't know how to correctly peel an egg or not.  But I sure am glad that I figured it out.  So I'm sharing this for all of you out there who may not already know the precious secret.

Good Luck!

~Ashley

Paper Dolls Turned Magnetic

I found these super cute paper doll kits at Wal-Mart.  They were in the party favor section.  I have wanted to make some for Rayelle for months!  So I finally did it.  I knew I wanted them to be magnetic so the clothes would stick to the doll.  Rayelle is only 2 so the magnets would help her out tons. 

 I also bought a tin from the Dollar Store to store the dolls in and stick them to.

This is the clothes that came with the dolls.  I used both sets so she would have more options.

She wanted me to take a pic of her during the project.  Camera ham ;)

I just glued all the outfits to magnets adds that come on the phone books.  then cut them out.  It was very detail oriented.  But it went pretty quick.  

I'm going to glue the dolls onto bigger magnetic sheets that you can buy from craft stores.  I think Rayelle is going to like it.  I just hope she doesn't lose the pieces right away.  

~Ashley

Chicken Enchilada Pasta Bake

This was a new recipe that I have had the clipping for for about 6 years or something like that.  I went through my recipe binder recently and threw out all the ones I knew I would never get around to using.  I like to find recipes online and see what the reviews say before using them.  So nearly all the magazine clippings went to recycling.  But there were a few I kept that I could would be pretty good.  And this was one of them.

 

This is what it was supposed to look like.  They are always perfect in the magazine.

Recipe found here.

And this is how mine turned out.  It's not as picturesque, but it was still yummy!

A few tips I discovered:

1. It makes a lot!  Maybe freeze part if you don't have a large family.  It was just me, hubby, and 2 yr old.  TONS of leftovers!  We ate it for 4 days and there was still leftovers...we threw it away.
2. I would only put the Doritos on the parts you are going to eat right away.  They get soggy on leftovers and don't taste good at all.  
3. I only had large shells, not jumbo.  So I didn't stuff mine, just mixed them in.  Stuffing them would have been way too much anyways.  I even read that someone used penne and it turned out just fine.

~Ashley

Deceptively Delicious Rice Balls

Tried another new recipe.

Not one of my best endeavoured.

I ordered the cookbook, "Deceptively Delicious"  about a year ago.  And never did anything with it.  My reasoning was that I needed a good food processor to make the purees required.  I finally got a "Magic Bullet" after Christmas.  We found it online for only $25!  And it came with the full-size blender and the juicer.

So now I'm ready to make some new recipes.

Last night I tried to make the "Rice Balls".  They sounded yummy with rice, chicken, cheese, sweet potatoes, broccoli, and bread crumbs.  They were supposed to look like this:

And this is how mine turned out:

I couldn't get my balls to roll in the bread crumbs without them falling apart. After thinking about this, I realized that i had forgotten to add the milk to the breading mixture.

The kids didn't like it, but I did!! Not sure if I will attempt this one again!

2 Birthday Parties 4 days= burn out

My daughter turned 6 last week, and of course everything in her life is Princess and all things girl!! She wanted a Princess only party. My job, to make the invites and come up with something to entertain a bunch of girls, and of course everything else that goes with a party!!
the invite-

While we were waiting for al the girls to arrive, we decorated princess crowns.
Then it was time for games-

1st game was my version of musical chairs. I enlarged the castle i used for the invites to use on the floor as musical castles (instead of chairs). Next time i will laminate them, they were ripped up by the time the game was over!!
2nd game was help the princess find the castle. I just used some stickers of princess'.
Then of course it was time for cupcakes!!

Birthdays and beyond.............

So my little buddy turned 4 this week !! He is really into the whole Toy Story scene. Here is my idea of a Toy Story Party-
Let's Party, the invite

I used the coloring ink for the Cricut machine and then hand cut out each of the images, LONG process. I am still new to using the inks, but i am loving them!!!!

 Bingo

 I found the templete for the alien with instructions on some Disney site. I didn't think it would hold up with just glue so i sewed it. I didn't follow all of the instructions, i also modified the antena and mouth.

 Overall i think he turned out cute! We used him to play hot potatoe

 bean bag game

 bought this board at the dollar store

I didn't like how Buzz' face turned out, a little too pink for me!! The kids loved the game. It could have used some reinforcement, next time i would attatch dowls to the back along the sides or something sturdy. For the images on this and the bingo boards i used the Toy Story Cricut cartridge.
                             It was a lot of work, so plan ahead!!!

Halloween Wreath

I know, I know...

I'm 2 months too late.  But I did want to share my Halloween wreath because it turned out so cute!

I made the shape from an old swimming noodle that I taped together.

I then cut up a maternity dress that I wasn't too fond of.  But I love the way the black and grey work together making it look Halloween.

I just cut strips and double tied it into knots around the noodle.  I also gave it a mummy kind of look.

I found the bows at Joann's on clearance.  So they were like $.50 each. 

Only paying $1 for this wreath made me feel...amazing!

~Ashley



Christmas Stockings & BYU Blanket

I love when you start and finish a project on the same day!! Yesterday I had a marathon craft day!!
4 Stockings done, 3 for my kids and a new one for me. I love how cute they turned out!!

I made a blanket for my husband for Christmas (forgot to take a picture before I wrapped it!) with the leftovers I made both of us a scarf!
         I am on my way to being done with projects for Christmas!!

~ Marcie

Chicken, Bacon, and Sour Cream Taquitos

                    Chicken, bacon and sour cream taquitos
                                        -Made 2 ways-
cooked,chopped bacon
2 cans of chicken- not a fan of this so we grilled the chicken
8 flour tortillas, for the GF I used corn ones
avacado-omitted, didn't have any
1/4 cup of mayonese
1/4 cup of sour cream
1 tablespoon of milk
1 1/2 teaspoon of white vinegar
1/8 teaspoon each of salt and parsley and onion powder (didn't have any onion powder so I left it out)
stir bacon and sour cream with chicken
spoon onto tortillas, roll and secure with toothpicks
fry
I decided to modify this a little. I added some Ranch seasoning mix and pepper also. I didn't follow the measurements, I did it by taste.
SUCCESS, man was it yummy!! Everyone loved it, we will do this one again for sure :)

the top one is GF

~Marcie

Cordon Bleu Pasta

Cordon Bleu Pasta (2 ways)

So I often get bored with making the same stuff over and over for dinner!! I like to go online and look for inspiration and then make it my own.
                              

This is the recipe I used-well sort of!! I did make some changes here and there.
pasta
1 cup of cooked,cubed chicken
1 cup of cooked,cubed ham
1 1/2 cup of milk
8oz of cream cheese
2 tbls of dried onion
2 cups of Swiss cheese, shredded
salt,pepper,cayenne pepper
1 cup of bread crumbs
1/2 cup of melted butter
I did two versions of this recipe because i have a daughter who can't eat wheat
I used left over rotisserie chicken (GF of course)
I didn't have dried onion so I sauteed a yellow onion with the ham
then combined that with the chicken and peas-my own addition
In a saucepan I combined the milk, and cheese, then melted in all together
I used it as a gravy for the noodles, then added the bread crumbs at the end. I used Italian for the regular one and gf bread crumbs for the other one.

The bottom one is GF
The result-
It was o.k. I think it was the Swiss cheese that really didn't work for the kids. I liked the idea and think that if I do try it again I will use a different type of cheese.

~Marcie

It's the busiest time of the year!!

 It is a busy time of year for all of us!! I hope that amongst all the chaos we find time to remember what is most important, the MEANING of the season NOT all of the stuff.

The first picture is of my Christmas card holder. I never have anywhere to hang all of my Christmas cards. I solved the problem!! I took a piece of posterboard and cut it to the shape I wanted, then covered it with material. The lettering was done with my cricut machine. I am going to paint some clothespins to hold the cards on. I think it turned out super cute. I love simple!!

 
  I actually made this wreath last year. It was really simple. I spray painted it blue and covered with ribbon and gave it a little glitter (you can NEVER have too much glitter). I found almost all the stuff at the Dollar Store.

I needed something cute to put in my window. It was so easy to do, I just added a little glitter, and hot glued the snowflakes on the ribbon, and as always the glitter :)

~Marcie

Carrots!!!

                          My first time blanching carrots, 10lbs worth.

                                      All ready for the freezer.
I was so excited when I found carrots on sale for .25 a lb. So i bought a bunch to put in the deep freeze.

~Marcie

Giving Thanks

I am the Activity Day leader for girls ages 8-11yrs. We do a lot of fun activites!! Last month we talked about giving thanks, what Thanksgiving is and how it began. We made these fun table decorations using beans.

~Marcie

Pumpkin Muffins

I saw a very yummy looking muffin on Pinterest not too long ago.

It was for pumpkin muffins!

And to me, no other food says autumn like pumpkin.  So of course I had to try them.

Needless to say that they were delicious!

I thought they were going to be dry and taste kindda bland.

But they were so moist!  And just the perfect sweetness.  Not too sweet to be off limits for breakfast. 

And the pumpkin definitely was not overpowering.  I was actually hoping to be able to taste more pumpkin than I did. 

So here's how to make it:

~ 1 box cake mix - your choice...I used white 

                            I read that yellow works well and chocolate kindda overpowers
                            but is yummy

~ 1 15 oz can pumpkin puree

~ Preheat oven to 350*

~ Mix cake mix and pumpkin together until cake powder is moist

~ Bake in regular muffin pan 25 min.

~ Bake in mini muffin pan 13 min.

Here's the link to the recipe I followed:     Pumpkin Muffins

~ Ashley

Ties

This is our attempt at making ties for my son and husband. I really like how they turned out. I am excited to give them to my guys for Christmas!

~Marcie

Halloween Wreath

I saw a lot of ideas for making a wreath, nothing was quite what I wanted so I made my own. I wasn't really sure how to make one, so i'm glad it turned out! I started by spray painting a wreath black. Then

i cut strips of different colored tulle. Word to the wise, cutting the strips to thin is a long and boring process so make them on the wider side. I couldn't find a spider I liked so I created my own. I took a large marble and covered it with material. The spider web is a place mat cut down. I am so excited that it turned out so cute!!
I need to take pictures as i go, but be patient, i'm still learning!!!
 Marcie