Use Hairbow as a shirt pin {DIY clever idea}

Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I thought this was a pretty good idea!
Instead of making BOTH a hair bow AND a shirt pin... just make one.

It all stemmed out of laziness on my part. I was planning on making some turkey hair bows (Girly things Bows) for my daughters and their cousin.

Tutorial at Girly things Bows 

Then I came across these some beige sweater dresses for the girls and thought that I could use them for both Thanksgiving AND Christmas by adding a festive pin to it. BUT, I didn't feel like making 6 of the SAME turkey bow (half with shirt pins and half with hair clips) so I just made one for each girl and used safety pins to attach them to the dress. I am happy to say that the bows STAYED! Even on the rugrat to the far right who was not a happy camper.
* I used alligator clips for my bows

On the left, the turkey hair bow and my girls have the pin on their dresses

All I did was:
1. Figure out where I wanted the bow to go and insert 2 pins (for stability, although 1 may work fine) in the shirt from the inside so the main part of the pin is on the inside of your shirt.

Outside of shirt

Inside of shirt

 2. Flip the shirt right side out and slide the clip through both safety pins and...

Slide clip through safety pins

 3. Voila! We now have a shirt pin!

Enjoy!!

Linking up: Southern Lovely, Someday Crafts, Sweet Peas and BB, Twin Dragonfly Designs, Handyman Crafty Woman, Momnivores Dilema, It's A Keeper, Between You and Me, The Crafty Blog Stalker, Love Sweet Love, House of Hepworths, Gluesticks, Sun Scholars, Fingerprints on the Fridge, Lady Bird Ln, Christies Cuties, 5 minutes just for me, Bacon Time, Sarahndipities, CRAFT, Chef in Training, A Bowl full of Lemons, Not just a Housewife, Homework, Creating my way to Success

Weekly Meal Plan {plus last weeks in review}

Ooops, this is late... I blame Thanksgiving traveling!

SUNDAY
Leftover Chili that we brought back from my parents house AFTER the 9 hour drive home

MONDAY
Salmon with a Honey-Mustard Glaze

TUESDAY
Baked Chicken with Sweet Potatoes and Salad

WEDNESDAY
Chicken Caesar Salad

THURSDAY
NO CLUE! I'll be too excited for...
FRIDAY ... we are OFF to Key West for the weekend for our friends 30th Birthday!

Chef Salad

Andoulli, Red Beans, and Rice

THANKSGIVING!

Turkey (2 smoked, 1 fried), Andoulli Stuffing, Hot Apple-cranberries, Cold Jello cranberies, mashed potatoes, noodle, and turkey gravy!

Happy Turkey Day!!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!!! I hope you are all having a wonderful (and non-stressful) Thanksgiving Holiday with family and friends.

The shirts are embroidered ...

Planet Applique

 The bows are made...

Found on pinterest & instructions here

 Our Turkey craft is complete...

Pinterest inspired

My Thanksgiving Scavenger Hunt is printed (PS - SUPER excited about this!!)...

Src
Pinterest Inspired

My Turkey head is made for my turkey cheese ball...

Src - Gluesticks

And we have driven 8 hours up to Georgia...

We. Are. Ready!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Pizza Night #13 - Margheritta Pizza w/ Basil Oil

Boy it has been a WHILE since I have posted a pizza night, and that's probably because we have been so dern busy we haven't really done many pizza nights (although I do have 2 new pizza nights to post when I have time so keep an eye out). For a few Pizza Nights, we made our Spinach, Ricotta, & Mozzarella pizza (which we LOVE) but we kind of grew sick of it... it's a pretty "heavy" pizza.

So off to the computer I went and found this yummy recipe. We didn't make the dough as the recipe calls for (remember my pizza night fail?), so here is what we did.


Margheritta Pizza with Basil Oil
Ingredients

About 6 tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil, divided

1  can (14.5 oz.) crushed or diced tomatoes (preferably organic), whizzed briefly in a food processor to a chunky purée

2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

1 cup lightly packed basil leaves

6 oz fresh mozzarella, cut into 1/2-in. cubes

About 1 tsp. dried oregano

Preparation

• In a medium pot, heat 2 tbsp. olive oil over medium heat until hot but not smoking. Add garlic and swirl in hot oil until it starts to smell good, about 15 seconds. Stir in tomatoes and simmer, uncovered, to thicken and cook off the "canned" flavors, at least 25 minutes.
• While sauce is cooking, put 1/4 cup olive oil and basil leaves in a food processor and whirl to finely chop basil, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Stir 1 tbsp. basil oil into tomato sauce as it's cooking, along with 1 pinch salt. Pour remaining basil oil into a small bowl and cover surface with a thin layer of olive oil.
• Toss dough and set on pizza stone or baking sheet sprinkled with cornmeal.
• Spoon 3 to 4 tbsp. tomato sauce onto dough, leaving at least a 1/2-in. border.
• (optional) Layer pepperoni
• Cover with mozzarella and oregano
• Bake according to dough directions (ours says *400 for 18-25 min), until dough is slightly golden.
• Remove from oven and let sit a few minutes
• Drizzle pizza with basil oil (we then used a spoon to spread it around)

Enjoy!

This is definitely a keeper!

Weekly Meal Plan {plus last weeks in review}

SUNDAY we had...
Chili

MONDAY
Chef Salad

TUESDAY
Andoulli Sausage, Red Beans, & Rice

WEDNESDAY we are leaving for my parents house for Thanksgiving
Beef Stew


THURSDAY
um.... TURKEY!!

FRIDAY
Left overs

SATURDAY
... probably more leftovers


LAST WEEKS RECAP

Top Sirloin (on sale!) with broccoli and baked sweet potatoes

Mashed Potatoes over Hamburger & Veggies

Baked Whole Chicken with Green Beans & pasta

Meatloaf with Smashed Potatoes & Asparagus

Crock Pot Italian Chicken & Potatoes

I've DEFINITELY gotten my exercise today...

... by going up and down the attic ladder dozens (yes plural) of times bring my Christmas boxes down.


6 bins, 2 large nut crackers, 1 sesame street tree.
PS - How cute is that white tree on top of the right stack?
My mom made Charlotte a sesame street tree for her room last year!
(Click to enlarge)



4 bins, 2 small outdoor light-up snowmen, 1 large outdoor light-up snowmen and 1 bag of large Annalee Santa & Mrs. Claus



3 boxes of outdoor plastic luminaries, snowman cookie jar, large Santa plate, funky tree, bag of misc greenery. Oh and my advent calendar leaning on the other side covered in a white garbage bag.

Impressive? (well, I think so)

And that's not even all! There are at least 4 boxes up there that hubby placed in REALLY awkward places and are WAY too heavy for poor little me to lift. Plus a large Christmas goose cutout and large wooden sleigh for my large Annalee Santa & Mrs. Claus.

Christmas is my FAVORITE holiday and I LOVE to decorate for it.

Nothing goes up outside until Black Friday, but as long as I don't have Thanksgiving events at my house... I start a week before Thanksgiving on the inside.

This year, I have a thanksgiving play date on Monday and we are leaving for a Georgia Thanksgiving (my parents) on Wednesday bright and early. So Tuesday will be a packing, trip prep, and start to Christmas decorate day!! Woo hoo!

My radio/CD/mp3 is tuned to Christmas music from the day after Thanksgiving until Christmas Day.
 Actually... we'll be listening a little bit longer this year because our Annual Holiday Cocktail party is going to be in January due to date conflicts throughout December.

Stay tuned for ALL my Christmas and decorating fun!

Mimi's Birthday Gift {Pinterest Inspired}

I FINALLY completed a project from my Pinterest "To-Attempt" board. YAY!

My mother-in-law is the kind of person who buys herself everything that she could possibly want, need, and not need in a million years. Which leaves holidays and birthdays quite difficult to purchase a gift for. I decided to go homemade and "from the girls" this year.

I made Handprint/Footprint plaques from over at Homemade Grits.

They turned out pretty good for someone who can NOT make dough (see my homemade pizza dough night for reference). I figured it out eventually after adding LOTS of flour. Also, I'm not very good at rolling out dough, so I just made a ball and flattened it so clearly it is not as pretty as Homemade Grits's but my mother-in-law enjoyed them. Plus, trying to get a 1 year old to press her hand into dough and NOT make a fist is near impossible; we have a ball though!

Mimi's Gift - Tote & girls handprints

I decorated the girls some shirts and my mother-in-law a tote with an iron-on that says "There's no place like home" around the outside and "except Mimi's" in the middle. PS - the scalloped edges look adorable but were a PAIN in the rear to cut out!! [Must get silhouette machine!! :) ]

Lousy camera phone picture

Lastly, I made her a coupon book from the girls including coupons good for one visit to the mall play area, Busch Gardens, a pizza night, sleep over party, lunch and dinner outings and more.

Not that she will use ANY of the gifts... but she enjoyed us coming over to play and have dinner which is all she really wants from us anyway.

PS - If you are interested in my PSD or JPG file for the shirts/tote please drop me a line; I would be more than happy to share.

Linking up: Momnivores Dilemma, It's a Keeper, Gluesticks, Crafty Blog Stalker, Nap Time Crafters, Lamb Around, Delicate Construction

Recipe::. Chicken Noodle Soup {Easy & Hearty}

I have a new favorite soup recipe, then again... "winter" is on its way and there will be TONS more soup recipes tried. The word winter is quoted because I live in Florida and am sitting here in shorts and t-shirt as I write this.

Anyway, mom gave me this recipe and we LOVE it. The girls love it and hubby had 3 helpings!

Chicken Noodle Soup {Easy & Hearty}

INGREDIENTS

Poultry - rotisserie, I've used leftover smoked turkey, whatever. I used about 1/3 of the rotisserie this time. How much you ask? In the words of my grandma, "until it looks right".
1-2 boxes of LOW SODIUM chicken broth; this is more of a "Stew" than a "soup", so don't put TOO much broth in. I added more broth periodically as I added ingredients
2 t white wine
1 t sesame oil (or more)
2 T soy *don't add any salt until you taste it because Soy sauce is salty
Noodles - In this case I used my grandma's homemade noodles, but I usually use half of a container of these chopped into bite-sized pieces

Noodles

Handful or so of shredded carrots
1 box of mushrooms, chopped
3-4 scallions, sliced
Package (or 2 handfuls or so) snow peas, cut into 1inch pieces

DIRECTIONS
Place 1.5 boxes of chicken broth into a pot and bring to a boil.
Add wine, sesame oil, soy, chicken & noodles and lower heat to medium.
Cook noodles to "al dente" (look at time instructions on package of noodles).
If it thickens too much, add some broth.
Add carrots and cook for 3 minutes.
Add mushrooms and cook for 1 minute.
Add scallions and cook for 1 minute.
Add snow peas and cook for 1 minute.
Salt & pepper to taste.

Enjoy!


Linking up: Vintage Wanna Bee, Chef in Training, Gingersnap Crafts, My Girlish Whims, Sew Much Ado, Handy Man crafty Woman, Bacon Time, Sweet P & BB, Someday Crafts, Remodelaholic, Vintagegwen, DIY By Design, Twin Dragonfly Designs, Momnivores Dilemma, It;s a Keeper, Gluesticks, Crafty Blog Stalker, NaptimeCrafters, Lamb Around, Delicate Construction
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Weekly Meal Plan {plus last weeks in review}

SUNDAY we had...
Top Sirloin (on sale!) with broccoli and baked sweet potatoes

MONDAY (mama has Junior League meeting so...)
Mashed Potatoes over Hamburger & Veggies

TUESDAY
Baked Whole Chicken with Green Beans & rice

WEDNESDAY
Easy Chef Salad & Date Night (to hopefully celebrate good work news?!)

THURSDAY
Meatloaf

FRIDAY
Crock Pot Italian Chicken & Potatoes

SATURDAY
Hubby has drill... so not sure yet

LAST WEEKS RECAP

Tilapia with Tomatoes & Spinach

Mussels with Wine & Tomato

Taco Salad

Hubby was sick so instead of Pork Tenderloin, the girls and I had spaghetti with Italian sausage

Still sickies... so Homemade Chicken Noodle soup (recipe will be posted tomorrow)

Pizza Night!! Margarita with Pepperoni & Basil Oil

Happy Veterans Day!

I just wanted to wish everyone a Happy Veterans Day!

I also wanted to share this picture from last year when hubby was deployed last year.

The USO has this program called United Through Reading where dads (and moms) record themselves reading a story book to their child on DVD. The USO then mails the DVD and the book to their child for free.

 This was Charlotte watching the DVD for the first time...

Pretty cute, huh?

45 days until Christmas! It's time for Holiday Cards!

Really?!

There's only 45 days until Christmas (as of 8:00am, November 9, 2011)!

Yikes!! Lucky for me, I have been doing my Christmas shopping all year. See...

Step 2 Roller Coaster Src

Thank you sales, consignment, birthdays, & craigslist!!

PS - We may be holding a few toys back for Charlotte's birthday.
I'm pretty sure I'm done with my daughters! I only have a few more gifts left to get, SWEET!

Now it's time for the Christmas cards.

For the past 15 years (or so), my family has been mailing out photo collages. At the beginning they were literal collages (you know, like taking actual 4x6 photos and trimming around the people and fitting them together) color copies and inserted into store bought Christmas cards. We did collages because between the 5 of us, there was so much to share about the year (graduations, proms, dances, sports, family trips, etc). Mom even included a caption to describe what each picture was.

Once I got married, I continued on the tradition of the photo collage (see *unfinished* collage to the left; I couldn't find my final copy), however things have gotten MUCH easier now.

Speaking of which... have you heard of Tiny prints?

They have got to have the cutest cards out there. In fact, I used Tiny Prints for my daughters birth announcements (I got so many compliments on them!).

I had the chance to review their 2011 card line and I am impressed! Here are a few of the photo collage cards that caught my eye (You can easily narrow your selection by photo count, card shape, etc along the left hand side).

If you can't pick your favorite pose :)

LOVE this one! Simple. Classic. Adorable!

Love the simplicity!

 And for my TOP 2 favorites (no... I still haven't made a decision yet)

This is just so whimsical and fun!

Just gorgeous! I love the snow flakes!

I must say, these cards are so much easier than the original cut, paste, color-copy OR when I attempted to make the collages myself. I love how simple it is to add your pictures to the cards.

Head on over to Tiny Prints to see their 2011 Holiday line.

Find Tiny Prints on facebook for special deals and offers.

If you would like the chance to write a post featuring Tiny Prints Christmas or holiday cards in exchange for 50 cards from the 2011 line, visit here.