A favorite meal

Well, I didn't intend to leave this week hanging over here.  I am at my sister's house 6.5 hours away from my home this week.  She had a very big surgery on Monday and I'm here taking care of the kids for the first week (she will be in the hospital at least 2).

So in planning to keep blogging from here,  I brought lots of fun crafts, pictures from home on my camera and planned to take pics of her house and do a post gushing about the wonderful artist my sister is.  Her home is like a mini art gallery.  However, I can't the wireless to work and use my netbook for downloading my pics.

So after many tries to get the wireless security code for my computer, I decided to just talk about some food that I already had pics uploaded to my photobucket.

It's a simple dinner, but definitely a favorite.  Teriyaki chicken kabobs.

Making them is ridiculously easy.  I cut up chicken breasts to pieces and do the same with red and green peppers, onion (though didn't have one on this occasion) and fresh pineapple.  mmmm hmmmm

Soak all veggies and meat and pineapple in teriyaki sauce.  My fav is LaChoy.  I also pour a little pineapple juice in if I have it.  You can soak in the fridge overnight or the day you make it.  Load up your skewers with all the yummies.  I usually grill these, but I think on this day it was rainy and really cold.  So I just broiled them instead.  I broil/grill them total 15-20 mins turning a few times.  I like to use a meat thermometer to be sure they are done (I've given myself food poisoning before and that is so NOT fun.)

I serve with a side of yummy sticky white rice (am I weird that I like my rice to be sticky?)

Teddy Bear, Teddy Bear

I think I have been planning this party for several years.  When I bought some ridiculously cute bear and heart fabric that must be made into a proper twirling skirt.  With Maressa's birthday being the day before Valentines Day, a teddy bear themed party seemed to be a must have.  As she is turning 4 years old (ACK!!! my baby!) next month, I thought it the perfect age for a teddy bear picnic party.  Boy has this been fun to plan.  Perfect for boys and girls alike with so many activities to keep the preschool crowd busy!

Then I came upon this precious cupcake set and garland.  They are my inspiration for colors and decor.  They also make a coordinating centerpiece and invitations/thank you notes as well.  But I really have a thing about making homemade invites.  Closest thing to scrapbooking that I do.  ;)

So here are my invites.  I used one of the cupcake toothpicks to trace the dancing bear onto brown card stock paper.  I printed all the info with my computer leaving space for my little bear.  I included parts of the Teddy Bear Picnic poem on the invitation as well.  I just copied it from a Teddy Bear Picnic book I got....I'm sure you can google it as well.  Then I cut out tiny triangles for the little bear to hold a tiny garland.

As I didn't have enough of any one printed paper I just used 2 different ones that would match.

So now that those are sent out, I am working on many more crafts for the party.

The party guests will make wooden beaded necklaces for them and their bear.

They will go fishing with fun little take home crafted fishing sets.

They will go on a bear hunt and look for bears with paper binoculars.

All attendees and their bears will have party hats.

And of course their will be a picnic to go on with their individual baskets.

More details to come including a sparkly glitter number 4 tee how to!

Stay tuned!

Candy Bar Brownies

Made these scrumptious brownies over our snow break and they are just too yummy!

Nothing more dangerous than having serious chocolate in the house when you are snowed in for a week!

Super simple to make!  Take your favorite moist brownie recipe and pour half into your pan.  Then lay Hershey bars on top...or other candy bar variations.

Then pour on rest of the mix.  Bake as directed.

Try not to eat too many.

Don't tell me I didn't warn you!

Barn yard favors

My most frequently asked (actually my only frequently asked...lol) question is where did I get the mini barn favors in the above picture for my son's three year old farm themed birthday party (boy where did the time go???)

I unfortunately got them at Target dollar spot years ago...the one place that turns over toys and knick knacks in merely a week or so.

HOWEVER!   I spotted very similar barns there just this past week.  If  you are hunting down barn yard favors, don't walk, but run to Target.  They have some barns (they are a little bigger and bit different shape, but cute nonetheless.  They also have animals and other farm themed toys.

While there I picked up Batman yo-yo's for the boy's 6th birthday this summer!  Yikes!

Fuzzy Wuzzy was a Scarf

Kalla has been becoming quite the accessory girl.  She has gone from dislike of any type of jewelry or anything else of that nature (mostly due to sensory issues) to the love of all things sparkly.  She has grown fond of necklaces and bracelets and wears them daily.  And as the days grew colder and colder at the end of the last year, she was wanting a nice warm scarf to wear with her coat.

So I made the girls a fun and super soft winter scarf as a gift for Christmas.  I made this same scarf actually about 4 years ago as an added accessory to a custom boutique outfit I was selling on eBay.  I loved it back then, but sent the one and only away with the sold outfit.

So when a scarf was requested I knew this would be the perfect scarf for little girls.  Something so soft they would love the feel against their delicate faces and necks.  And to be honest I love them too.  I wear them sometimes around the house when I have a chill.  When my neck is warm, it helps keep me warm all over.  And they do feel SO good and soft.

So let's get to the how-to.  Here's what ya need:

62" x 15" minky material  I wanted the smooth like the last one I made years ago, but only found the dotted, but either works just as well
2 pieces of pom pom trim 7" long
matching thread and ball point needle

This is a knit material, but if you use a ball p point needle and be gentle and take your time, minky is no hard to sew.

First, fix one pom pom trim to the short end of your minky strip.  Place it to one edge with pom poms facing in on the fabric, on right side of fabric.  You can sew it down if it helps, or just pin in your scarf sandwich like in the next photo.

Now fold over length-wise so that wrong side is facing out and right sides are together.  Pom pom trim should have pom poms tucked inside and should be the length of your edge when folded.  Do this with both short ends of the minky strip pinning as you go.  Pin the entire length of fabric with all edges lining up.

Now sew all edges being careful to leave a 5" hole or so along the long side of scarf.  You will then turn it right side out.  The hole can be sewn together by hand or the lazy way like I do topstiching it carefully along the edge along the hole.

That's it!  Would make a wonderful Valentines gift for your little sweeties.

Christmas Rewind

Before I could properly move on to new things, I felt the need to document the last month or so.  It kinda happened in a big blur.  But we managed to get most things done that we wanted.

Christmas parade-check--where I also got a proper Christmas card pic (see top photo of next collage).

Little kids' school Christmas program

School Christmas parties with crafts and party favors-check

Teacher gifts-check

Trim the tree and make new ornaments-check

Make cookies for neighbors-check

Three separate opening gift sessions-check

Kids' church Christmas program-check--the 3 oldest participated and Z had a speaking part

11 hour trip to Grandma's for big snow and Christmas-check

After an actually easy drive up to Iowa, we came to the land of real snow.  

The likes that my little Alabamian kids have never seen.  A foot of snow glory all over.

There they wore their first snow boots, ate their first snow cream and went sledding every day in Daddy's old sleds.  They were in heaven.  At dinner one night 9 year old Zachary exclaimed, "I had to wait 9 whole years for this!"

Course, we have put those snow boots and snow pants to good use again now with our big Alabama blizzard as seen in my previous post.

Then the day after Christmas, Zachary went to his very first Bears game with his grandpa and dad. 

Really really cold with lake effect snow.  He still was in heaven.

Tomorrow:  fuzzy wuzzy scarf tutorial.

Hello!

Long time no blog!  :)  Sorry about that!  But thanks for letting me catch my breath.  Cause that's kinda what I was doing.  Life got a little tricky the closer to Christmas we got.  But more on that later.

Kids went back to school last Tuesday.  Everyday I kept saying, today I will blog.  But then I didn't.  I played, or went to Target, or caught up laundry, or just general laziness.

So then I said the next week, I'll really make an effort to get back to the blog.  After all I do have some tutorials, some sewing and crafts to share.  But then the southern blizzard came.  In our yard, we got 5-6" but some areas got up to 10".  That's huge for us in Alabama!  My neighbor said he hadn't seen this much snow in the 26 years he's lived here.  So today is day #3 of being out of school.  And in my true form, I make everything an event.  So I've had neighbors over for chili, made lots of snow cream and hot chocolate and hosted  a movie event for neighbor kids with snow cream and lots and lots of popcorn.  I have also spent significant time outside with the kids building multiple snowmen and snow forts.  We've had the time of our lives.

But today I've suited up the kids, sent them outside and I'm catching up on laundry.  Sneaking a little coffee 'break' and trying to post with littlest  Miss Chatterbox here beside me.  :)

More to come.....