The Pink Cricut

One of my favorite feel-good meals, is simple and very, "country."   Soup Beans or Bean Soup-- whatever you call it,  I could eat it, and eat it 'til I make myself sick.  It is also very simple to make, and is always served with warm cornbread.   My kids LOVE it as much as I do-- and get excited when mommy makes it.

My grandma is the queen of soup beans-- and has really perfected the dish.  My mother made it when I was a child, and every time I would go home or go to my grandma's it was my one request.  But, then I had to learn how to make it myself and for my kids. 

The only thing that keeps me from making it on a more regular basis, is the lack of  ham bones  lying around my house.  To get a ham bone, I buy a ham, cook the ham, eat the ham, and then use the bone.  Some people can pick them up from a grocer or catering business- for cheap or even free- But, since my husband likes ham-- we do it the long way.

Now, my grandma and mom buy the beans in a bag, and soak them-- etc.  But, I have little patience when it comes to Soup Beans-- so I cut the corners a little.

You'll need:

ham bone (with ham pieces sticking to it preferably)
3 cans pinto beans
1 can navy beans (last time I subsituted black beans)
salt
cornbread

Rinse beans, and throw all ingredients into a slow cooker.  Cover beans with water.  Salt to taste.  Let cook until hot and soupy.  Make cornbread with your favorite recipe or box. 

Serve with cornbread and onions if you would like.  Yum, yum, yum.

So, the neighborhood kids were going to have a Christmas party-- and I volunteered to make the sweets.  My mom had told me about these cute melted snowmen cookies--so, I decided it was the perfect opportunity to give them a try!

I love homemade everything--if I can figure out how to make it from scratch-- I will.  It tastes better, and makes me feel better about giving it to my family.  One thing I have learned to make, that also saves money are spice blends.  Yes, I am still a spice-snob, and do most of my spice shopping at Penzey's nowadays-- but their spice blends as well as everyone else's are so ExpEnsivE...and you can't really change them.  So instead, I buy their amazing spices, and make my own blends.  Then I save my old jars, and fill them with my new spice blends--I can give them as gifts or just always have what I need on hand.

Here are a couple that I love to make and use a lot of:

• 3 tablespoons chili powder
• 3/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• 3/4 teaspoon onion powder
• 3/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 3/4 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1-1/2 teaspoons paprika
• 1 tablespoon and 1-1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1 tablespoon sea salt or salt to taste if you are on a low sodium diet
• 1 tablespoon black pepper

There are some things I have become spoiled in, as I have gotten older.  One of them, is hot cocoa.  This grown-up girl is not settling for those powder packets and hot water ever again.  I am just too old to waste calories on a less than yummy version of what should be a delectable treat.

I have tried many hot cocoa recipes, and used a variety of ingredients to get the Hot Cocoa I LOVE!  I know not everyone will think this is the BEST cocoa recipe, because we are all different.  Some of us like it super-rich, some of us like it with a spicy kick.  I like mine foamy, and with a perfect dose of chocolate.  However, after finding the recipe I preferred, I then started to switch the brands of ingredients--and found the best ingredients for this PERFECT cup of cocoa, IMO.  However, you might want to take my word for it, if you know how picky I am about my coffee-- and that I would unhesitatingly pay $5 for a cup at Starbucks.  But, this cocoa--has Starbucks cocoa beat.

So, without further ado, here is the recipe with brand suggestions, please do not feel obligated to use these brands--they are not paying me to write this--(although, I wish they were).

Frothy Hot Cocoa
Makes 1 big mug

2 cups of milk
2 t of Penzey's High Fat, Dutch Process Cocoa
4 t of sugar
3/4 cup of mini marshmallows
1 t of homemade vanilla (message me for how-to)
Sprinkle of Penzey's Cassia Cinnamon

Combine the first 4 ingredients in a pot.  Heat on med. until marshmallows are melted and foamy.  Add vanilla, and then pour into warmed mug.  Sprinkly cinnamon on top-- and sip away! Mmm

Next yummy drink recipe I will try to conquer- Peppermint Mocha

With trick-or-treat being tonight, and Halloween tomorrow, I realized I am running out of time for creepy treats! So, for snack today, I made the kids Bug-apillars. They are super easy to make, and took less than 10 minutes to put together.

Tis the season, for Pumpkins!! As I was grocery shopping the other day

My mom has a very giving heart, she loves to give, give, give.  She is constantly thinking of others when she is out and about, and picking up something that they would love-  The two people she does this the most for is her 2 grandkids-- which both belong to me.  There isn't a time that she sees them, that she doesn't have a surprise for both of them.  It could be Hannah Montana candy, clothes, or decorations for their room.  She also gives me things--random things for me do to, "something," with-- it could be craft related or home decor- But, this past weekend she brought me Bulgar Wheat.   She had purchased it for a recipe, and didn't care for the recipe--so in a way she challenged me to find something to make with it--and, I was up for the challenge!

I found a lot of recipes that sounded rather-- yucky--.  Then, I thought that since it was wheat-- it should be good in a bread.  However, since it was pretty course it would need to soften a little--and it would need something sweet to digress the eater from the healthy qualities of the bread.






At first I was going to make 1/2 this much--but, I screwed up on my salt and oil--and had to make twice as much-  I still just made 2 loaves--but, they were BIG loaves!  Also, I got new yeast, because I had been suspecting my other yeast (which I bought in bulk) was not working any longer--and evidently I was correct- because this bread rose like crazy!

If you are a health-food lover, you will love this bread!  It is hearty with a hint of sweetness.  I love the texture that the wheat creates.  I will be rotating this in, with the breads that I make--at least until my bulgar wheat is gone! Also, it tastes great with homemade apple butter---which is good, because I made another batch with the leftover apples!


Thanks again mom, for the bulgar wheat!

Hopefully, I didn't make anyone cringe at the memory of those awful standardized tests we had to take in school---

The kids and I have been lucky enough, to have a regular, "date" on Wednesdays for the past month, with some good friends.  The mommy's hang out and the daughters hang out--and Jaxen hangs on everyone :).

When the weather was  nice, we let the kids play outside on the swingset, while the mommies chatted and baked.  (We both enjoy baking/cooking)  But, since it has gotten cooler outside, we have been planning indoor activities for the kids.  A couple of weeks ago, it didn't seem like we had enough planned for them--because they lost interest quickly.  So, this past week we decided to overload them on activities.  What we didn't realize was that really, we were only overloading ourselves.

We thought it would be fun, to make Halloween-themed sugar cookies- because when isn't it a good idea to make sugar cookies??  While the dough was chilling, we started the kids on 2 other activities-

The first activity was to trace, and cut shapes for bats.  The bats only had 2 body parts--thankfully!!  The bat wings and bodies were free-handed and then traced by the children, and cut out of black construction paper. Then a mommy got the job of gluing the bats to black clothes pins, so the bats could clip onto different things around the house.  These turned out very cute--and are super simple to do!

Now, we should have just stuck to this, "craft," and then did cookies--but, this Mom is a little too "krafty" --(those of you, who know me before I was married, will get this joke ;)).
So, instead we went to the next project-- pumpkins made from egg cartons.  Well, for this the other mom, Jamie, had to cut the cups of the egg carton out so that we could glue them together.  Regular glue did not work, so we got out a couple of hot glue guns and made them work :).  Luckily, they dried fast this way--and the kids could get right to painting, to make them look like pumpkins!!

We covered the kids in smocks, sat them down with these tiny paintbrushes, and let them begin to paint these very porous egg carton pieces.  We knew right away, that bigger paintbrushes would have been smarter-- oh well-- The kids would paint the pumpkin MOSTLY, and then Jamie and I would quickly try to paint the rest of it ;).  Then they were off to dry, while we started to roll out the cookie dough- *are you getting tired yet?
(The faces were drawn on later by a mom with permanent marker, and pipe cleaners were used for the stems)


Well you all should know how to make sugar cookies--so I will spare you the details.  The sugar cookie dough turned out perfect, and the rolling out and cutting went smoothly-- (we sent the kids to play).  They baked and cooled while the moms made 3 different colors of frosting for our pumpkins, bats, ghosts and cats.  Jaxen was very antsy during this part--wanting to get his fingers in the dough and the frosting, whenever we weren't or were looking!  2 mothers and 1 2 year old boy-- We were no match for his sneaky ways!!

The mothers were getting tired, and decided it would be better if we frosted the top layer and then let them decorate with the MANY candy decorations that were available to them.  That was probably the best idea, we moms, had all day!  But, needless to say the candy did get a little out of control!  The first cookie Jamie's daughter made had a piece of chocolate candy on every centimeter I think!  Then, my favorite cookie topping, the "crunchy balls," spilled all over the floor.  (This is not the technical name, at least I don't think so--but, they are the tiny round ball decorations that crunch when you eat them).  The container was nearly full, and then.........not so much.....and, if you have ever tried cleaning those little suckers up off the floor--you would swear you would never buy them again!  We actually had to take the shop vac out, and Jamie swept them towards me, who was holding the shop vac hose.  This seriously took about 10 minutes or so...and while the moms were preoccupied, the kids took the opportunity to frantically eat from their candy buffet!

We should have taken a picture of the moms at the end of our playdate-- we were covered in paint, flour, frosting...with crunchy balls stuck to our feet.  We had used all of our energy, patience, wit and management skills for the day--and we never even got to have any "mom-talk."  But, we have learned our lesson--and learned it well.  There will ever only be 1 craft and 1 food activity--or maybe we will mix them together, because we may enjoy crafting, cooking and baking--but doing those things with 3 toddlers and a baby--is just plain CRAZY!!



However, we do have some mighty cute decorations for Halloween--but as a warning to my readers--DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME!!!!!!!!

A trip to the Orchard is always fun--and we always seem to have more apples than we know what to do with!  This year it was a little cold, so we started off our trip with some hot chocolate and caramel apples.  The kids got to play in the corn, and had a great time!  We went to a chemistry show where Alexis got to be the, "lovely assistant,"  we pretended to be the 3 little pigs, we jumped on a huge air pillow, we slid down a very long slide--and we picked LOTS OF APPLES!

Thankfully. with the help from my PC peeler/corer-- we were able to quickly start making yummy apple treats.  Kyle joined in the fun, and made a caramel apple crisp-- while the kids helped me peel and chop apples for Apple Butter and Applesauce.

The Apple Butter, was a crock-pot version recipe, that I adapted.  I loved the day-long simmering method--because it was easy, and it made the house smell amazing.  The applesauce we made was a pot on the stove, version--but also turned out yummy.

The recipe for the Apple Butter--which is best served warm-- is:

• 5 1/2 pounds apples - peeled, cored and finely chopped ( I used my apple peeler/corer and vidalia chopper)
• 1 cups sugar
• 2 cup brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• dash or two of salt

I peeled, cored and chopped several apples and put them in a pot. (approx 3 lbs)  I covered them just enough with water, and turned on the heat.  I let them simmer until apples were tender-- about 15-20 minutes.  Squirt about 1 Tb of lemon juice on top, add a little sugar, depending on how sweet you like it-- and then blend in a blender til desired consistency.  I only added 1/4 cup of sugar, but some people would prefer to add much more.  Chill.

I served this for dinner with my Truffle Pot Roast and the kids just gobbled it up-- adding just a little cinnamon to the tops of their servings.

We still have about 1/2 peck of apples left--so, I will be making some apple pie, and some more applesauce this week!

*note: I made a 2nd batch of applesauce, added about 1/4 cup white sugar, cinnamon  and some freshly ground nutmeg, and a couple shakes of vanilla sugar!! I couldn't stop eating it!

I love me some beer bread---it is the best reason to go to a Tastefully Simple party :).  However, I don't like paying over $5,00 for simple ingredients I am sure to have in my pantry.

So, I set out to find a comparable bread that I could make without having to contact, order and wait for a TS representative.  I wanted the airy, yet hearty texture--and the subtle sweetness that goes well with EVERYTHING!

After a little research, I quickly realized the only things that come in that little packet for $5.50 is flour, baking powder, sugar and salt.... hmmm... I have that in my pantry on any given day, don't you?

• 3 cups flour (sifted-this is important!)
• 3 teaspoons baking powder 
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup sugar
  
  
  
  
  
  
• 1 (12 ounce) can beer (experiment with which beer you like best, in the bread)
• 1/4-1/2 cup melted butter (depending on your personal tastes)
  
  
  
  
  
  

Direction

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Mix dry ingredients and beer.

Pour into a greased loaf pan.

Pour melted butter over mixture.

Bake 1 hour, remove from pan and cool for at least 15 minutes. (watch it though, because all ovens are different--I took my loaf 8 minutes early, and it was PERFECT)

My darling daughter, is very interested in upcycling.  She likes to save every single container we empty.  She uses a spaghetti jar, for a bug catcher-- a butter container to hold her special treasures--I have to admit, I would rather just throw them into the recycle bin, because I have bought store-made bug catchers, and store-made treasure holders.  But,they are never as loved as her upcycled ones.   My daughter is naturally green, I guess-- and she does not get it from me. 

Recently, she has started to rub off on me.  I saved an ice cream tub, and an oatmeal container. They sat on my counter for a week!  I almost threw them into the recycling bin severeal times.  I resisted, and finally this morning the kids got to make their very own Halloween decoration.

It was a simple kids project, nothing fancy, and no special supplies were needed.  It was perfect for the Rainy day that we are having today!

We used the oatmeal container, construction paper and glue.  I did roll up brown paper for the stem and cut a whole in the bottom of the oatmeal container (top of the jack-o-lantern) to slip it thru.  The kids had a fun time, tearing the construction paper and sticking it with glue all over the container.  So, if you empty an oatmeal container before Halloween, you might want to try this fun and quick activity with your kiddos.

I had seen blocks with letter on them, and thought it would be a cute idea to have them on our mantle.  My father-in-law works with wood, and tends to have scraps--so he was generous enough to give me 5 cut squares of a 2x4.  (Or, at least I think that is what he cut up)

I took them home, and found letter that would compliment our living room decor.  I then found coordinating paper to go behind the letters.  I glued it all on with a tape runner, and then modpodged on top of the paper and letters.  After the mod podge dried, I then added embellishments such as ribbon, crackets, flowers, etc.

The backs of the letters seemed a little plain, so I decided that I would devote each block to a family member-  So, on the backs of each of them there are individual pictures and embellishments.  They never get turned to that side, but it is a nice surprise when someone picks them up to look at them.

These simple and cheap little blocks have become quite a staple on my mantle--even at the new house.  If you have some scrap wood, I would encourage you to try these.  They are simple, and can be adapted easily to whatever suits you.  You can use any word or name-- Maybe the word, CREATE for your scrapbooking area, or the word BABY for a nursery.  Have fun with it, and let me know if you try it out!

I was in the mood for soup today, and my family was a little spoiled--since, I was in the mood to cook and bake from scratch.  Or, at least I think they are spoiled--they would rather order pizza ;).

We had quite a few fresh peaches to do something with, before they were wasted--so, I decided to make a Peach Cobbler.  I have made these in the past, because they are my husband's favorite treat--but, none of them were PERFECT, in his eyes.

So, I made something, part pie/part cobbler- It has a pie type bottom crust, and a lattice top, but made in a 9x13 pan.  It does take a little over 2 hours to make--but, I am told it is worth it.   It is very juicy, and I guess--PERFECT!!

I had a great little helper, in rolling out the crust, (or nibbling on it, anyway)--
So, instead of doing just a regular boring ol' lattice top--we cut out a, "J" for Jaxen and a spaceship for Buzz Lightyear!  Sorry, about the picture--I forgot to take a pic, until it was 1/2 eaten!!



The recipe is:

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My DH and I were hosting a wine-tasting party.  No dinner, just h'ourderves.  I decided it was the perfect time to make chocolate truffles for the first time.  I wanted to try 2 different recipes, just in case one didn't turn out.   The first recipe was: