Confessions

This week I am linking up with adelynSTONE. 

My confessions:  My guilty pleasure every holiday season is hallmark and lifetime Christmas movies.  I cant help it, they are corny, but I LOVE them!  The endings are always happy endings and predictable, the acting is not the best, but that's OK.  Sometimes you need a good corny, feel good movie!

There are good people out in the world: a friend (coworker) of mine, has been struggling to have a child for awhile now.  So they decided to adopt.  Well they still needed about $5,000.  (her family threw her a fundraiser to get money) and one her regular guests came in and asked her out the process was going and she explained to them what she still needed and by spring they should be able to apply for government grants.  Well this guests says, is that all that is stopping you?  $5,000?  Consider it done!  He is giving her the $5,000 so they can start the adoption process.  Melts my heart that there are people out there.  She really deserves it and I am so happy for them!

I am kinda bummed that none of my cake plates or scarves sold today while at the flea market.  I even bought a rotary cutter and split my finger open making scarves and no sales! haha.  That's OK, I am really considering getting a booth at a craft fair. I really enjoy making these things and I scout all over for the perfect plate, or perfect color.  So I will see how I fair with the craft fair and if it is a success I may open a etsy store sometime next year!

Well that's all for this week, I hope you all have a wonderful week leading up to Christmas!

*Allie 



Wreath Obsession

Awhile ago I had a post about wreaths and what I wanted to make.  You can find that not your traditional wreath.  I had good intentions.  Really I did.  I bought googly eyes for the Halloween wreath and that never got anywhere.  (I blame it on school!)  I found an awesome blog that made wreaths out of Styrofoam piping at home depot for $.97.  Well there are different sizes and let me tell you.  The thick ones are not conducive for wreath making.  I couldn't make a circle out of it!  And not all are $.97.  The small ones are.  So I went out again and bought 5 more tube things, and got to work.

  This is the tube thing I was talking about.  So after I made my first two, I noticed that it doesn't hold its shape.  I thought maybe because the tape I used was packing tape and not as sturdy as duct tape, so I tried again.  Well see how they hold up.  I also hot glued the ends together.  Keep your fingers crossed they stay shapely!

This is one of my faves, but one that lost shape :(  It is made out of vintage gold tinsel garland.  I found at my grandmas house.  I love vintage and anything shinny! 

Attempt number 2.  I think the green thing is a tad big, but its sparkly, so it stays.  OK onwards....

I have been scouring thrift stores for Styrofoam wreaths and have scored.  I found 3.  Well one was one of those branch looking wreaths. I can work with that tho.

This wreath is a small one, but oh, so cute!  I love the colors.  I got the yarn at the $ store.  The beads I used were from a broken necklace of mine and felt can be picked up any craft store.  I have to say tho, I love those felt flowers. 

Zoe helped me with this as well, she made me add another flower to it! 

This yarn was much bigger and it has some white parts showing, but I think it came out OK. 

All these wreaths took me a little over an hour.  Hopefully I can make some more soon!

*Allie 

Soup!

So here in good ol' Florida we have had a few nights of 60 degree weather.  Crazy!  I know!  It's Christmas time and we are still in shorts and t-shirts.  I miss jeans, sweaters and closed toe shoes!  So one night Zoe and I were pinning and I found a Wisconsin Cauliflower soup.  I love cauliflower.  Have I ever used them in a soup?  Nope, but I got a head for $.99 (cheap, I know!).  So I went out and bought some cheddar cheese and we made some. 

Zoe is my helper in the kitchen, she is an expert stirrer!  The soup was super easy and didn't take long at all.  The original recipe can be found at Utah deal diva.

It was a nice thick soup.  Good to keep you warm on a cool night.  I used all cheddar cheese (and I didn't measure, so I am sure I used more then its called for). 

Finished product!

 

Does anyone have some good soup recipes they want to share?

 

*Allie

Facebook

Hello All!  Its been super busy around here, finals, christmas parties, christmas shopping.....I'm exhausted!  But I have some fun crafts planned and will show you all in a post soon!  But for now I made a facebook page!  Yay!  Finally got around to doing it.  So look to the right of this post and click the Like button! 

Hope you all are enjoying this holiday season!

*Allie 

Confessions

This week I am confessing to be completely out of it!  I NEED a vacation!  I thought I did stupid things before having coffee in the morning, no.  I have been doing stupid things repeatedly with copious amounts of coffee and caffeine in me!  I am so happy that school is almost over.  I have some assignments to do for computer and an extra credit exam and then a math exam tonight, then a English exam tomorrow night.  I am really freaking out about the math class.  I have complained all semester about the teacher and really I just feel stupid, like why cant I retain this stuff.  O wait I know, because I wasn't taught it!  Doing some example problems on the board is not teaching!  Then when I look in the book to teach myself its like in another language.  I know I am not stupid and my last two math classes I aced but this time I am just having a hard time!  I have been stressed to the max with that class and writing 4 papers this semester.  I give young college students cred b/c when you get my age and have a full time job as a mom and working full time going to school is NOT easy.  It will take me years (more then 2) to get an associates!  But its OK, slow and steady wins the race right?? 

Last night we got our Christmas tree.  we cant afford a lot this year so we went to walmart.  a small 5-6 footer was $19.88, but what do you know...its only Dec. 5 and they are out of them!  What did people do buy trees Nov. 26th??  Hello, its a real tree, lights and dead trees don't mix people!  I usually wait until 2 weeks until Christmas to get one, but I am having a work party at my place and I have to be decorated (add that to the list of stresses!).  That and my daughter is all about Christmas this year!

So while getting the tree, they had a bunch of bikes out in the garden center and what does Zoe do?  Climb right on a big girl bike and start riding down the aisle....did I get teary eyed?  Damn right I did.  My little girl is growing up WAY too fast.  So I guess Santa is getting a nice new blue huffy bike this year!  It was comical watching her and my hubby riding up and down the aisle b/c Zoe wasn't watching where she was going and knocked the bikes down.  I'm talking domino effect.  That was fun :)

So those are my confessions this week, what are yours?  Linking up with adelynSTONE.

*Allie 

Feature Blogger : Melissa

Hello All!  This is my first ever feature!  This lovely lady Melissa, aka Molly Dobbins is a good friend of mine.  We met online thru our love of anything twilight!  Both of us being twilight moms in our twenty's.  After realizing that we both love twilight, along with a few other lovely ladies that I consider good friends, we all realized we like to craft! 

Melissa is a very talented knitter/crocheter.

"I guess I have been the crafty type pretty much my whole life. As a child I loved art class more than anything. When my mom went to local craft shows I BEGGED to tag along. I guess I just love making things and creating. The crochet thing started years ago when my Nana taught me. At the suggestion of a friend I tried knitting and soon became addicted to that. I also sew which is something I got into years and years ago when my mom first taught me to hand sew."

You can find Melissa's Blog right here When I grow up I wanna be......  You can find some awesome recipes, great crafts and cute pictures of her lovely children!

Other things Melissa has been up too lately.

"Unfortunately I haven't been blogging a whole lot lately :(. In the absence of blogging I have been busy volunteering at my daughters school. It's been a wonderful experience and I love seeing my DD in her school environment.
On the crafting side I've been spending most of my time planning my handmade Christmas gifts and knitting. I just finished a knit head wrap/ ear warmer for myself and I couldn't be more happy with it.
As the colder weather has set in I find myself cooking and baking more and more. I have found tons of new recipes on Pintrest and I recently gave two a try; Chicken Parmesan Crescent Rolls and Pizza Casserole. The crescent rolls were okay. With a few tweaks I bet I could make them more to my family's taste :) The pizza casserole on the other hand was FANTASTIC!! My family couldn't get enough of it :)."

Very Cute Melissa!

Picture of it w/o being worn below

(links to those recipes will be at the bottom of this post!)

I have had the privilege of receiving a knitted hat by Melissa.  I had been looking in store, after store trying to find a hat like this one.  Bigger then a beany, but hangs in the back to hold your hair.  The ones in the store just didn't do it for me.  So when I saw Melissa pin this hat, I was like oooo can you make that??  Shes like yes I can, what color would you like.  I was beyond excited to receive it in the mail!  I love it!  I wear it all the time, its great for when you really don't feel like doing your hair, you just throw it on and for it to be homemade just makes it even more awesome!

So first I tried to take the picture myself......didn't really work out (yes that is a forks shirt, I got it while vacationing there a couple years ago!)  Then I enlisted the hubby and well this is the best I got!

I love it, its comfy, it hides my bad hair days and its comfy! 

Here are the links for the awesome recipes Melissa has made recently:

chicken parmesan crescents

pizza casserole (I have to say I have this pinned, and it looks absolutely delish!)

headband ear warmer (free pattern!)

So go over to Melissa blog and send some love, she is a wonderful mother, awesome crafter, talented writer and a great friend!

*Allie 

Biscuits, biscuits, biscuits!

Ever get tired of buying biscuits and just using them as biscuits?  Does that make any sense?  You buy biscuits to have biscuits right?  Well I usually just make my biscuits with Bisquick and rarely buy canned biscuits, but they were on sale and now I have biscuits coming out of my ears.....so I tried a couple of new recipes!

First one is a mini calzone.  I honestly can not remember where I found this idea.  All I did was roll out a biscuit and added some yummy fillings.  Ricotta, mozzarella and parm cheese with some pepperoni and black olives. Mix it all together and add a heaping tablespoon to the middle of the biscuit and fold over.  Pinch the sides and your done!  Bake for how long the package says.  I added a couple of minutes so the insides were nice and warm.  I heated up some marinara sauce to serve with it.

 

All sealed and ready to bake!

All done!  Nice little dinner to serve with some salad and you are good to go!

Last night I made a crockpot pizza.  Cooking Nuggets had this awesome recipe.  I just looked at her pics.  So I don't have the exact recipe.  If you want that just visit her site :).  I took pics along the way of what I did.  The house smelled so yummy, who doesn't want a house smelling like pizza??

So first what you do, is dump a jar of pizza sauce on the bottom.  Then plop your fillings on top of that.  I did a layer of pepperoni all pretty on top of this, not pictured.  (I just woke up from my one nap a week so I didn't feel like chopping up my black olives!)

So the original recipe the lady just pinched off quarter sized biscuits.  I cut mine into six parts and then threw them on top in an orderly fashion.

Now that, that is done, turn your crockpot on high for 2-3 hours or low 4-5 hours. 

This is after two hours.  The biscuits got nice and brown so i topped it with mozzarella and some cheddar I had left over.  Put the lid back on and let it cook for 15-30 minutes more.

Cheesy goodness!

Look at that!  Its like an upside down pizza!  I could not wait until I got home from school to eat this!  It was yummy! And the best part was the sauce didn't make it soggy at all!

I was thinking this morning of other variations that I want to try.  BBQ sauce with red onion and chicken, pineapple and ham, veggie deluxe, maybe a white chicken pizza.  The ideas are endless!

So anyone in the mood for pizza?

*Allie