Wednesday, April 13, 2011

What I'm Loving Wednesday


I'm Loving  . . . .that I finished scrapbooking 2008 this past weekend.  I love that it is done to completion and we can now enjoy the pictures!

I'm Loving . . . how I re-arranged my living room slightly.  Made a better toy corner, kept the couch so the boys can still look out the window and made an grown-up corner too :-)

I'm Loving . . .the recent beautiful weather!  The 80 degree day on Sunday was a nice peak at summer (but I'm kinda glad spring is back for a little while longer!)

I'm Loving . . . that I have more flowers popping up.  I also have more bulbs to plant and some raspberry bushes to go in but . . .I live in Michigan and must be patient LOL

I'm loving  . . .  that my husband pulled out the ugliest bushes in the world this past weekend.

I'm loving  . . .that we got in our first trip to the Lake on Sunday - I love Lake Michigan :-)


What are YOU loving this week? 


PS - Don't forget to check out the giveaway located on my giveaway tab on the top of the blog - it ends soon!

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Too Cute Not To "Toot"!!

Starting us off this week is a really easy Easter decor idea from J and J Home.  It is super easy and quite "cheep" too!

In case I haven't given you enough great ideas to use with your kids, here is another one coming from Mydeliciousambiguity using Easter eggs for all kinds of great ideas.  Many of these are a little old for my kids but they would be great for an elementary classroom
This is a fantastic learning idea from Inspiration Surrounds, Creativity Abounds using bubble wrap for flashcards.  Kids love to touch things and what better than good old bubble wrap to get them jumping for joy!
Musings of Me always provides such adorable ideas - here is a great spring craft to do with the kiddo's!
Keeping it Simple shares an adorable Easter craft/decor idea using  a 2x4 - these little critters made me smile when I saw them :-)

As always, I know there are tons more ideas out there but, this week, I ran out of time to search!  Been running like crazy it seems - lots of fun things - but keeping super busy just the same!  Hope you are all having a great week!


Sunday, April 10, 2011

Happenings In This House

**Make sure and click on the "Giveaway" page tab at the top of the blog to view my current giveawy**


The past couple of weeks my Saturdays and Sundays have been super busy so I missed one of our happenings posts and didn't want to miss today.  Here are few pictures of what we have been up to over the last few weeks.

Nate loves sitting inside baskets - he likes to go "in" and "out"

The boys - playing on the bed.

Nate - in the basekt again.



In getting ready to (hopefully) paint the house, my Gardener pulled out the ugliest bushes in the universe.  :-)

Darryl had an Alive concert today.  It was great to hear the group - I don't get to attend a lot of concerts right now with the two little boys. 

And, Darryl took me to the beach!  I love Lake Michigan - since we were in Holland, we went out to the park and enjoyed the view for a little bit.

Some other things in our week - I was able to do tons of spring cleaning (isn't that thrilling) because my  parents took our boys Thursday-Sunday.  I asked myself,  "What can't you do easily when the boys are here" - so out came the steam cleaner for the carpets and I went to work.  The living room carpet was cleaned, my comforter was washed, bedrooms rearranged, and toys cleaned out and re-organized.  I also got to spend 11 (yes, that is right) hours scrapbooking between Friday and Saturday. AND I totally finished my 2008 albums.  The reason that is such a big deal is that 2009 is also done but is all done digitally - I just need to adhere the prints to the pages that I have printed and finish printing the other pages.  To add to that 2010 is done through March, I believe so I'm getting closer to being current.  Another HUGE thing in our week is that my husband got a job.  He was laid off at the beginning of December and just finished up his CDL class two weeks ago.  He applied for a job driving truck at a "local" company, was called a few days later, had an interview this past Wednesday via phone, an in-person interview on Thursday morning at 9:00 and was offered the job at noon.  Crazy, huh?  He will sign the official papers on Tuesday so I'll share all of the details about the job after that only because until he signs the papers, nothing is official! 

Finally - my parents sent us some pictures from when the boys were with them and I wanted to share these as well - they are too cute!



I wonder who wore the other one out? LOL
Hope you all had a wonderful week!!

Creative Memories Spotlight - A Giveaway!


Every week I try to share with you some of my favorite products or the products currently on sale.  Yet, what better way to let you experience the great product than to give it away!!  So this week - instead of telling you about some product - you get to WIN one ! YEAH! 

The giveaway is for the 8x8 Family Max Kit.  This includes a 8x8 green picfolio album.  The album has blue stitching and tan pages that have an opening large enough to fit a sheet of 8x8 paper (it just slips right in!).  Also included in this lovely kit:

This includes 24 decorative, layered pages 2 sheets of title stickers 3 sheets of die cuts with ready-to-stick foam tabs that add dimension.  It coordinates perfectly to the album and enables you to throw together an album quickly. 

I enjoy using this type of album setup for theme albums - Pets, Birthdays, Christmas and more!

So how do you win?  I want to keep it very simple because I kinda don't like it when there are 45 different ways to enter a blog giveaway!

You can get a total of 4 entries
1.  Leave me a comment and tell me what you would use this album for if you won.
2. Write a blog post about this giveaway, come back here and leave me a comment with a link so I can read about myself :-) hehehe
3.  For TWO entries - place an order!  Just head on over to my Website, pick out your favorite products and place any size order.  I will get a notification that you ordered and put that total towards the Memory Keeper Club.  Just leave me a comment that you ordered also in order to get your 2 extra entries!!

Enjoy :-)

So how great is that?
This giveaway begins today, 4/10/11 and will end at midnight on Friday, April 15th.  I'll announce the winner on Saturday during my normal Creative Memories Spotlight. 
This giveaway is open to the US only.
 

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Busy Busy Busy!!

Normally I post "Happenings in this House" and "Creative Memories Spotlight" on Saturdays but . . .well. . we've been a little busy!  The kids when to the grandparents house on Thursday so I took full advantage of that time to clean . .. .steam cleaning carpets, rearranging bedrooms, cleaning out toys - you name it!  This went on until Friday afternoon when I heading to a scrapbooking crop and cropped for 5 hours, came home and slept and than got back up and went scrapbooking for another 6 hours!  BUT 2008 is DONE YIPPEEEEEE!!!!!  I feel like I can finally start cruising towards that "getting current" goal.  Darryl and I took advantage of our freedom lonely time without children, to go out to our favorite place for dinner - Duke's - and than we came home and worked on our hobbies for a few more hours (He worked on music and I . . .scrapbooked LOL)  Than we took a drive around the back roads of town and got Frappes because, well, we could :-)  And now - it's time for bed since we have to get up early and go to an Alive concert tomorrow in a land far, far away . . Holland.  (Michigan that is LOL).  So. . .my two normally scheduled posts will have to wait for tomorrow . . ..

PS . . The Creative Memories Post is a GOOD one - you'll love it, I promise :-)

Friday, April 8, 2011

Superbowl Appetizers

**Obviously I wrote this post back in February but I had such a huge backlog of posts (especially Recipes) that this got pushed to the bottom - they are still good recipes though!

As I've mentioned in other posts - we love football in this house so, needless to say, Superbowl Sunday is a day to celebrate!  Here is our menu along with a few recipes that I used for our celebration!

Lunch:
Brats
Corn Dip
Wisconson Cheese and Crackers
Chips and Dip
Garlic Cheese Bread

Dinner
Left over brats and KFC (we had planned something else but with all of the other food - we stuck to leftovers)
Cheese Dip
Leftovers from lunch (again, I had a couple of other things planned but after seeing what we had left, I decided leftovers was a better idea!)

Dessert:
Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting


Hot Corn Dip
(I found this recipe at Hanging with the Hewitts)

Ingredients:
1 15 ounce can white corn, drained
1 15 ounce can yellow corn, drained
1 10 ounce can Ro-tel tomatoes
1 8 ounce package cream cheese, diced and softened
1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
chopped fresh cilantro to taste

Directions:
1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. In a medium baking dish, mix all ingredients together.
3. Bake for 30 minutes or until hot and bubbly.

Serve with tortilla chips

We liked this recipe because it was different but I wouldn't count it as an all time favorite.  Just note that it will taste like . .. corn. LOL  I made mine the day before so I cooked it "cold" and probably should have cooked it another 10 minutes and that might have helped it a little.  I would make it again to have for a party because it is so different from most dips.

Hot Chorizo and Cheese Dip
(I found this recipe at Mel's Kitchen Cafe)

Ingredients:
1 tablespoon butter
1/2 cups minced yellow onion
8 ounces chorizo, casings removed and diced
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups milk
8 Ounces Cream cheese, softened
1 1/2 cups (6 ounces) medium cheddar cheese, grated.
1 small can diced green chili's
1/2 teaspoon salt

Directions:
In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat.  Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until translucent, about 2-3 minutes.  Add the diced chorizo and cook, breaking up the chorizo into smaller pieces if you like, until it is cooked through, about 5 minutes.  Pour off all but one tablespoon of fat from the pan.  Add the flour and stirring constantly, cook for 1-2 minutes.  Gradually whisk in the milk and combine well.  Cook over medium heat until the sauce is thick, about 4 minutes.  Add the cream cheese to the pot in tablespoon-size pieces and stir to combine as the cream cheese melts.  Reduce the heat to low and add the cheese 1/4 cup at a time, stirring until each addition is melted before adding more.  Stir in the green chile's and the salt.

Serve warm in the bread bowl or with tortilla chips; you can also serve this with pretzel bites too!

This recipe has become one of our favorites. I did find Chorizo at my grocery store but they only had "fiery hot" and that is not us!  I substituted regular sausage instead and it tasted fine.  I might add a second can of chilies just to give it more flavor next time. 

Garlic Cheese Bread
(I found this on a blog, saved the recipe but did not write down which blog it came from - if I can figure that out, since it is one I follow, I'll link it up!)


Bread:
2 1/2 - 3 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
3/4 Tablespoon yeast
1 cup warm water
1 Tablespoon cooking oil

Topping:
1/3 cup Italian salad dressing
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon oregano
1/4 teaspoon thyme
A dash of pepper

1 1/4- 1 1/2 cups of cheese - any Italian combo is fine

Ingredients:
Combine the warm water with the yeast and add oil.  In a mixing bowl, mix the remaining bread ingredients.  Add the liquids to the dry to form a soft dough.  (I used my dough mixer for 1-2 minutes or you can turn it out on a floured surface and knead for a couple of minutes until smooth).  Place in a greased bowl and allow it to set for about 20 minutes in a warm place.  Place the dough on a buttered 12' pizza pan and spread out to the sides.  Combine all of the topping ingredients, except the cheese.  Spread on top of the dough.  Sprinkle the cheese on top and bake at 450 degrees for approximately 12-15 minutes - or until a nice golden brown.  Serve warm alone or with a side of pizza sauce.

We LOVED this.  This would make a great side to go with pizza (and now you don't have to buy cheesy bread to go with it!) Plus it is a great snack too!  The flavor will be impacted by the type of dressing you use - I used a really strong one that we like on salads . . I think I would go for a more mild (cheap) Italian dressing next time but it was still fantastic.

Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
(This is "my" recipe that I've had for years - it is Darryl's favorite cake hands down.)

Cake
1 ½ cups granulated sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
3 eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ teaspoon salt
3 cups shredded carrots
1 cup coarsely chopped nuts.
Frosting:
1 8-oz package cream cheese, softened
¼ cup butter or margarine, softened
2-3 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
4 cups powdered sugar

Heat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease bottom and sides of 13x9 inch pan with shortening or cooking spray; lightly flour.  In large bowl, beat sugar, oil and eggs with mixer on low speed about 30 seconds or until blended.  Add flour cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, 1 teaspoon vanilla and the salt; beat on low speed 1 minute.  Stir in carrots and nuts; pour into pan.  Bake 40-46 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.  Cool completely, about 1 hour.

In medium bowl, beat cream cheese, butter, milk and 1 teaspoon vanilla with mixer on low speed until smooth.  Gradually beat in powdered sugar, 1 cup at a time on low speed until smooth and spreadable.  Frost cake.  Store covered in refrigerator.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

April Tot Time Plans and a Few More Ideas!

I have more ideas for you for the Spring!  My kids headed to the grandparents this week so I didn't even plan for this week.  Instead , I have ideas for the next couple of weeks based on some great books. 

I saw this idea over at Helping Little Hands and fell in love with it.  Why?  Because it fits us perfectly.  I love activities that are connected to books because by reading the same book over and over for days (or even weeks) on end kids learn what to expect and can start to "tell the story" themselves.  Right now my boys LOVE playing in laundry baskets so an activity that includes playing in one is perfect!
Another book idea is from Notes from a very red kitchen (I think she is the sister to the writer of the above blog . .).  I liked the math/number ideas she gives to go along with the book "This Old Man."


This looks like a fun idea to do outside from The Path Before Me.  I think we are going to hold off on this idea until this summer when it is warm enough for the ice cubes to melt and paint though.
One Hip Mom gives a great tutorial for making a tool belt - a cute idea for an Easter basket idea.

Another idea for a cute Easter basket gift is this crayon holder from Nested.  There is a great tutorial included too. 
Everyday Celebrate gives a tutorial for a colors quiet book - she also has items available in her etsy store to help make this craft easier.  We are starting to focus more on colors so I really like this idea.
This is an idea I started working on last summer when I went into Craft overload and never finished so I think I'll follow the clear tutorial given over at smartbottomenterprises and finish up this project for spring.

I would really like to do more crafts with the kids (well . .Josh .  .Nate has a little while yet) and though this was cute.  It's from Funny days with mommy and maddie and show how to make a cupcake liner bouquet.
Muffin Tin Mom gives another easy craft for making a paper chick.  I love that I do the prep work (cutting, etc) and than the boys get to be creative. 
Of course we need a bunny craft too and One Mom, Five Boys and a Bundle of Joy delivers!

The Ramblings of a Crazy Woman gives a cute Easter Wreath idea for kids to make. I'm not sure if I will have dandelions by Easter but I think that using pom poms would work too.

Another idea from Muffin Tin Mom is painting with plastic Easter eggs. 
These would be fun to make and fun for some pictures - bunny ears from Kaboose
I never did get my sensory bin made for March so I'm going to get April's done.  Here's one idea from mydeliciousambiguity
The Spring Units are starting to come out too!  Musings of Me has prepared another great unit with so many wonderful ideas to use.

She has also posted some really cute art projects to share also!

Home School Creations has a really neat looking Garden Unit.  They are also hosting a Garden Challenge that begins March 31st.

Than, over at Our Little Monkeys has prepared an April Showers Tot Pack.

Idea overload yet? LOL  It is amazing the ideas that are out there in blog world and, with Easter falling late this year, I know that there will be tons more ideas coming in the next few weeks.  I had planned to have my April calendar ready to post this week - and I actually had it done . . .than all of these spring units popped up and I felt the need to make some changes to my plans. I plan on finishing up plans and getting everything prepared this weekend so we can start out Monday with some fun plans. I also find that the last week of the month I use to plan for the next month (and this week . .. well I just dind't do anything) - the break is good for both the kids and for me!
So, for now, enjoy all of these ideas!