What I'm Reading!

Hello Fellow Readers :-)  If you recall, last week I mentioned that I finally re-organized my book shelves and found a nice stack of books I haven't read.  Most of them are some harder reads (which is probably why I haven't read them!) but, I did pick two so far that I've completed - which was kinda nice!  (And neither were as difficult as I thought they would be!)

I have mentioned Liz Curtis Higgs as being one of my favorite authors.  I have read one book of hers that I didn't like that I did actually review here but all authors are entitled to a bad book here or there :-)  This book, Here Burns my Candle  takes place in 18th century Scotland which, right there, tells you that this isn't going to be an easy read.  It is very authentic in the language and setting.  I do not know my Scottish history which may have been a little bit of a stumbling block but Liz does a good job and being informative yet keeping the book exciting.  The book tells the story of the Kerr Family - Lady Marjory, her two sons, Lord Donald and Andrew, and their wives.  As the story plays out, family secrets are learned and the family is devastated by events that take place around the rebel army riding into Edinburgh in September 1745.  This is not a book you can skim through; you actually have to read it in order to stay caught in the story, which I know is not always easy!  All in all, I did enjoy this book and plan on getting book 2 so I can continue on with the family's journey.

This next book, A Brother's Journey by Richard Pelzer is one that I borrowed from my parents a long time ago.  It interested me but yet I didn't read it because I wasn't sure if I wanted to. Richard Pelzer is the brother of David Pelzer who is more well known as The Child called "It".  In this book Richard tells his story of the abuse - both of his part in David's abuse as well as the abuse he was given after David was taken from their home.  Ironically, this was an easy book to read - not the content but the way it was written.  Richard wrote it in away that gives you a very clear picture of what he went through but it is not written in such a way that it is gruesome.  I have never read the book about David - I know that it was a very popular book among teachers when I was teaching; a way to know how to look for abuse, I guess but I just couldn't read it.  I am totally amazed that these children remained in the home even though people know what was going on; that their mother was mentally ill.  I am glad I read this book and I would recommend it but I do want to say that there is language in this book; it is understandable but I like to make that statement up front when I recommend a book like this.

After reading those two books this past week I went back to my "already read" books and have picked up the first book in a series I haven't read in a long time.  I'm looking forward to sharing the books with you as I finish them!

Keep reading!

My Favorite Reads - Blog Style

Like most blogs, I keep a running list on the side of my blog of the blogs I follow and read.  I actually update that list fairly frequently and, my general rule of thumb is if someone hasn't posted after a month, I remove them from the list (unless it is a real-life-friend - then I let them stick around longer).  Plus, if I find that I always skip over that blog when I'm looking for updates, I delete it.  I like to keep that list fresh and also not let any sit stagnate.  So with that said, I thought I would pick out my "most favorite" blogs from the list and share - maybe you are looking for some new inspiration or just something different to read.  Just because I'm only picking my most favorite, doesn't mean the others aren't great - these are just the ones I gravitate to first :-)  Come on now, we ALL have favorites!

I'll start with my "Inspiration Blog" - the blog that actually moved me into creating my owl blog.  It is the story of the Sullengers who's young daughter drowned in a terrible accident.  It has been encouraging to read her blog this past year as they have overcome over whelming grief and welcomed in a new baby.  They just posted family pictures where are amazing (11/08/11) including the idea the photographer used to include Preslee in their family photo.

The next blog, entitled "Everything Beautiful" is written by a friend of mine from High School.  We played Clarinet together in band (she usually won 1st chair and left me in 2nd every time!).  It has been great to reconnect with her "all of these years" (haha) later.  Her story is amazing and she isn't afraid to mince words either (which is one of the many reasons I adore her!).  She fights for some great causes and shares her heart willingly.  If you enjoy being challenged - take time to check out her blog :-)

"Our Happily Ever Afters" is a current favorite more because of what they are going through right now.  They just adopted a little boy from Korea and I've really enjoyed reading about the transition as they have brought him home.  I will admit, sometimes her life seems a little like a fairy tale but, as is true in blog world, we only put in blogs what we want others to see :-)  I think really, her life is just different then mine and that makes things easy to look at with rose colored glasses!  She really is such a tender hearted, kind person though, it is hard not to just enjoy reading about her life :-)

This next blog, "Superchikk" is just a simple blog about her life with her family but I just love the way she writes.  This is one of the blogs that I always look for updates on because . . .shes just fun!

 



I hope you'll check these out as well as a few others on my blog roll or click on some of those buttons on the left side too!  I will admit, some of the "buttons" are not blogs I click on that much anymore but Oopsey Daisy, Craftomaniac, and House of Hepworth are really great blogs too! 

Enjoy some new reading!

Holiday Control Journal Part 2!

Welcome back to week 2 of my holiday planning.  If you want to see past posts both from this year as well as the more in depth version from last year, just click HERE.  Also, Flylady has started her Cruising Through the Holidays plan.  This LINK takes you to the "home"page which gives ideas from recipes to her version of the Holiday Control Journal. She also gives a daily Holiday Cruise Mission.  I'll be honest, I keep forgetting about them and she is already on day 18!!  I guess I need to go back through them and see which ones I really need to do (Today's is cleaning out the toy clutter . . .we don't have oodles and oodles of toys but I know there are some that can be donated at this point!).  I will say I'm not on board with all her daily missions - for example, I don't do any on-line ordering until after Thanksgiving when everyone has free shipping :-) 

As I mentioned last week, this weeks goal is to get Nate's birthday party pretty much planned and even have everything I need for it that I can purchase early.  I do have the ideas and food all planned along with links to what I need to order.  I had planned to do more this week with it but got hit with a small stomach bug on Monday night - nothing big but just enough to keep me from wanting to do much other then read to the kids :-)  I've also added something else that I want to accomplish and that is planning our Christmas Book Advent for December.  I'm in the midst of planning, ordering the few books I need and putting together stuff for a special family devotional tree we want to do at dinner.  My holiday plan from last year that I updated has me decorating part of the house next week but, because we are putting our tree up one week later this year then in years past I'm actually going to push everything ahead a week and continue to use the rest of this week as well as next week to get the birthday party and Christmas Advent ideas all done.  Plus, we are finishing up the basement this weekend which will include putting all of the Christmas stuff in one place since it is scattered right now.  (We are actually moving all of the Christmas/holiday stuff to the garage to store there in order to lesson the amount of stuff in the basement). 

I've been reading through my decorating plans from last year and want to pick up some lights, garland, and maybe even some curtains - I'm hoping for some good sales around Thanksgiving.  Plus, I saw an idea for adding angel wings to the back of dining room chairs . . I think I need to do something more . . .flat LOL  I'm wondering about making them look like presents.  Not sure I can get something like that made this year . . .I wonder if my mom could make quilt covers. Now that is idea!  A quilt, using Christmas fabric,  for the back with like a green, gold,  or red fabric for the "backing" but have them open on one end to slip over the chairs?  Mom? did you read that?  How fun would that be?  You could measure the chairs at thanksgiving!! :-) hehehe

Rumors of snow are starting to circulate and, when snow falls, it feels so much more like Christmas plus I have lots of ideas pinned to my Christmas Board in pinterest!  Here are just a few cute ideas!

Make your own glitter ornaments!

Door Decor

Cute Christmas Tree - this is actually an idea I saw last year and have not forgotten about it!  I would love to make a larger one for our porch as well as a small one for the bathroom sink.  I had meant to buy pots this summer while they were inexpensive but kept forgetting!  I'll have to see what I can find :-)


That's just a sneak peak of what I'm looking at right now.  I do have some more ideas that I'm pretty confident I'm going to make so I didn't post there here :-) 

How are your holiday plans coming?  I'll be posting our Thanksgiving menu soon - I find menu's so inspiring!

What I'm Loving Wednesday

I'm loving . . . that pomegranates are back.  They are so yummy!

I'm loving . . . that the stomach virus I had was only the 24 hour kind and that the worst of it was done after 12.  At least I was able to sleep most of it during the night!

I'm loving . . . that my kids have learned to get Kleenex when their nose is running - they look so cute using one too LOL

I'm loving . . . that I'm hearing the word "snow" being tossed around.  Those first flakes are always so exciting!

I'm loving . . . . that the Duggars are having another baby (#20!)  I've watched their show and read one of their books and they are a fantastic family.  I know that many people judge them and think they are crazy but, have you seen their kids?  I only hope my kids turn out as great as theirs!

I'm loving . . .. THIS!!

That's my niece and she is getting married!  I was so excited to get this little card in the mail today!  Such a fun thing!!!

What are you loving today?



Too Cute Not to Toot

I'm really looking forward to see what great ideas people come up with as we start this holiday season.  There were so many things I saw last year that I had hoped to complete for this season but, well, I'm trying to simplify my life HA!  (Just wait - I have plans)  So for now, I'll keep "saving" them here and sharing them with all of you!

We'll start out with a gift idea for the kids.  Oopsey Daisy shares a great tutorial for making an ABC mat.  I would really love to make one of these for the boys to play with this winter.  I think they would have a blast with it!

This could also be a cute gift idea or a stocking stuffer.  The idea comes from Diary of a Crafty Lady and requires some simple supplies!!  A great way to teach colors :-)

Lines across my face is a blog that I currently follow and she is just starting out with a series called The 13 Crafts of Christmas.  I won't promise to share all 13 because, well, if I don't love them . .  .but this first one is cute.  I love countdowns despite having never made any version of one yet - so maybe I'll make this one eventually!

Switching back to Thanksgiving, I like this idea for a Thankful Tree from Bargain Bound.  It is a simple idea that fills up a wall.  The only thing that I can't wrap my mind around is . . .the trees are off the tree; they add them to the tree each day with a thankful thought written on it . . .shouldn't the leaves be on the tree and then as you write a thankful thought, they fall on the ground?  Or am I just being too much of a realist?  What is your opinion?

The Country Chic Cottage is also hosting a series called  "Handmade Holidays" with 12 different handmade gift ideas.  The first one is for Guest Slippers.  I don't have many guests but this would still make a cute gift for anyone!

That's it for this week - with some of these series starting up, I'm hoping to have more ideas to share this week.  Things seemed a little slim this week !
 

Weekly Pinterest Challenge #5

Success and Epic Failures

Yes, you read that right - EPIC failures.  Wow,  I had some total doosies this past week.  I'll start with the failures and will not spend a lot of time on them but will then show you several successes all around a shower that I co-hosted with my mother-in-law for my niece. 

I wanted to try out a few recipes that we wanted to use at the shower - so I tried out an Egg Casserole in the crock pot.  Wow.  It was awful.  The eggs never set up; and it had no taste.  It was a total waste of food and we ate Mac and Cheese that night for dinner.  The other thing I tried was an overnight French Toast recipe that was a Paula Dean Recipe.  It was awful.  The bread was so soggy that it basically became a wet, gross, mushy custard.  I spit it out.  We had Little Ceasers Pizza that night.  Out of respect for those sites, I'm not going to link back to the original posts.  Just trust me when I say, it was not my week for cooking.  (There was another recipe I made this week that was NASTY but it didn't come from Pinterest HA!) 

I also saw this idea:

It looks like a great idea doesn't it?  I was boiling potatoes and thought I would try this - I proceeded to watch the pot boil completely over making a huge mess.  So this counts as another fail!!!

So, now, lets move on to the GOOD things!!!

First up, I wanted to make some muffins for the shower and came across a recipe for Donut Muffins. They turned out fantastic! 

This is what the inspiration looked liked from Smashed Peas and Carrots

And this is how mine turned out:

They are super yummy!  Here's the recipe, because it wouldn't be fair to show you this picture and not share the recipe:

Donut Muffinsadapted from Smashed Peas and Carrots

These are truly as good as they look and they do actually remind me of a good cinnamon/sugar donut.  A couple of things I learned :  1)  I doubled the recipe to make enough for a shower.  The recipe states it makes about 18 mini muffins but I actually 50 mini-muffins when I doubled it and a few of the muffin cups over flowed while cookie so I probably could have gotten close to 55 muffins.  2) Separate the "dipping" cinnamon and sugar into smaller bowls.  The best way I can describe it is that it becomes like wet sand as you dip the buttered muffins into it.  Otherwise, just make this recipe and try not to eat them all!

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup butter, melted

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

1/2 cup milk (soy milk works nicely too!)

1 tsp baking powder

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 cup butter, melted

1/2 cup sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees and grease a mini-muffin tin, set aside. Mix up the 1/2 cup sugar, 1/4 cup butter and nutmeg in a large bowl. Then, add in the milk, baking powder and flour until just combined. Fill muffin tins about 3/4 full and bake for 15-20 minutes.

During baking get your cinnamon-sugar topping mixed up! Melt 1/4 cup butter in a small bowl and then in a separate bowl mix together the cinnamon and sugar. When the muffins are done, remove them from the pan. Dip the tops in the melter butter and then roll the WHOLE muffin in the cinnamon-sugar mixture. Let cool and then try not to pig out too badly!!

-----------------------------------

On to the next idea I picked from Pinterest.  My inspiration came from Cheeky Kitchen and looked like this:

Aren't those just adorable?  As much as I wanted to order some of these push-up pop containers off of etsy.com, I just couldn't make it fit into the budget so this is what I made:

I think they are still cute and are actually a little easy to eat, most likely.  I simply bought clear plastic cups and filled them with Vanilla Yogurt, Granola, and Fresh Fruit.  I must confess, after I went to the store, I added up what I spent.  I could have bought 15 Yogurt Parfaits from McDonalds (they are $1.00 a piece) and it would have cost me less and saved me the work HA!  But, they looked nice and everyone seemed to enjoy them!

Now, this next idea is one that I've had before and just love but I did see an inspiration photo on Pinterest as well.   The idea I found is from Pioneer Party and she actually supplies an actual recipe for this idea.

Now, here is my version :

I keep these really simple - I bought sugar cookies from my local store (Meijer).  Then, spread some Cream Cheese Fruit Dip on top (you can usually find this by the cut up fruit in the deli - it comes in a tub like Caramel Dip) and top with your favorite fruits.  I used some blueberries, Strawberries, Black Berries and Pomegranate Seeds (yummy!!) 

Finally, I wanted to share this LINK - I find this site through Pinterest as well and it is a great place to get games for all kinds of of events from showers to birthday parties.  I just looked at the most popular games and picked two.  Yes, you have to pay a small fee to "purchase" the game but, you can search through the list and find quite a few that are on sale.  It was well worth it to me to do it this way!

 Finally, this is the actual recipe we used for the overnight french toast - it is a tried and true recipe of my own - I should have just stuck with this to begin with!  This is so good you almost don't even need syrup!

Holiday French Toast

1 loaf French bread

½ cup butter, melted

1 cup milk

¾ cup brown sugar

Cinnamon

¼ teaspoon salt

3 eggs

Melt butter in 9x13 cake pan.  Sprinkle brown sugar over melted butter.  Sprinkle with cinnamon.

Beat eggs in bowl, add milk and salt

Cut bread in 1 ½ - 2 inch slices.  Dip in egg mix and place in pan.  Refrigerate overnight.  In morning, bake at 325 degrees for 30 minutes. 

When turned out of pan, sugar mixture will be on top.

I didn't get a great photo of the French Toast but it is sitting on the tray right in front of the egg casserole.  I am not a French Toast person at all but this stuff is SOOO good that you "almost" don't need syrup!


So, that's it - lots of ideas were gathered from Pinterest for the Shower - it really is a great place to get ideas!!

Mold

This is one of those posts that I've been meaning to write for awhile but, I guess I kept putting it off because it has been such a difficult situation to walk through.  Recently, I was looking through some old posts and came across this Post which showed my entire basement all clean and organized.  Little did I know what we would deal with just 7 months later.

We had a very hot and humid summer; according to news reports it was one of the worst summers since the 80's.  We do not have central air in our house so we survived with fans.  And lots of doing nothing.  It was near the end of July or beginning of August (I blocked it out of my mind) when I noticed that our basement floor was not just damp but actually wet.  Our basement is an old style so the cement floor has "pocks" in it and there was actually water that had puddled in all of those little indentations.  That weekend, my husband and I headed downstairs to organize it and find where the water was coming from . . .we were busy working when I picked up the bouncy seat and noticed it was completely black.  It was at that point we discovered a bigger problem - the entire basement (or so it seemed) was "filled" with mold.  It was everything from the outside of Rubbermaid totes, to clothes, baby items, and canning jars.  We also had rust - tools, shelving, and more had turned rusty from the moisture.  I think the best two words to describe what we faced that day are - devastating and overwhelming.  We knew at that moment that we had to get stuff out so we started hauling everything to the garage.  After finding the 3rd large baby item covered in mold, I gave up and came upstairs to let my husband finish.  We spent the rest of the day doing research, making some calls and then, making a run to Walmart to get vinegar and sponges. 

A few things we learned: 1) "Black" mold really means any type of mold but "deadly" mold is extremely rare.  2) All of those companies that say they will clean your mold use the scare tactic to make you think that the mold is all bad - most of it, if not all of it, can be cleaned up with a lot of hard work and strong muscles  3) Vinegar is one of the best things to use to clean mold; not bleach.  Bleach will not kill the mold - only vinegar will.  Now, anything that is porous (like particle board or cardboard) has to be thrown out because the mold will be absorbed.  Fabric can normally be washed with vinegar and the mold will come out. 

With that said, we emptied every single tote in the basement, took them outside and scrubbed them inside and out with vinegar.  I washed every article of clothing that was in a tub in vinegar.  We did end up having to throw out tons of things from a dining room chair that was in the basement and was just covered in mold (gross, I know), a bouncy seat, jump-a-roo, swing and play mat that where just unable to be cleaned.  It broke my heart to see that stuff like that - it kinda make me sick.  We ripped out boards from the walls, scrubbed 2 x 4's that were covered in mold, took down plaster and scrubbed walls (well, i should say my husband did!) It was awful.  Masks and gloves were required when we worked down there it was so nasty.  Just not fun!  Once we emptied out everything, a friend of ours came and hauled it all away for us. 

We are still, these several months later, working to put it all back together.  Just this past week I finally got the laundry room cleaned up, all of the laundry finally done from those totes, the "extra" room cleaned and organized and the desk cleaned off.  The last few bags of trash have been taken out and I've started boxes up things we are donated to Good will (the one good thing - we cleaned out TONS of stuff HA!).  Next Saturday we plan on putting the final pieces back together - taking things to Good Will, organizing everything and doing a final look a few places for any hiding mold devils. (yep, devils!!) I'm hoping it will look like that picture I saw recently  . . well without the shelves, they were all destroyed. 

It took me a long time to tell this story, and it really isn't a fun story, but it almost defeated us.  We considered packing up and walking away; of giving up on this house.  I have a feeling that is a pretty normal feeling in our situation so I don't feel bad about that fact but it doesn't make it any easier!