more pinterest

Another project I found on pinterest and made for my fifth grade babies (their Christmas presents): 

Sources: 

• http://www.scjohnson.com/en/family/family-economics/10-08-24/Back-to-School-Message-Pencils-Napkins.aspx
• http://eighteen25.blogspot.com/2011/08/back-2-school-printables.html

pinterest

I've held off on getting pinterest for quite a while now... several months. You see, I knew that once I got in, it'd be hard to get out. Well... I finally gave in this past weekend. Here are a few of the things I created:

this adorable sign to put on my desk.

and this for especially trying days ;)

I also have been wanting to make a 'faux' dry erase board for quite a while. All you need is a glass picture frame and a printout of whatever you want. Then you can write, write, write and erase, erase, erase! :)

This is in an 8 by 10 frame. I created this one myself, but I'd be glad to send the file to anyone.

Are you on pinterest? Are you also addicted??

strange, but good :)

We ate at a restaurant called Seasons in Williamsburg. I had a REALLY hard time deciding what to get... probably because I was super hungry. AJ knows me SO well. He told me to order the 'pineapple bowl' so I did.

Well, hold on to your seats... it was a 1/4 of a pineapple sliced up... the 'shell' was kind of the bowl for the whole thing... and there was chicken salad on top of the sliced pineapple, apples, and melon. IT WAS SO GOOD.

and that bread... that looks like meatloaf, was some sort of fruit bread... that I probably could have eaten three loafs of. NEED the recipe.

Strange... but very, very good!

Colonial Williamsburg

AJ and I went to Williamsburg this past weekend (both of our first times!) and we L-O-V-E-D it.

The Christmas decorations were beautiful.

Can't wait to go back.

our 'babies'

uhb-sessed.

family fave.

When we were in Christmas for Thanksgiving, my mother-in-law gave me some of the recipes she used to make for AJ.

AJ is a pretty sentimental guy, and he absolutely loves when I try to recreate some of his favorites from growing up. This one is a ground beef stroganoff:

I feel like I take a lot of pictures VERY similar to this one :)

Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup butter
• 1/2 cup chopped onion
• 1 pound ground beef
• 2 Tbsp. flour
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. pepper
• 1 can cream of mushroom soup
• 1 cup fat free sour cream
• 1 package egg noodles

Recipe:

1. Put a big pot of water on the stove. Turn heat to high.
2. Melt the butter in a skillet (medium-high heat) and add the onions. Cook until caramelized and soft. Add the ground beef and cook. Drain the meat when fully cooked.
3. Stir in the flour, salt, pepper, and add a small can of mushrooms if you want. (We didn't have any... otherwise, I would have)
4. At this point, put your noodles in the hot water!
5. Cook several minutes and then add the soup and 1/4 cup water. Simmer 10 minutes. You may need to add more water. It should be like a stew.
6. Add sour cream. Heat JUST until boiling and remove from eat.
7. Serve over noodles.

Spritz!

I made the first batch of Christmas cookies the other day... and they were SPRITZ. They freeze very well, so they're put away now... These are my mama's favorite, so I'm trying to save them for her!

Mainly because they freeze well... and because I love my cookie press.

I have a Williams-Sonoma press I got as a wedding present, and I LOVE it. The recipe inside the box is very easy to follow and I haven't had any problems with the press working when I've used this recipe. The dough does need to be room temperature... I usually set out my butter and eggs a few hours before starting.

pretty little snowflakes.

Christmas trees :)

Recipe:

• 16 tbsp. butter (2 sticks!)
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 2 1/2 cups sifted AP flour

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Make sure everything's at room temperature!
2. In your mixer, beat the butter and sugar together on high speed for about two minutes, until light and fluffy. 
3. Add egg, vanilla, and salt. Continue beating until well mixed, about one minute. 
4. Reduce speed to low. Add the flour. Beat ONLY one minute, just until blended. 
5. Fill your cookie press with the dough. Follow the instructions in the box to press them onto an ungreased sheet.
6. Bake 11-12 minutes until light golden brown. Put the entire baking sheet on a cooling rack for five minutes. Then transfer your cookies to another cooling rack. Decorate as you wish :)

O Tannenbaum

Our Christmas tree is up! We have a Charlie Brown tree and I'm okay with it. I think I actually love it. I haven't taken a picture of it with lights on yet, but I'll get to it.

Anyway, AJ and I half-love/half-hate putting ornaments on the tree. We have a really tiny tree. That'd be okay if we didn't have many ornaments... but AJ's family has this tradition...

Every year when he and his sisters were growing up, they'd get an ornament for Christmas. AJ's always had something to do with sports and his sisters got angels and musical-themed ornaments. I LOVE THIS. And... to top it all off, his mama kept a list of every. single. ornament.

Amazing, right?

Well... we have a lot of ornaments. This one might be my new favorite.

 I found it at World Market (where else?) and I think he's a little Swedish nutcracker with his salmon in hand. LOVE IT.

Listen to this :)

western style omelettes

AJ and I are really into the weekends. I know this 'season' of our marriage will not last forever: no kids to worry about (unless you count our cats), and jobs that allow us to be off on the weekends (most of the time!).

I cherish the weekends: waking up 'late' (usually around 7), making a big breakfast, easing into our day slowly. We choose what to do... which is sometimes nothing. Today, we are heading to Williamsburg because we got a great deal on tickets. Neither of us have ever been, so we jumped at the chance.

I made that salsa from my BRAND NEW food processor this week and it was so delicious. We didn't make much because tomatoes are not really in season right now, thus they are expensive.

We ate quite a bit of salsa with tortilla chips, but we still had a little bit left. I decided to make western-style omelettes for dinner with it. YUMMY.

P.S. We love brinner (breakfast for dinner)

I sauteed some onions, peppers, and chiles for several minutes until they were soft and starting to caramelize.

In comes the eggs! I just mixed (I think four?) eggs with 1/4 cup of water. My Grandpa told me when I was starting to cook eggs (probably when I was 12 or 13) that it didn't matter if you chose water or milk to add to scrambled eggs. No one can tell the difference. So, since then... I've always used water.

When the eggs started to solidify, I tried to flip them over all together. FAIL. But... you know what? My husband doesn't care that his omelette isn't perfect so I went with it.

I shredded some colby jack cheese and added some salsa and more chiles to the top before I attempted to flip it over.

Yummo! Have a wonderful, relaxing weekend!

simple pleasures.

guess who got a food processor on Black Friday? THIS GIRL.

First project: salsa!

Side note: how have I lived almost 24 years of my life without a food processor? Mystery.

cheesy casserole

I have found another delicious use of spaghetti squash... cheesy hamburger (cheesyburger?) casserole! I love this kind of comfort food!

All I did was mix this baby with cooked spaghetti squash and a pound of cooked ground beef. I also added some peppers and onions. Baked for 15 minutes in a 375 degree oven: PERFECT.

I'm very fortunate that my husband loves this kind of thing too!

Panettone French Toast

World Market is probably my favorite store, next to Trader Joe's of course. I find so many wonderful things there... most recently, panettone.

I follow Giada de Laurentiis on twitter and she suggested the other day using panettone for french toast. Well, first off.. I've never even had panettone... but she made it sound AMAZING.

At World Market, they had a really big box of it and then a smaller (I think 3 ounce) box. I got the smaller version, and it turned out to be just right for AJ and I. I had to wait to use it until we both had a morning off, which turned out to be Sunday.

I found several recipes for panettone french toast, but I didn't have everything needed for any of them. Therefore, I kind of made up my own.

Here's the bread cut up into pieces. It cut into five pieces but the top slice was curved, so I ate it. WHY has no one told me about panettone before? Or made me eat it? IT IS SO GOOD.

You have to mix some eggs, milk, vanilla, cinnamon, and salt together to form the 'dip' for the bread before you put it in the hot griddle.

 before & after... sorry if raw eggs make you queasy.

Then you dip the bread on both sides and then put it in the griddle!

They need to cook for 4-5 minutes on each side... so while I was waiting, I made Giada's cinnamon sugar syrup to go on top. And I also made scrambled eggs with my gingerbread spatula: Judge not.

Recipe:

• 1 small panettone (cut into 4 or 5 slices)
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 1/4 tsp. cinnamon
• pinch of salt

1. In a broad bowl (you'll need to dip), mix the eggs, milk, vanilla, cinnamon, and salt together. Make sure it's really mixed up! 
2. Dip each piece of bread (mine were about 1/2-3/4 of an inch thick each) into the mixture. Make sure both sides are covered and then put it on a griddle pan over medium-high heat.
3. Cook for 4-5 minutes on each side and then eat! It is sweet enough that it doesn't need syrup, but the syrup is yummy!

cinnamon sugar popcorn

I have become a wee bit obsessed with making popcorn. It's my new favorite snack.

I found a recipe the other day for cinnamon sugar popcorn and had to try it quickly! It did not go as well as planned.

The recipe went well... for a while.

You start off by melting some butter and then stir the sugar in (I also added a tiny bit of vanilla). After it's dissolved, you put the corn kernels in and wait for them to pop.

At this point in the recipe, my kitchen smelled amazing. The sugar and the butter mixed with a teeny bit of vanilla... YUMMMM.

Here's the problem: I think I had the stove temperature too low as the popcorn didn't start popping for a good 10 minutes. That results in: burned sugar.

The non-burned pieces were pretty stinkin' good, though!

 I'll try again shortly and let you know how it goes :)

pizza pizza!

I love homemade pizza! Growing up, we had pizza (either homemade or frozen) every Sunday night after church. AJ and I have tried to continue that tradition, but we have not been successful yet! We'll keep trying :)

Anyway, we made homemade pizza this past weekend because I found some inspiration in the grocery store... my mama used to use this sauce on her pizzas and I haven't seen it in a while. I was EXCITED.

I cheated again by using refrigerated dough. This particular dough (Pillsbury thin crust) had to be pre-baked alone... and then the sauce, cheese, and toppings get baked as well. YUM.

Then I sprinkled oregano, basil on top and baked for about 10 minutes. Delicious.

Did we eat half of the pizza in about 10 minutes? Yes. Yes, we did.

it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Here are the cookies I CAN NOT wait to bake this Christmas (in no specific order):

1. homemade Oreos!
2. Real Simple's basic sugar cookie dough (you can transform this into SO many different things)
3. Spritz cookies: my mama's FAVORITE
4. Peppermint bark
5. Andes mints cookies: HELLO!!! I think my daddy will love these!

and obviously, there will be more :)

Happy weekend! The hubs and I are relaxing and watching Madagascar 2. I'm about to make some popcorn!

caramel cake with chocolate frosting

A week or so ago, I found a caramel cake mix at the grocery store. CARAMEL? I have never seen a caramel cake mix before! I was intrigued, thus I obviously had to buy it!

It's been sitting in my pantry for a while now... and I've been racking my brain to figure out what to do with it... thinking of flavor combinations.

Two or three days ago, I gave up. I googled it. And I found this beauty. I read the reviews and adjusted accordingly and OH. MY. WORD. And bonus! It was crazy easy to put together. And I may have eaten quite a few spoonfuls of the caramel cake dough... it was so delicious.

Here's the dough patted into a 13"x9" pan. The dough is really thick!

While that was baking, I found a recipe for chocolate frosting. I whipped it up (literally, haha) and WOW.

Beat the butter... and then you'll mix in your milk and sifted cocoa/sugar mixture. YUM. Add the very end, you mix in one teaspoon of vanilla. 

I thought you might need a close up of the icing. 

And then... putting two amazing things together:

So yummy. It was one of those things where I gave AJ a bite, and we just stood there making 'ooh' and 'ahh'  noises for a few minutes. I am going to buy another caramel cake mix SOON! You should too!

P.S. Is it care-a-mel or car-a-mel?

Here's the recipe for the caramel cake:

• 1 package caramel cake mix
• 2 large eggs
• 1/4 cup water
• 1/4 cup (firmly packed!) brown sugar
• 6 tbsp. butter or margarine
• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Step 1: Preheat oven to 375 degrees and grease 13x9 pan.

Step 2: Combine EVERYTHING but the chocolate chips and mix it all together for a few minutes (until it's blended together) and then stir in the chocolate chips. IT IS REALLY THICK and it's supposed to be like that. Spread into the greased pan.

Step 3: Bake until a toothpick comes out clean when stuck in the center. Mine took 24 minutes. 

And the icing:

• 2 3/4 cups confectioners' (powdered) sugar
• 6 tbsp. unsweetened cocoa powder
• 6 tablespoons butter
• 5 tablespoons milk (the recipe called for evaporated milk, but I'm not going to open up a can of that and not finish it, so I used skim milk... and it was still AMAZING)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Step 1: In a medium-sized bowl, sift the sugar and cocoa together.

Step 2: Cream the butter in your mixer until it's smooth. Alternate adding the sugar/cocoa and the milk until everything is added. Mix it up well!

Step 3: Add the vanilla and continue frosting until it's whipped up nicely. 

Step 4: Try it to make sure it's okay :)