Old shoes turned new.

The other day, I decopauged some old shoes I had. I am so happy with the results. They are so cute!

Alll I did was get an old shirt that I never wore, I cut it up and glue gunned the fabric onto the old shoe I had.

This was the old shoe, it was just a cheap plastic flat that I had had for a while.

This shoe:

It was really easy, but I did get a few glue gun burns. Next time I might get some fabric glue, it might be easier.

I didn't do much with the insides, but no one ever sees those, so who cares what the insides look like right?

Then I made a couple pom poms (tutorial on how to make pom poms to come later) and glued those on as well. And all set to go!

I love them!!

Oatmeal Cookies-- mmm mmm good

Well these babies are my all time favorite cookie. They are just sooo amazing and rich and my mouth is watering just thinking about them.

Pretty much you have got to try these ooey gooey cookies.

I have posted these before, like the third day I had this blog and had no followers and I took a crappy picture of the cookies, so here it is agian.

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies:

3 C. Quick Oats

2 C. Brown Sugar

1 C. Margarine (2 sticks) Softened

2 Eggs

1 tsp Baking Soda

1 tsp Cinnamon

1/2 tsp Salt

2tsp Vanilla

1 3/4 C Flour

1 pckg chocolate chips (I prefer Semi-Sweet)

Mix everything together except flour and chocolate chips with electric mixer in big bowl. Then add flour slowly. Then add chips and mix again. Drop onto greased cookie sheet and bake at 375 degrees for 8-10 minutes

Also a good tip for cookies, if you feel your cookies are constantly going all flat and pancake like on you while they are baking, try putting your cookie dough in the fridge for about twenty minutes before you bake them. Works like a charm every time for me.

Its is weird, they used to never go flat for me, but when i moved to our apt they did, I think it depends on the humidity, your alitude and your oven. So its a great trick to try if your cookie recipes are angering you!

Also who here is a fan of cookie dough?? I can't ever decide which I like better, the cookies or the cookie dough. I know, sallmonella and all that, well I have been eating cookie dough for 21 years and haven't got sick yet, and i think if I did get sick, I would still eat it, I like it that much.



LOVE Banner.

So ever since I started this blog I see all these really cute banners around, and I am totally jealous, I want a cute banner. But I could never get like the letters cause I didn't have a cricut and I couldn't ever find any cheap ones... but since I was able to borrow my aunts cricut to make the 'Be Mine' boxes I cut out a few letters and I made myself a banner.

I like it, but I don't love it. It seems like there are some cuter ones out there. I had the letters and I used the cricuit to cut out the circles too, then I crinkled tissue paper on the back and glued it there, then I sewed the paper aound the letters. But I don't know, It still seems to be missing something. I am going to cut out letters for more banners so maybe I will get better with time. I do have some great ideas for a fourth of july one, but that is ages away!! But for my first banner I still like it. I made it a few weeks ago but kinda forgot to post it... But tell me what ya think and if you have any suggestions.

Oh I used tule and twine to hang it up.



I could put up more valentines day decor on my shelf, but I have like a wierd problem. I like all my year round decor and don't like to take it down... Plus Valentines isn't one of my fave holidays. we usually never do anything, its too busy to go out and have a fun date night, so we just do small gifts, so I don't want to make a ton of Valentines decor for just a small holiday...

What do you guys do for Valentines Day??!

Chicken and Peanut Noodles

My hubby absolutely loves this meal. Basically he is obsessed with peanut butter and so anytime I can make a dinner that incorporates that, he is in love.

I don't remember where I found this meal. I think it was a Disney website, which is weird, but I didn't want to spend all this time googling the recipe to find the original source, so sorry. But the hubs and I found this recipe while we were dating, and thought it would be fun to cook together. The website said it was a healthy recipe, I guess it kind of is, if you used whole wheat noodles and low fat peanut butter, but its healthier than a lot of meals and isn't fried so whatever.

1lb. Bonless Chicken Breast

1/2 c. Peanut Butter

2 Tbsp Soy Sauce

1 Bag frozen vegetable medley

2 tsp Garlic

1 1/2 tsp Garlic Chile Sauce

1 tsp Ginger

8 oz. Spaghetti Noodles.

Cook Pasta according to directions on package. Cook Chicken until no longer pink in the middle. Cut Chicken into bite sized pieces.

Whisk Peanut Butter, Soy Sauce, Garlic, Chile Sauce, and Ginger in a bowl. Set aside.

When pasta is almost done, add the bag of veggies to the pot with the noodles. Cook until veggies are soft. Before straining noodles and veggies, take one cup of the hot water out of the pot and pour it into the bowl with the peanut sauce.

Strain veggies and noodles, pour in large bowl with chicken. Whisk peanut sauce with the water, add to noodles and veggies and chicken, stir everything together, serve warm.

Ok I don't really like frozen veggies, so what I did was add green peppers in with the chicken while I was cooking the chicken, so they were tender crisp, and I just took the 1 c. of water out of the noodles before I strained them. You could serve this with rice too, but I haven't tried it, the hubs isn't a huge fan of white rice, so if I can put noodles in the meal, he is super happy!

But it is a really yummy meal. The peanut sauce is way good. I have tried similar sauces at restaraunts and stuff.

An Incredibly Lazy Day!

So I am not going to lie to all of you, yesterday I had an incredibly lazy day. 

Basically I took the day of work off, I slept in until eleven! Thats right, eleven. I ate breakfast at noon and didn't clean the apartment at all. The hubs had a lazy day too, he skipped school and stayed home as well. In his defense, he did work, but since he works from home on his laptop, its still lazy. We didn't shower at all, we stayed in our pj's all day and didn't brush our teeth. Gross I know, but sometimes you have to have those days. Pretty much I ate cookies and played video games all day. Haha it was a blast!! 

Now today I am working and have about twenty thousand dishes to do, but it was so worth it!

I challenge all of you to have a lazy day where you do absolutely nothing, it feels wonderful.

Menu Plan Monday

Menu Plan Monday

There is this site I just found called Organizing Junkie and every Monday you can link up your weekly Menu. I always have a menu planned out, because I go to the grocery store about every two weeks and If I don't plan around two weeks of meals, then I end up buying NOTHING good and we eat cereal and fast food everynight. So I have a cute little chalkboard in my kitchen (remember that upcylcled old clock that said LOVE? ) I use that as my weekly menu board that I write all my dinner items for the next two weeks. I never actually sit down and decide what days to do them on though, so I thought maybe this week I will give it a shot. Plus then I can share with you what I am going to make, and if it turns out good, then I will share with you the recipe. And maybe this will inspire others to make weekly menus. They are so helpful.

So here it goes...

Monday:  Tonight I am making Pork Chile Verde Burritos. My dad's family used to make this all the time and I loved it, I tried making their recipe once when I was in college, but I failed at it, so I am trying again. Cause I love this dish. If it works, I will share it tomorrow...

Tuesday: Left overs. With just the two of us we usually have left overs when I make a big meal like that. I know some people hate left overs, but I grew up on them.

Wednesday:  Sloppy Joe's. Basically I just get a can of 'Manwich' and use that. I don't really like homemade sloppy joes and wouldn't eat them when I was a kid until my mom started using the canned stuff. I am such a weirdo.

Thursday: French Dip Sandwiches. As Au Jus, I use a can of Lipton Onion soup mix, it works perfectly.

Friday:  Yeah I probably won't cook this night. Date night or something out to eat sounds perfect!

Saturday:  Ravioli. I should someday try to make homemade ravioli, but in the meantime, I buy a bag of the frozen stuff at walmart and pour a can of meat sauce over, heat and serve. I have to buy the beef filled ones, cause as you know, me and cheese are not friends, ick!

Sunday:  I always plan something for Sunday nights but then we always end up visiting family, or I am just tired from teaching primary (church classes for little children in our church) that I don't feel like making anything, so we will probably go to someone's house and eat dinner or I will make pancakes for dinner or something.

Hmm.. Just realized most of my meals are red meat... Weird, the last two weeks I made only chicken recipes... But next week I do have mostly chicken recipes planned again.

So go plan out your recipes and come back and tell me what your making. I always need ideas.

Damask Coasters.

These coasters are seriously so easy to make, and totally cheap and you can make them to match your decor as well. I am loving them. So in case you want to make them too, here is my tutorial on how to make them. I saw this on a few other blogs out there (sorry it was a while ago, so I can't tell you which ones) but I made them a couple weeks ago and they are the greatest.

Step one: Get some square tiles at your hardware store. I went to Home Depot and they were like 16 cents each. So I boght sixteen of them, and spent like $2.50 , how sweet is that!

Here is the tile, I put it on lovely zebra fabric so you could see it better.

Step two: Get some cardstock and cut it out to fit your tile piece, I did mine just a little bit smaller than the tile. I chose Damask paper cause I love myself some damask print.

Step 3. with a foam paint brush, brush mod podge onto the tile, put the paper onto the tile and flatten out any air bubbles. Let it dry for a minute or so, then brush more mod podge onto the paper and tile again. Do a very light layer, too much mod podge will make the paper bubble. Here is a pic of the mod podge on the paper.

Step Four: Get a spray can of clear paint sealer and quickly spray it over each tile. Let it dry for a little bit.

Step five: Once all the tiles are dry, cut out squares of felt the same size as your tile.

{Felt!}

Now take your glue gun, put some glue the felt piece to the back of your tile.

{Glue on tile}

Voila! you are done.

{RED}

I did them in bundles of four, then tied them with a ribbon. I did two bundles of red, and two bundles of green. I gave one of the green ones to my aunt and kept one of the red ones for me. Now I need to decide who to give the other two to...

I just love them. I was a little skeptical at first that the paper wouldn't get wet or ruined or something when you put your glass on it, but its been two weeks and they have held up. The mod podge coating and the sealer coating really work well. And I am always spilling my water and stuff, so if they hold up for me, they will for anyone.

Bahama Mama's Tortilla Soup Recipe

My senior year in high school I worked at this place

Rumbi Island Grill

its like a fast casual place that serves 'Island Food' Which  is basically mostly rice bowls. Not sure if that is island food but whatever... But anyway I worked there for a year and in that time I fell in love with a soup they serve there. It was called 'Bahama Mama's Tortilla Soup'

It was amazing, and probably the first restaurant I had ever ordered soup at. I am not a huge soup person and I always felt like it was a waste to order soup and I usually only ever like Chicken Noodle soup. But after working there for a while, I eventually got sick of rice bowls and had to expand my horizons to getting soup.

It is one of the best soups ever!! Eventually I got the recipe online somewhere (I didn't work in the kitchen so I didn't know the exact recipe) and I have been making this baby for the last year or so. Its delicious.

Bahama Mama's Tortilla Soup

3 chicken Breasts

8 C. chicken broth

1 C water

1 carrot shaved thin

1 C. chopped onion

1/4 tsp all spice

1/2 tsp thyme

1/8 tsp cinnamon

1 Tbsp Ginger

1 T Garlic

1 c. chopped tomato

1 (14 oz) can coconut milk

1 tsp hot pepper sauce

1 c. mozzarella cheese

2 c. white tortilla strips (fried or baked)

2 limes wedged

Grill chicken, cut into small chunks.

In large pot combine chicken, water, broth, and carrot. Add thyme, all spice, cinnamon, ginger, and garlic. Bring to a boil over medium high heat. Then lower temp to med. and let simmer for about 10 minutes. Pour in tomato, hot sauce and coconut milk. Ladle into bowls top with cheese and tortilla strips. Squeeze lime juice over. Serve.

It tastes exactly like the one they make at Rumbi Grill.

It is a very thin brothy soup, which are my favorite kinds. But man it is amazing. I always add extra lime juice, cause I love lime juice on everything... And I fried my tortilla strips and a couple were a little extra crispy, but in the soup they tasted fine, next time I am just baking them, so much easier! (can you buy tortilla strips? That would be even easier?)

Here is another pic with less broth so you can see the chunkiness. (This is my bowl with the no cheese!) prior to having the tortilla strips. I didn't put tomatos in cause I didnt feel like it with them being so gross this time of year.

This post is making me hungry. Now I want to go eat leftover soup for lunch, and its only 930! I need breakfast.



Wowie! Look at these Beauties.

So I usually surf through some blogs, especially linky parties, to get great ideas. I found some way awesome stuff out there and thought I would share it with ya. 

So here are some crafts and a recipe that I thought were amazing, and I will probably try out most probably all of them, cause I can't stop crafting!

Check out this great bookmark tutorial at Bugaboo

I am in Love with this LOVE banner. Jessica sells these babies, and right now if you head over to These Are the Days you can enter in a give away for them that she is having. AWESOME!

{Plus Jessica is my auntie-in-law, so you have to check it out hehe}

I am in love with this rosette headband. How gorgeous is this.

Check out Borrowed and Bleu to see the tutorial.

Scissors and a Whisk got me wanting to whisk up this yummy Nutella hot chocolate recipe.

How adorable is this Valentines Day wreath?? She has a tutorial on how to do it. It is super easy and how perfectly cute is it. Head over to Kevin and Jessica to see how its done.

More Recipes and Chicken Noodle--Fast!

So I didn't get all the recipes done I wanted to do last week. I mean I did five last week which is what I wanted to do, but there were still a couple I wanted to share with all of you. So I will still be adding some more recipes this week as well to get through all the ones I wanted to do. And then after that I will keep doing more recipes as before but week of recipes will be done for a bit.

Here is an idea that I wanted to share with all of you that I thought was soo cute!

Chicken Noodle Soup in a Jar!!

How freaking cute is that.

My mother-in-law gave me this little jar of soup mix for Christmas among other things.

I thought it was so cute. What a great gift. This would make like a great neighbor gift for any time of the year! Especially since it is so cold and gross out right now.

So this little baby came with a jar of egg noodles (I think thats what they were, I only ever buy spaghetti noodles, someone want to help out here and confirm what these noodles are?) with some spices and flavorings inside the jar, and then she put a can of chicken on top and what you needed to add to it.

Sorry, kinda blurry, my camera really had a hard time taking close ups. Stupid thing!

So I don't know her exact recipe, I was going to ask her, but I forgot, but here is one I found on the internet that looks pretty similar click HERE for it. The recipe my mother-in law gave me and the web recipe both calls for water as your base, the one I linked to said 8 c. water, my mother in law said she tried her recipe with just the water and said it was bland, so I would recommend doing half of that chicken or veggie broth.

But man, I cooked it up, and it was fabulous! And so easy! I just added broth, carrots, onions and celery and it was done.

And my hubby loved it! I think we both had seconds

Yeah we usually don't eat up at the table, and I could have gotten up to take a nice picture, but I was hungry, so I had my hubby take a quick one before I dug in.

In a few weeks I am going to post a recipe for my mom's Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup, with homemade noodles, which is also super yummy so get ready for that!

'Be Mine' Boxes

Look what I made...

Lovely 'Be Mine' Boxes

I am in love with these.
I got the idea at Craft-O-Maniac

I bought these boxes at the dollar store

They were kind of by the gift bags and stuff like that. The small tan one was inside the larger red one, so I got six of these babies for three bucks! SCORE.

They were okay lookin, but not the prettiest, so I fancied them up.

Add a little bit of Mod Podge to the box, put some cardstock on them, and voila, they are twenty times more cute.

So if you want to do this too, you just get your mod podge, paint it on the box and then put some paper that you have cut out and stick it on there, smooth it out so there are no bubbles and then do the same with all box sides. Once it was pretty dry I then repainted it with mod podge over the paper that I had put on, you don't have to, I just think it makes it have a cooler look and feel, it doesnt' look as much like paper to me. But if you do the extra layer on top, don't do it until the first coat under the paper is dry or else it will bubble up!

Here they all are before I put the words on and decorated them.

I think its most fun if you do the lids of the boxes a different paper than the boxes themselves, I have this great big Damask paper book and so I just used all the red and pink prints from that, so they all match.

I wasn't sure how to get cute letters on them, and heaven knows I can't paint them on there, so my lovely aunt let me borrow her cricuit! Can I tell you how much I love that thing. I am using it for everything and like cutting out a ton of letters for future crafts before I give it to her. Thanks for letting me using Bonnie!

So I cut these 'Be Mine' letters out, I thought about doing them different prints too, or at least different colors, like red and pink but I thought that might be too much. so I did them all white and then took a stamp pad to the edges.

Next, mod podge those on too.

See the white, its the mod podge.

Now that they are dry add some ribbon or something to jazz it up. I used ribbon and netting. I wish I had some cute red buttons, but I don't... :(

The E is my fav. I love the big bow on top that is made out of netting.

So in all, this project cost me $3.00

I already had all the other stuff on hand.

You can't beat that.

So like I said earlier, Craft-O-Maniac gave me the idea, She did these cool NOEL boxes for Christmas, and I was all for dollar store stuff! I looked at her blog after I finished these things and found she has done a ton more of these too, so go check that out if you want more inspiration. They are cute.

Week of Recipes, Day #5 (spotlights)

Week of Recipes, Day #5

Ok here are three recipes from this blog I love Oopsey Daisey

It was the first blog I found and she had a ton of great recipes.

Here is my absolute fave of her recipes.

Cafe Rio Burritos

If you life in, or around Utah, Cafe Rio is like the best place ever to eat, they have burritos to die for. And while its not like authentic, its like AMAZING! So if you can't go to Cafe Rio, try these cause my mouth is watering just thinking about them. I have tried many knock off recipes for these pork burritos, but this is the closest.

To get the recipe go to this page. I could have posted the recipe, but she has it all step-by-step and with yummy pictures so why do work that has already been done great?

Snickerdoodle Muffins

From the same blog, these are soo good. They are like snickerdoodles in cake form. I make these all the time and they are perfect! I start to crave them now.

{P.S. Don't eat these in bed at night, I did and they got all over, my husband was very displeased when he woke up with cinnamon and sugar crumbs all over the bed!  Or am I the only weirdo who eats food in the bed?}

Click HERE for the recipe

Can you see the writing?

So someone left a comment on here that said they can't read some of the writing on my post cause my background is covering it. But when I view my blog it looks perfectly normal/readable to me... I have tried on a few different computers too and its all showing up ok.

So if you can't read some parts of my blog let me know and I will try to fix it.

Also if you can't see it, please tell me what internet browser your using ( internet explorer, firefox, safari, chrome.... ) And also if you can tell me if your using a Mac, Windows system, or a Linux System and then I can know a bit more about the problem.

I can't fix it cause I can't see the problem... And I want everyone to see my blog or what is the point of writing this thing?

Zucchini Bread

Week of Recipes, Day # 4

Zucchini Bread

I don't remember where I found this recipe, but I love it. I made it last night at ten, I had a weird craving for it last night. I get weird cravings a lot, I can't tell you how many times I made my husband take me on late night runs to Artic Circle (a local burger place) to get fries or a chocolate mint oreo shake with fudge (Try it, now!) I don't know what we are going to do when I get pregnant someday, those cravings are going to be crazy.

Zucchini Bread

2 1/2  C. Sugar

3 eggs

3 C. Flour

1 Tbsp vanilla

1 c. oil

2 c. Grated Zucchini (I just use one zucchini and its usually only like 1 1/2 c. but its ok)

1/4 tsp Baking Powder

1 tsp Baking Soda

1 C. Chopped Nuts

3 tsp cinnamon

Mix everything together in a bowl, pour into bread pan. I don't know what size, mine doesn't say a size so I don't know what size it is, but for me the batter fills my regular sized one and a smaller one.

Bake at 350 Degrees for one hour.

This is the only recipe I have made of zucchini bread, and I absolutely love it. The outside is a bit crunchy. The first time I made it I was like, 'Oh my gosh I cooked it too long,' but then I tasted it and fell in love, the outside is my favoritest part, its like sweet and sugary and just lovely!!

UPDATE:

I have made this recipe lots more and still love it. But I have tweeked it to make it more healthy and still oh so delicious. 

I do half wheat flour, half white flour; decrease the sugar to 1 3/4 Cups; and add 1 C. applesauce instead of the oil. It is still amazing, but doesn't carry as much guilt. 

But if you want to stick to the original recipe, that is yummy too!