Sweet Tea 101

I love sweet tea.  If you are ever at my house I will have a gallon of it in my fridge.  I thought I would tell you how I make my tea. First, I start with 3 family size tea bags and my small pot which I only use for tea. As you can tell I have tea stains in this pot because I use it so much.

 Remove the tags from the tea bags and put them in the water. Over medium high heat bring them to a rapid boil.

 

Add 1 1/2 cups of sugar to a gallon pitcher. Pour the hot tea in with the sugar and stir. Add water to fill to near the top.

Then pour in a glass and enjoy.  It is also better to store the tea in the fridge.

 

Walgreens Deal 2/25/10

Today only at Walgreens you can get a free 8x10 photo.  Just enter FREEPHOTO in the code box and you can get it today at your closet walgreens.  I just ordered mine.

In Memory of Mrs. Matheny

I have been behind on my blogging this week.  It has been one of those weeks around here.  I found out yesterday that a very dear woman in my life passed away suddenly. When you get that call it doesn't seem real and that it can't be happening. I was wanting here to be here for selfish reasons.  Her life here on earth was spent serving the Lord. She taught the precepts bible study at my church.  I learned so much setting under her teaching. I am truly blessed because I knew her. My prayer is that I will be that Godly woman that she was.  So many of us have cried over this loss these last few days. If she knew we were crying she would be so upset. She lived for heaven and she is there praising the Lord.
Psalm 23

Easy flower hair clips

 

These are so easy to make. My daughter is loving these.  She is asking me to make them in multiple colors.

First I picked my material. Then I took a mason jar lid and traced it on the fabric.

 

You need about 6-8 circles depending on how full you want the flower. Cut the circles, fold the circles in half and then in half again.

 

 Then begin to bunch the circles on at a time.  They will begin to get full as you put more in.

 

Once you have as many as you like put a straight pin through to hold it while you sew it together.  I used double thread and went all the way through all of the corners about 4 times when you are done knot your thread to hold.

When you are done hot glue the bottom to a clip or a hair clasp.  Let dry and you are done. These are so fast and easy to do. Enjoy!

 

Shirt

I had seen this shirt made here several months ago and I have been dying to try it.  Finally, I was in target and they had some T-shirts on clearance for $2.24.  My mom was with me and she got a shirt in her size and so did I.  Then I bought the extra large shirt to use for the ruffles on the shirt.

 

I made a 2 1/2 inch heart, traced it on the XL shirt and cut them out 2 at time.  I used about 12-14 heart per shirt. After I was finished with all of the cutting I started placing each heart one at a time.  I hand stitched about 3 times to hold it secure.  Then started placing them next to each other.  The closer they are the fuller it will look.

I continued bunching them up and sewing until I got to the point on the neck that I thought looked good.  I am very thrilled with the finished product.

Can you tell I was taking the picture? Next time you are out look for cheap shirts that you can fix up.  I made 2 of these for $6.75.

My Baby

 

I need a mom moment.  I registered my baby boy Carson for kindergarten last week.  I must say this has been eating away at me.  I have been blessed to stay at home with my children, but now the baby is going to school. When I handed the registration forms to the school I felt a tug at my heart.  To be honest when I walked out of the school office I wanted to cry.  Many emotions were running through my body. We are blessed that our children go to such a wonderful school and I am so happy for him, I just need to work out my mommy issues.

Proverbs 22:6  Train a child in the way he should go,  and when he is old he will not turn from it.

Book Mark

 

I saw these on Somewhat Simple blog. 

They were so cute I had to try them.  I just used material that I had and put interfacing on each side of the fabric.
 

I cut the edges with pinking sheers. Put them together and sew around.  Place a ribbon in the top and sew it in.  My first try was ok. Next time I will be more prepared.  Hope you enjoy these.

What we had for dinner.....

 

My dinner all started with this bread.  Honestly, I am from the south and I was raised on biscuits.  Biscuits are what I make, not yeast breads.  I love yeast breads don't get me wrong, but I am just not good at them. But, I found this recipe here and it is so easy and wonderful. You really need to give it a try. 

So I thought we need some good soup to go with this. In my $5.00 dinner mom recipe book there was one for Pasta e Fagioli Soup(I love this soup at Olive Garden). I changed this recipe up so I am going to give you my instructions.

3/4 pound ground beef

2 carrots, chopped

2 celery stalks, chopped

1/2 onion, chopped

1 can (15 ounce) diced tomatoes with juice

1 (6 ounce) tomato sauce

1 can red kidney beans drained

2 tablespoons dried Italian seasoning

2 teaspoons garlic powder

salt and pepper to taste

1 cup elbow macaroni

In a skillet, brown the ground beef and drain the excess fat. 

Add the cooked ground beef, chopped carrots, chopped celery, chopped onion,, canned tomatoes, tomato sauce, beans and 2 cups of water to a large stock pot.  Stir in the Italian seasoning, garlic powder, and salt and pepper. Bring to a boil and reduce heat to low.  Cook for about an hour on low heat.  Add elbow macaroni and cook for about 30 minutes longer. 

Hope you enjoy!

Happy Valentine's day.  I have been behind on blogging, mainly because of all of the snow.  It can be really hard to be motivated with all of the snow on the ground. I wanted to share our family fondue we had for Valentine's.

 

  

  

This is my children's favorite drink.  It is just equal parts ginger ale and grape juice. I just made it fancy for valentines.

 

My older 2 being silly.

 

As you can tell they ate a lot of chocolate.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine's Day!

 

Nanny Wrights sewing box

 

Today I was going through some of my crafting things and there sat my great grandmothers sewing box.   Its amazing to me everytime I open it.  It was in storage until a couple of years ago and then my grandmother gave it to me.  I have never been able to get rid of one thing in the box.  I am sure some of the material and trim has dry rotted, but it is a reminder of my Nanny.  She sewed so many quits and clothes for us growing up.  In fact I found the last quilt she was working on before she died. One day I will finish it. I think this box is a way of holding on to all of the memories of my great grandmother.  I learned a lot from her and I am blessed that I was able to have her in my life as an adult.  She died before Kevin and I got married so she was never able to see my children. I know that there is a part of her in them and I am thankful.

My favorite Sugar Cookies

I have to share this recipe with you.  This is a recipe I got from mine and Kevin's first neighbors, Justine and Matt. They lived on the other end of the duplex apartment we lived in. We were both newly married couples so we would switch recipes. She shared it with me because her husband loved these and she thought I would enjoy them.  I was so upset because I had lost my recipe I had for years. Thank goodness for facebook because we are friends and I just facebooked her and a few hours later I had it.  I hope you all enjoy this as much as we do.  Thanks Justine!

 

 Preheat oven to 350

Ingredients

3 1/2 cups flour

1 1/2 tsp. baking powder

3/4 tsp. salt

 Mix dry ingredients together. Then mix the wet ingredients.

3/4 cup softened butter

1 1/2 cup sugar

2 tsp. vanilla

2 eggs

1/4 cup milk

After the wet ingredients are mixed gradually add the dry until mixed well.  Cover and refrigerate for several hours or overnight.

  

Roll out and begin cutting in whatever shape you like.  We are doing football theme because of the superbowl. Place on pans and bake for 6-8 minutes.  Do not let them get brown! Let cool and then decorate however you like.

 

  

 

 

Honey Oatmeal Bread

 

This was a recipe that came with my kitchen aid mixer.  I was really pleased with how it turned out.

1 1/2 cups water

1/2 cup honey

1/3 cup margarine or butter

5 1/2-6 1/2 cups all purpose wheat flour (or white)

1 cup quick cooking oats

2 teaspoons salt

2 packages active dry yeast

2 eggs

1 egg white

1 tablespoon water

oatmeal

Place water, honey, and margarine in small sauce pan.  Heat over low heat until mixture is very warm.

Place 5 cups four, oats, salt and yeast in mixer bowl. Attach bowl and dough hook to mixer. Turn to speed 2 and mix about 15 seconds. Continuing on speed 2, gradually add warm mixture to four mixture and mix about 1 minute.  Add eggs and mix about 1 minute longer.

Continuing on speed 2, add remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, and mix about 2 minutes, or until dough clings to hook and cleans sides of bowl. Knead on speed 2 about 2 minutes longer.

Place dough in greased bowl, turning to grease top. Cover. let rise in warm place, free from draft, about 1 hour, or until doubled in bulk.

Punch down dough and divide in half. Shape each into a loaf. Place in greased 8 1/2 x4 1/2 x 2 1/2 inch baking pan. Cover. Let rise in a warm place, free from draft, about 1 hour or until doubled in bulk.

Beat egg white and water together with a fork.  Brush tops of loaves with mixture.  Sprinkle with oatmeal.  Bake at 375 for 40 minutes. Remove from pans immediately and cool on wire racks. 

Snowman

 

I got the idea for this at The idea room . She tells how to make one.  I had to change a few things  , but I think it is still too cute.

Pillows

I love this pillow.  I made it for my daughters bed.  I used the same technique as the Valentine wreath except with fabric and sewed them on.

 
 

Here it is upclose.

 
 

This was just a basic pillow and I sewed rick rack just to add some lime green color, which Savannah wanted.

 

Snow Again

Here is a picture of my backyard at 9:45 this morning.  My children are out of school yet again and are eating me out of house and home already.  To be honest I am looking foward to a board game and crafting day in my PJ's.  Thanks goodness I went to Panera to get bagels and to JoAnn fabric to get my crafting supplies yesterday. Of course everyone else in this town was at the grocery store.

Sickness

I have to say that during the winter months I live in fear of someone getting the stomach bug.  It hit my family in NC last week and I felt so bad for them.  It was at a time when my brother in law was on a mission trip.  My sister had her 2 boys and my mom was helping them. They all got the stomach bug.  Now after being in 5 days with snow it hits my family.  My husband and son were so sick last night.  My day today has been spent bleaching and washing.  I know that God never gives us anything we can't handle. I have kept that in my mind all day.  God is good and will see us through.

Salty and Sweet

These are such a quick and easy snack. The kids love to make. All you do is unwrap Hershey kisses and place them on a pretzel. Put them in the microwave for about 1minute and 30 seconds. (this all depends on your microwave) then plave an M&M in the middle and let set until hard. You can change the color of the M & M's to fit the holiday season you are in. These are so quick and easy!