Yummy Lasagna (make and freeze)

I love lasagna! This is the recipe my mom used all growing up. Enjoy!

You will need a boiling pot of water and a box of lasagna noodles and a can of spaghetti sauce ( or use your own homemade sauce)

A few foil containers (I get my medium sized ones at the dollar store and my little ones at walmart)
And some seasonings, cottage cheese, 2 eggs, some parsely and dehydrated onions (and not pictured, mozzarella cheese)
Pour the cottage cheese, seasonings of choice, eggs and onions in a bowl and mix well. Then add in approx 2 cups of mozzarella cheese and stir again.
Spoon in a spoonful or so of spag. sauce into the bottom of pans and spread it around.
Cook your noodles as directed on the box.
Then put all your ingredients in close reaching range so you are ready to go.
Then layer your ingredients in the pan. (noodles, cottage cheese mixture, spaghetti sauce) and then repeat until you are either out of ingredients, full to the top of the pan, or to 3 or more layers :)
I make a bunch of little ones and medium sized ones and put them in the freezer!
Then top with a layer of spag. sauce and mozarella cheese. If you are going to freeze them make sure you double wrap them with alliumium foil or it will get freezer burn. Be sure to label and date them! When ready to eat, throw it in the oven for 45-60 minutes at 350 degrees! Enjoy!

Magnet Dinner Menu

I have seen a bunch of people make these really simple reusable dinner menus. I thought the idea was really fun, but decided to add my own twist to it!

You will need: A picture frame (with glass or plexiglass or whatever is in it), at least 3 really strong magnets (I really like the neo-magnets), hot glue, and a computer to design your menu page.

First you will want to design your menu page. I did mine on the computer and then printed it out and put it in the frame. Then I hot glued 3 really strong magnets on the back.

And Volia! I have a dinner menu that will stay on my fridge and looks alot prettier than my crumpled up paper with my menu. :)

SIDE NOTE: This is the greatest super glue ever! I hated using super glue growing up because I always managed to get it on my fingers or something! This super glue takes a little longer to dry (15 seconds instead of -2 seconds) and you can also control how much is coming out! You squeeze the green handles on the side! It is amazing...and that is all :)

Balloon Jam

I was so excited for our 1st Celebrate Party this week! We decided to have a Balloon Jam (aka blowing up a bunch of balloons, turning on some fun music and letting the kids go)! It was a ton of fun! Both the little ladies loved it! Sadly my daugher only played for a few minutes and then went and laid on the couch. I so discovered that she had a fever of 103. Its been a long couple of days :( Anyways Here are some fun pictures of our CELEBRATE Party!

Did you CELEBRATE this week? Tell us what you did!

Introducing: Celebrate...A Little Each Day!

Hello Friends! This past week I came across a blog that may have changed my life. This blog is called Serving Pink Lemonade. Basically everything on this blog is things that I have been wanting to do for a long time, but need to wait until my little one is a little bigger :) Anyways this amazing blog helped inspire this idea for a little series that I will post every month. At the end of each month, I will post a list of things to do, projects, and fun holidays to celebrate that month. I am really excited to start doing some celebrating every week! I have adapted my schedule to fit a toddlers abilities, but I will try to include lots of other ideas that will include older children. Anyways, without any further ado, I would like to present...

SEPTEMBER 2011

Fun Holidays to CELEBRATE

*Sept. 5th - Cheese Pizza Day

*Sept. 5th - Labor Day

*Sept. 9th - Teddy Bear Day

*Sept. 11th - Grandparents Day

*Sept. 13th - Fortune Cookie Day

*Sept. 14th - Cream Filled Donut Day

*Sept. 17th - Constitution Day

*Sept. 18th - Play-doh Day

*Sept. 18th - Cheeseburger Day

*Sept. 20th - Punch Day

*Sept. 26th - Pancake Day

Most information gathered from here and here

Other Fun Things to Do

*Have a Bubble Party (Do any and everything you can think of that has to do with bubbles)

*Build forts

*Make some thumb print pictures

Stay tuned for pictures of how we CELEBRATE a little each day!

Let us know if you have any suggestions to add to the list! And let us know how you CELEBRATE a little each day!

Little Black Dress

I got this crazy idea to make a dress to wear on a date with my husband when he finally comes home.  Those of you who know me know that I don't sew, I quilt, which is quite different from sewing actually.  However, with the help of a couple of friends I was able to make this beautiful dress.

I love the fact that the black makes it hard to see the flaws because it has a fair amount, however, for my first, and probably last, ever dress, it's not too shabby.

How to turn an old room new again

First off I'd like to thank those who helped me today my 4 neighbors who helped: Paint, Babysit, and Re-Organize for all their time and effort.  I'm very blessed to have such great neighbors.

Paint!  What a wonderful thing. I  spent $200 on paint last night, turns out I didn't need to buy that much.  Who'da thunk I could paint half my entire house with two cans of paint?  Anyway I have 2 1/2 cans of unused, unopened paint, but I'm sure I'll find a use for it somewhere, eventually.

Here are some finished pictures of my work:

Dining Room (from livingroom)

  

Kitchen (from Dining Room) 

Living Room from hallway 

Dining Room from Hallway 

Entry Way 

Living Room 

Quilt Wall 

Hallway 

Kitchen/Dining Room

I must admit that this project was not quite the undertaking I had expected.  I decided to try a new item (new to me at least.)  Have you heard of Sureline?  A newer brand of painting supplies that eliminate the need for taping.  Take a look at this:

All of the trimming was done with the new eder by Sureline, no tape and it went SO FAST!  Love it!

My rating of Sureline's line of painting supplies is 5 stars.  Made this busy woman very happy!

Now that I've finished painting I can finally do a few vinyl projects I've been waiting to try out for several months now.  Get ready.  It's coming.

The truth about having kids

This isn't really a craft, but it seems most of our readers are Mothers, I think you'll like this.  Kristie stumbled upon this article shared it with me and I must admit I love it.  It's only too true that most people don't understand what goes into raising a child, even husbands at times can seem ignorant.  The way this woman puts it puts a smile on my face and a "that's right!" in my attitude.

This is from the Washington Post, by Carolyn Hax in 2007

Carolyn:
Best friend has child. Her: exhausted, busy, no time for self, no time for me, etc. Me (no kids): Wow. Sorry. What'd you do today? Her: Park, play group . . .

Okay. I've done Internet searches, I've talked to parents. I don't get it. What do stay-at-home moms do all day? Please no lists of library, grocery store, dry cleaners . . . I do all those things, too, and I don't do them EVERY DAY. I guess what I'm asking is: What is a typical day and why don't moms have time for a call or e-mail? I work and am away from home nine hours a day (plus a few late work events) and I manage to get it all done. I'm feeling like the kid is an excuse to relax and enjoy -- not a bad thing at all -- but if so, why won't my friend tell me the truth? Is this a peeing contest ("My life is so much harder than yours")? What's the deal? I've got friends with and without kids and all us child-free folks get the same story and have the same questions.

Tacoma, Wash.

Relax and enjoy. You're funny.
Or you're lying about having friends with kids.
Or you're taking them at their word that they actually have kids, because you haven't personally been in the same room with them.
So, since it's validation you seem to want, the real answer is what you get. In list form. When you have young kids, your typical day is: constant attention, from getting them out of bed, fed, clean, dressed; to keeping them out of harm's way; to answering their coos, cries, questions; to having two arms and carrying one kid, one set of car keys, and supplies for even the quickest trips, including the latest-to-be-declared-essential piece of molded plastic gear; to keeping them from unshelving books at the library; to enforcing rest times; to staying one step ahead of them lest they get too hungry, tired or bored, any one of which produces the kind of checkout-line screaming that gets the checkout line shaking its head.
It's needing 45 minutes to do what takes others 15.
It's constant vigilance, constant touch, constant use of your voice, constant relegation of your needs to the second tier.
It's constant scrutiny and second-guessing from family and friends, well-meaning and otherwise. It's resisting constant temptation to seek short-term relief at everyone's long-term expense.
It's doing all this while concurrently teaching virtually everything -- language, manners, safety, resourcefulness, discipline, curiosity, creativity. Empathy. Everything.
It's also a choice, yes. And a joy. But if you spent all day, every day, with this brand of joy, and then, when you got your first 10 minutes to yourself, wanted to be alone with your thoughts instead of calling a good friend, a good friend wouldn't judge you, complain about you to mutual friends, or marvel how much more productively she uses her time. Either make a sincere effort to understand or keep your snit to yourself.

Add the fact that stay-home-moms recieve no pay for all of that and you've about covered it!  Those of you with kids are probably nodding your head right now, am I right?

Jelly Filled Butter Cookies

The Great Thing about Jam: It has SO many uses.

Today I tried my hand at making Jelly cookies and I must admit, they're not bad.

You can use any butter cookie recipe for this delectable dessert.

(In a few days I might have to post my Great Grandma's Recipe for Butter Cookies, she was known all over our home town for the best butter cookies.)

 Once you have made your dough,

roll it into small 1" balls and place 2" apart on baking sheet.

 Use your finger or a small spoon

(I used a round 1/2 tsp measuring spoon)

and press into the center of each dough ball.

The edges of the dough will crack and that's okay.

Once all the dough balls have been "welled" they should look like this. 

Next place 1/2 tsp of any flavor preserves you like.  Today I used Peach and Blueberry. 

Bake the cookies at 375° for 10 minutes or

until the bottoms of the cookies are slightly golden brown.

Place on wire rack to cool

and sprinkle with powdered sugar

using a sifter or colander. 

Cool and enjoy.

Gift Bag Storage Idea

I was searching for quite awhile to find a good way to store all our gift bags. I really didn't want to get rid of any because I use them all the time. So I organized them into stacks of birthday bags, christmas bags, and plain colored bags. And then put all of each kind into one of the bigger of those bags. I then wrapped the handles of those bags onto a small baby hanger. It takes up way less space then when I had them all over the place.

Colors Poster

Well its offical, the school teacher in me has started to come out. I decided to start making posters to hang in my daughters room so we can start learning our colors :) To make this poster I used:

Several Crayola paint swatches (I got mine at Sutherlands)

They have numbers at the top of the swatches so I cut them off. I cut mine off straight, but you could cut then at an angle so it looks like they have been colored with.

I stuck mine on with pop dots.

Then I printed out all the colors on the computer and then cut them out.

Then I stuck them on with sticky squares.

Now I have a fun color poster. My plan is once my daughter get s a little older, we will start coloring pictures of finding pictures of things that are those colors so hang up next to the words.

Have fun making your poster!