Have you seen Umi shoes? Adorable. These little leather classics make me happy. Right now, Umi is offering a 30% discount on any order throughout the month of May. Use the code MAY30 at checkout. I think they also offer free shipping for any order above $75. Quality shoes – you will love ’em!
Don cooked dinner a few nights ago and used this recipe from Paula Deen. The kids ate it up! We actually saved money by using organic beef from Costco – we were able to use one pound instead of two (no shrinking with good beef!) – I highly recommend both the recipe and the meat.
1 teaspoon each dried basil, cumin, and dried oregano
Salt and pepper
3 cup canned crushed tomatoes
2 lb lean ground beef
1 tablespoon chopped garlic
2 cup chopped onion
2 cup chopped green bell pepper
2 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 lb box elbow macaroni
2-3 cup grated cheddar cheese
Cook the macaroni according to package directions; drain and set aside. Heat the oil in a skillet; add the peppers, onion, and garlic, and saute until soft. Add the ground beef and saute until browned. Add the tomatoes, salt and pepper to taste, and the basil, cumin, and oregano. In a large bowl, combine the macaroni and the beef mixture. Spread this mixture into a 9 x 13-inch baking dish. Top with the cheese and bake at 350 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes, or until the cheese is lightly browned and bubbly.
Cook’s Note: Ground turkey or chicken can be used in place of beef, if desired.
Yield: 8-10 servings
Prep time: 8 minutes
Cook time: 25-30 minutes
Ease of preparation: easy
And the winner is…Danielle! Yeah, entrant #2 is the winner chosen by the number generator at www.random.org. Thanks for entering – hope you love the cookbook! Send me your new snail mail address and I’ll get it off to you ASAP. Congrats!
I was browsing Barnes & Noble (thanks, LeAnne!) and came across these books for knitting a pair of socks at the same time on circular needles. It looks fairly easy — I’m putting both the books and the project on my “to do” list!
Adapted from Beverly Nye’s recipe entitled Down-In-The-Dumps Pudding from “A Family Raised On Sunshine”.
This is one heck of a cake. It’s more of a brownie with molten hot fudge bubbling below the surface! It is perfect for ice cream and – the next day – is great right out of the pan with a spoon (would I do that? oh yes!).
Beat together:
2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
generous 6T cocoa
Stir in:
1 cup milk
4 T vegetable oil
Spread mixture in an ungreased 9 x 13 pan.
Blend in a small bowl: 2 cups brown sugar, 1/2 cup cocoa. Sprinkle over top of batter.
Pour over all: 3 cups hot water. Bake at 350° F for 45 minutes.
Beautiful catalog. Beautiful rugs. Puppies in the pictures…what more could a girl ask for? Love rugs. Love puppies. My only suggestion is if you HAVE dogs, look for olefin or a natural fiber you can wash! My Capel wool oval rug is the nastiest for vacuuming up – the yellow fibers clog my Dyson brush all the time.
Picture from Vintage Tubs.
If you’re like me and you like vintage along with your modern, here is a home decor site for you: Vintage Tubs. I ran across this site and they offer FREE shipping to US & Canada. Now if I could only afford to remodel my bath…just yet. It looked like they had some great pricing on benches and other outdoor furniture.
Hollywood at Home also has some great antiques – but whoa – those prices are out of this world. Still – a girl can look, right? It’s not even that I WANT this stuff but that I really enjoy looking at what people can do with it to create a home or a mood or a feeling. It’s all about making a HOME, right?! I am always surprised at the simplest things that can make a home, like:
– scriptures laying out on a table having been read
– fresh fruit in a bowl with tiny bites out of each and every one
– shoes and socks lining the entryway
– Star Wars stickers all over the bunk bed and toy pails
So what makes YOUR house a home?? I’m just curious!
We have two raised garden beds that we build for square foot gardening. Having thought we’d be moved to Texas by now, I have ignored gardening up until now. I have the itch. Even if it’s just a few plants. When we moved to Nebraska from Utah, we had planted a beautiful garden full of tomatoes and zucchini and other wonders and the people who moved into our home there didn’t even like tomatoes. C’est la vie! Since we’re not so sure we won’t be here sans husband (he might have to travel back and forth), I might as well get my garden on!
These gardening books by Mel Bartholomew are fantastic (we have the original but I hear the revised version if great, too!).
Here’s a link to a blogger – My Square Foot Garden – with some other great resources and insights into gardening. Thanks, Diana, for the link!
Speaking of getting my garden on – did you see that $5 Dinners has a giveaway right now for a $50 Home Depot gift card? Be sure to tell your friends & good luck!
This cotton candy colored scarf is so pretty – you have to see the color in person to believe it, really! It’s the perfect color to match Nana’s eyes. It’s so soft and squishy that my kids all wanted to keep it but Jack decided modeling it would work suffice (love that bed head hair, huh!?). This was made with Paton’s “Be Mine” yarn in Sweetie Aqua. It is a bulky (5) 100% acrylic super soft machine wash and dry yarn. It took three 50 g / 1.75 oz skeins. I always seem to like my scarves really wide but I am going to try to make the next one a little less wide.
Thank you, friends & clients, for the birthday cards in the mail!
Thank you, dear Facebook friends, for taking the time to email me short notes of love and encouragement.
Thank you, dear sister, for bringing over flowers and checking up on me (even if Mom did ask you to do it!). It helps.
Thank you, dear sister, for taking care of Mom & Dad this week and helping me feel better with an overly generous gift card (which will be completely used by me, I promise, I’m not even sharing!).
Thank you, crazy friend, for being so utterly creative and helping me have fun and vent my frustrations at the same time. I am so glad you didn’t get a ticket by that policeman.
Thank you, kids, for always being willing to help and snuggle only sighing mildly when you’re asked to pick up your things for the zillionth time.
Thank you, Don, for bringing home chocolate upon request and letting me sleep in.
Thank you, neighbor and friend, for your listening ear, cooking magazines, and rescuing my child from wandering the neighborhood.
I have been blessed!
Check out the Granny Spiral crochet tutorial from Crochet Me. Thank you!
Here’s a few things I have loved that I have spotted on Flickr lately. My computer crashed before I had a chance to record the links so – PLEASE – if these are your images, let me know so I can attribute and link to you. They are both really great ideas.
1. A new sampler for the modern age: QWERTY and web icons. How genius is that? Plus who doesn’t appreciate the quote, “Thank you, Internet, for letting me observe so many crazy people from a safe distance.”
2. Decoupage family face eggs. A little freaky and possibly narcissistic (search for your own image eggs, maybe?) but also quite fun and original. Maybe next Easter!
Interesting concept. I’ve come across a few sites that I don’t want to forget and – just in case you’re interested – thought I’d put them here to share with you. First, there’s a great tutorial by Grumperina on how to make your own custom labels with ribbon and an inkjet printer here. She also has a great knitting blog. Thorough as she is, there’s also a great tutorial on cabling here.
Next, I’m bookmarking several companies who will produce your labels professionally: namemaker, Northwest Tag & Label, Clothing Labels 4 U, and Custom Couture Label Co.
A few other options: I’ve heard also that you can search ebay and etsy sellers for custom labels as well. If you really like to control the creative process – print your label onto inkjet transfer fabric and create your own to sew in the seam.
Photo above from the Clothing Labels 4 U website.
Embedding is not allowed so here’s the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY
Thanks for the link, Robyn via Facebook. Very inspiring 7 minutes. I hadn’t heard of this before! Fantastic stuff. I’d like to replay this one over and over again…
