Leftover Turkey? Make Enchiladas!

The enchiladas that I fixed tonight turned out so pretty that I just had to take a picture of them!

Here is the recipe that I followed (almost!): Simple, Perfect Enchiladas

The biggest change I made to the recipe: instead of using ground beef, I chopped up some of my leftover turkey and mixed it up with the onions and chiles for the filling. Also, I steamed the tortillas in the microwave with a damp towel instead of frying them in oil. Much easier!

My family loved these enchiladas, and it was a nice change from the usual turkey leftovers. Give it a try!

But That's Just Me

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Stuffed!

I hope you are stuffed with blessings, and your turkey is stuffed with sage and rosemary.

Sunday Funny

I remember watching this skit a long time ago. You can tell it's the Seventies because they still allowed smoking on the airplane.

Let Us Give Thanks

Has anyone else noticed that the stores, TV ads, etc. are going directly from Halloween to Christmas? What happened to Thanksgiving? I think that the concept of being thankful is very important, and sorely lacking in our society.

So what do you say--let's slow down the Christmas rush and let November be the month of Thanksgiving, and not the month of "I have my Christmas shopping done before you do". Go ahead and savor that turkey carcass! (and your family and friends, and your football games, and your parades)

So Glad It's Sunday

Autumn Table Topper

For the past few weeks I have been sneaking into my sewing room for a few moments at a time to make this table topper for fall:


Mine turned out wider than what the pattern called for since I used 3 inch fabric strips instead of 2.5 inch strips. Mainly because I bought a Moda scrap bag that had all of these beautiful 3 inch strips and there was no way I was going to cut them all down to 2.5!

Also, I was only supposed to use dark and light fabrics, but I mixed in lots of pretty mediums, so I don't have quite the contrast that I should have. But I really like it anyway.

The best part? It's reversible! The other side is similar to this side, except more dark fabrics and fewer light. So when I have a little spill, all I have to do is flip it over!

Lots of cutting and piecing, but I like to call that "therapy".

The pattern is in Quilter's World June 2010.

Rubber Duckie Spud

Today I found a potato that looks just like a rubber duckie. I'm hoping it will make me rich and famous.

Remind Me To Never Go Running Here

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Baking Photos

Here are some more pics of the baking that I did for the Black Walnut Festival. Again, if you would like recipes, let me know.


Oatmeal Cookies with Black Walnuts and Cranberries:

Black Walnut Cake:


Pinwheel Cookies with Black Walnuts, Raspberry Jam and Coconut:


The sale is today and we are having fantastic fall weather. Hopefully we will sell out!

Black Walnut Baking

On Saturday, our church will have a baked goods booth at the Black Walnut Festival in Camden, Ohio. Needless to say, I have been doing LOTS of baking with black walnuts. Here are some things that I did today:

Banana Black Walnut Bread:


Pumpkin Black Walnut Bread:



Black Walnut Bars (not sliced yet):


If you've never tried black walnuts, they are different from the usual english walnuts. The taste is much stronger and more aromatic. They are also very expensive--about $12/lb. If anyone ever invites you to help shell black walnuts, just say no! You have to open them with a hammer and then use a little pick to remove the nut meats. And they stain your hands. It's not a good time. But they are delicious! Email me if you want recipes.

Mitten!

I tried my hand at machine applique yesterday--and decided that I need a lot more practice! But this block will make a cute table runner or wall hanging if several mittens are made in different fabrics. I got the mitten template from the Connecting Threads site--it's a free pattern for a mitten garland, which is also really cute.

Redwork Hand Embroidery

I've waited a long time to post this project on my blog!



I made this for an embroidery challenge in my Yahoo group Quilt Makers International. We were each given the simple embroidery design and told to make anything that we want using it.

I decided to go with simple redwork, since I have been wanting to do some redwork for a long time. I embroidered by hand onto some white on white fabric, and then used that as a center panel for a table topper.

I couldn't show you the finished project until now, because our group members were voting for their favorite entry during the month of August.

Wow, this gives me the itch to sew! I haven't done very much in my craft room this summer. It's time to get back in my groove!

Sunday Silliness

Check This Guy Out!

I went out to pick some basil for my tomato salad and look what I found! I honestly mistook it for a stick at first--until it moved. Really cool!

Oh Snap!

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Don't you hate it when this happens?

Summer Tomato Salad

Look what I did with the fresh tomatoes that we got from our CSA farm yesterday! I sorta invented a salad of chopped tomatoes, queso cotija (a mexican cheese that crumbles like feta), chopped fresh basil and some extra virgin olive oil. Tastes like summer should taste. I'm serving it with some of my husband's famous grilled chicken for Sunday dinner.

Have a good evening everyone. We are going to a drive in movie tonight.

Anniversary Cake Scrapbook Page

Here's the first scrapbook page that I've done in ages! I used the July sketch from Scrapbook Sussies to put this together, along with supplies from past kits and some stuff from my stash.

The topic is the lovely cake that we had when we were down in Orlando in June. My husband ordered it from a bakery on The Boardwalk at WDW. It was just beautiful--the picture doesn't do it justice.

Also, on the side of the cake were little silver Mickey Mouse's.


And it was absolutely delicious--quality on a level that I'm certainly not used to. Yes, this cake deserved it's own scrapbook page.

Spending our 20th anniversary at WDW was especially appropriate for us because we spent our honeymoon at Disneyland in LA. I guess we will never outgrow Disney!

Chicken Spaghetti

I tried this recipe tonight--boy is it good! It is a great choice when whole chickens are on sale, as you need 2 cups of cooked chicken as well as the broth it was cooked in.

Chicken Spaghetti, or The Only Casserole Marlboro Man Will Eat | The Pioneer Woman Cooks | Ree Drummond



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Baby Gift Tag

Here is a gift tag that I made using a digi stamp from Stampin Dragon designs.


I also added a line of text with a font from Firecracker Designs.

BTW--Hobby Lobby has a sale this week on scrapbooking organizers. I bought some yesterday and am working on getting my papers sorted. Big job!

Have a good Thursday.

DOH!

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It's a hot day here in SW Ohio--good day for the pool, or a movie. Or cardmaking! Or sewing! Or wandering around Hobby Lobby! Woo Hoo!

Note Cards--None of Them Stamped!

By now you all know that I use lots of ink and stamps when I make my cards, right? Uh, not this time.

I wanted to make up some note cards that I could have delivered to my daughter while she is at camp for the week. Also, I have lots of scrapbooking supplies that I receive from Scrapbook Sussies once a month. So, I decided to just put together some of the great papers and embellishments to make some fast and cute cards. Here are the results:








Actually, these aren't much different from what is being published in some of the card making magazines these days. I can't believe how lame some of the cards in those mags are!

Anyway, I hope Erin likes the cards. We miss her a lot!

Swimming Cutie

I made this card yesterday using a digital stamp from The Michelle Perkett Studio. A digital stamp is another way of saying that you print out the image instead of stamping it. It's obviously not as versatile as a regular stamp, but it's inexpensive and convenient. It works well if you like to simply stamp and color, and it's nice because you can resize your image to fit where you want it.

I used Splitcoast Sketch SC291 for this card.

This is one of the cards that I made so I could send notes to my daughter when she is away at camp. I made four other cards last night--I will post pics later.

It's that time of year!

Do you have a lot of these?


Would you like to turn them into these?



Here's a good way to do it:

Zucchini Bread Recipe from Allrecipes

Unfortunately, my blog does not have a smell function. But if it did, you would love the smell of my kitchen right now!

I made this today

The pattern is called Prairie Queen from Quilterscache. It's actually the January block from my Block of the Month quilt--it seems that *somehow* I forgot to make this one! Anyway, I also made another block for this quilt, but it came out 1/2 inch too small. And for all of you non-quilters out there, 1/2 inch might as well be 1/2 mile. So I need to redo that one and figure out how to get it right.

And I also finished up a project for a challenge in my online quilting group. But I can't show it to you yet! Some of the people that are voting on the winning entry might see my blog post and my entry will no longer be anonymous. But I promise I will show you soon.

Have a good rest of the weekend. We are absolutely sweltering here!

Saturday Motivation

I'm in a funk. Big time. Very unmotivated in all areas of my life. I think I'm seriously lacking in some "me" time to make me human again.

OK, so this morning I tried to think back to figure out when was the last time that I did anything the resembled "art" or "craft" or otherwise creative. I discovered it was in April. That's way too long. I'm taking this "life gets in the way" thing to an extreme.

My craft room is such a mess that I almost can't find my sewing machine. But find it I must. And today is the day.

Here is a motivating video from You Tube that might help me:

Always let your conscience be your guide!

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What a Great Story

A Good Man in the Making

I Need a Vacation...

...to recover from my vacation! Our first day home from DisneyWorld was one of crisis management. The air conditioner at home wasn't working, the brakes on the car were thumping, Erin got new braces put on, the yard looked like a jungle, and so on. But we had such a fabulous time in Orlando that it was all worth it.

Today's agenda: pulling weeds, doing laundry, feeding soft foods to Erin. And rest!

Lilies!

Yay! This is the first time in 3 years that the deer haven't devoured my pretty lilies.

Birthday girl

Blogging from my phone!

Sunday Silliness

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I think I will probably spend my Sunday afternoon doing something like this.

Under the Sea

I used CPS165 from Card Positioning Systems to make this invitation for my daughter's "Under the Sea" birthday party. I made the background using watercolor paper and Shimmerz paints in blue, green and purple. The dolphin stamp is from All Night Media. The wording stamp is from Belinda Landtroop.

Sunday Silliness

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If You Build It, They Will Come

OK, I got the roof a little crooked, but hopefully they will still come. I got the kit to make this birdhouse from the Preble Co. Historical Society.


And here is something really amazing: My tulips have NOT been eaten! Aren't they gorgeous?



This poor yellow tulip has practically been showered in Liquid Fence, otherwise it would be in some deer's tummy by now.



The deer won't eat the hyacinths, thank goodness. Here are some of my little hyacinths that are my favorites.



Have a great Sunday!

A Quilt with No Name

The name of this block is No Name Block #2, which I find kind of strange because I've seen all kinds of interesting names for quilt blocks. It seems odd that they couldn't come up with something to name it! It's the first block that I have made for my 2010 block of the month quilt. Never mind that I'm four months behind!

The pattern is on www.quilterscache.com.

Like Mermaids?

Well, what's not to like? This mermaid is a digital image by Dawn. A lot of fun to color with pencils and accentuate with a clear gelly roll glitter pen. The Elan stamp is from Belinda Landtroop.

For the background I crumpled up some tissue papers and glued them down to the background. Makes a cool textured panel. I then carefully cut out the image and glued on.

Have a good weekend everyone.

National No Housework Day

Did you know that you're not supposed to do housework today? Well, put down that mop and do something else!

I made some Mother's Day and Father's Day cards. Here are the pics:

This stamp always reminds me of a photo that we have of my Dad's Dad--


Here's a card for someone who sews--



I love the old fashioned look of this one--



Here's a trifold. It's hard to see but the daffodil shows through the round window--


This stamp is really great--


I think I will do some sewing now, since I still have the rest of the day off!