"Fiesta" Shawl

Before:

  2-  6 oz. Skeins of Lion Brand Homespun yarn

After:

Comfy, cozy "Fiesta" Shawl

I love the fall colors mixed throughout this yarn.

If you like this shawl, keep watching my blog.  I'm planning an exciting giveaway for my Blogaversary!

Linking to:

Raising Homemakers Link-up
Strut Your Stuff Thursday
Made By You Monday
Making Your Home Sing
Homemaker Mondays
Metamorphosis Monday

My Menu Planning Method

Lately I've been seeing lots of ideas on how to menu plan.  I thought I'd share what works for me.

In our house, payday comes every two weeks on a Thursday.  That Thursday is also my set Grocery Shopping Day.  So I set my menu planning to that schedule.  I think it is important to tweak things to make them work for your particular and unique needs.

First, I made a simple table to print out.  I made my chart for two weeks and it starts on a Thursday and ends on a Wednesday.  I then slid it inside a sheet protector.  You can also laminate it if you have the supplies.  I use a dry-erase marker so I can easily use this chart over and over.  Stick it on the fridge with a magnet and you have a valuable resource.

I start by checking out what I have in the freezer, fridge and pantry.

I then look through my calendar to see what is coming up within the next two weeks that will effect my meal making.  (Homecoming was Saturday, therefore I didn't have to cook!)

I then count how many meals I need and also what types of meals.  Days that I have a lot going on I may choose to make something quick and easy.  I have meetings every Thursday so after a long day of grocery shopping and errand running it is super easy to stick a pizza in the oven.

So I figure out what I'm making on what days and mark them on my chart.

I also look to see if there is anything special I need to make throughout the two week period.  Get-togethers, church dinners etc.  I also try to plan what I'm making for those.

I then compare what ingredients I have to what ingredients I need and make my grocery list from there.

Actually having a menu to plan my grocery list from really does save money.  It is also nice to not have the great debate every day:

"What am I going to make for supper?!?!"

Linking to:

Making Your Home Sing

Homemaker Mondays

Raising Homemakers Link-up

Spicy Oatmeal-Raisin Cookies

Spicy Oatmeal-Raisin Cookies are the first cookie ever made during "Colletta's Christmas Cookie Try-outs".  Click on the button above to see more about the Try-outs.

Before I get into the recipe, I must tell you about a kitchen gadget that I will be using for basically every cookie recipe I make.  It is the Pampered Chef Scoop. 

There are 3 different sized scoops and the smallest is absolutely perfect for cookies.

Uniform in size and oh-so-easy to scoop the cookies onto the cookie sheet.

Now on to the recipe.

Spicy Oatmeal-Raisin Cookies

3/4 cup packed light brown sugar

1/3 cup sugar

3/4 teaspoon allspice

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/8 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup flour

1 cup quick-cooking oats

3/4 cup raisins

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1 egg

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened

1.  Preheat oven to 375.  Combine dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl.  Add egg and butter. 

2.  Beat on low speed or mix by hand until mixture is thoroughly blended.

3.  Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls (or scoops!) onto ungreased cookie sheet.  Bake for 10 to 12 mintues.

4.  Remove from oven and let cookies cool on cookie sheet for 1 minute.  Transfer to cooling rack.  (Makes 2 to 2 1/2 dozen.)

Icing (Optional)

1 cup powdered sugar, divided

1-2 tablespoons milk

1/4 teaspoon vanilla

1.  In small bowl, combine powdered sugar with 1 Tablespoon milk and vanilla.  Stir until smooth, adding additional milk as necessary until drizzling conisistency is reached.  Drizzle over cookies and let set.

Results

I don't like raisins so I have to admit that I didn't actually eat one of these cookies.  However, oatmeal-raisin is my mom's favorite cookie so she was my taste-tester.

They passed with flying colors!

Let me know if you try this recipe and if you like it.

Linking to:

Made By You Monday

Making Your Home Sing

Homemaker Monday

Tuesdays at the Table

Raising Homemakers Link-up

Strut Your Stuff Thursday

Foodie Friday

Potluck Sunday

Brown Sugar Cinnamon Cupcakes with White Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

Brown sugar + cinnamon + cream cheese + white chocolate = Yum!

I found this recipe at http://www.sweetebakes.blogspot.com/ .

Brown Sugar Cinnamon Cupcakes

3/4 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
3 eggs
1 1/2 cup flour
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 325.  Line pan with cupcake liners and set aside.

In a large bowl, cream butter and sugars until fluffy.

Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition.

In a small bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. 

Add vanilla extract to buttermilk.

Mix dry ingredients into butter/sugar mixture alternating with buttermilk, beginning and ending with flour mixture.

Fill each cupcake liner 3/4 full.

Bake for 20 minutes or until cupcakes bounce back to touch or toothpick comes out clean.

Cool completely before frosting.


White Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

1 8oz. package of cream cheese
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup white chocolate, melted
1 Tablespoon crisco

In a large bowl, cream butter and cream cheese until smooth and creamy.

Slowly add sugar, whipping cream and vanilla extract.  Beat until smooth and creamy consistency is reached.

Melt white chocolate and crisco in the microwave.  Check every 30 seconds until melted.  Allow to cool slightly before adding to icing mixture.

Add melted white chocolate to frosting mixture and beat on high for a few minutes.

Place frosting in the fridge for a few minutes.  Use a ziplock to pipe frosting onto cupcakes.

Mix some sugar and cinnamon together in a small bowl.  Sprinkle cupcakes with sugar/cinnamon mixture.

Let me know if you try this recipe and what you think!

Linking up to:

Making Your Home Sing Monday

Made By You Monday

Homemaker Monday

Tempt My Tummy Tuesday

Homemaking Link-up

Strut Your Stuff Thursday

Tasty Thursday

Foodie Friday

Potluck Sunday

Hanging Kitchen Towel Project

I don't know about you, but I love having a Hanging Kitchen Towel at my fingertips while cooking.  So does my sweet Aunt Sherry.  Hers were so well-loved that she said they weren't fit for the rag bag.

She asked me if I would make some for her.  I said, "Of course!".  She had already bought the towels.  I guess she anticipated my answer!

So here are the towels before:

 And here are the towels after:

Only one end of the solid towel had the stripe, so one of each color is just solid at the bottom.  My aunt has MS so velcro was the way to go for closures.

These were so easy to make.  Now I need to make myself some.  Mine current ones aren't fit for the rag bag either!

It only took me about 1 hour to construct all four Hanging Kitchen Towels.  Super easy!

If anyone is interested in a tutuorial, let me know and I can put one together.

Linking to:

Homemaking Link-up (Raising Homemakers)
Strut Your Stuff Thursday
Made By You Monday
Making Your Home Sing
Homemaker Mondays
Metamorphosis Monday

Pink Lemonade Cupcakes

I made these cupcakes to take to our Guardian Angel Program picnic.

The Guardian Angel Program is a program where adult church members are assigned a specific school-kid to pray for and to give special treats to for that school year.  The child's Guardian Angel is a secret until they are revealed at the yearly picnic.  It is great fun and a very special lady, Jane, is the coordinator.

I originially found this recipe at http://www.potsandpins.com/ .  I tweaked it a little, especially to make the cupcakes more "pink".

Pink Lemonade Cupcakes

1 1/2 cups sugar

6 Tablespoons butter, softened

1 Tablespoon grated lemon zest

3 Tablespoons thawed pink lemonade concentrate

2 teaspoons vanilla

3 drops red food coloring

2 large eggs

2 large egg whites

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 1/4 cups milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line muffin tins.

In a large bowl combine sugar, butter, lemon zest, lemonade concentrate, food coloring and vanilla.  Beat until well blended.  Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

In a medium bowl combine dry ingredients, mixing with a whisk.

Add flour misture to sugar mixture, alternating with milk.   Mix only until blended.

Spoon batter into cupcake liners (fill them fairly full) and bake for 20 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean.  Cool in pans 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack.  Cool completely before frosting.  Makes 24 cupcakes.

Pink Lemon/Cream Cheese Frosting

2 Tablespoons butter, softened

2 Teaspoons lemon zest

2 Teaspoons thawed pink lemonade concentrate

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

3 drops red food coloring

8 oz. cream cheese, softened

3 1/2 cups powdered sugar (I needed more than this.)

Pink Decorating Sugar

Combine in a bowl at high speed the butter, lemon zest, lemonade concentrate, vanilla, food coloring and cream cheese.  Beat until light and fluffy.  Add the powdered sugar at a low speed and best until well blended.  (You'll probably need additional powdered sugar to get the consistency desired.)  Chill frosting for one hour before using.  Spons into a Ziplock bag, snip one corner and pipe onto cooled cupcakes.  Sprinkle pink decorating sugar on top.

Regrigerate, loosely covered, but serve at room temperature.

I took some different colored bendy straws and cut them down to add a little bit of decoration to the top of the cupcake.  They were a hit and the kids loved picking out the straw colors.

Let me know if you try this recipe and what you think!

Linking up to:

Making Your Home Sing Monday

Made By You Monday

Homemaker Monday

Tempt My Tummy Tuesday

Homemaking Link-up

Strut Your Stuff Thursday

Tasty Thursday

Foodie Friday

Potluck Sunday

Dr. Pepper Cupcakes

These cupcakes were so moist!  They were so chocolately and fudgy and just oh so delicious!

I originally found this recipe over at http://www.christyrobbins.blogspot.com/ .

They are a must try!

Dr. Pepper Cupcakes

1 1/2 cups Dr. Pepper Soda

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 stick butter

4 Tablespoon cocoa powder

2 cups sugar

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 eggs

1/2 cup buttermilk

In a pan, combine Dr. Pepper, oil, butter, and cocoa.  Stir over medium heat.  When it starts to simmer, turn of stove.  Make sure it is well mixed.

Add all the dry ingredients, but don't over mix.

In a separate bowl, beat the buttermilk and eggs, then add it to the rest of the mix.  Blend together.

Place batter in cupcake liners.  (Fill the liners almost completely full.  These don't rise much).

Bake at 350 for 16-18 minutes.  Don't over-bake.

Buttercream Icing Recipe

1 lb. powdered sugar

1 1/2 Tablespoons milk

1/2 Tablespoon water

1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup chocolate chips

1/4 cup cocoa powder

1/2 stick butter

Combine sugar, milk, water and vanilla.

In a pan, melt and stir together the chocolate chips, cocoa and butter.

Add melted chocolate mixture to the sugar mixture.  Beat together until smooth and fluffy.  You may need to add a little more milk if your mixture looks to crumbly.  ( I had to add quite a bit more milk.  Just add a little at a time until you get the consistency you desire.)

I topped each cupcake with a well-drained Maraschino cherry.  It added that sweet pop of cherry flavor.  And it looked so cute!

Let me know if you try this recipe and what you think!

Linking up to:

Making Your Home Sing Monday

Made By You Monday

Homemaker Monday

Tempt My Tummy Tuesday

Homemaking Link-up

Strut Your Stuff Thursday

Tasty Thursday

Foodie Friday

Potluck Sunday

Coconut Cupcakes

I originally found this recipe over at http://www.acuppycakelife.blogspot.com/ .  I tweaked it a little to accommodate my tastes and what I had on hand.

This cupcake has a delicate coconut flavor and is like eating a little bit of summer.

Coconut Cupcakes

2/3 cup butter, softened

1 3/4 cups sugar

2 eggs

3 tsp. coconut flavoring

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 1/3 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1 1/4 cups coconut milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line muffin tins and set aside.

In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking powder and salt.  Set aside.

In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Add eggs one at a time and beat until well blended.  Mix in coconut flavoring.  Add the dry ingredient mixture in thirds alternating with two additions of coconut milk.  Beat until all ingredients are well blended.

Scoop 1/4 cup of batter into each cupcake liner.  Bake 13-18 minutes (more toward the 18) or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  Let cool in pan for 4 minutes before removing to wire rack to cool completely.

Coconut Buttercream Icing

(enough for 24 regular cupcakes)

1 1/2 cups vegetable shortening

1/2 tsp. salt

1 Tablespoon coconut flavoring

6 cups powdered sugar

2/3 cup coconut milk

In a large bowl cream shortening, salt, coconut flavoring and 2 cups of powdered sugar.  Add remaining sugar alternating with coconut milk until desired texture is reached.  You may not need all of the coconut milk.  Beat on high for 10 minutes until creamy and fluffy.

I will be linking up to:

Made By You Monday

Making Your Home Sing Mondays

Homemaker Mondays

Tempt My Tummy Tuesday

Homemaking Link-up

Strut Your Stuff Thursday

Tasty Thursday

Foodie Friday

Potluck Sunday

Sanity Saving Routine Charts for Kids

It was the week before school was to start and I was dreading the inevitable fighting in the morning to get ready for school, the afternoon to do homework and the night to get ready for bed and the new day.

I was trying to forget about all that when I came across a post at New Nostalgia about routine charts. Now, we had tried chore charts in the past with no success. But, I decided to give it another go for the sake of my sanity and mother/daughter relationship.

I am glad to report that it has been a success for the past two weeks!! Maybe Kaylee just wasn't mature enough before, or maybe I was just too lenient for it to work before. Either way, it is so wonderful not to have to tell her step-by-step what to do every morning, afternoon, and night.

I thought about what reward to use and decided on an allowance system. She gets $0.50 for each that she completes every one of her tasks. She gets paid when we get paid, which is every two weeks. She can use her pay for the student store, book orders, Dollar General, whatever she wants. It is her spending money and once its gone, its gone.

Here's what we did for her charts:

I used DLTK's Custom Chore Charts to print them off. Then we pasted them onto colored posterboard. Kaylee decorated them with stickers and then I put them into a page-protector so she could use a dry-eraser marker and we could just wipe it clean at the end of the week. (I couldn't find laminating supplies at Wal-Mart.)

We taped them on the back of her bedroom door so that she has easy access to them.

Morning Routine:

Afternoon Routine:
Bedtime Routine:

I think you should be able to read what we have included in each of her routines. If not, let me know and I can type them out. Really though, you'll have to personalize them to suit your specific needs in your household.

I hope we can continue having success with this system. So far, so good!

Good luck to you! Let me know if you try it and how it goes.

Linking to:

Making Your Home Sing Mondays

Homemaker Mondays

Homemaking Link-up

Strut Your Stuff Thursday

Peppermint Patty Cupcakes

I found this recipe for Peppermint Patty Cupcakes at "A Cuppy Cake Life". I LOVE Peppermint Patties and knew right away that I had to try this concept.


I changed my version up by using a cake mix and my regular fluffy icing recipe. I didn't have the necessary ingredients for the Spong Cake used and I wanted the icing to be thicker like the actual center of a Peppermint Patty.


You can go over to A Cuppy Cake life to find the original recipe I found. Here's my quick and easy version:


Peppermint Patty Cupcakes




Cake:

Use a chocolate cake mix and follow instructions as on box. Fill the cupcake liners only 1/2 full. Bake and cool.

Icing:

1/2 cup shortening

1/4 cup milk

1 tsp. Peppermint Flavoring

4 cups powdered sugar (est.)

Combine shortening, milk and peppermint flavoring. Beat. Add powdered sugar. Beat until well mixed. Continue beating until fluffy. You may have to add a little more milk/sugar to get the consistency you desire.

Pipe the icing onto the cupcakes.

Garnish with a mini Peppermint Patty.

I took these to a church picnic and they were devoured! They were really, really good. A must try.

Let me know if you give them a try and what you think.

Simple Yardsale Couch Makeover

My aunt had a yard sale and I was so excited to see that she was selling her couch and over-size chair. Now, I have envied this couch for years because of its extreme comfiness and loungability.

(Here you can see Baboon-butt Pudge. He has a skin condition that gets worse in the summer.)

So, I snapped it up. But the Atztecy pillows just aren't my style. Not to mention that this couch has gone through my 3 cousins and was a little worn.
After recruiting my husband to haul the couch and chair to the house, my mind starting whirling with possibilities. I knew I wanted to re-do the pillows and I started calculating yardages and planning a trip to the fabric store.

I had to go to the Dollar General for some basics: bread, milk, cleaners. I actually made it out of the house by myself so I was wandering the isles just browsing. In the bedding section a really cute sheet set caught my eye. King size for $30. Aha! I knew what my after-cleaning project was going to be.

First, I scrubbed all the surfaces to freshen it up. Then I went to work cutting the elastic out of the fitted sheet. I measured the pillows and made basic slip-covers for all the pillows. I used the pillowcases to make covers for the smaller pillows.

The result:

Much more my style.

I just love the print.

I just threw the flat sheet over the huge, comfy chair and tucked it here and there and used a few safety pins on the sides. Completely different look.


The best thing about this make-over is that all I need to do is take the slip-cover off and throw them in the washer if they get dirty.

And it only cost $30!

Making Your Home Sing

I have my Homeschool Preschool post linked up to the "Making Your Home Sing Monday" at Moms the Word.

Here's a little bit about the meme:

Every day you are doing something to make your house into a home for yourself and your family (if you have one). My point with each Monday post is, what are you doing or going to do today? It can be an attitude or an action. Motivation, our attitude, baking, encouraging our husband or children (if we have either one), organization, cleaning, saving money....the opportunities are endless.


Whatever you're doing you are blessing your family. I just want people to post what they're doing that day or going to do that day to "make their home sing." Anything we do to bless our families, to make our homes run more smoothly, anything we do to go about our homemaking more joyfully and thankfully will apply.

Please check out the meme and post your ways of Making Your Home Sing over at Mom's the Word!