Happy Day and a Yummy Recipe!

Just loving everything Pumpkin right now....

...and enjoying afternoon walks through the Fall leaves.

How about you?

Here's one of my Fall Favorites:

A LIGHT RECIPE, RIGHT FROM OUR COOKBOOK, FOR YOU TO TRY.

With Smiles! Val

Fall Fun!

 I really want to try my hand at making some home-made applesauce this year. 

So before we hit the golf course yesterday, we went apple picking.  

We found ourselves having to climb a bit to get to our yummy fruit but had fun as we worked to maneuver ourselves between all the branches, feeling like a little kid...but surely not as agile!

They had an apple that was a cross between the Jonathan and Golden (JonaGolds) recommended for applesauce. I can tell you, from the first bite, I knew these were going to be worth the climb!

We spent the rest of the afternoon on the golf course. It's hard to resist being outside when it's this pretty and the temperatures are a perfect 70 degrees! Fall comes and goes way too fast it seems.

On our way home, we stopped by the hardware store and bought a quick peel, core and slice apple machine. One more cup of coffee and it's time to start prepping my apples.

And though it's been hard to spend time inside when the weather is so nice, I also hope to spend some time in the ol' sewing studio today. I have a friend's quilt on the frame and I'm making good progress on our grand-guys Super Hero birthday quilt. I'll be sure to share all my quilty progress soon.

Until then, let me wish everyone a wonderful day and as always, thanks for stopping by.

The Most Adorable Cookies!

Personal resolution #2 this new school year:

I will join a sewing group of some kind. 

And this week I'm doing just that! I feel so lucky that our previous applique teacher, who taught at our local quilt store before it went out of business, put together an Applique Club where a few of us will get together for a "sit-n-stitch" the second Tuesday of every month. She is the nicest and most talented person. I had these adorable cookies made for our first meeting and my wool birdies for my Sunny Side of the Street quilt are cut, pinned and ready to stitch. I can't wait!! Stay tuned once again.

FAST! Yogurt Pie

 Today I thought I'd reboot a post from a previous Fourth of July to share a quick,
last minute, summer dessert recipe that's a family favorite around here:

 Strawberry Yogurt Pie

Here's the recipe:

First, Mix together in a bowl:

2 cups of lowfat strawberry yogurt

1 8 oz.container of cool whip (thawed)

1/2 to 1 cup of chopped strawberries

Next, spoon mix into a premade Grahman Cracker Crust. (Add toppings if your want)
Then, freeze for about four hours.
Finally, remove the pie from the freezer and place in the refrigerator about 30 minutes before serving.

Store leftovers in the freezer.

*NOTE: If strawberries aren't your favorite, you can easily substitute the strawberries for your favorite yogurt/fruit combination. Maybe use blueberry yogurt with blueberries, vanilla yogurt with crushed pineapple, peach yogurt with diced peaches?? Whichever flavor you choose, this pie literally takes 5 minutes to mix together and get into the freezer! (And everyone loves it...especially when it's HOT outside.

And for this quick jello cake recipe, check out my 4th of July post from another previous year.
Happy Fourth of July to everyone state side, and well, no matter where you live,
 these are both yummy additions to any summer get-together. ENJOY!

Christmas Joy!

Our grand-guy is visiting with us until we bring him home on Christmas Eve.

His Poppi treated him to this special Reindeer pancake breakfast this morning:

He loves Rudolph this year and was over the moon happy! Nothing better than that to remind me of the true Joy of Christmas than to see it through the eyes of an energetic four year old.

He's of course, counting down the days until "Santa" arrives and in the mean time,

is keeping his Meme and Poppi hopping as they too begin to count down the days to Christmas. (LOL!) But having a little one around this time of year always reminds me of the true Joy of Christmas. I forgot how little ones find delight in everything we do and how they love to help. 

He's helped Poppi bake cookies and...

...they even enjoyed putting a Gingerbread Train together. 

(Of which Jackson ate half of it while we were at a Christmas party!!! Luckily he did not get sick. )

Heck!  I finally got him our of his Christmas jammies. I enticed him with a warm bubble bath of green and red glow sticks, as we returned from one of our Winter walks to the park down the street.

I have to note, that he and Jackson have been inseparable! This was both of them by 8:00 pm:  

As you can imagine, not much sewing this week, but I'm happy to have had my hand stitching to enjoy during our afternoon Christmas movie time. It's comforting to just sit and stitch as I rest in-between the energy spurts of a dog and a little boy that fills our home right now. 

I sure hope that the Joy of Christmas is filling your home in one way or another. 

We wish you and yours a very Merry Christmas.

I specialize in edge to edge pantographs with over 100 designs to choose from.

Check out my Long-Arm Quilting page for details.

I offer FREE Return Shipping on all quilts in the U.S.A.

Thin Mint Crackers (A Blog Hop)

These cracker cookies seriously taste just like the Girls Scouts Thin Mints. 

And this is the recipe that can be found:

BUT!!!!

The double boiler system has never worked for us using the chocolate chips!! 

The chocolate chips have NEVER melted right:

We  always end up throwing the chocolate away.

My husband's "secret ingredient": 

Now this recipe is truly as easy as 1-2-3.

1. Melt a bag of this Almond Bark in a double broiler.

2. Add 1/2 tsp. of peppermint extract once melted.

3. Dip your Ritz crackers into the chocolate and let them set on a cookie sheet.

That's it. OH! And they taste WONDERFUL right out of the freezer!

Happy Holidays everyone! Oh! And if you are new to my blog, I welcome you take some time to look around and follow if you like what you see. I always follow back as it's fun to meet new bloggy, quilty friends. Also I have a give-away going on and have extended the deadline to Monday, Dec. 11th to include all of you fellow Cookie Exchange participants. Click HERE for the give-away.

I'm happily joining everyone else in Carol's:

December 5 

Creatin’ in the Sticks

Creative Latitude

Gray Barn Designs

Domestic Felicity

Pieced Brain

Quiltscapes

Ms P Designs USA

Cynthia’s Creating Ark

December 6

 Sew Incredibly Crazy

Freemotion by the River

Moosestash Quilting

One Old Goat And Her Little Farm

A Little Bit of Everything, from Mike & Alisa

Hazel’s Daughter

Patchouli Moon Studio

Bumbleberry Stitches

Selina Quilts

Brenda’s Blog

December 7

 Quilt Doodle Doodles

Kris Loves Fabric

Life in the Scrapatch

Home Sewn By Us

For The Love Of Geese

Stitch Days

Val’s Quilting Studio

Tu-Na Quilts

It’s A T-Sweet Day!

Just Let Me Quilt

Carol, THANK YOU, THANK YOU for organizing this event for all of us!! You Rock!

I specialize in edge to edge pantographs with over 100 designs to choose from.

Check out my Long-Arm Quilting page for details.

I offer FREE Return Shipping on all quilts in the U.S.A.

Surprise Happy Mail!

How wonderful to walk to the mailbox and receive not one, but two surprise Happy Mails!

 Inside each I found much to smile about!

I won the magazine from Em's Scrapbag as she celebrated having her Baby Blooms pattern published in this edition! How cool is that! (And how lucky am I to now have a copy of it!)
The other was a surprise from my good ol' blogging friend Nita.
Her personal letter touched my heart and certainly made me smile...oh the eye-spys did too!

I can't even remember the last time I wrote a hand written letter?? Can you??

Yet, as we prepare for Thanksgiving, I find myself sentimental as we dig out old family recipes.

I smile at my mom's handwriting and am always amazed as I reflect upon the advancements since my own Granny's days of typed (like typewriter typed) recipes that are to this day, kept tucked in my mom's  Betty Crocker cookbook. So grateful I preserved these in a scrapbook so many years ago.

Thanksgiving Traditions Scrapbook 2006

Well, Thanks Em and Nita. 

I've ever grateful for the support and friendships found in our little blogging community.

A Happy Birthday + Recipe!

The best birthday surprise was having this little guy arrive for the weekend to 

help his Meme celebrate her birthday! 

Who better to help me blow our all those candles!

(And this was only half of my 51 candles.)

We were all left in stitches when he spit instead of blew!!

If you ever need a quick and oh so yummy chocolate cake, I hope ya give this recipe a try.

It's been a family favorite since we were kids. Thanks for the recipe mom.

INGREDIENTS:

1 pkg. Devils Food Cake Mix

1/4 cup of vegetable oil

2 eggs

1 1/4 cups of water

1 pkg. Chocolate Instant Pudding (4 serving size)

1 cup of chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Pour oil into a 13x9x2 inch pan. Tilt the pan until the bottom of the pan is covered with oil. Add the remaining ingredients in to the pan, stir with a for or spoon until well blended. (about two minutes) Scrape sides and spread batter evenly in the pan. Bake for 35-45 minutes or until a toothpick comes our clean. Cool cake and sprinkle with powered sugar. Enjoy! 

Happy Memorial Day.

Sign-ups open June 1st!!

Tuesday Archives #68: Recipes!

Welcome to the linky party that rejuvenates your old quilting/sewing posts! 

Please click here to read more about this linky party.  

This week's theme is: Recipes! 

This week find's us "exchanging" recipes! Crock pot, BBQ, breakfast, dessert...any recipe your little heart desires. I mean we can all use something new, especially if it leaves us with more time to sew! A summertime favorite I found in my archives is our FAST yogurt pie:

Here's the recipe:

First, Mix together in a bowl:

2 cups of lowfat strawberry yogurt

1 8 oz.container of cool whip (thawed)

1/2 to 1 cup of chopped strawberries

Next, spoon mix into a premade Grahman Cracker Crust. (Add toppings if your want)
Then, freeze for about four hours.
Finally, remove the pie from the freezer and place in the refrigerator about 30 minutes before serving.

Store leftovers in the freezer.

*NOTE: If strawberries aren't your favorite, you can easily substitute the strawberries for your favorite yogurt/fruit combination. Maybe use blueberry yogurt with blueberries, vanilla yogurt with crushed pineapple, peach yogurt with diced peaches?? Whichever flavor you choose, this pie literally takes 5 minutes to mix together and get into the freezer! And everyone loves it...especially when it's HOT outside.

Stay-cation Day 1: Spring Yard Work

The first thing getting checked off my Spring Stay-cation List is cleaning the yard. Which means a big breakfast like this: (I can take no credit for this...my husband is the cook of the family! I irritate him when I even try to make a sandwich in "his" kitchen...

good problem to have if you ask me!)

So between yesterday afternoon and today, the yard got thatched:(It's been almost four years since we've done this. We didn't aerate this Fall, so lots of snow mold. We both looked at each other and promised to make sure we aerate each Fall and thatch every two years!) 

c

Roses got trimmed and fertilized...

...and some trees did too.

Good news! I only chipped one nail throughout all this! LOL! It was a beautiful 65 degree, overcast day. We have rain coming in by Monday so it feels good to have our spring yard cleaning done. But don't worry, all work and no play make for a dull stay-cation you may be thinking...not us! Our day will find us winding down with a nice dinner of beef stroganoff that has been cooking in the crock pot all day and us rejuvinating our achy muscles right here with a nice glass or two of wine! (Along with a few card games of Phase 10 afterwards.)

Tomorrow is a sew day for me...oh wait...I don't have to work next week...I guess we'll see what tomorrow brings. Until then...thanks for stopping by!