ShE's NoT yOuR aVeRaGe MoM: A stitch in time...Christmas is a coming!

Thursday, December 2, 2010

A stitch in time...Christmas is a coming!

A menagerie of felt ornaments...

and fabric for homemade stockings too...

a little panted star action...


and spray painted pinecones and leaves too!

As I prepare furiously to get the last of my tree decorations finished for this weekend, I thought I'd share a glimpse of what I'm making. Each year at the end of the season when all the decorations are on sale for 75% off, I choose my Christmas color theme for the next year. Last year I was able to snag some adorable sparkly teal bead-garland for like a dollar a strand. This paired with some gorgeous gold gem ornaments, birthed my theme for this year. Now heaven forbid I was able to find matching stockings anyplace, so I got creative. I snagged some material from the remnant bin at my local Wal-Mart that was a good match along with some remnant cream felt and it set me back a whole 3 bucks! I found a stocking pattern off the net and got to work cutting out and stitching together stockings for everyone.
This fall the kids collected three large grocery bags of pinecones at our local park and I used most of them as decoration in my empty window boxes. I purposely saved a bag and spray painted them gold to match, 3 bucks for spray paint, pinecones, free!
I went to Michael's to get some felt for ornaments and came across some wooden stars for like 40 cents each and came home and painted them teal and gold to match and talked my man into drilling holes in the centers for me. A little gold yarn later and I had star ornaments!
The felt was on sale for 5 sheets for a buck and I loaded up. It took me a little bit to decide exactly what I wanted to make out of them. At first I thought stars...but I had several of them already and I didn't want my tree to read as western in theme. I finally decided on wreaths! I folded the felt into fourths and took my trusty sharpie and a small bowl and traced circles for the wreaths. I next found a plastic cup and traced around it for the centers. After cutting out all my wreaths I decided I should do something with the centers left over. I traced stars out of the cream felt centers and glued them to the teal with a little tacky glue. I then used my gold yarn again and threaded through two points in the middle so they looked like threaded buttons and came up through the backs and tied small bows to the fronts. For the wreaths I blanket stitched the middles together and lined the insides with a strip of batting and blanket stitched the outsides shut. I wanted them to have a little more gold on them, so I wove some more gold yarn across the fronts in a triangle pattern. These are a little more time consuming, but completely adorable!
All of this good stuff will be paired with wide ribbon garland, white lights, some matching glass balls for cheap from Tai Pan Trading and of course the things I picked up last year. I'll post pictures of it all up when it's done! For now I need to hurry and complete my ornaments for Christmas is a coming! ;0)

No comments:

qUiCk ReCiPe GuIdE

Being Gluten-free rocks!

Honey Lemon Barbecue Sauce (gluten-free)

3 tablespoons clover honey
1/2 cup lemon juice
3 tablespoons worcestershire sauce
3 tablespoons brown mustard
1 tablespoon garlic powder

Recycled Chicken Enchiladas (gluten-free)

2 to 3 pieces of leftover cooked chicken
small can of diced green chilies
1 lrg green onion (chopped)
1 can black olives (halved)
1 can black beans
1 can authentic red chile enchilada sauce (Las Palmas)
1 package corn tortillas or Frito's corn chips or 5 minute rice
2 to 3 cups of shredded Mexican blend cheese
sour cream

Heat chicken, green chilies, and onion in skillet over medium heat...stirring occasionally. Add black olives and black beans and red chile sauce, simmer for 10-12 minutes on medium/low heat. Wrap in corn tortillas and cover with cheese and bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes. Serve with sour cream. OR serve over bowls of Frito's corn chips, cover with cheese and sour cream. (kid friendly) OR serve over instant rice with shredded cheese and sour cream.

Ham and Potato Soup (gluten-free)

1/2 large onion (chopped)
1/4 margarine or butter (soy butter works as well)
2 tablespoons Bob's Red Mill all purpose flour (gluten-free)
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dill
2 cups water
4 to 5 medium red potatoes
1 lb cubed ham (or turkey ham)
2 cups milk (dairy or soy)

In the bottom of your large soup pot combine margarine and onion and saute till onion is translucent. Remove from heat and stir in flour, salt, pepper. Add water and potatoes and return to medium heat. Stir in milk and bring to a boil letting simmer about 5 minutes or until sauce starts to thicken. Add cubed ham and garlic and dill and reduce heat to low, cover and let simmer 25 to 30 minutes. Stirring occasionally. Serve when potatoes are no longer firm.

Pumpkin Bread (Gluten-free)

(I actually converted this recipe from a traditional pumpkin bread recipe, if you don’t need gluten-free just use regular all-purpose flour and enjoy)

1 can (15 oz) of pumpkin (not pumpkin pie mix)

1 2/3 cups sugar

2/3 cup vegetable oil

2 teaspoons pure vanilla (not imitation)

4 large eggs

3 cups Bob’s Red Mill Gluten-free All purpose Flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

½ teaspoon ground cloves

½ teaspoon baking powder

½ raisins or chocolate chips if desired

Move oven rack to lower position to ensure tops of loaves will be in the center of the oven. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease bottoms only of (2) 8 ½ x 4 ½ x 2 ½ loaf pans or (1) 9 x 5 x 3 loaf pan, (Pam spray works)

Mix Pumpkin, sugar, oil, vanilla, and eggs in large bowl till blended. Stir in the remaining ingredients (minus raisins, or chocolate chips) until blended. Stir in raisins or chocolate chips. Divide batter evenly between pans.

Bake 8 inch loaves 50 to 60 minutes, 9 inch loaf 1 hour and 10 minutes to 1 hour and 20 minutes or until toothpick inserted into center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes on wire rack.

Loosen sides of loaves from pans. Remove from pans and place topside up on wire rack. Cool completely, about 2 hours, before slicing. Wrap tightly and store at room temperature for up to 4 days, or refrigerate for up to 10 days.

The best vegetable soup ever, no kidding (courtesy of the Today Show) *this recipe is naturally gluten-free as well!

Mark Bittman, New York Times columnist and author of "The Food Matters Cookbook"

Ingredients

3/4 cup olive oil, more or less
2 onions, peeled and chopped
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
2 celery stalks, peeled and chopped
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 bunch parsley, washed and chopped, thick stems discarded
2 or 3 cabbage leaves, chopped
1 bunch chard, preferably white, washed and chopped
1/4 cup tomato paste
2 cans white beans (such as cannelloni) with their liquid if possible

Preparation

Put about a third of the olive oil in the bottom of a deep pot and turn the heat to medium.

Add half the onion, carrot and celery and cook, stirring occasionally, until they soften, which takes about 10 minutes.

Add about half of the remaining oil and repeat the process, seasoning with salt and pepper as you go.

Add the remaining oil with the parsley, cabbage and chard and cook, stirring occasionally, until everything is softened but not browned.

Add the tomato paste and stir.

Mash the beans so that they're about half mashed and half more-or-less whole. Add this mixture to the pot, along with any bean cooking liquid and enough water to make the whole mixture stewy but not watery.

Continue cooking, tasting and adjusting the seasoning as necessary, until all the vegetables are very tender and the soup is hot. Serve hot or warm.

Serving Size

Makes about 10 servings

Impossible Pumpkin Pie

3/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup gluten free baking mix ( I like Pamela's)
2 table spoons margarine
1 13 oz can evaporated milk (or 1 1/4 cups Coffee Rich)
2 tea spoons gluten free vanilla
2 eggs
1 16 oz can pumpkin
2 1/2 tea spoons pumpkin pie spice

Preheat oven to 350. Beat all ingredients until smooth-1 minute in blender. Pour into a lightly greased 9 or 10 inch pie pan. Bake until knife inserted in center comes out clean, checking at 45 minutes.
Optional: add 3/4 cup chopped pecans in mixture before pouring into pan. Garnish with whipped cream.

ShE's NoT yOuR aVeRaGe MoM

Thursday, December 2, 2010

A stitch in time...Christmas is a coming!

No comments:

Search This Blog

Labels