Food Glorious Food! Challenge #9

Admittedly, I'm falling behind on these challenges. Spring Break and a wonderful dumping of snow are to blame. Nonetheless, I will try to continue to post. Here is last weeks challenge this week...

9. Food, Glorious, Food! This is for the Food Network Junky who loves "Chopped" Wait until you have to go to the grocery store...and then challenge yourself to make a new and creative dish from the pantry/freezer. Incorporate the leftovers that need to be eaten and create a new meal. You are not allowed to go to the store for this challenge.

This is actually a weekly challenge here at my house, only for the main reason that I hate going to the grocery store. Don't ask me why, cause there isn't just one reason, but it is just not my favorite task.

I looked in my cupboard and fridge on Saturday afternoon, and was struck by how many veggies needed to be used before they were bad, so those were definitely going to be in my creation.

I also found some sausage that would be tasty in my dish so out that came as well.

My ingredients were the following:

1 orange pepper

some spinach

can of diced tomatoes

2 cloves of garlic

quarter of a white onion

about 10 baby carrots

a package of reindeer sausage

some left over rice/quinoa

parsley

Cajun seasoning

garlic salt

red pepper flakes

bay leaf

water

I began by putting the pepper, spinach, onion, and carrots into the food processor and chopped them up really fine. I also chopped up the garlic. I put all the chopped veggies and the can of diced tomatoes into a large sautee pan...which should have been a large pot, but whatever...I added some water and let them cook down. After they had cooked down a bit I added the spices. I didn't measure the spices, but added them to taste. I also added a bit more water and let it cook down again.

While it was cooking I cut up the sausage and added it, along with the rice/quinoa--which was already cooked--and let those stew for a bit.

And I came up with a very healthy and hearty stew.

What kind of concoction did you make up?


Linked to:frugallysustainable.com

St Patricks Day Craft

With St. Patty's Day coming up I decided to make a banner for the front door with Aria and finally take down the Valentines Day wreath!! I thought we should make a 3 leaf clover banner but Aria decided a 4 leaf clover would be much better :-) so 4 leaf clover it was!!

  I grabbed some white and green plaid fabric from my stash, 3 corks, green craft paint and paint brushes and we got started.   I cut the four leaf clover from the white fabric and using the corks with green paint Aria made some awesome 3 leaf clover prints on it while I added the stems.

After the paint dried I bonded the 4 leaf clover to the green plaid, hemmed the edges and added twine to hang it up.  I wanted to add weight to the top and bottom so it wouldn't flap around in the wind so before I sewed the hems shut I put 2 bamboo skewers each into the top and bottom hems. It's what I had on hand and it worked perfectly :-)! 

Start to finish it took about an hour and we both had fun making it! I loved seeing how excited Aria was to put it on our door!!

 

What crafts have you done for St Patty's Day?

Nathania

Run away with me...my late submission for challenge #6

I love to run races but what do you do with all those medals and bibs that you just can't bear to get rid of because of the accomplishment they signify?  Make a running medal and bib board is what you do!!  I can't remember where I first saw this idea but you can find lots of examples on Pinterest.

I decided to make one for my friend Tamsin's very belated Christmas present. It is on the larger size as I wanted to add a cool saying and when I found one on the Union Jack I knew it was perfect as she is a Brit!

I picked up a board and square hooks at Home Depot and after my awesome husband cut it down to size I got started. I sanded it down primed it and then applied 2 coats of chalkboard paint that I had in my paint collection. I used chalkboard paint so she could record her PR's (personal records) for her races and also as motivation to keep training write down when her next race was. I used a gold metallic Sharpie to write PR and Next race on the board.  I modgepodged the saying down making sure not to put too much on so it wouldn't squeeze out the edges and dried it upside down so there wouldn't be any wrinkles.  Using an old bib I measured where to place the hooks for the bibs and then spaced the hooks for the medals about 2 inches apart.  The square hooks have screws on the end so I predrilled the holes and screwed all of them in by hand. Simple!  I love how it turned out and my friend really loved her very belated Christmas present!!!

Challenge #8 - linen closet

 It has been a little hectic around here lately with travels and school for Sarah and for me not sleeping well and heartburn towards the end of my pregnancy so our challenge completion has been a little sketchy as of late!! But I did attempt this last one and a late post is better than no post in my books so here it is.
Here was the challenge...

Challenge #8 Linen: Mismatched sheets, pillowcases, old towels. Can you repurpose any of it before you throw it out? Betcha you can. I dare you.

I have to be honest, I didn't re-purpose anything from my linen closet but in the spirit of the challenge I did pull out a badly neglected project!  Besides towels and sheets I also keep tablecloths and napkins in mine so I pulled out and re-sized a tablecloth that I had purchased yrs ago.  When I bought it I didn't realize it was way too big for my table but decided that my crafty self could re-size it and make napkins with the extra fabric in no time, yeah right!!!!

 Today I finally cut off the extra 30 inches of fabric and had enough to cut out 8 napkins and then the fun began...ironing the hems. I really, really hate ironing but it sure made it easy to finish up the sewing! Even if it was tedious.

Even though I do hate ironing I really did iron the tablecloth prior to this picture!  I really need a new one!! Anyone out there have an iron they love to bits??


Nathania

Bracelets and headbands

What do you do when you're bored? I usually do something with fabric...but if you've been reading this blog for any amount of time you would know that!

The other day I was bored and wanted to make something creative, but relatively easy, so that I could actually finish it. I'm a notorious non finisher when it comes to my projects. I went it the abyss of a craft room and came up with two very easy projects.

The first one is a bangle or bracelet or whatever you wanna call it.

What you need is the following: 

some random clear rings that you bought scarves on--or some ugly bracelets you don't like any more:)

scrap fabric and/or ribbon

some modge lodge

a paintbrush

I wrapped the fabric and ribbon around the loop and then finished it off with modgepodge so that the ends were sealed and wouldn't fray. 

Took 10 minutes start to finish. 

They are even pretty stylish if I do say so myself...now if only I were stylish...

The next project I did that same night was to make the simplest ribbon headband ever.

I went to the craft room again---can hardly believe I made it out---and found some vintage ribbon and some elastic. 

I measured about an inch of elastic and sewed it on the ribbon on the back with a zig-sag stitch. The elastic allows you to get it over your head with the majority of the headband being ribbon, and you only have a bit of the elastic showing. It works for people who wear headbands with their hair up in a ponytail--like me:)

Then I took this really awkward self portrait. 

Whats great about the ribbon headband is that it's not too tight. I often get headaches because headbands are too tight. I made this one the exact tightness I wanted and I wear it all the time--without a headache.

So thats what I do when I'm bored. What about you?

Sarah