Monthly Archives: January 2012

Freezable Hot Taco Pockets

Posted by Leanne on January 31, 2012 None comments

So as part of my mission last year to be organized, I began searching for freezable recipes. I’m kind of a dummy when it comes to food… if it can be frozen, best before date, how to reheat… all that jazz. It was my goal to double recipes to I could have extra food in the freezer for busy nights, or nights I just don’t feel like cooking.

I reader of mine had emailed me this advice last week: “…making much more than twice the original recipe - say five or six times the original. We are a retired military family and when we lived overseas a friend of mine heard about this system of cooking in bulk, dividing into meal size portions and freezing it. There are books available that explain the ins and outs of how to do this. My favorite is entitled “Dinner’s in the Freezer” by Jill Bond. There is another book called “Once a Month Cooking”. ”

This is a fantastic idea, which I would love to do, except we don’t have a deep freezer, so space is limited. I do have a friend though, who hosts evenings where a group of girls get together, each with a little job to do, and together they create multiple meals for you to take home and freeze. I participated once, and also joined this to get my Christmas baking done. It was fabulous, and a ton of fun. My friend runs it through her church, using their kitchen, and some of the grocery money collected goes towards families in need, which is also fabulous! If I had a deep freezer, I would participate every month! If you live locally, and would like more information, just leave me a comment, and I will email you back!

So in the meantime, I picked up this little “Taste Of Home” booklet at the till at the grocery store, and I am in love with it. It has every small detail a girl like me needs, and so far, the family has raved about every recipe. Today I’ll show you our number 1 favorite!

The recipe ( I took photos, I didn’t feel like writing it all out!) :

Because my kids aren’t crazy about spicy food, I eliminate the green chilis. And I only use 2 tubes of crescent rolls, the small size.

I realize I didn’t get the nutrition facts in the photo. If you want it, let me know, and I’ll add that in!

What they show it’s supposed to look like:

What mine looks like:

I know, LOL, right? Doesn’t quite look the same, but let me tell you, they taste awesome. The kids actually cheer when I make these! And so easy to pop out of the freezer and warm up on a busy night!

If you try this recipe, let me know what you thought!!

Thanks for reading!

~Leanne

If you are just visiting my blog, thanks for visiting! I love comments, and I love, love new followers… to follow and receive my postings by email, just find the spot at the top right hand corner where it invites you to add your email.

I’d also love for my readers to click on “Like” (below) if you liked today’s post, and of course give me your comments, anytime! Just click below where it says “Leave a Comment”. Thanks!!

Every Child Is An Artist

Posted by Leanne on January 30, 2012 10 comments

Monday! Do you love Mondays, or do they make you groan? I love the back to school part, but not the waking up early, making lunch, rush off to school part. Often Monday mornings when I’m driving them to school, I look in my review mirror, and see Jordan hasn’t done his hair, and they both have Nutella on their faces from breakfast. Woops!

We had an awesome weekend, especially Saturday. We went down into the States to visit the Costco in Bellingham, then went to the town of Lynden. I love that place. It is a quaint town, very Dutch (my heritage is Dutch) and full of antique shops and consignment stores. I love, love, love the fact that my hubby and my kids love antiquing and thrifting as much as I do! So fun digging through treasures with the kids…. and showing them what kind of phone mommy and daddy used to use when we were kids. Gulp. Those are in antique shops already?!?

Anyways, today I want to ~~show off~~ show you a favorite project of mine.

"Every Child Is An Artist"

My kids create masterpieces, and the only place I have been showing them off so far is on the fridge… our fridge is getting a little crowded! One day while window shopping in Fort Langley, I spied something like this, and have been waiting for the right spot that was worthy of making it for. So when Abby took up residence in the corner of our living room, the time had come to make it.

From the free scrapwood we collected from Rona, I picked the size needed, and painted it this cool graphite black… I’m sorry, I don’t remember the name of this paint. I purchased it off a paint chip at Rona on a whim for my desk re-do, and didn’t keep the chip. I did 2 coats of paint.

Then I found this website called www.Picnik.com. I am in love with this site, and am in mourning, as they are closing it down in April. No idea why, but it is very, very sad. On picnik, I chose my font, and came up with this,

If you follow my facebook page, you would have seen this already… betcha didn’t know where I was going with it though, right? (to view a tutorial on how to do this, visit this blog here.)

I then colored the back with yellow crayon for a transfer method...

(to see a better tutorial on my transfer method, please see my post here.)

...cut out each word, placed it on the board and taped into place...

..traced the words, with crayon transfering the letters onto the board, and painted in the words...

For painting the words on, I used a product from Michaels, called Sharpie Poster Paint. It looks like a Sharpie felt, and works amazing. I’ve used the same one for a bunch of different projects now, and haven’t run out…. and soooo much faster than using a paintbrush! Awesome. (and no, I wasn’t paid to say this, I just love it SO much!)

... I then measured the centre, and 4 inches in from each side, for placing of the nails (I wanted 3 nails)...

...hubby used a drill to make little holes for the nails (wanted to make sure the nails didn't go through the board!)...

...added the nails.... I ended up taking the nails out and adding hot glue to them before replacing them for staying power, in case the kids yank at them...

... hung it up, added 3 alligator clips and artwork, and ta-da!! Love!

The third piece of artwork isn’t hung in some of these posts, the kids were getting real antsy at this point, and I just needed to take some pictures and get it done! Ahh, real life.

Do you love it as much as I do??

Do you love it? Check out my For Sale Page for more info!

thanks for reading!!

~ Leanne

I’d also love for my readers to click on “Like” (below) if you liked today’s post, and of course give me your comments, anytime! Just click below where it says “Leave a Comment”. Thanks!!

Catch-up Saturday!

Posted by Leanne on January 28, 2012 None comments

Hope you are having a great weekend! Did you miss anything this week? Here’s what happened, just in case!

Monday: Aahh…. Relaxed!

Tuesday: What Beautiful Canned Vegetable Cans!

Wednesday: Inspired By Pinterest

Source: justlovelythings.blogspot.com via Leanne on Pinterest

Thursday: Introducing…

Friday:

Thanks for reading!!

~Leanne

7 Wants in A 10 Day YOU Challenge.

Posted by Leanne on January 27, 2012 4 comments

See my 10 secrets here, 9 loves here, 8 fears here

7 Wants in a 10 Day You Challenge. Well, this one is dangerous. I have many, many, many wants. I know in my head they are wants, not neccessarily needs, but some days, it doesn’t really feel true. In fact, some does I am completely serious that all of these are needs! Especially currently, when my blog changeover isn’t going as smoothly as hoped, and my house feels smaller and dirtier than ever… the dog just got a grooming, and it’s always the worst after that, because his hair sheds as he runs around. Yuck.

7 Wants in a 10 Day You Challenge. Well, this one is dangerous. I have many, many, many wants. I know in my head they are wants, not neccessarily needs, but some days, it doesn’t really feel true. In fact, some does I am completely serious that all of these are needs! Especially currently, when my blog changeover isn’t going as smoothly as hoped, and my house feels smaller and dirtier than ever… the dog just got a grooming, and it’s always the worst after that, because his hair sheds as he runs around. Yuck.

But I did have a great morning. It was just what I needed. The kids had a day off from school today, so I packed them all up and headed to my home town for a Pampered Chef party at my friend’s home. It was a beautiful drive, we counted 8 bald eagles, 2 blue herons, and 3 birds my son swears is a white-tailed-black-spotted-bellied-hawk. I doubt he’s right, but I don’t know any better, so I won’t argue! Had a great time visiting old friends, seeing my mom, and eating yummy treats (thank Sandra! )… it was just what I needed after a couple nights of staying up till midnight trying to figure out my new blog site… I had no idea it would be so over my head! Hopefully it’ll all be worth it!

Okay, so my 7 needs: oops, Wants:

1. I want to win the lottery, or for someone to give us lots of money. Lots. Enough to pay off the little bit of debt we have accumulated, get a new car so we don’t have to worry that ours might break down on us any day, fix up our house exactly the way we want it (or enough $ to buy us a newer house!), and enough to give us a great back yard. We have 1/4 acre here, which is awesome, except we never have enough $$ to do something great with it, so often it feels a little useless.

2. I want out house to always be clean. Especially my floors. 3 years ago we put in these drop dead gorgeous deep brown harwood floors. They are gorgeous. Whe they are clean. And they are only clean if no on else is home after I’ve washed them. As soon as someone walks on them, they are dirty already. Especially if you have a crawling baby… or someone wears the same socks they did yesterday. I am often checking out the footprints, figure out who’s they are, and demand they change their socks. If the socks have a little bit of sweat, oil, anything, it shows. All dust shows. Every spill smears along with anyone who walks on that spot, if it wasn’t cleaned up with the exact method thaat I demand, because that is the only method that works. Very, very, annoying.

3. I want my baby to stop growing. She is the most amazing little baby ever, and I just wish she could stay a baby, so she could stay this personality forever.

4. I want to travel more. I got most of the travel bug out of my system when I was a flight attendant, but it would be really nice to be able to go somewhere warm once in awhile, since it rains almost every day here.

5. I want to move out of this town. This town is fine, but it’s a little too industrial, a little too busy for me. I’d love to live in the country again, with safe roads, and close to the river. I loved where we lived growing up, on a dairy farm… we did run into bears a fair bit when we went on walks, but that’s as dangerous as it got! LOL!

6. I want to see my friends more. This probably is more of a need, but with all of us being in the baby making stages, getting kids to and from school stages, and many of my friends working full time jobs, I really don’t get to see them often. And almost never without kids. And seriously, what kind of conversation can you have when you’re busy wiping snot and dirty bums in the meantime!

7. I want more space. I want space for us to all have our hobbies and loves, without inconveniencing the whole family by it overtaking the whole house. Space to store things, space to move around, space to ride bikes without fearing some crazy person on the road will hit us, space without traffic and noise, space for my kids to make noise without giving me a headache.

I know there’s not a #8, but I’d really like computers not to be so confusing! I don’t know if I’ve explained it well enough, but I’m trying to change my blog over from WordPress.com, to WordPress.org. Mainly because one day if my blog grows well enough, I’d like to have a few adds on my blog, to make a wee bit of income off of it. But it turns out that I can’t do it on the .com site. I have to self host it on the .org site. Which means e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g. needs to be transfered over manually, by a girl who know nothing about computers, and a hubby who is a computer programmer, but doesn’t speak bloggy language. There’s really no rush, but niave little me thought it would happen easily in one evening (because of course, that’s what they tell ya), and didn’t realize how intense and detailed it would be. And obsessive little me wants it done immediately, for absolutely no reason at all excpet to get it done! Oh well, I’ll get there!

I’m looking forward to a great little evening with the inlaws tonight, and a relaxing weekend with the family, and wait for the library to call me to tell me the “WordPress for Dummies” book is in, waiting for me!

Share with me some of your wants! I’d love to know them!

Have a great weekend, and thanks for reading!

~ Leanne

I’d also love for my readers to click on “Like” (below) if you liked today’s post, and of course give me your comments, anytime! Just click below where it says “Leave a Comment”. Thanks!!

Introducing….

Posted by Leanne on January 26, 2012 2 comments

Today I am excited to return the favor, and introduce you to my friend Randee, from Randee’s Organized Chaos!! I have to tell you, this lady is a.m.a.z.i.n.g. at a certain something that I am absolultely NOT… Adorable snacks! Most of the time, I can’t even be bothered to make food adorable, it’s enough for me to make it in the first place! But Randee is inspiring me, and may even get me to take a chance and make something cute one of these days!! …or I’ll just leave it up to my sister, she’s already amazing at it!

So here she is! Take it aways Randee!!

HI!! My name is Randee and I am visiting from

Randee’s Organized Chaos !!

I first want to thank Leanne for asking me to guest post!! I am SUPER DUPER excited about this opportunity!! I am a stay at home mom that LOVES my kids and my husband!! EVERY aspect of my life is chaotic but I would not have it any other way! I am a mom that LOVES to craft, cook, throw parties and find new EASIER ways to do things! I think what makes me a little bit different, is the fact that I tell it like it is and have fun with life!! When you read my posts, just think of a very energetic and SOUTHERN voice and you will have me pegged!!

I want to tell you about a party that I have going on right now called

RANT and RAVE About My Blog!!

It is a party where you can link up your blog and have it critiqued by fellow bloggers! This is done anonymously and I am the only one that sees the results besides you!! In return, you will critique two blogs!! So far, there has been a wealth of information and I am taking it to heart!! What better way to see what people think about your blog!! So come on by and link up!!

THANKS again for having me today!! I hope to get to know some of you here in BLOGLAND!!
I am sharing with you today a post about one of the MANY chaotic things that I think up in my head!! They are always MUCH easier in my head than when I actually execute them!!

ENJOY!!!!

Mary-Catherine’s teacher came to me and asked me if I would be willing to a “cute” snack for the 100th day of school!! Of course, I said YES!! I went home and started looking around on the web and even went to Pinterest but I just couldn’t find anything that I LOVED!! I found that most people brought different items in 10′s such as M&M’s, cheerios, pretzels and then combined them to make a hundred!! Ok…that was all FINE and DANDY but just not me!! So my little mind went to working when it dawned on me that I had the PERFECT idea!!

One of MC’s favorite books of all times is

ERIC CARL’S

The Very Hungry Caterpillar!

I remembered where I had made a birthday cake once in the shape of a caterpillar so how could I make the HUNGRY CATERPILLAR for the 100th day!! Well here is how….