Lovin' My Crafts: Pompom Wreaths

Living in a rental townhouse gives me limited abilities to decorate.  Normally this isn't a problem since I don’t really have time in this stage of life to explore my decorative side but this past year, as the holiday’s began to approach, I felt a little sad at the thought of not being able to deck the halls of our little home.  As a newly married couple, our decorating budget was (and still is) less than zero so our options were fairly limited.

Our Christmas spirit was shown through a little 18-inch fake Christmas tree that I decorated with crocheted bell ornaments that I’d made and my husband's little Christmas village that he collected throughout his childhood.  All in all, our festive “deck the halls” decorations could fit on our coffee table.

In order to liven things up on the outside of our house, I decided we needed a Christmas wreath.  I was disappointed at how much they cost already made so I decided to be a bit creative and make a pompom wreath.  I stole the idea from a friend who had seen an example on Pintrest.  It may not be the most exquisite and tasteful decoration, but it put a smile on my face to come home every evening to my happy little Christmas wreath with its bright red and green sparkly pompoms.

Since the winter dragged on and I needed something to welcome me home from the cold and snow, I also made a January wreath out of blue and silver pompoms.

They are super easy to make.  Just get a Styrofoam wreath form and hot glue your pompoms of choice on to it.  I also hot glued the ribbon hangers on to the Styrofoam which seemed to hold just fine even through the windy, cold and wet winter we had.  I didn't put any pompoms on the backside of the wreath since they wouldn't be seen and it helped the wreath lay flatter against the door.

I've learned since making these that you can buy the Styrofoam pipe insulation and duct tape it into a circle for a cheaper circular wreath frame to work on.  The ones that I got from the craft store were a bit pricey so I’d be interested to see if I could make the alternative, cheaper option work.  I’ll let you know if I do try it and what I think.

Lovin' to Cook: Eggstra Easy to Peel Hard-Boiled Eggs

I’m sure we've all experienced the frustration of peeling a hard-boiled egg when most of the egg ends up going with the shell.  It seems like a huge waste to me so I did a little research before I made my latest batch of hard-boiled eggs.  I found that there are about a hundred methods to making the perfect eggs including baking them.  I wasn't feel that adventurous last night so I stuck with a boiling method that worked out really well.

R ecipe	Hard-Boiled Eggs
Ingredients:
6 eggs		1 teaspoon baking soda
Directions:
Fill a medium pot with water and bring it to a roaring boil. Once the water is boiling, add a teaspoon of baking soda. Cook the eggs for 10 minutes in the boiling water. Once the 10 minutes is up, remove the eggs from the pot using a slotted spoon.  Carefully drop them in a bowl of cold water. Once all eggs are removed from the pot and have been dropped in the bowl of cold water, carefully poor the cold water out of the bowl and rinse the eggs in fresh cold water.  After the water is no longer cold, fill the bowl back up with cold water and let the eggs sit for just a few minutes. Then let the cracking and peeling begin!  Tap the egg on the edge of the counter or sink and then squish the shell until it is cracked all over.  You should be able to peel the shell of easily without taking the egg with it.  Rinse each egg in cold water.

I like to make a batch of eggs and peel all of them at the same time.  After you rinse the eggs, if you store them in an airtight container, they’ll be fine for a couple of days.  These make for a quick and healthy grab and go snack.  I like them for breakfast on the go and simply put one in a Ziploc bag to eat once I get settled at work (before everybody else gets there of course).

Lovin' Life: Bananas For My Husband

One of the reasons why I love spending time with my husband is because he always makes me laugh.  He doesn't even really have to try.  He's just so cute and funny.  I was reminded of how much I love this aspect of him just the other day.

He came home from work and was emptying his backpack of all the odds and ends that had collected in the bottom of the bag.  All of the sudden he pulls out the most black and shriveled banana that I have ever seen.

With the most serious and inquisitive expression, he looks at the banana.  Then he looks at me and says totally serious: "So I take it this banana isn't good anymore."  You probably had to be there and actually hear him say it to find the humor but I busted out laughing so hard and the stress of the day seemed to melt away.  I hadn't purchased bananas at the grocery store for over a month and I wasn't sure how he'd gone so long with this rotting piece of fruit in his bag.

I realized later that these goofy moments are so precious.  Laughing together just makes life so much more enjoyable.  We both seem to go a million miles an hour most weeks and the fact that we can take a few minutes to laugh over a banana brings so much happiness to my soul.

So as you go on today, find and treasure those simple moments that bond you together with the one you've chosen to be your forever friend.  Take time to laugh and love.  Even if it's over a rotten banana.

Learnin' to Clean: My Smelly Dishwasher Loves Lemonade

My husband and I live in a rented townhouse and we are the proud renters of a very smelly dishwasher (or dishwarsher as my husband calls it).  As newly moved in, newly wed and newly figuring out how to take care of our place, I tried just about everything I could to change our dishwasher into a non-smelly one.  There are few things worse when it comes to kitchen appliances than opening your just run dishwasher and being inundated with a smelly something that can’t really be described.  I’m pretty sure my dishes were making food taste like my dishwasher smelled.

So enough with the melodramatics.  I wouldn't be writing a post if I didn't have a solution.

All you need to do is buy too packets of sugar free lemonade powdered drink mix.  Make sure you get the sugar free kind, otherwise, the sugar can make a sticky mess in the soap cup and other parts of the dishwasher.  I just used the cheap store brand which fit better in my budget then some of the more expensive name brands like Koolaid.

Fill the soap cup with both packets of lemonade mix and run the dishwasher.  Make sure the dishwasher doesn't have any dishes in it when you run it.

After the dishwasher has finished running, open it up and enjoy a much fresher smell and the good feeling of finally beating the smelly dishwasher.

I've only had to do this once to my dishwasher and the smell has yet to return.  However, I have a stash of lemonade packets on hand should the smell attempt to make a comeback.

Lovin' to Cook: Impossible Cheeseburger Pie

As a kid, growing up, I always wondered why it was called Impossible Cheeseburger Pie.  Was it impossible to make?  No, that couldn't be the case because my mom made it all the time.  Was it impossible to eat?  No, that couldn't be it either because it was quite tasty and I didn't really make a mess or anything when I ate it.

It wasn't until I was desperate for a meal idea one day and was searching for ideas that I realized the real name of one of my favorite dishes as a kid: Impossibly Easy Cheeseburger Pie.  Now that’s more like it!  Impossibly easy!  That’s exactly what I needed after a hectic day of work and limited time to prepare dinner.

The real recipe can be found on the Betty Crocker website but if you’re in a hurry and don’t have time to find it, here’s the recipe that I use along with some of my embellishments and tips.

R ecipe	Impossible Cheeseburger Pie
Ingredients:
1 pound ground beef 1 large onion, chopped (about 1 cup) ½ teaspoon salt 1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese (4 oz)		½ cup Bisquick mix 1 cup milk 2 eggs
Directions:
Heat oven to 400 degrees. Brown ground beef and onions.  Drain grease and stir in salt.  Spread mixture in a lightly greased 9-inch glass pie plate and sprinkle with cheese. In a small bowl, stir the remaining ingredients (I use a small whisk) until blended.  Pour the mixture into the pie plate – it will seep all through the ground beef mixture. Bake 25 minutes or until knife comes out clean when inserted in the middle.

Don’t have an onion?  Don’t fret!  I totally forgot to buy an onion one time and made this dish without it.  It still was tasty.  Another time when I once again forgot the onion I sprinkled in some minced onion from my spice rack and it gave it a nice flavor.

Don’t be afraid to add spices to the meat and onion mixture.  My husband likes food packed with a punch so a lot of times I’ll throw in a pinch of crushed red peppers, some garlic salt or other spices I have on hand.  He never knows what to expect!

I once made this with bacon added into the ground beef/onion mixture.  I cooked the bacon separately, let the grease drip off and then crumbled it into the ground beef after I’d put it in the dish but before I add the cheese and Bisquick mixture.

Don’t be afraid to make this one your own.  Be adventurous.  I've learned that the best way to learn how to cook is to take the recipes that are easy and familiar and just start embellishing.

Lovin' Life: Exploring My Areas of Growth Potential

Today was just another normal day.  I seem to never wake up quite early enough so I spent my mornings rushing around running downstairs to get this then back upstairs to get that.  I finally ran out the door (five minutes behind) with wet hair – it’s okay I've got my hair tie on my wrist and will just pull it up at the first stop light I have to wait at.  I have something that resembles a lunch – I guess breakfast is just not going to happen again this morning.

My only saving thoughts today are that my car is NOT out of gas and I already have tonight’s dinner done and will be welcomed home by the aroma of amazing spaghetti and meatballs, patiently waiting for me in the crock pot.  As I strive to become a successful wife and homemaker, it’s these small victories that keep me going.  When I feel like I've let everything slip through my fingers, I try to focus on the one thing that I was able to succeed at.

The author of one of my favorite blogs, The UntrainedHousewife, calls the areas she struggles with “areas of growth potential.”  I love that.  When I run into those areas that I’m having difficulty with I no longer look at myself as failing but as exploring my “areas of growth potential.”  So fellow wives and homemakers in training, don’t get discouraged.  We can do this!  And by swapping ideas and sharing our successes we can help each other along the way to becoming the individual homemakers we are striving to be.