Garage Sale Booty

I'm so excited to share with you what I found at garage sales last week!

My first treasure is this pumpkin trio. I think they're adorable, and they were only $10! Right now they're sitting on the bar in my kitchen...which I'm not sure I like. I'll have to scare them up a better place next year. {bad joke?}

I love love love wooden bowls, plates, and serving utensils. I couldn't believe it when she told me $3 for 8 bowls. And they are Pottery Barn bowls.

SCORE!

These are the perfect bowls for The Best White Chicken Chili. Yum!

I've been on a farm kick lately... since we went to our family reunion down in L.A. (Lower Alabama) in a small farm town called Hartford.

I just love this basket. It reminds me of egg baskets or veggie baskets.



I love using my starfish in with other decorative items. It makes me feel like the beach is never far away.

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I'm not sure what these next two items are. They look like bundt cake pans or jello molds. Do you know what they are?

 I'm envisioning them on top of chunky wooden candlesticks. Wouldn't that be adorable? What color should I paint the candlesticks? Brown? Black? Other???


This is what I'm using them for right now.

And my piece-de-resistance..... drumroll please....



A $5 chandy that I can't wait to re-do!! {Oh yeah, Hubs thought I was NUTS when I brought that home!} I'm nervous about it, and I'm afraid my perfectionist nature will take over. And what color do I paint it? {I'm leaning towards glossy black, but I also like glossy white! Ack!}

All you DIYers... got any tips???

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Peek at Garage Sale Finds!

Last weekend, my sister and I went junkin'. I found some really great things... I'll post them tomorrow.

But today, I wanted to share a really cool find... a chalkboard shelf thingy.

It's got places on the back for hanging it, but I have it sitting out on furniture.
(I've already moved it from the top of this piece of furniture!)

It was all black, but I taped up the chalkboard part in the middle and painted the top and bottom green and distressed it a bit. Cute, huh?

And it goes with the rest of my fall touches around my house.

My youngest daughter wants to write the next saying on there. Makes me smile.

What would you write?

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My Girls {Wordless Wednesday} 10.25.11

I shared this over at the StrongMothers blog.... I wanted to share here, too.

These are my girls....

Super Easy DIY Menu Board

Hubs and I try to plan meals for the week, but with two girls to keep up with, sometimes our paths get crossed and plans get forgotten or lost. I wanted a cute way to write our menu for the week so that we could stay on track budget for a while!

I've seen many dry erase boards out there in blogland, so I knew that I needed to get my rear in gear and finally make one.

I'm always inspired by the girls over at eighteen25.

Here's their dry erase to-do list:

And here's a menu planner that's just to die for...

This one's over at the Lovingly Thrown blog.

I just wanted wanted one that was in my budget (F*R*E*E) and one that would be cute and functional.

Here's what I came up with...

I'm really pleased with it. I found a frame in the guest room closet that wasn't being used, and the decorative paper is just scrapbook paper. I think gift wrap could be used, too.

On ivory resume paper, I printed the words "Weekly Menu" in the font called Scriptina Pro. I used size 60. (Sixty is not a given option in MS Word, but if you highlight the font size, it will let you enter the size you want.)

I just eyeballed the placement of the words and used a paper cutter to cut the paper down the size of the resume paper. The scrapbook paper was a little wider than the back of the frame (I just used the cardboard back that comes in the frame), so I trimmed it to size with the paper cutter.) I used a glue stick on the cardboard piece along the edges and glued down both pieces of paper. {I intentionally overlapped the scrapbook paper over the resume paper a little.}

Cute, huh? And easy, too! It took me about 30 minutes from start to finish, and that includes finding the supplies, printing, and assembling!  :)

How do you keep up with your weekly menu? Leave me a comment and let me know.

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The Best White Chicken Chili

Yummy Fall Food!

On Sundays, I usually cook 2 or more entrees for the week... some I can take to work for lunch and some we will have at dinner. Hubs loves to grill, so we usually end up grilling about 4 nights a week and I pick up the meat on Sundays instead of cooking.

Today, I cooked White Chicken Chili and Chicken and Rice Soup, made a big salad, and bought meat for the grill this week: 2 packs of chicken breasts and one pack of chicken wings.

I've got to share this yummy chili recipe with you! I make some changes which I'll include in the recipe. {I'm not sure where I got the recipe -- I keep a 3-ring binder with page protectors for the recipes I collect through the years.}

White Chicken Chili
1 tsp olive oil
2/3 medium onion, chopped
1 clove garlic (I use a tsp of garlic powder instead)
1 seeded jalapeno pepper, chopped (I use 1/2 pepper)
1 can (4-oz) chopped green chilies
2/3 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp dried oregano or Italian seasoning (I use Italian seasoning)
Pinch ground cloves
Pinch cayenne pepper
1 can large white beans, undrained
2 cups chicken broth
1-1/2 cups diced cooked chicken (I use a 12.5-oz can of chicken if I don't have leftover cooked chicken)


Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Stir in the onion and cook until tender, 4 to 7 minutes. Mix in the garlic, jalapeno, green chilies, cumin, oregano, cloves, and cayenne. Continue to cook and stir the mixture until tender, about 3 minutes.


Mix in the chicken broth, chicken, and white beans. Bring to a boil. Turn down heat and simmer 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. At the end of 20 minutes, mash chili lightly using a potato masher, until about half of the beans are broken up.


Garnish with grated cheese, cilantro, chopped fresh tomato, salsa, chopped scallions, and/or guacamole. Wonderful when served with warm tortillas or tortilla chips on the side.

Hope you enjoy the recipe. Tomorrow I'm going to share my DIY to help Hubs keep track of our weekly menu. Come back and visit!

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Marshmallow Pops

Confession time...

I have a bloggy crush on Bakerella. Her photos are beautiful, and they really pop off the page. (No pun intended!)

I also love Jenn over at Hostess with the Mostess.

They both make me want to C-R-E-A-T-E in the kitchen! So I tried marshmallow pops, and I thought I'd share the mistakes I made along the way in case you want to try them, too.

Here's my inspiration...

from Hostess with the Mostess

I started with a trip to Wally World to get my supplies.

I couldn't find lollipop sticks, so I went with these

I chose the Zombie Mix for sprinkles. The colors are way cool!

The first thing I did was put the chocolate in a bowl and microwave according to the instructions on the back of the package.

Then I added blue food coloring. (My mistake!)

The more I stirred, the harder the chocolate got. I had to re-do my chocolate, but use only a little blue food coloring. Since doing these, I've learned about candy melts and how to color chocolate. {The Hungry Happenings blog has some great info about it!}

The next step was to insert a Skinny Stick in a marshmallow and dip it in. I then kind of rolled the chocolate-dipped marshmallow in a bowl of Zombie Mix.

Here's the final product....

I'm no Bakerella, but the kids and their friends loved them. Isn't that what it's all about?

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