Happy Thanksgiving!!!! Gobble Gobble!

Good Morning and Happy Thanksgiving! I look forward to a wonderful day with my family. I have so much to be thankful for today and everyday. My list of blessings is long, but here are the top blessings: My children, my parents, my friends, a great job, a home and a nice comfy bed. We often forget that there are many who do not have these things.

I am sure all my crafty blog buddies have much to be thankful for today. I thank my blog buddies for sharing their ideas and inspirations. Speaking of inspirations I thank my blog friend Jen over at Lipstick and Laundry for these cute little goodies! So simple to make!!!
Mini vanilla wafers adhered to a Hershey kiss with a dab of chocolate frosting, topped with a dab of chocolate frosting for a stem and there you have it Sweet Little Acorns!


Dessert is done! Doesn't it look yummy? This one is so easy and goes over very well.
This is the recipe:

1 package Duncan Hines Yellow Cake Mix

1 26 oz can of pumpkin

1 12oz can of evaporated milk

3 eggs

1 1/2 cups of sugar

4 tspns pumpkin pie spice

1/2 tspn salt

1 cup of chopped pecans or walnuts

1 cup of melted butter

Cool Whip or Rediwhip for topping



Grease the bottom of a 9 X 13 pan. Combine pumpkin, milk, eggs, sugar, spice and salt. Pour into greased pan. Sprinkle dry cake mix evenly over the top, sprinkle with chopped nuts. Drizzle melted butter over the top. Bake 50-55 minutes at 350 degrees. Serve with whipped topping! Dee-Lish! I promise!

More little boxes

I am sorry and I hope you can forgive me for my OCD. When I find something that is simple yet very cool, I have to keep making it!! I am sure if you have read my blog for any length of time you have figured that out. So thanks for coming back and bearing with me.
Here are the little boxes again. I can make them now without looking at the tutorial. Sweet! These are providing great stress relief therapy for me :). I had to post these because I love the colors. They are not for Christmas, they are gifts, but if I changed the ribbon to snowflake ribbon, then they could be used for Christmas.
I do hope my recent crafty posts are inspiring you to create! Have a great evening!

A couple of cards

Just a couple of cards to post today. I haven't made many lately. I actually needed these for work. Our employee non profit group is donating Thanksgiving groceries to 2 families on Monday. We thought it would be nice to give them a Happy Thanksgiving card with the groceries. I cut a 8 1/2" X 11" piece of cardstock in half to make a 5 1/2" X 4 1/4" standard card. I used heavy cardstock to cut out 1 top note die and cut that in half, then added ribbon and a button to that. I then cut a piece of 3" and 4" scrapbook paper and put it all together. I used the computer to print out the greeting.

The second card is for an employee who is part of our non profit group that is leaving work. This card was also easy. 2 top note die cuts, I cut the perforation off of the pink piece so you could see the brown behind it. I used the curly set punch and stamp from Stampin' Up for the greeting and piece of ribbon hot glued and tied and a little button for the finish. I am really loving the pink and brown.

A little more Christmas Crafting

To keep myself from going insane. I have narrowed my crafting this Christmas down to 3 paper projects and a couple candy making endeavors. Both of the boxes in the photo are made from the tutorial over at Splitcoaststampers . The only difference between the two is I didn't add the top note die to the stacked boxes. These little stacked boxes are so easy to make and all you need for them is heavy cardstock paper, something to score with, adhesive (I use hot glue so they don't fall apart) and a small round punch. Actually, you don't have to use the round punch if you don't have one. Finish off with pretty ribbon and a little tag. I think they would look beautiful sitting on each persons Christmas dinner plate. I will make alot of these two and the little bags that I showed 2 posts back.
For my candy making this year I have decided on candied pecans and almond roca. Yummy! The homemade candy will go in clear cellophane bags with lovely ribbons and tags. Mints and kissses and other bagged candy will go in the boxes and bags. Ready, set, go! I want to get the Christmas stuff done! :) Happy Crafting!

A Christmas Box

There are actually tiny little pizza boxes under this pretty paper. Julia gave me the tutorial and a sample (the snowflake box) Friday night. She spoils me just like my mom! Love them both!
Have I mentioned I am not good with hardcopy tutorials? However, I was feeling a little brave this morning and tried this one. Not so difficult after all! These are now on my Christmas crafting list. I am really loving the brown paper with snowflakes and blue ribbon! Here is a photo of the actual box that the cute top note dies are adhered to. You might want to try these! Here is the link to the tutorial Splitcoaststampers.

This top note die has been the best craft investment I have ever made. If you want one go on over and see Julia. If you don't want to or can't buy one right now I would be glad to cut some out for you if you want to try this project or any of my other top note die crafts. Just get in touch with me via email or comment to make arrangements. My Christmas gift to you, my blog peeps :)

Craft Night

It was so nice to see my crafty friends Julia, Judy and Mona last night.
This was the first item Julia had us make. This beautiful reindeer card. All Stampin' Up supplies. Then we made this oh so cool, yet oh so easy gift card holder. I am showing you the inside and out here so you can see how cool it is!!! If you want directions to make either of these items or need to order Stampin' Up supplies go over and visit Julia at her blog.The gift card fits perfectly in the center fold.

Lastly, I am posting this to show Julia, Judy and Mona how cute a ribbon looks with a button in the center! I just love this look! Happy Saturday and Happy Crafting everyone!

I'm back!!!!! Christmas crafting has begun!!!

Well I hope y'all hadn't given up on me!!! Today is Nov 12th--and Christmas will be here in the blink of an eye! I decided drastic measures needed to be taken to get my Christmas crafts going. That along with a little nudge from Julia ;). Thanks Julia!!!

I figured if I put up the folding table up in my daugthers room I could leave everything out and have a place to work!!!! (no I didn't kick her out of her room, she is away at college) I enlisted the help of 11 year old Gillian and we set out to cut a lot of top note dies to make some of these cute bags! We also used the Stampin' Up Curly set for the Christmas stamp. Gillian thinks that her Mom, Nonnie, Grandma, my mom and her teacher will really love them! I am sure she is right.

These were made with supplies I already had on hand. Not bad. But tomorrow night I get some crafting time with Julia my friend and Stampin' Up demonstrator and my crafty friend Mona. I am hoping to come home with some great ideas, so be sure to come back soon!

No crafts, but a good recipe for dinner

Still don't have my craft mojo going yet. But I did make a decent dinner tonight. I have a lot of recipes saved on pillsbury.com. This was one of them "Zesty Italian Crescent Casserole".
It was fairly easy, no expensive ingredients and I get a thumbs up from my taste testers. I liked it too! It was like a crescent lasagna. As Rachel would say "Yumm-O". Made a salad to go with, and there you have it, easy, inexpensive and tasty!
If you haven't checked out pillsbury.com yet, I would highly suggest it. Lots of recipes to peruse.

I love every other Friday!

I am on a work schedule that allows me every other Friday off (and every weekend). Today is my Friday off! So I get to act like a stay at home mom and make pancakes for breakfast. I know I have said this before, but it is these little things in life that make it so worthwhile!
Now if I can muster up the energy I need to clean house and run errands, life would be Grand!!!!!
I have just had a lack of energy for the last couple of weeks. It sucks!!!! I haven't even crafted in over 2 weeks! What is up with that? So to you my few blog peeps, I apologize for the lack of creativity on my blog. I hope to come up with something soon! In the meantime enjoy your day, have a great weekend and stop by to visit again soon.

Halloween 2009

Halloween has come and gone like a whirlwind. But boy was it fun! My weekend started with a day of errands on Friday and a wedding at 4:30 in the afternoon.
Saturday it was on to prepping for a Halloween party Saturday night. Followed by some clean up and un decorating and a little rest today.

Let's start the photos with my cute boy Zach! He dressed up as a businessman Friday. He learned how to tie a Windsor knot on You Tube. Took him about an hour of practice, but he figured it out! I was so impressed! I guess I liked the costume too much and made too big a deal over it and embarrassed him. So he dressed as a zombie for Halloween instead of a businessman! I was so disappointed! He was so adorable in a hat and tie! I must say that having a 60's themed Halloween party makes for some very colorful photos!

See what I mean? Loved all the colors and great costumes!!! It was so groovy!

Lastly, a new use for a picture frame that I found while watching Sandra Lee Semi Homemade on the Food Network. She took a frame and put some Halloween scrapbooking paper under the glass and then used it for a serving dish. It worked great for my pretzel ham rollups!

I hope everyone had a Happy Halloween! Now looking forward to a Wonderful Thanksgiving!