Project Tie Remake

   Looking for a great gift for a birthday, Father's Day, anniversary, or just cause? Making or buying gifts for guys can be a real pain compared to girls. But with this inexpensive and fun project, gifts for guys is a breeze!
   All you will need is:
 An old ugly tie
Thread & a needle
1 yard of silk or any sort of tie like fabric
Sharp Scissors
Sewing Machine (optional)
   You take the old tie and carefully rip out the stitches where the maker hand sewed the tie together. Once you have pulled the tie apart there should be the fabric that covered the tie, the tie interfacing, and on the tie's fabric there should be a some fabric sewn to the tips that make a little pocket. Take out the the tip liner thingys, and where the fabric of the tie meets, it is sewn in two or more parts, rip that out. Now you should have two triangles, a big and little, and two pieces of the tie, front ; these will now serve as a pattern for your new fabric.
    You use that to cut out your fabric then sewn on the tips to the tie front and tie back, then put the tie interfacing in it. Then hand stitch it closed and it's done!

   You also can make a paper box to but your gift in. I made mine out of scrapbook paper. Yes, i know the lady is very annoying. But its a good tutorial. 

~ Maren

Quiche facile or easy quiche.

Ok, tired moms and women every where, here is the easiest recipe known to the world of cooking.
This is one of my go to recipes. What is a go to recipe? It's when you haven't thought about dinner and it's 5:30 pm going on 6:00, the natives are getting restless and you have brain fog.
I keep a recipe card of 7 or so easy, quick to make recipes, go to recipes.
One of my families favorites is Quiche. When I make this my family blesses my name, I become a great cook instead of the Mom who never cooks anything.

Okay, for the recipe! The one I use is from the Lion House cookbook. The ingredients are simple and fairly inexpensive: eggs, bacon, green onions, swiss cheese, and pie crust. For the pie crust you can make your own, use ready to use or my favorite Jiffy pie crust mix.
3eggs well beaten
1 cup grated swiss cheese
6-8 pieces of cooked bacon
1/4 cup of chopped green onion
1 cup of heavy whipping cream
 Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Spray 9 inch pie pan with cooking spray, place rolled out pie crust in pan, poke 5-6 times with fork. Bake for 5 minutes, remove from oven.
Spread Swiss cheese, crumbled bacon, green onions in the bottom of pan. Whip eggs and heavy whipping cream together in bowl, add to pie pan.  Place pie pan on a cookie sheet to avoid having to clean oven later.
I haven't had any problems with this recipe spilling over the sides but you don't want to have to clean the oven, right?
Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until firm.
This can be eaten right away or is good cold, that is if it makes it to the fridge at all. Bonne Appetite!
- Nancy

Sweet 16 Birthday Decor

      My birthday was last month and I made the cutest decorations for my party. I made a banner out of scrapbook paper and yarn, some tissue paper pompoms, and I strung some twinkly lights. The menu was potstickers, panko chicken, chips and salsa, and cake of course! My sister made the Chocolate Mousse Crunch Cake  from the gals at Ourbestbites.com, she left out the heath bits and well it didn't exactly turn out pretty. But it tasted great! And everyone loved it! I also got some nice presents from my friends, and we played Maren Jeopardy and Accent Draw ( were everyone gets an accent and has to talk in that accent the rest of the night). We also played the tape game (its kinda like musical chairs) and Just Dance 3. We couldn't get them to leave.  Probably the best birthday ever! Sorry about the picture quality I wasn't planing on posting the decorations and food.
     ~ Maren

Isn't The Cake just lovely?

My Cousin Geogia and My Sister Josie 

Cake and icecream, don't forget the Ginger Ale

Scrapbook Banner in the background with my balloons and twinkly lights

mini orange pompoms

The guys enjoying their cake

More decorations

February Adventure: World's best Bread!

Hey Bloggers! Do you love homemade bread? I know we do! Making your own bread is cheap, healthy, and so tasty! Now some bread recipes aren't the easiest, but our recipe is almost fool proof. The only thing that hard about it is having enough time and having the right mixer.

Easy Bread Recipe

Makes 2 loaves

5 cups of flour ( you can do anything from all purpose to whole wheat)

1 1/2 tablespoons of dough enhancer

1/2 tablespoon of salt

1 Heaping tablespoon of yeast

1/3 cup of honey ( you can use sugar, but honey makes the bread softer)

2 tablespoons of oil

2 cups of hot water

Cooking Spray

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees. Briefly mix dry ingredients ( this recipe works best with a bosh).You only add 3 cups of flour at this point. Put the salt on one side of the bowl, yeast on the other. If you put the yeast and salt together, the salt will kill the yeast and your bread will be flat. Then pour in honey, oil, and water. Then the remaining flour, then mix. If the dough is too wet add a tablespoon of flour, if too dry add a tablespoon of water. Then on a low medium speed knead the dough for 8- 10 minutes ( this is the easy part the mixer does all the work for you). Turn off the oven (we just needed a warm place to rise our dough, but we don't want it hot.) Spray a clean part of the counter with Cooking Spray. (Instead of kneading the dough out on flour we are going to use oil this will make the bread less dense.) Lay down the dough and knead it, making sure there are no air bubbles. Form the dough into a ball and cut the dough in half with a knife (instead of tearing the dough we will cut it so we don't tear the gluten. It will also result in a straight edge when you cook it.) Put the dough into pans that have been sprayed and let it rise in the oven for 30 minutes of until it is double the size of the pan. Once it has risen Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes until golden brown. Carefully take out the bread and put it on a cooling rack. When cool enough to touch, slice and serve. Enjoy!