Valentine's Day 1

For the 14 days til Valentine's Day I am going to do 14 posts of fun ideas...

This first idea is from Martha Stewart's Feb. Living. My roommates and I thought they were too cute not to try and make ourselves.

Chocolate Filigree hearts for cupcake toppers. It really is super easy, just melt some chocolate, put it into a decorators bag or a ziplock bag with a tiny hole cut in the corner. Trace a heart cookie cutter on some parchment and then outline the heart with chocolate filling it with swirls and designs. Freeze for 15 minutes to set then top cupcakes.

Here are pictures of mine:

Week 4

22. finally have caught up on writing and reading my blogs.
23. big shopping day and cooking day for Mission: Dinner. I made banana chocolate chip cookies, prepared a breakfast casserole to cook tomorrow, and made some super fantastic chicken tortilla soup.

24. The scriptures on the left are my newer ones I've only had a year or so. I had to replace the ones on the right because not only have I been missing D&C 89, but they fell out of the binding. The old set I got when I started seminary at 14. They survived seminary, institute, and 3 summers of EFY. I love them...they are full of quotes, markings, stories, and memories. But it's time to make my new ones as great as the old.

25. Bed is my favorite. I have had a really hard time sleeping since I got home from the cruise...I am only on 12 hours in 3 days. yuck, sometimes my body yells at me to make a horizontal position immediately. If only I could at work. (and yes that is a high school musical pillow case, lol)

26. Level 20 of tetris, it was an amazing feat and wonderful way to waste time at 4 in the morning.

27. All I have done for days is work, the only picture I could manage to take that wouldn't break privacy laws. I hung a lot of blood that day so if I could have that would be my picture.

28. Finally had some fun when I went to a crop at my friend Kris' house. current favorite product is anything October Afternoon and Cosmo Cricket.

Week 3

15. chocolate buffet on the cruise ship. yum.

16. nothing like spending a day on the beach...white sand, blue clear water, relaxation in the sun. bliss.

17. world's largest Crustacean. yikes, but a great photo-op nevertheless on our drive of the Florida Keys.

18. Found this and a bunch of other cow-tipping stuff during our layover in Ohio. For some reason this made me so totally happy!

19. Clink! Got together with old roomies from USU. We sure loved to clink. ;)

20. My closet is clean and organized for the first time in forever!!

21. Bought a washer and dryer! The framed picture is one from my Aunt Frances...old school tide commercial, I love it.

Scraplifting

Write.Click.Scrapbook's articles this week have been perfect for me. I am an avid scraplifter, and relaly felt bad that I couldn't comeup with my own designs anymore...like I had scrapbooked every way possible that my poor incompetent brain had thought of. But no more. Instead I actually recognize that scraplifting is not a sin. Not only does it save major time (I scrap WAY faster than I used to...like 2 LO in 30 minutes vs 1 an hour...or a movie) but I recognized that I have at many times scraplifted from myself. While I have a pretty strict no reuse policy on paper and embellishments (there are just too many good choices out there) if you have a good LO that you love for some reason--reduce reuse recycle, I say! I especially like to scraplift layouts that use tons of pictures, but keep it looking clean. I have gotten to the point where I can generally afford only 1 LO per event...my storage space can't handle much more than that, so 2 page LO with tons of pictures are my friend.

Some things I have scraplifted recently from myself and others-- Unfortunetly I didn't keep good track of where these are coming from...but 100% guarentee they are either Becky Higgins, Scrapbook's Etc mags, Simple Scrapbooks mag, or CK mag. Thanks for the inspiration and feel free to scraplift and redesign any of these how ever you want--

These 3 LO have similar styles...collage of pictures on the right, 2-3 pics on the left. And signature to my style if I use an element on one page I have to use it at least once on the other page of 2 pg LO.

These LO are also all similar in style... Grouped pictures acting as one large picture and then a second picture orienting the other direction. This is the most common way I make my LOs...actually almost every 2 page LO has one that looks similar to these.

Using photos as a border is something else I do a lot of. PS aren't my puppies just cute!

This is my new favorite way to scrapbook lots of pictures. It is a simple clean design that gives you good speca for journaling and a title without making the LO feel cluttered. I have a lot more example of this but my camera battery died!

Want to learn more about scraplifting? Check out the rest of this weeks Write.Click.Scrapbook articles by Lain.

Happy Scrapping!

Week 2

8. this is a machine that de-ices the wings of planes. This is typical in Utah, except I took this picture in GEORGIA because it had snowed in Atlanta that day.

9. We went gator spying on an Airboat tour and only found one, it was just too cold. Glad we saw one anyway.

10. At Everglades Natl. Park they have a problem with creepy vultures eating rubber off tires.

11. Finally on my Cruise aboard the Ship Norweigen Jewel. This is a day at sea, and never have I seen such vibrant and clear colors of blue water.

12. Monkey-ing around. At least the monkey here is at Gumbalimba park in Rotan, Honduras. "Who's evolved?!" -Night at the Museum

13. This is the only picture I managed to take that day...being sick on a boat is no bueno.

14. Costa Maya Mexico. Since I was sick and missed Belize, these were the only "Mayan ruins" I was able to see...at least it's shaped like a "J".

Florida Keys

back in Florida we drove the keys...

Key lime and coconut pie

Pastry:

1 1/2 cups flour

1 tsp sugar

dash of salt

1 egg yolk

1/3 cup butter

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Sift dry ingredients together. chop butter into mixture to make crumbly mix. Add sugar, egg yolk, and cold water until firm dough forms. Roll out dough and drape in pie pan. Refrigerate for 30 minutes. Bake for 15-20 minutes until golden. Reduce oven temp to 325 degrees.

Filling:

1 1/4 cups coconut milk

2 eggs, separated

3-4 key limes, juiced and rind grated

3/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup cornstarch

In a saucepan, slowly add cornstarch and coconut milk. Stir continually until mix begins to boil. Cook for 3 minutes more until thickened, keep stirring. Remove from heat and add key lime juice, rind, egg yolks, and 1/4 cup sugar. Pour into pastry crust. Stiffen egg whites into meringue while whisking in 1/2 cup sugar. spread over filling and bake for 10-15 minutes. Garnish with key lime rind.

Great Stirrup Cay, Bahamas

Bahama-mama. It was hot, sunny, and beautiful...just kicked it on the beach.

Bahama-Mama's secret recipe cookies

1 Tbsp dark rum (or rum-flavoring)

2 eggs

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1/2 cup macadamia or cashew nuts, chopped

1/2 cup butter, softened

2 cups flour

1 tsp cinnamon

1 cup rasins (opt)

1 cup brown sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp cloves

1 cup dates, chopped (opt)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix together rum, butter, and brown sugar. Sift dry ingredients together and mix into rum butter mixture. Add dates, raisins, nuts. Arrange cookie dough on greased cookie sheets. Bake for 10 minutes.

Day at Sea #2

The second day at sea was spent looking at the ocean, eating, looking at more ocean, and sleeping.

Fried Fish

6 pieces of fish

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp parsley

1/2 cup cold water

1 lime, juiced

2 1/2 Tbsp flour

1/2 tsp garlic salt or celery salt

1/2 tsp pepper

1/2 tsp thyme

1/2 cup vegetable oil

Sprinkle fish with lime juice. season with celery salt, ginger, pepper, thyme, and parsley. Let sit for 10-20 minutes. Mix flour and water into a thin batter. Coat fish on all sides. Heat oil and fry fish until golden brown on both sides. Drain on paper towel.

Costa Maya Mexico

because I have been craving Empanadas and the day was spent in mexico... This is a link to a set of Empanada recipes on allrecipes.com

Day 4

Day 4 all I could eat was a banana because I was so sick. Thus we have...

Banana Vanilla Muffins

1 1/4 cup mashed banana

1/2 cup butter

1 1/2 cup flour

1 egg, beaten

1/2 tsp vanilla

3/4 cup sugar

1 tsp baking soda

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine bananas, eggs, sugar, butter, and vanilla. Dissolve baking soda in 1 Tbsp of hot water and add to banana mixture. Mix until creamy and add flour. Bake in greased muffin tin for 20 minutes.

Rotan, Honduras

Day 3 was spent with the monkeys in Honduras...

Monkey Tails

3 Bananas (large)

2 Tbsp Orange juice

1 cup chocolate chips

6 Popsicle sticks

Cut bananas in half and peel. Insert stick. Brush with orange juice. Freeze until firm. Melt chocolate chips and dip bananas. Wrap in plastic wrap and freeze until ready to eat. Roll in coconut or sprinkles for fun.

Day at Sea #1

This was a Day at sea as we headed out to the Carribean on our cruise.

I ate some amaz-za-zing Bavarian cream for dessert.

Bavarian Cream

2 Tbsp unflavored gelatin
1/2 cup cold water
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup white sugar
pinch of salt
2 cups milk
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups heavy cream

Stir together the gelatin and cold water. Set aside to soften. In a 2nd bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, sugar and salt until smooth. In a saucepan, bring the milk to a boil. Stir a small amount into the egg yolk mixture, continue adding egg yolk mixture into the hot milk until well blended. Whisk in the softened gelatin and vanilla. Run through a strainer, and allow to cool. When the mixture has cooled to room temperature, whip the heavy cream to medium stiffness and fold into it. Refrigerate until ready to use.

Great to use as a filling or layer in a lot of different desserts.

This is the one I had...

Florida

Day 2 was spent at Everglades Natl. Park and in Key Largo.

Here is a recipe from Key Largo inspired by the "Don't stop the cook! Carribean Food" cookbook I got.

Key Largo Lime and Mango Shrimp

Shrimp:

1 lb shrimp, cleaned, and shelled.

1 cup shredded coconut

1 cup breadcrumbs

2 eggs, beaten

1-2 cups milk

oil for frying

Clean and prepare shrimp. Soak in milk for 10-20 minutes. Mix coconut and breadcrumbs. Dip shrimp in beaten egg, then roll in coconut mixture. Fry shrimp until golden brown. Drain on a paper towel.

Dipping Sauce:

1 cup yogurt (Key Lime flavor if possible; otherwise add 1 TBsp of key lime juice extra)

1 Tbsp lime juice

1 cup mango pureed.

Blend all ingredients together et chill. Serve as dipping sauce to coconut shrimp.

Pirates of the Carribean and other fun recipes.

I just got back (Jan. 17th) from a trip to the Western Carribean and Florida. I want to do what I did last trip I took (Seattle) and pick a recipe of the day for each day of the trip.

So here is Day 1:

We spent the day looking for gators... While I've had crocodile and it was tasty, I don't reckon here in Utah I'll be able to cook myself up some gator so let's go with...

Tator Tots instead.

1 pound ground beef
1 onion, chopped
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 (32 ounce) package tater tots
1 can condensed cream of mushroom soup
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 cups shredded Cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 350 degrees
In a large skillet brown the ground beef with the onions. Drain grease, add salt and pepper to taste. Spread the beef over the bottom of a 2 quart casserole dish. Layer tater tots over beef. In a small bowl, stir the soup into the milk until smooth; pour over tater tot and beef layers. Sprinkle Cheddar cheese evenly over the top. Bake in preheated oven for 30 to 40 minutes, until cheese is bubbly and slightly brown.

Now to turn it into Gator Tater Tot Bake...Add a layer of green beans.

Week 1

1. get together with friends from high school to celebrate the holidays and play with all the new babies.

2. family party with the cousins to celebrate the holidays and play with all the new babies.

3. finally got all my Christmas packed up.

4. finally did all of my laundry. i had mountains of it and had to drag it to my parents house. i really need to buy a washer and dryer. i also realized i only weer bright colored tshirts, jeans, and brightly colored scrubs.
5. spending all my free time watching glee on DVD. love love love this show!

6. I may have a 12 pack of A&W rootbeer cans in the pantry, but sometimes all a girl wants is rootbeer from the tap. A&W only of course!

7. room is almost clean and i'm all packed up for my cruise. my suitcase is a nice 48lbs. i always overpack.

Project 365

Many of you have heard of Project 365. I blogged about it sometime the beginning of last year and being a timeline enthusiast I didn't feel like I could start without it being from the beginning. So here is my chance to start. I am super excited and will try to post each weeks worth a pictures.

So I present to you: January 1, 2010