July Foodie Penpals

Posted on July 31, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

So my pal Joanna introduced me to this program called Foodie Penpals. It’s hosted by Lindsay over at The Lean Green Bean and it’s kind of a big deal! I like food and I like mail (and Cupcake really likes when momma gets a package in the mail!) so I thought I’d give it a try! So this was my first month participating and I was matched up with other first time participants, so it was exciting for all of us! I received a package of goodies from Kindra over at Miss Metropolitan. She’s a dachshund lover, too!!! So here’s what arrived from Texas!

Starting out front she sent me some Texas napkins! Cute! It’s a good thing neither of these schools are big Purdue rivals or I would totally let my dachshund destroy those napkins.

Next we have a few different varieties of tea. I have to admit I don’t drink tea often. I typically reach for hot cocoa if I want a warm drink. And I think I’ll wait for some cooler weather before trying these out.

Pineapple………..yum! How did she know pineapple is my favorite fruit?!?!?!?!

Jell-O………tropical fusion flavored. I’ve never tried this flavor but I love Jell-O as a summer snack. Especially with a dollop of whipped cream on top and I just so happen to have some in the fridge……. I just might share with Cupcake as she loves Jell-O, too. Or I might wait until she’s sleeping to dig in!

Trail mix with chocolate! My favorite kind of trail mix! It also has cranberries, so it’s healthy, right? She noted that it makes a great pre or post workout snack, but I think it makes a great 12-hour car trip snack!

Clint’s salsa. This is a Texas made salsa that I hear isn’t too spicy. How funny is it that I get paired with someone from Texas, you know where they eat spicy food, and I don’t like spicy food. I haven’t had a chance to try to the salsa out, yet as we are fresh out of tortilla chips. The good news is if I think it’s too spicy hubby will love it. I also want to note that Kindra’s finance’s name is Clint.

Honey, mmm…. I go through a lot of honey in this house! It’s my preferred sweetener in my oatmeal, so this will really come in handy.

What a fun selection of items! Thanks, Kindra!!!

If you want to see the box I sent out check out Rachael over at Around, Wondering.

Are you interested in participating in Foodie Penpals? Here’s the deal.

-On the 5th of the month, you will receive your penpal pairing via email. It will be your responsibility to contact your penpal and get their mailing address and any other information you might need like allergies or dietary restrictions.
-You will have until the 15th of the month to put your box of goodies in the mail. On the last day of the month, you will post about the goodies you received from your penpal!
-The boxes are to be filled with fun foodie things, local food items or even homemade treats! The spending limit is $15. The box must also include something written. This can be anything from a note explaining what’s in the box, to a fun recipe…use your imagination!
-You are responsible for figuring out the best way to ship your items depending on their size and how fragile they are. (Don’t forget about flat rate boxes!)
-Foodie Penpals is open to blog readers as well as bloggers. If you’re a reader and you get paired with a blogger, you can choose to write a short guest post for your penpal to post on their blog about what you received. If two readers are paired together, neither needs to worry about writing a post for that month.
- Foodie Penpals is open to US, Canadian residents & UK residents. Please note, Canadian Residents will be paired with other Canadians only. We’ve determined things might get too slow and backed up if we’re trying to send foods through customs across the border from US to Canada and vice versa. So, I’m going to keep two separate lists and match US w/ US and Canada w/ Canada!

For more info or to sign up, head on over to The Lean Green Bean.

Bathtime Picasso

Posted on July 27, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

Like momma, like daughter. Cupcake likes to get crafty. Her new obsession is painting! She asks to paint every day. She’s so cute when she paints, too. She always dips her paintbrush in the coordinating paint color when first starting. So the red paint brush always goes in the red paint first, the blue brush in the blue paint, and the yellow brush in the yellow paint. If I don’t give her one of those colors she debates for a really long time about what color to dip the brush in. It’s really fun to watch her thinking about it.

Anywho, I attempted to make bathtub crayons once and it didn’t work. I made a big mess making them and they didn’t actually show any color on the white tub or tile. I recently discovered this post on how to make bathtub paint on Pinterest and figured this was one I wouldn’t screw up! And she would really enjoy playing with it.

So I gathered up my supplies and got to work!

Luckily I had a brand new bottle of baby soap that I got super cheap with coupons because 1 cup of it was half the bottle!

I’m not sure I really use corn starch for cooking (at least I can’t remember the last time I used it for cooking) but I’m glad I had some on hand for crafting!

Stir, stir, stir.

I only added one drop of color to start. I wanted to make sure it didn’t stain my grout, but still was colorful enough. I figured I could add more color after a test run if needed.

I thought the colors looked pretty good!

And then bath time finally came!

Does she like it?

I think she does!!!!!!!!

It’s important to note that at first she only wanted to dip her green paint brush in the green paint. It’s also important to note that the colors showed up fine on the white tile and tub, but also washed off clean. And now Cupcake wants to take a bath 3 times a day just so she can paint on the walls!

Bath tub paint

1 cup baby bubble bath or body wash – as long as it is clear/white
4 tbsp cornstarch
a few drops of food coloring
small containers with lids

Combine the body wash and cornstarch. Divide into 4 separate containers. Add one food coloring to each container until you reach your desired color. Paint!!! When you’re done, snap the lids on and save the leftovers for next time!

Fresh Out of Walnuts – Banana Bread

Posted on July 25, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

Cupcake loves bananas! Every time we go to the grocery store she demands bananas. Some times we’re quick to eat the bananas. Other times not so much. But who doesn’t mind have a few overripe bananas around? Banana bread is always an option! I ended up with two overripe bananas this week, which was perfect because my favorite banana bread recipe calls for two bananas!

So I set to work on my banana bread. As always I didn’t plan ahead so my butter wasn’t softened, but that’s something 10 seconds in my microwave could easily fix. I hit another speed bump along the way when I reached into the drawer in the refrigerator that holds my nuts only to discover I didn’t have walnuts! Only pecans and almonds. I highly doubt I was “fresh” out of walnuts because I don’t remember the last time I actually used walnuts in a recipe. What is a girl to do?

The good news is in that same drawer was an opened bag of mini chocolate chips!! Problem solved! And who doesn’t prefer chocolate over nuts anyway?

This recipe comes together quickly and it only makes one loaf of banana bread, which is OK with me since there are only 3 of us in this house. One loaf is all we need! I particularly like this recipe because it only calls for 2 bananas, instead of 3 like most other recipes I’ve tried, but I don’t typically end up with 3 bananas so………….. And sorry Betty Crocker, but this recipe yields a moister, or is it more moist, loaf. And that’s important to me. I think it’s the sour cream. I find that baking with sour cream typically gives me moist results.

Is your mouth watering, yet? Well, go ahead and make your own loaf, then!

Banana Chip Bread

1/4 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup mashed ripe bananas (about 2 medium)
1/2 cup sour cream
2 1/4 cup flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2-1 cup chocolate chips (depends on your preference)

1. In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

2. Stir in bananas and sour cream. Combine the flour, cinnamon, baking soda and salt. Stir into banana mixture just until moistened. Fold in chocolate chips.

3. Transfer to a greased loaf pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan to wire rack to cool completely.

Adapted from The Taste of Home Cookbook.

Big Girl’s Bookcase

Posted on July 23, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

It’s coming along! The big girl room, that is. I made some progress over the weekend and I’m so excited to share one of the projects, her new bookcase. You got a sneak peek of the bookcase project when it got rained on. The goods news is the project was able to be saved! I was a little worried because there was some exposed wood that was pretty wet, but alas my quick attention to drying it paid off.

So, the crates started out looking like this. They’re unfinished pine. I picked them up at Joann’s at 50% off, so instead of $12 each I paid $6. Score! I stacked them up in the aisle to figure out how many I needed to get the height I thought would be good and settled on 4. Four was a good number since I had 4 colors of spray paint at home.

I got one coat of paint on these suckers before the rain incident. Then they lived in the garage for 2 days since the spray paint told me to wait 48 hours before recoating (since I didn’t do it right away). And I wanted to make sure they were completely dry from being rained on as well. And I ran out of Berry Pink paint, so a trip to Home Depot was in order. Luckily for me the convertible that typically lives on the other side of the garage was off to the shop, so I could do the second coat in the garage. This makes me happy because I can see where I’ve missed spots better when I don’t have the blinding sun on me. And it’s less breezy in the garage.

So a second coat went on and then a clear coat. And then they had to dry for another 48 hours.

But alas they were dry!

So I gathered my materials. Baby monitor: check. Phone playing Pandora: check. Drill with charged battery: check (someone take note that I actually thought ahead to charge the drill battery!!!!!!!!!! That is a big deal for me!) Drill bits: check. Mending plates and wood screws: check.

I decided to attach the crates together from the back so this is what I got (also purchased when I went to pick up some more Berry Pink paint). I bought two packs of plates and 3 packs of screws. I think it cost me around $5.

And because the crates are pine and I was afraid they would split I predrilled my holes.

And screwed ‘em.

I did this on both sides between each crate.

Now here’s the tricky part. You can’t just lift this thing up to set it right side up. And it’s not because it’s heavy. It’s because you’ll just snap the wood that you’ve just attached the plates to since the crates aren’t attached to each other in the front. Flip it on it’s side, then holding the top two and bottom two crates together carefully put it upright. Phew! When it’s upright it’s sturdy. You could attach the crates together by putting a small screw on the underside of each of the crates into the one above it, but I didn’t want to chance splitting wood (since I had gotten this far without doing so!).

The next tricky part was getting it in the house (without running into my car) and up the stairs into the big girl room. Hubby was out of town for the weekend, so this was a job done alone. Again, it’s not heavy, just awkward. But it now sits in it’s new home!

How cute is that?!?!?! All that is left is to attach it to the wall. You can’t trust a 2 year old to not pull it over. Oh, and to accessorize!

I love how it turned out! I think it’ll make for a great little reading nook for Cupcake in her new room. She’s already tested it out and I’m pretty sure she likes it.

*I was inspired to paint each crate a different color after seeing it on Crazy Little Projects.

*Spray paint might not have been the best choice as the ends of the slats didn’t want the primer or paint to stick to it very well. It required several coats at weird angles to get to cover the rough edges. But I wanted to use the colors that I’ve been using on everything else in the room, so spray paint it was!

p.s. I also hung some curtains and some artwork on the walls. I only have one wall left to decorate and am waiting on the replacement mattress and we’ll be ready for moving day!!!

Did you do any craft or DIY projects this weekend?

Camera Strap Cover – A Tutorial

Posted on July 20, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

On Monday I posted this picture of some camera strap covers I made over the weekend.

They received a bit of interest, so I thought I’d share with you how I made them. I’ve made about 7 or 8 of these in the last year and a half or so and I’ve got the process down (don’t be confused by my mess up, it was a measure twice, cut once issue)! So much so that it took me about 30 minutes to whip up a new one, while taking photos along the way.

A friend of mine showed my a picture of a strap cover she liked back in the day and asked if I could make her one. At the time there weren’t any tutorials floating around the internet, so I just kind of winged it and it worked! This is not the only way to do it, it’s just the way I do it.

You need very little fabric for this project. I use cotton for the cover, jersey knit for the ruffle. Jersey knit doesn’t fray, so you don’t have to hem the edges! Half a yard of fabric will yield you several strap covers!

I have a Nikon, so my measurements are based of the Nikon camera strap. You can easily adjust the measurements to you camera strap, though.

My strap measures 20 inches between the two leather ends.

And 1.5″ wide.

So I cut my fabric at 2.5″.

And 21″.

You’ll need two of these strips.

I then cut my jersey knit. I’m going for a two layer ruffle, so my wide ruffle I cut at 2″.

I cut the top ruffle at 1.5″.

I like my ruffles really ruffly, so I don’t cut them lengthwise.

With right sides together, stitch down one long end of your fabric strips.

I use a 1/4″ hem as I like my cover to be a bit wider than my strap so it’s easier to get on and off.

Press your seam open.

To finish the short ends fold up your fabric 1/4″ and press.

Fold it up again and press again. Here’s the only part of the process where I use pins!

Repeat on the other end and then straight stitch both ends.

Now we’re going to ruffle. Set your machine to the longest stitch length.

Stitch a straight line down the middle of each of your knit pieces, leaving extra thread on the ends to gather. Do NOT backstitch!

Gather your fabric by gently pulling on the bottom thread.

Gather to the length of your strap.

Repeat the process with your top ruffle and center your skinny ruffle on top of your fat ruffle.

The ruffles can get a bit twisty, so make sure you untwist it as you go. And make sure that the edges of your ruffle are pulled away from the center, since that’s where we’re going to stitch.

Line up the edge of your large ruffle with the seam you’ve stitched attaching the two pieces. Return your stitch length to normal and stitch down the middle.

Take it slow to make sure your ruffle edges don’t try to creep back up into the middle.

Tucking your ruffle in, match your right sides together again to finish off the other long end. You don’t want to catch any ruffle edges in your seam!

Stitch your tube, while keeping those ruffles safely tucked inside!

Flip your cover right side out.

Once I flip it out I go ahead and press it as it can get a bit twisty. I just place the cover ruffle side down and press the backside (don’t press too hard!).

That’s, it! You’re done! Now admire your work!

Which color do you prefer?

And because this beat up thing has been on my camera too long……

(This was the 2nd camera strap cover I ever made)

I took a “Hey, I’m taking a picture of myself in the bathroom mirror” picture just for you to show off my new cover.

So hopefully if you are handy with a camera you are also handy with a sewing machine and can pretty up your camera strap!

p.s. If you want a little more cushion on your strap cover cut a piece of fleece (fusible fleece works great) the same width and length as your straps and add it to the back side (non-ruffle side) of your cover. My previous cover had the fleece in it and while it was more cushy it also made my neck sweaty so I opted not to use it this time.

28 Weeks: Gender Reveal!

Posted on July 18, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

I know most gender reveals happen about 8 weeks sooner, but our baby wanted to keep us waiting. We got a guess of gender at 20 weeks, but it was just a guess. Now we know for sure. But first, the bump.

It feels much bigger than it looks! It gets in the way. It wiggles. It’s full of tricks!!

I’m finding the second pregnancy to be a little more difficult. Apparently all those stretched out ligaments and joints and whatever else tend to ache a bit more the second time around. I can’t sleep without a body pillow or my hips ache. I get round ligament pain after working out or a lot of walking. And by the end of the day my lower back is usually sore.

I definitely think pregnancy in the summer is much, much harder than pregnancy in the winter. Especially since it’s been SO hot. 90 and 100 degree days do not make a pregnant momma very comfortable! Seriously, why does it have to be the hottest summer ever right now? I just can’t stay cool! If this heat keeps up I’m going to just go naked all the time!

My blood pressure is normal, my weight gain is in the healthy range, I don’t have any swelling (except after walking around in 100 degree heat all day!), I didn’t pass out after my glucose tolerance test (GTT) this time, and I had another ultrasound!

I don’t really have any food cravings or aversions any more. Well, except I want ice cream. But I always want ice cream. I still love me a big, juicy hamburger, but I don’t crave them quite like I did a few weeks ago. I have a serious sweet tooth, so I’m really hoping I passed the GTT. Update: I just got a letter in the mail today saying I failed the 1 hour and have to do the 3 hour test. Boo!!!!

So, are you curious? Do you want to know if it’s a boy or a girl?

Drum roll please……………..

It’s another girl! Cupcake is going to have a little sister to play dress up with, to share her secrets with, to gossip about boys with. For some reason hubby figured we’d only have girls. I admit I was really hoping for a boy. This is it for us, so I’ve had to deal with the emotion of knowing I’ll never have a momma’s boy. Daddy will have two girls. I hope that with them being a little less than 2.5 years apart they’ll be close.

So now we have to decide on another girl name. We are so picky about names! It didn’t matter if Cupcake was a boy or a girl, she didn’t have a name when she was born. We still hadn’t decided. At least this time we only have to focus on girl names, but still! It’s such a hard decision to make (and agree on)!

I’ve already dug through Cupcake’s old clothes (I had actually sort of gone through it earlier in the pregnancy and pulled out all the gender neutral stuff and sent the summer clothes to my sister since I knew an October baby wasn’t going to wear floral rompers even if it was a girl) and inventoried how much we had. I think we’re set on newborn sized clothes, we’re OK on 3 months sized sleepers, we have 1 long sleeved 3 months sized outfit, and we’ve got a good start on 6 months sized long sleeved stuff (since Cupcake was still wearing 6 months when fall rolled around). I stopped there because Cupcake was a slow grower, measuring 30th percentile throughout my pregnancy and after she was born. This baby is measuring 60th percentile, so maybe she’ll go through sizes quicker? I didn’t want to get to far ahead of myself and also I don’t have a lot of room in the closet (or any room in the dresser) to put those clothes since Cupcake is still in the nursery right now.

I have to admit I’m a bit bummed that we did everything gender neutral the first time around since I could’ve reused it with H2.0 if it were girly, but how was I supposed to know? Cupcake’s nursery is very neutral, so I think I’m going to try to girly it up on the cheap. It’s brown and white so I could easily bring in some pink or yellow to soften it up a bit.

And I’ve realized this post has gotten long and probably boring so I suppose I’ll end it here. If you’ve made it this far, thanks for listening. And since you stuck it out this long I suppose I’ll give you a baby picture to look at!

p.s. She already has hair!

Houston, We Have Problems!

Posted on July 16, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

Busy weekend! I did lots of cleaning. Fun! I shampooed the most run over carpet in the house (living room) and all it did was make the stains more prominent. But we rearranged the furniture so some stains are hidden and it actually looks quite good in there! Everyone else in the house was napping during this process so I was alone for furniture removal. Not a good idea! I think I pulled a belly muscle. Luckily hubby had awoken from his slumber by the time the carpet was dry and furniture was ready to be moved back in. Unfortunately Cupcake was, too, and she really wanted to ~~get in the way~~ help.

I got to spend some time down in the craft room sewing. Except that the pile of clothes that needed repaired was getting taller and my room was getting messier so I worked on the not so fun projects. And then I had time to sew a camera strap cover. And then I realized that my measurements were off and it was too narrow, but I wanted to save the ruffle, so my seam ripper saw a lot of use. And then I whipped up two more (of the correct size!). I only had enough yellow knit for one ruffled strap, so I thought I’d try something new with the scrap of yellow I had left. I think it turned out pretty cute if I don’t say so myself!

Update: Want to make a camera strap cover for yourself? Find my tutorial here.

Joann’s had ~~a bunch~~ four 50% off coupons in their circular that started yesterday, which was perfect timing because I had 4 things I wanted to buy at 50% off!!

And then I got busy painting them. And then I ran out of paint on the last one. And then they were drying outside when it suddenly started pouring down rain. Out of nowhere. With no warning!!

I think they’ll be OK. I thoroughly dried them off while my little helper ran around in the rain in just a diaper. When I head back to Home Depot to return the broken bird feeder I purchased on Saturday I’ll pick up some more paint and continue on in the hopes that I can share with you the beauty they become! Oh, and what you cannot see in this picture is that my car windows are down! Yeah, I was in such a hurry to get the crates in that I didn’t even think about my car windows! It wasn’t until 10 o’clock at night that I even realized they were still down. At least I realized it then because it also rained over night.

I’m glad we got the rain, though. It was desperately needed. The grass is so crunchy that it hurts to walk on with bare feet.

I discovered that Instant Jello in makes delicious pudding pops. And talk about easy!!

We learned that Cupcake can count to cinco in Spanish. I guess counting the rice plants in her Dora the Explorer book over and over and over again has paid off! I love how she says cuatro.

I kept the carpet shampooer handy for a bit just in case Oscar had any ideas about putting his stink on the fresh carpet (he’s been known to do that once or twice!), but luckily he didn’t leave me any carpet puddles to scrub. He did, however, end up in the doghouse for destroying one of Cupcake’s toys that I crocheted for her before she was born.

I think this one is going to take me a while to get over.

I’m getting excited to move Cupcake into her big girl room. It’s so close to being done! The mattress set was delivered……….but there was one tiny problem.

Make that a big problem! I ordered the low profile set. I was not delivered the low profile set. With as high as her bed sits off the floor plus the large boxspring and mattress it’s just too darn high off the ground for a 2 year old. Hopefully the correct set is delivered before we go on vacation. I need to figure out window treatments, finish my project that got rained on and get some stuff on the walls. And I think she’ll be ready for move in day!

And hopefully she’ll be so excited about her new room she won’t fight nap time! She did not nap yesterday, which makes for one CRANKY toddler in the evening. At least we can get her to bed a bit early on days she doesn’t nap, so there was plenty of time for cookie baking last night!

Yesterday I forgot to put dinner in the Crock Pot in the morning, but it turned out that the potatoes that I needed for the recipe became a side dish to a different dinner earlier in the week, so it wouldn’t have worked out any way. So for the first time in almost 2 years we had a pizza delivered! And it was greasy and delicious!!! And I have leftovers for lunch today! With temperatures over 90 degrees this pregnant momma needs something to look forward to!!

How was your weekend? Tell me the good and the bad. But not the ugly, please!

Clutter and Color

Posted on July 13, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

Do you have a junk drawer? You know the drawer that holds all the random crap that has nowhere else to live? Yeah, I have like 5 of them. Strangely one of them was my bedroom vanity drawer!! How it became such a mess I don’t know, but I was really getting tired of searching for my contacts case and ending up with a handful of breath mints and a keychain. (OK, maybe I do know, and it might have a little bit to do with a certain someone who is just under 3 ft. tall) I had been on the prowl for some sort of organization system for inside the drawer, but because the drawer is so shallow I kept coming up empty handed. It seems like every system out there was 5 inches tall. My poor little drawer is only 3.5 inches.

So here I am wandering through IKEA, checking out the children’s section, not that I needed anything in the children’s section, and I spot this organizer! I can’t remember the dimensions of my drawer at the time because I had basically given up on my organization plan, but I picked it up anyway and crossed my fingers I wouldn’t have to do a return (which is why I was there in the first place – to exchange a comforter for a different size). And then we picked up another set of trains for Cupcake. She loooooooves her IKEA trains!!

As embarrassing as it is here is a snippet of what was in that drawer.

My My Lowe’s card that I have yet to do anything with even though I’ve had it since the fall, several pens, a keychain, 3 nail clippers, a few packs of mints, a piece of chalk and lotions, contact stuff, hair products, oh my!

And now?!?!?!

Ta da! The organizer was almost the perfect size. It is exactly the height I needed and it just left a little space on the side, which is the perfect spot for my jewelry cleaning wipes and the scented oil for the diffuser that lives in that room. And Cupcake thinks it’s boring in there, now, so she’s stopped playing in there!!! I can now keep track of just how many lip balms, lip gloss tubes, and mini Aquaphor tubes I have. And my Invisalign trays, rubber bands, chewies, etc. are no longer strewn all about. It is bliss!!!!

Speaking of bliss Cupcake was in a state of bliss when I let her work on a messy craft project. Silly momma thought it would be fun to pick up some paint and wood shapes at the craft store the other day since they were 25% off and we could work on an art project since it’s been too warm to play outside. I set her up at her table and she got to work!

It’s not a painting party until you have purple paint on your face!

The flaw in momma’s plan was that this paint, while only costing $1, is not washable. Luckily she didn’t get any on her clothes. Her face, hands and arms however were quite messy. Oh and the table!

It took a good bit of scrubbing to get that off and my good friend Mr. Clean and his magic eraser had to make an appearance to really get it off!

Even though she was finished painting her wood pieces she was not ready to stop painting. This time momma got out the washable stuff!

So many colors to choose from!!!

I expect to see this hanging in a museum soon, very soon.

Check out the artist in action!!

Baked Chicken Cheese Enchiladas

Posted on July 11, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

See this bowl of slop? It’s about to become the most delicious enchiladas you ever had!

They’re not the best looking enchiladas. They’re not winning any beauty contests any time soon. But OMG they are tasty!! Shout out to Joanna over at Midwestern Bite for turning me on to the recipe!! The 2 year old likes them. The hubby likes them. My momma friends like them (especially after they’ve just had a baby I and I whip it up and deliver!). They make great leftovers, too!!! Really the only downside is they require you turning on the oven, which in the heat we’ve been having is the LAST thing I want to do. But I did it any way.

I filled my tortillas with that slop!

Rolled ‘em up! Tossed them into their salsa bed.

I tucked them in with a blanket of more salsa and cheese.

A sprinkle of green onions post baking.

And we devoured them!!

You want some now, don’t you? Well, lucky for you I’m going to share the recipe with you. This recipe used to be on the Food Network website, but now it’s gone!!! Don’t you worry, I have two printed copies and now it’s going to be posted on the internet again and I promise I won’t take it down!

Baked Chicken Cheese Enchiladas

Baked Chicken Cheese Enchiladas

Ingredients

4 oz. cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup sour cream
2 cups prepared salsa
2 cups grated Cheddar or Monterrey Jack cheese
2 cups shredded cooked chicken
1 cup frozen corn kernels, thawed
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
salt and pepper
4 scallions, thinly sliced
12 to 14 soft round 6 to 8-inch flour or corn tortillas

Instructions

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
In a medium bowl cream together the cream cheese and the sour cream. Stir in 1/2 cup of the salsa. Stir in 1 cup of the grated cheese.
In a second bowl toss together the chicken, corn, cumin, oregano, cayenne, salt, pepper, and 1/2 the scallions. Add the chicken mixture to the cheese mixture and stir to combine.
In a baking dish spread a 1/2 cup of the salsa over the bottom. Place about 1/3 cup of the filling on a tortilla, roll up and transfer to the baking dish with the seam side down. Repeat process for the remaining tortillas. Pour remaining salsa over enchiladas, spreading to coat all of them. Sprinkle remaining grated cheese over the top.
Enchiladas may be prepared up to this point 12 hours in advance.
Transfer to preheated oven and bake for 20 to 25 minutes until hot and bubbly. Sprinkle with the remaining scallions and serve warm.

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I highly recommend Salsa Verde for these enchiladas. My favorite salsa is from Trader Joe’s. It’s delicious and surprisingly less expensive than the Salsa Verde from the grocery store!

While you’re whipping up these enchiladas tonight I’ll be busy working on the big girl room. The mattress is being delivered this afternoon! The room is really taking shape!!

I came, I saw, I pinned, I completed!

Posted on July 9, 2012 by Heather Hawkins

Pinterest. You’re addicted, right? You pin DIY projects, recipes, home decor inspiration, toddler friendly activities and in general waste hours of your life not doing anything productive. Yeah, I’m addicted, too. I’ve pinned over 1200 things. You wanna see what I’m pinning? Check me out……

I needed Pinterest. I was a serial bookmarker. But then everything just got lost. Pictures help! And when I have pictures I’m more likely to actually get around to making things! I feel more organized. I do fall into the trap, though, where I go on a huge pinning spree without actually doing anything. At least I don’t fall into the trap of pinning million dollar houses that I will never own, though……………

Anywho, I wanted to share some Pinterest projects I’ve recently completed!!!!

Food

I’m a sucker for new recipes. I hate eating the same old thing over and over. I’m always looking for something new to add into the mix. First up, breakfast burritos! This recipe was courtesy of Mom On Timeout. I started making this recipe just as a storm started moving our way. Picture me with a dozen eggs being scrambled, bacon baked, sausage browned, and a lot of cheese at the ready and freaking out that the power is going to go out! Luckily it didn’t and burritos were made!

They were yum! Hubby is loving having these in the freezer for a quick breakfast before work. The original recipe says to cook for 3 minutes, but even with our almost new, usually too high powered microwave they weren’t cooking through, so we had to add some cook time. But I still give them a thumbs up!

Now this is the recipe that got me all giddy! Avocado Chicken Salad courtesy of Becoming Betty. It contained 3 of my favorite ingredients: avocado, lime and cilantro. The recipe calls for green onion, but strangely I didn’t have any on hand, so I omitted it, but I don’t think I was missing out.

This photo doesn’t do it any justice…………because it is day 2 of the chicken salad. And we all know how avocados feel about being exposed to air for a day! But I still devoured it! This could easily become my new go to lunch recipe. And I especially enjoyed eating it on pita, which is a bit of a treat for me! Yep, this one is a keeper!!!

Crafting

These are the pins I usually have a harder time getting to since they are typically more time consuming, but that’s what nap time is for, right? First up is a dress from A Small Snippet. I found some tank tops on clearance at Gap for $0.99 that I thought would be perfect for this project. And I was right!

I loved the print of this fabric. So colorful and bold! It was really easy to make. I have another tank waiting to be made into a dress as well, but I think I’ll try to find a more flowy fabric for the skirt. This cotton is a little stiff and poofy, so it just makes this pregnant lady look like a blimp. I think I’ll wait until my belly shrinks before wearing it out in public!

On the quick project list were these Jersey Knit Bracelets from V and Co. These were super simple and came together in minutes! And can be done with a toddler in the room without having to fight her off! And because she was so good she got one, too!

Aren’t we cute with our matchy matchy bracelets? Cupcake was super excited mommy made her a “pretty.” At least for a day. And then she stretched hers out and threw it in the toy box. I love my 2 year old.

So that’s the round up for now. I’ve got a few more projects on the waiting list, supplies on hand to work on here soon and I’ll be sure to share them with you when I finish!

What have you pinned and completed lately?