DH found these in the back yard yesterday. I am so happy to see them!
So refreshing to see the beautiful colors of crocus blooms.
In the evening, Middle Daughter and I caught up on several episodes of Top Chef. A friend gave us ten pounds of pecans, so while I watched, I picked pecan meats. Got a quart with lots more to crack and pick.
The grands are here today and the weather is beautiful. I think we’ll have some fun!
~~Rhonda
We are seeing signs of spring, even if it’s only inside the house. Our late blooming Christmas cactus has a bud.
And the hippeastrum is blooming. My mother called this clivia, but that isn’t the correct name. She took a start from this plant at her great-uncle’s house years ago. It is commonly called an amaryllis, but it’s not a true amaryllis.
I made peach pie for my Valentine. While I had the rolling pin out, I also made a pie for our friend Gary and had enough crust and peach filling left to make a little pie that we shared with our friends Roger and Marilyn.
I’ve been working on ornaments. I ordered some small deer last week. Today I painted them white and glittered them.
Then I made an ornament using one of the little deer.
I also made 30 new soldered ornaments this week using Christmas cards with bird pictures. Here are a few of them.
Getting down to business, here’s the menu for the week.
Monday
Pork Tenderloin Sandwiches
Tuesday
Carry Out
Wednesday
Ravioli and Cheese Bake
Salad
Green Beans
Thursday
Chicken Alfredo Baked Ziti
Balsamic Roasted Brussels Sprouts
Corn
Garlic Bread
Friday
Smoked Pork Shank and Beans
Cornbread
Saturday
Fridge Food
Sunday
Spaghetti Carbonara
Garlic Bread
Sugar Snap Peas
Corn
You can find many menu ideas at Menu Plan Monday.
~~Rhonda
Wednesday afternoon, my friend Tricia came over and we worked on picture puzzle blocks together. I made a set four years ago. The tutorial is here:
This time, I made a set with pictures of the twins. The blocks still need another coat of Mod Podge and then a sealer. I’ll get to that later today. The finished size for this puzzle is six inches by three inches, using two inch square blocks.
This one shows what happens if the picture isn’t cropped to avoid having someone’s face caught in the wrong spot. This picture had been cropped previously and then saved, so I didn’t have the original. I had to work with what I had. But I love the picture, so used it anyway. If these were gifts for children, they wouldn’t mind, or even notice, probably.
This picture shows Snow White and Rose Red wearing Christmas sweatshirts I made for DH and our children about 25 years ago. Snow White (on the left) is wearing the one her daddy wore and Rose Red is wearing the one her grandpa wore.
Your turn!
~~Rhonda
Today is cold and windy. Overcast and snowing now and then. I’m thankful for our warm home.
A good day for Winston to catnap in a comfy spot.
I finished the menu for the week. I had it laid out yesterday but didn’t get around to finishing the post. Here it is. The Slow Cooker Chicken and Corn Chowder was very good. I added leftover mashed potatoes to it and also two cups of shredded cheese. Next time, I will add a can of creamed corn to it in addition to the whole kernel corn. Also, I didn’t add a thickener. It didn’t need it. Perhaps because I used mashed potatoes.
Monday
Slow Cooker Chicken and Corn Chowder
Harvest Grain Toast
Tuesday
Fridge Food
Wednesday
Sloppy Joes
Homemade Buns
Roasted Ranch Potatoes
Green Beans
Thursday
Chicken and Rice Casserole
Sautéed Mushrooms
Balsamic Roasted Brussels Sprouts
Friday
Smoked Ham Shank and Beans
Cornbread
Saturday
Fridge Food
Sunday / Happy Valentine’s Day!
Marinated Pork Tenderloin
Mashed Potatoes
Corn
Green Beans with Mushroom Sauce
Apple Pie and Homemade Ice Cream
You can find many menu ideas at Menu Plan Monday.
~~Rhonda
I have been using Christmas cards that were kindly shared with me to make some new shadow boxes and diorama ornaments. Following are a few of them. Note: the pictures don’t give a good sense of scale. These ornaments range in size from two inches to three and a half inches.
Tutorial for shadow boxes from Christmas cards: shadow boxes from Christmas cards
Tutorial for diorama ornaments: Christmas ornament diorama tutorial
This Christmas card seemed to ask for copper colored embellishments. I have a smattering, so was able to utilize some of them on this project.
I always like the white snowy themed shadow boxes. The Christmas card used for this little box was perfect. The placement of the sleigh and bridge and the river running to the front all worked to make a pleasing scene.
A close-up of the bottle brush tree and embellishments…
I thought this pink ornament needed a pink pipe cleaner trim. I had to order the right color so it sat aside for a few days until the order arrived.
Finished. The tree topper on the little pink bottle brush tree is a spacer bead.
The ball for this ornament is three and a half inches wide. The bigger ornaments give more wiggle room for placing embellishments.
This diorama is in a two inch wide ornament ball.
The scene with the large white deer is in a three inch ornament ball. The outside of this ball has white snowflakes on a dark blue background and a frosty beaded finish. It looks very nice with the white interior.
This ornament has a snowflake on a short chain, dangling from the bottom.
I painted the bunny white and, while still wet, doused him in fine white glitter. When the paint dried, I added the black eyes and pink nose with fine tip Sharpie felt pens.
I spent some time online looking for items I can use in new ornaments. I ordered some mini deer, snowmen, and bunnies. Also some greenery and more pipe cleaners in new colors.
If you’re interested, I have a Pinterest board that contains a few links to places I’ve found that carry items I can use when making Putz houses or other crafts that use miniature figures or Christmas craft supplies. Follow this link:
A piece of advice for those who want to collect embellishments for art/craft projects. Keep track of where you bought each item. I wish I had kept track of where my embellishments came from. It would make it easier to replenish the supply when I run out of a particular item. It’s a little frustrating to run out of a favorite embellishment and not know where to find it again. I have started a file in Evernote for just that purpose. I take a picture of the item, make notes about where it was purchased and how much it cost and the date I bought it. In Evernote, I can add tags and/or write a description in my notes of the item. That makes it is easy to do a search on my Evernote files to find what I need.
I hope you enjoyed the new ornaments. I’ll post again as I work on others.
My Putz Christmas card shadow boxes and diorama ornaments are featured in my Etsy shop. ChristmasNotebook
~~Rhonda
I tried a new-for-me recipe this week. I based my version on this recipe that I found online. Roasted Ranch Potatoes with Bacon and Cheese
I have to use dry onion (and not a lot of it) in dishes I make because my husband is allergic to onion. The dry onion flakes don’t seem to bother him like fresh onion does. For the dry onion used in this recipe, you may use any amount of sautéed fresh onion, scallions or green onions that you like.
Roasted Ranch Potatoes
5 pounds small red potatoes
1 cup bottled Ranch dressing
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
6 slices cooked and crumbled bacon
1/4 cup fresh parsley, minced
1 teaspoon dry dill (OR 1 teaspoon dry rosemary)
1 Tablespoon dry onion (or the amount of sautéed fresh onion that you prefer)
1 teaspoon basil
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated black pepper
Preheat oven to 400°F. Grease a 9×13 baking dish.
Wash the potatoes and cut into large bite-size pieces. Do not peel. Place into a large bowl.
Place the other ingredients into the bowl and stir until the potatoes are well coated.
Place the potatoes into the baking dish and spread evenly.
Bake in a 400°F oven for 45-60 minutes or until potatoes are fork tender. Baking time depends on the size of the potato pieces.
The potatoes were delicious with hamburgers.
I like to cook bacon in the oven. I line a cookie sheet with foil, lay out the bacon and bake in a 400°F oven for 10-15 minutes.
For the recipe, I diced the bacon into small pieces. I used a little of the bacon grease to fry the hamburgers.
Everyone gave the potatoes a thumbs up. This would be a good dish to take to a potluck. I haven’t tried this recipe in a crock pot, but I think it would work well. Wouldn’t be crispy but would still taste good. I’d cook it on low for four hours or on high for two or three hours.
~~Rhonda
The grands were here last weekend. Their parents came to take down the last of the Christmas decorations (yeah!!). Things look a bit bare now, but it is nice to have it all stored away for next year.
I worked on more soldered ornaments this past week. These are fun to make. You can find the tutorial here: soldered Christmas ornaments using microscope slides
I dyed some bottle brush trees. Aren’t they pretty?
I dried some fresh parsley to refill the parsley bottle. Friends gave us a dehydrator more than twenty years ago and we still use it.
I’ll need some of that dried parsley for the menu this week.
Monday
Hamburgers
Homemade Buns
Roasted Ranch Potatoes
Celery Sticks
Tuesday
Creamy Shrimp and Mushroom Pasta
Garlic bread
Peas
Wednesday
Taco Pizza
Thursday
Cheesy Potato Sausage Soup
Friday
Fridge Food
Saturday
Baby Back Ribs in the Crock Pot
Roasted Potatoes / Carrots / Brussels Sprouts
Side Salad
Sunday
Roasted Lemon Chicken with Veggies
Green Salad
Rosemary Bread
You can find many menu ideas at Menu Plan Monday.
~~Rhonda
This is a new recipe for me. It is very easy to make and turned out delicious. We will be having this again. I started with the chicken recipe at the following link and modified it slightly for my own use. Roasted Lemon Chicken with Potatoes and Rosemary
I used boneless, skinless chicken as that is what I had. The dish would be delicious with bone-in, skin-on chicken, as well. Probably even better. Cut up a whole chicken or buy it already cut.
I used small red potatoes. Fingerlings would work well, too.
After juicing the second lemon, I sliced it, too, and added it to the dish.
Roasted Lemon Chicken with Veggies
2 large chicken breasts, each cut into three pieces
6 chicken thighs
12 small whole potatoes (or cut larger ones into small pieces)
1 onion, quartered
2 lemons (one sliced, one juiced)
1-2 cups small tomatoes
3 cloves garlic, minced
6 long stems of rosemary, leaves stripped from stems (Optional: reserve one stem for garnish.)
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/3 c. olive oil
Preheat oven to 400°.
Grease a 9×13 baking pan. Place chicken in the bottom of the pan. Place potatoes, onion, one sliced lemon and tomatoes between and over the chicken.
Sprinkle with juice of one lemon, minced garlic, rosemary leaves, salt and pepper. Drizzle with olive oil.
Bake, uncovered, in a 400° oven for 60-70 minutes. Chicken should be at 165° and potatoes should be soft when pierced with a knife.
I hope you will give this recipe a try. It smelled wonderful while baking and turned out so well. Thumbs up from us!
~~Rhonda
On January 17, Snow White and Rose Red planted basil.
Snow White planted hers in a flower pot.
It came up yesterday.
Rose Red made a planter from an egg carton and planted one seed in each section.
Hers came up today.
They’ll be here this weekend. It will be fun to see their reactions. We’ll probably have to find something else to plant, too.
Winston and Ski are waiting for the wheat berries to sprout…
~~Rhonda
When it’s very cold (and for me that’s anything under 25°), I feel like time crawls along. Not sure why. But there it is. So the past week or so has been dragging. I’ve looked at the forecast and the weather looks better going forward. Even some 50s on the horizon. I like the sound of that. I am already yearning for spring. I confess. I am ready to see some of these.
And some of these.
And some of these.
While I wait for God’s good timing for spring, I am making ornaments and considering the ins and outs of having an Etsy shop. More pondering to be done there. In the meantime, here’s what I’ve been working on.
I managed to pull together a menu for the week. Having an idea ahead of time saves stress at supper time. Even if we juggle it during the week or skip a meal or decide we want something else, the guide is still in place. For the most part, we follow it pretty well.
Monday
Take Out
Tuesday
Chicken Tortellini Soup
Harvest Grain Toast
Wednesday
Cheesy Potato Sausage Soup
Cornbread
Thursday
Roasted Lemon Chicken with Potatoes and Rosemary
Corn / Peas
Spinach Salad
Friday
Chicken Taco Chili
Cornbread
Saturday
Turkey in the Crock Pot for Sandwiches
Homemade Harvest Grain Buns
Grapes
Sunday
Homemade Pizza
You can find many menu ideas at Menu Plan Monday.
~~Rhonda