Being One with the Trees

Lately, we have been loving our local library card. And not just for the loads of books we check out every week, the free Wii games we rent for our family or the free storytime hours we meet friends at and get some well needed time out of the house. Our library, and many throughout Illinois, is currently offering the Museum Adventure Pass. It's a new program that started this past September and goes until August of 2010 that let's you check out free or greatly reduced passes to lots of local museums in the Chicagoland area. The passes are usually good for a family of two adults and two children and is can be checked out for 1 week at a time. Since we love to go on lots of adventures with our kidlets this pass is perfect for our family. I love being able to give our littles lots of exposure to fun things in the area, especially if it's FREE!!!

We have used the pass for numerous places on the museum list but our most favorite recently has been the Morton Arboretum. This place has been so fun for the kids to run around and burn off some much needed energy as well as just to get them outside in the sunshine and fresh air. Usually admission is $11 per adult and $8 for children 2 years old and up, so that pushes us to a grand total of $30 and that is without eating lunch or getting a snack...yikes! (And you definitely want to eat a little something here, their restaurant not only has some amazing food but their dining room has these huge floor to ceiling windows that overlook part of the arboretum so you can dine among the trees!) Here are some pictures from our last trip there:

Check out this giant tree table...so cool!

A look at some of the super sweet suspension bridges.

Lots of fun for the kidlets (and us mommas and daddas too!)

Noah feeling like Indiana Jones...

and jumping his way across this bridge

Time for some Treehouse fun.

Penny, livin' on the edge

So, if you live in Illinois or are somewhat close to the Chicagoland area, you have to get to your local library and check out one of their free museum passes before August of 2010 (and if you don't, maybe check to see if your library and your state does something similar...I mean Macy's are nationwide and they are sponsoring the program so they might have this awesome program in your state too). If you live by me and find the Morton Arboretum pass is always checked out, well...sorry, but we are just trying to live up this nice weather before the freezing temps and windchill are here!!! I only kid, har har I'm a jokester! Oh, but did you know that we had snow on Thanksgiving day!!!!!! What the Heck was that all about!?!

Happy Shopping to You!

Happy Thanksgiving

...a day late!

We were busy eating and playing yesterday, sorry! I hope you all stuffed yourselves full of all the Thanksgiving goodies on your table.

I am home now, on a mini-break from shopping. Oh, trust me. I did NOT start at 5 am. I contemplated it, not gonna lie. Instead I slept until 7:45 am and then ran out to Best Buy. This must be my lucky day though because not only did I sleep in and NOT go shopping early like I half-planned, but I arrived 3 1/2 hours later (at 8:30 am) and actually bought the exact item I was looking for, on sale, and didn't even have to wait in line...WooHoo! So much for early bird shopping. I hope you are all out there getting some great Black Friday deals too. Hmmm, where to next...maybe Joann's and Michael's?!? (Did you know Black Friday shopping was really just shopping for great deals for me? The kidlets have enough toys...right?)

Have Fun Today!

My Day...How Was Yours?

Humm...so what have I been up to today...

Well, I'll spare you the drama (well, most of it anyways) and give you the abridged version...my day went a little something like this:

1. Early morning playdate with friends...always crazy with the kidlets but always lots of fun!

2. Spent the rest of the morning and afternoon with a very cranky 15-month old whom I finally figured out was teething...a bottom premolar (I really dislike new teeth)

3. Was actually able to get both kidlets down for afternoon naps (even the crankster) and was finally able to browse through this:

Man, I love me some Martha Stewart in my mailbox...this is such a great magazine. Lots of easy recipe ideas that taste great too! I highly recommend checking it out!

4. Was also able to organize my Thanksgiving Dinner menu ...Yay!...while the kidlets slept, what a good feeling that was!

5. Waited patiently for my hubby to get home from work (ok, not really patiently, more like tapping my feet on the floor and pacing back and forth) so I could get my grocery shopping done before all the turkeys were gone. All the while with my cranky baby girl clinging to my leg and crying tears of pain...so sad!

6. Fought the crowds and grocery shopped for my entire T-Day list AND was able to get EVERYTHING!!!! Plus, my turkey only costs me $5!!! Wahoo, now that's a deal, and I loves me a deal!!!

7. Stopped by Joann's (cause I had some time and I had no littles with me which makes a trip there even more enticing) and picked up loads of patterns at their huge pattern sale. (Even though I'm not much a pattern person, I still couldn't resist passing this up!) All Simplicity and McCall's patterns for $1.99. Ok, so maybe I should have led with this little gem. Sorry! Bad Blogger friend, I know, I know...but, the good news is that this sale goes on until tomorrow!!!! Yup, you read me right! So get your little bums to Joann's for the last day of their 'Merry Moolah' sale and you can thank me tomorow!

Oh, and try to hold yourself back to ONLY buying patterns, their Black Friday sale is going to have lots of goodies at super cheap prices too...check out BlackFriday.info to see everything!

Just don't tell your hubby you heard it from me :)

Time to Get My Vote On...Again!

Hey, so have you guys been over to So You Think You're Crafty? yet?

OMGosh!!!! I just L-O-V-E going over there every Monday morning to see who the past week's winner was and what the current week's challenge is! It is almost too exciting for me for a Monday morning!! If you don't know about SYTYC, let me explain. It is this craft challenge contest (for lack of better words) that started with the choosing of 10 of the blog world's top craftiest ladies and has them pitted in a contest to find out who is the craftiest. For 10 crazy weeks they have to come up with a new craft idea based off of that week's theme then, at the end of each week one of the ladies is voted off 'So You Think You Can Dance' style by the general public (read: us!!!). Sounds crazy fun, doesn't it? Then, the winner's craft tutorial goes up the following Monday morning...gives us just a little something to look forward to on a Monday!!

So far, I have voted for the winning craft EVERY week...yeah, I'm THAT awesome! This week's challenge is so hard to choose who to vote for (they all usually are though) I just can't decide which one to vote for...ahhh, the hard choices I have to make in life sometimes :)

Dana from Made won this past week's challenge with these awesome totes...

Totally rad, right!?!
OK, so this week's challenge theme is "Turkey". Go over there now, look, browse, contemplate and get your vote on. It's a hard job, I tell you, but somebody's got to do it...hehehe!

Enjoy!

Train Stations and Good-Byes

So, the birthday weekend is coming to and end. We went down to Chicago yesterday to take in some sites and take my dad to the train station. So sad. It was so nice having him here for a few days to help us celebrate Noah's birthday. Since we live so far away from all of my family, we don't get to see them to often and we really have to cherish the time that we do have together.

There was a bit of chaos downtown yesterday since it was the Festival of Lights weekend ending with a big parade down Michigan Avenue with Mickey Mouse as the Master of Ceremonies but we made it, the weather was nice and we had a good time with two VERY energetic kidlets who do not like to sit in a stroller (anyone else have this problem?) The hardest part was when we had to drop Grandpa off at the train station. We had some major crying and screaming in the car, 'I want to go on the train with Grandpa Marc!!!!!' for the first half of a very loooong car ride home. Thank goodness both of my littles zonked out after a good fit of crying! Here are some pictures we were able to snap inbetween all the mayhem.

Too sweet!

Noah found the horse and carriage rides and couldn't get enough of them!

Yay horsies...he just loves his horsies!!!

Helping Grandpa with his luggage at Union Station

So proud!

Three Years Big!

Yup, that's right, my little baby boy Noah is 3 years old today...well, technically at 11:59 pm tonight but who wants to wait until then to celebrate and for only 1 minute! He seemed to have a blast today as at this age he very well knows it's his birthday. For the past few weeks he has been singing the Happy Birthday song on repeat and every night he has been wanting to call one of his grandparents, uncles or aunts to sing Happy Birthday to them just cause he knows how. Good times.

And, just so you know, Noah was in full force today since the minute he woke up, wanting his Cookie Monster and Elmo cakes that I had promised to make him the night before as well as a much promised toy garbage truck that he picked out OVER a month ago. We let him open the garbage truck this morning to appease him and then he had to wait for his party to open the rest...AND eat his cakes (we thought that was a good compromise, what do you think?) Anyhoo, so here are some pictures from today...enjoy!

The last known picture of Noah as a Two Year Old! **Tears**

Here are the Elmo cupcakes I made for his par-tay. He wanted both an Elmo cake and a Cookie Monster cake...this kid is so demanding, I tell you ;) I made Elmo cupcakes instead of two cakes though...I mean c'mon, who wouldn't want all these crazy mini Elmo's sitting at their party table? You can see in the picture that I made some with CRAZY lookin' mouths so they didn't all look the same, individuality...it rocks.

And here's the Cookie Monster cake that Noah just had to have...all decked out with cookies and eating cookies too. It's not Cookie Monster without the cookies, right!?!

The Birthday Boy surrounded by his Sesame Street underwear pals.

Blowing out the Big #3!

We may have done this a few times...he REALLY likes blowing out candles.

Family photo opp...3rd Birthday Fun!

Ripping into presents...here come the felt goodies :)

Whew, now I'm pooped, hope you all had a great day too!

G'night!

Linking to Poppies at Play

Sibling Love

I was going through some of the pictures we have taken over the last month and came across these:

Aren't they just so sweet, they melt your heart?

Sibling Love, that's what it's all about.

It seems my little ones have shrunken that huge gap of tiny little baby and big, big brother to two little playmates who can't be without each other...they run and chase each other, share toys and food and drinks as well as HOLD HANDS!!!! Yup, my two cuties like to do this when we go on our fun family adventures, *sigh* I just want to keep them like this forever. My little Noah likes to make sure his baby Penny is staying close by, what a good big brother he is, he doesn't want his little playmate to get lost, and I don't blame him they have way too much fun together! I love them! That's all, just wanted to let you all know :)

Felt Cupcake and Frosting Tutorial

So. I have had some readers email and write in the comment section about a tutorial for a felt cupcake. How fun, I thought...that would be a really cute felt food to make. So, here is my version of a felt cupcake with frosting. It was actually really easy to do and I actually handstitched it all in one viewing of "Eighteen Kids and Counting"...not sure why I like to watch that show, but I do. There. I said it. Please don't judge...there are worse things I could be watching, right? Please, tell me I'm right!

Looks good enough to eat!

Ok, so interested in making one of these puppies? Then, here is what you need:

Felt Cupcake and Frosting

1 brown piece of felt (or a cream colored one for a vanilla cupcake)

1 piece of felt the color of your choice (for the frosting)

polyfil

matching thread

needle

So, what I did was cut the bottom out from a cupcake liner and then cut the remaining cupcake liner to make a C-shape. These will be your templates for your cupcake! You will also take the cupcake liner (before your start cutting into it) and flip it upside down on your felt so that you can trace a larger circle for the top of the cupcake.

Then, take your needle and thread and stitch, stitch, stitch your little heart out...sewing together the base, middle section and top of the cupcake together. Make sure to leave a little opening to stuff the cupcake. I handstitched the base to the middle section first, then went up to the top and sewed that in place.

Now, stuff that sucker full, but not too full, of polyfil and sew the opening closed. Looks like a Hostess cupcake now, doesn't it? Man, I love those!

Then, just put it in a cupcake liner and there you have it...a lovely chocolate cupcake just for me...eh, Noah and Penny ;) But wait! I think we are missing something oh-so-vital to this little chocolate beauty...what could it be? Oh yeah...FROSTING!!!

Oh, Ok, that's much better! It sure was looking a little lonely, wasn't it? Wait. Do you want to learn how to make this fluffy stuff? We don't want an uproar in your home from the littles being upset about no sweet stuff on top of their cupcake, do we!?!

Ok, so to make the frosting, cut three circles about 3 inches in diameter in whatever color frosting you'd like to have on your cupcake.

Fold each circle in half and sew a few stitches down the fold.

Then, take your fingers and smoosh it to make this sort of shape...not sure what to call it...maybe a smooshed three-leaf clover? Now, go and stitch each section on the fold just like you did earlier. You should have three stitched sections on the underside when done.

Now, go ahead and sew the three smooshed flower-type things together at their pinched up bases, like the picture above.

Flip it over and Oooh and Aaahhh...now that's some frosting on a cupcake! YUM! It looks so good and creamy like it's right out of a bakery, me likey!!!

Or, what about we put the cupcake in a pretty decorated wrapper? Ahhh, that's better!

Stylish and Yummy!

Two of my favorite words :)

Crockpot Beef Stoganoff

Want an easy and super simple recipe for Beef Stroganoff, Yes Please! I pulled this recipe out of my recipe box this morning...cause it's just that time of year for beef-y/stew-y meals...and was so happy I had all the ingredients on hand (I just L-O-V-E when that happens)! It's a fantastic recipe because it hardly has any ingredients a typical beef stroganoff recipe has yet pulls off the beef stroganoff-y taste quite well. Holy Smokes, this post is challenging my spelling of 'stroganoff' BIG TIME!

I put everything in the crockpot this morning and when I came home for dinner, WOW, the house smelled heavenly. It was the perfect end to a busy day at work. Try it for your dinner soon, you won't be disappointed!

Crockpot Beef Stroganoff (Serves my fam of 4 with some leftovers)

1 lb beef stew meat

1 can cream of mushroom soup (I like the 98% fat free kind, if you cared to know!)

1 4 oz can sliced mushrooms

1 packet of dry onion soup

1/4-1/3 cup white wine

Put your meat (mine was frozen) into the crockpot and pour everything else on top. Slow cook for 8 hours on low. I really think that 'slow and low' is the way to go with this recipe, the stew meat turns out soooo tender and very flavorful! Serve with egg noodles or mashed potatoes and a green veggie to complete the meal. So easy, it's like your not even cooking!

Yum and Yum!

Felt Pumpkin Pie with Whipped Cream Tutorial

It's finished! I finally have the pumpkin pie and whipping cream tutorial up!!! Wahoo! Sorry about the delay, I was having a baking marathon yesterday and it just got way out of control. So, right about now you can get your felt-on and get to making this before T-Day. This way you and your littles can share in some delish dessert eating after your very own pre-thanksgiving extravaganza before you stuff yourself silly of the real thing...I know I'm going to do just that(yeah, that's right, I said it, honesty really is the best policy, right!?!)

Oh, and a little...or in my eyes BIG... side note, I have a few of these cute little pies going up for sale in my Etsy shop as well as some Turkey Dinners, holla!! So, if you find yourself running out of time or you just aren't one to pick up a needle and thread, then you must check out my Etsy shop and buy one! Thanks!!!

Here is what you'll need to make this oh-so-good Thanksgiving Dinner Finale:

Pumpkin Pie with Whipped Cream

1 sheet pumkin pie colored felt (I found mine at the Hob Lob, Joann's had nothing, zilch, zip in this color!)

1 sheet tan colored felt

1 sheet white colored felt

coordinating thread

polyfil for stuffing

First off, cut yourself a triangle from the pumpkin and tan colored felt each. Mine measured about 4 inches at the short end and 5 1/2 inches on the two long edges.

Then, go and cut a long rectangular piece of the pumpkin colored felt measuring 2 inches by 12 inches (you'll trim this shorter once you sew it together but I think it's always good to have a little more than less when doing attaching the pieces together!)

For the back edge of the crust, you are going to cut a tan colored piece of felt measuring 4 inches wide by about 3.5 inches.

Now, take the pumpkin pie colored triangle and sew the long strip around it, like the picture above.

Next, go ahead and take your tan colored square of felt and line it up with your pumpkin pie insides so that the widths of the square match the short edge of the pie triangle (see the picture above). You are going to sew the two pieces together with the pumpkin colored felt triangle on top of the tan felt about 2 inches, this will give you the crust top at the end of your pie slice. If you click on the picture above you can see a faint line where I am going to sew the two of them together!

Then, you are going to sew up the two vertical edges of both pie and crust on both the right and left sides, see it already done on the picture above?

Next, with the pie slice still wrong sides out, just sew the "bottom" tan colored felt crust on starting with one side of the pumpkin colored felt strip and working your way around. I didn't sew the back part of the crust together because you still need to have an opening to flip the pie right side out. So, what are you waiting for? Go ahead and flip it right side out and then stuff that baby!

Handstitch the opening shut and you are DONE!

Hurray! A piece of pumpkin pie all ready to eat!

Mmmm...check out these yummy results!

Ok, now onto the best part...the whipping cream dollop! Can I get a woot woot for some Whipping Cream! This pie is not complete without it...in my opinion anyways :)

Start by cutting a 4 x 4 inch piece of white felt.

Then, pin the edges together, like so.

Now, take your needle with some white thread and sew the edges together. You only want to sew about a 1/2 inch in, otherwise the dollop doesn't look as good!

Next, sew through the tips of each edge and pull or gather them together to make one nice point. Push in the rest of the edges to make them look all whipped cream-y and all.

And that's it!

Hope you understood this tutorial, this one was a hard one to explain!!!