Homemade pizza....MMMMMM

I have to give a little shout out to a great recipe that I just found.  There is a frequent scenario at my home when it comes to meal preparation.  Often I have something in mind that I want to make, and I have some ingredients that I need to use up and I have to find a way to make them work together.  Solution - Allrecipes.com.  As I have said before, this is my favorite resource for recipes.  I love to use their ingredient search when I have something that I need to use up, or if I need to find a new way to use a certain combination of ingredients.

Last night I wanted to make homemade pizza, but I didn't want to make just our usual hawaiian, and I had some chicken that I needed to use.  I'm not a fan of the barbecue chicken pizzas that seem to be all the rage these days, so I went to Allrecipes.com to the ingredient search and typed in "chicken" in the wanted ingredients section, and used "pizza" as a keyword.  I found the most fabulous recipe for Chicken Pesto Pizza.  I made pizza dough in my bread maker (be sure to make extra for cheesy breadsticks!) and used my favorite pesto mix by Simply Organic.  I didn't have any artichoke hearts (although that would have been divine) and substituted mozzarella & a little parmesan for the fontina.  I topped with a little chopped tomato and voila!  It was really yummy.  Even my husband and kids who aren't pesto fans liked it.  This one is definitely a keeper.

As I suspected...

Well, mother nature was just messing with us because winter is back in full force.  I think we got 4-5 inches last night - although it felt like a lot more when I was struggling shoveling it this morning.  The funniest thing happened this afternoon as I was standing at my kitchen window.  It literally started snowing in front of my eyes - and I'm not talking little flakes here and there.  One second it was clear, and then next there was a huge downfall of snow.  Although that's not quite as interesting as what I saw yesterday from my kitchen window.  There was a buck walking through our backyard!  Now, we get deer in our backyard all the time but I think I've only seen a buck once before.  My husband (the hunter) of coarse doesn't believe me because he's only ever seen does.  Life in the mountains...

Since we're still cooped up here I've taken the time to play more with my Stampendous stamps. 

Pear Happy Birthday - I really liked this combination of colors.  Very peaceful.  And I love pears - they may be my favorite fruit.  Just check out my canning inventory to see how much pear jam I made last year!

Stamps:  Fresh Fruit, Paisley Spring
Cardstock:  Wheat yellow and moss green (AC Cardstock), White (Georgia Pacific)
Ink:  Memento Graphite Black pigment ink
Accessories:  Copic Markers, Cuttlebug "Victoria" embossing folder, sewing machine, gold gems, sage gingham ribbon, Coluzzle

Happy Easter - I love this set.  I love paisley and this set has the most beautiful combination of a heart, a butterfly, and two easter eggs in addition to words for beautiful phrasing.  A very versatile, if not a little intimidating set.

Stamps:  Paisley Spring
Cardstock:  Light and dark Plum, moss green (Stampin' Up), White (Georgia Pacific)
Ink:  Memento Graphite Black pigment ink
Accessories:  Copic Markers, Cuttlebug "Swiss Dots" embossing folder, Cuttlebug "Flower #1 die", sewing machine, sewing machine, white marker, white organdy ribbon, Pearl gems, dimensional glue dots

Butterfly Happy Birthday - Another card with this beautiful set.  I'm still learning with my Copics, and it's a little intimidating coloring an image with so many little details, but I think it works.

Stamps:  Paisley Spring
Cardstock:  Purple (Bazzill), pink & green (Stampin' Up!), white (Georgia Pacific), pink & white striped paper (Stampin' Up!)
Ink:  Memento Graphite Black pigment ink
Accessories:  Copic Markers, glitter glue (Gina K), Imaginesce Bazzill flowers, Scallop edged scissors (Provo craft), sewing machine, purple gems

Hap bee Day - Isn't this bee the cutest thing you have ever seen?  Stampendous has a number of stamps and sets with this cute little guy.

Stamps:  Hap Bee Day
Cardstock:  pink & green (Stampin' Up!), yellow (Bazzill), white (Georgia Pacific)
Ink:  Memento Graphite Black pigment ink
Accessories:  Copic Markers, black glitter (Doodlebug Design Inc), Cuttlebug "Swirls" embossing folder, ribbon (American Crafts), 1/8th whole punch

Spring is in the air

I can't believe that it is February and we are already starting to see signs of spring.  The weather has been downright balmy lately - in the 40's, which is uncharacteristically warm for this time of year.  There has been very little snow this year too.  This morning my son and I went for a walk and I couldn't believe it when I saw little hints of green starting to poke up in the garden!  Of coarse this is Utah, so regardless of how warm it is now it may still be snowing in the middle of April like it was last year - which could actually be a good thing at this point since I would rather have the snow now than drought later.  However you look at it though, spring is definitely in the air which made me feel rather - STAMPENDOUS!

I have had this flock for months and had a bunch of Fun Flock for months and hadn't done anything with it, one of the colors of which was a bright, sunny yellow.  I decided that a cute chick stamp would be perfect to use the flock on, so off I went to Archiver's and found the cutest Stampendous cling rubber chickie called Cling Shower Chick.  I had never used cling rubber before this - I think I like it!  Clear stamps can be of such varying quality between companies.  It was nice to use plain old rubber and still have the ease of using a clear acrylic block and be able to see where I was stamping.  That said, I used another Stampendous stamp - this one a clear stamp - to stamp "Thank You".  Here's what I made:

 

The colorful paper in the background is another recent find - a paper company called Best Creation.  They have the cutest paper, most of which has some bling, and it's double sided!  At least the stuff that I have seen so far has been.  Anyway, I hope you enjoy the card, and sorry to anybody living in the east getting hammered with snow!

Very Valentine

 

 I am helping out with the activities for my daughter's Valentine party, so I had to come up with some easy crafts for them to do.  It's really hard for me to tone things down and remember these are children who don't want to spend forever making projects like these, and will most likely rip them to shreds shortly after (or during) the party anyway.  And with it being Valentine's Day, I had to try and tone down the pink and hearts and come up with something the boys could do too.  So this is what I came up with:  

• Matchbooks with Sweetarts inside - frogs for the boys and hearts for the girls
• Magnets - the little red and white lips are mounted on chipboard and have the peel and stick magnets on the back
• Valentines to give away - I was informed by my girls that the Valentines had to have candy with them, so cellophane bags with toppers it is!  But instead of ribbon, staples, because I was making almost 50 of them after all.  Whatever happened to those boxes of paper Valentines that you could just pick up at the store?
• A Valentine for the teacher - I am just loving the Sweet Treats Cricut cartridge and Doodlebug Design paper.  Cupcakes and pink & brown - I'm so trendy!

Yeah! It's....Monday...?

Can I just start out by saying that last week was a write-off and far from domestic bliss.  Three trips to the doctor's office in 2 days, amidst a science fair project being due, hosting a bunch of 8 and 9 year old girls, playing chauffeur to my sick husband, potty training, being sick myself...

It just wasn't fun.

But on the bright side, THIS Monday is way better than last Monday.  I got grocery shopping and some cleaning done this morning, my son is actually taking a nap, and the girls won't be home from school for another half hour.  I should be in my craft room playing and creating, which brings me to my constant battle.  I have a hard time starting anything when I know that I'm going to be interrupted.  And hello?  I'm a mother of three children, so I am constantly getting interrupted.  My life is one big interruption!  So here I sit, rambling on my blog, and looking at other blogs, searching for inspiration.  I am a very firm believer that everyone needs a creative outlet - it's therapeutic.  And heaven knows, I need therapy!  ;-)  So why is it so hard to get started?