Printable Shopping List

On my mind today are staples and 

GROCERY SHOPPING.  

 

No, not stapler staples, but food that we keep in the pantry.  

What are your basics?  Are there foods I really should have that I don't?  Is there a suggested list somewhere of foods we all should have?  Its time for one of my big shopping trips, so I have food on the brain
(and my give-away).

This isn't a pantry-list, but I'm here is a link to my 

~SHOPPING LIST~

I keep a copy of this on my fridge, and when something is out, someone marks it.  If it is something brand-specific, that I know we use, then I tried to leave room for that, too.  You will also see that I have room for the kids to write in what shampoo they want this month, and what type of deodorant they want me to pick up!

While I've tried to follow the lists of others as guidelines, I eventually created my own.  One of my basic staples is stewed tomatoes and tomato paste.  I rarely use them, now, but there was a time when tomatoes were my go-to vegetable.  

 Something else I keep in my pantry are beans.  I keep a lot of dried beans!  LOTS!  But you know what?  I also keep cans of baked beans and kidney beans and navy beans...  well, you get the idea.  I always kept kidney beans in there (I love chili with beans), but a few years ago my sister-in-law shared an AMAZING bean recipe so now I try to keep multiples of the ingredients on hand because not only does my family like it, it is also a recipe I can whip up at a minute's notice and bring to a pot-luck.  I think I will share that recipe in a day or so, since I'm going to make it for the holiday weekend.  YUM.

More things I make sure to stock include pasta, cooking oil/evoo, sugar, and flour.  Back when we were younger I found a lot of recipes you could make with just a few ingredients and they weren't semi-homemade, they were entirely home-made.  I don't have as much time as I used to, but I still think about the times I didn't have the money to buy the extras, and having those materials in the pantry gives me some peace of mind.  

Of course, this means that tonight my crafting will be limited to what I can do when I have gone grocery shopping, put everything away, individually bagged the chicken, and pre-made the burgers for freezing... 

which, I guess, is creative enough!

Here is a picture of the latest project Doogie and I are working on.  I hope to have it up to show you this weekend.  It will go in her room.

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!

         

Give-Away Fun

I'm doing a giveaway!  

One reader will win a  $20 Gift Certificate to Amazon.com!

Check it out on my Give-Away page - There is a link on the top of the page or check out the button on the right side, which looks like this:

Thanks for playing!

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!

Water Bottle Label Template

photo from Ruffledblog.com

Recently, when I was planning our son's college graduation party, I kept seeing personalized water-bottle labels.  But when I went to make them, I couldn't find any templates anywhere.  

I really thought I needed one.  

If you are looking for one, HERE is a basic template to start with.  Yellow & Blue were G's college colors.

I have posted a template below that has a  

UPC symbol 

&

personalized nutrition facts (cute!).

photo from ehow.com

But it turns out that I didn't really need a template!  Really, I was so worried about it - I guess because of all of the other party details - that when I sat down to create one, it was just all about decorating a rectangle!  

How simple is that??

But I'm attaching two templates here, anyway.  Just know that you can resize and re-color them any way you want.   The link above is to the blue and yellow backgrounds that I used to match my son's school colors.  

When I was looking, I finally found THIS template on Ruffledblog.  

This template has a  

UPC symbol & personalized nutrition facts (like: Love instead of calories - so cute!).

Ultimately I used just regular computer paper - 

but be aware that if the regular paper gets wet, 

the ink WILL run.  

So if you have time to buy waterproof paper, you should.

OfficeDepot.com sells Xerox Waterproof Paper, 

or you can buy if off the web from a place like WaterproofPaper.com. 

Thanks for stopping by, and

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!

...from Lori@Kitchenfunk

Independence Day Snack Basket

I'm sneaking a few pictures of the "Basket Blanket" hat I made to go with the basket I painted red the other day.  

Is that term the counterpart to the term Mug Rug?? 

I had a lot of fun with this.  It was pretty challenging finding scraps that worked well together.  I didn't even think I had anything with red or blue (in any shade) so I was pleased to find that I had some rather large pieces.  This made the piecing very simple. 

This pattern is what I finally chose:

The back is two pieces of a marroon fabric - fittingly, it has little yellow starts all over it.  Here is is, below, with the marroon side up:

and here it is with the pieced side up: 

Okay, I have been very timid about starting to quilt, but I think I am ready.  Previously my piecings have been touch-and-go, so now I think I'm ready to make something Quilt-Worthy!  In the meantime, I'm going to put this out on our July 4th picnic table, and fill it with cream cheese brownies...  

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!

...from Lori@Kitchenfunk

The Big Party!

We finally had that graduation party I was so very worried about!  It was amazing, we felt so much love.  Our very favorite family members were able to come, and though we missed the others, we had some wonderful friends come out who have touched the life of our son over the course of his life.  I'm just posting a few pictures here for today.  I will give a pattern for the water-bottle labels in my next post, if anyone is interested in them. 

  

These were the personalized water bottles we made - well, we re-wrapped with a new label - We didn't get a picture of it, but on the other sides of the bottles from the school logo, we wrote things like, "Congratulations, George!" These were really cute, everyone commented on them.

 Because I was making all of the other food, we ordered a cake from Costco.  Yes, I know my son was graduating from college, but his college mascot is a DRAGON and his major was ANIMATION, so how perfectly cute was this?  He loved it! (He's got a great sense of humor)

 Here is a picture of one of our mini-shrines we arranged for him.  

And finally, this is a very poor picture of the centerpieces we made for the party.  They really looked great, but again, I didn't think to take pictures before the party started, so I am left cropping what someone else took!  :)  But we had a blast so that's just fine.  The food got rave reviews (someone even today asked me for a recipe) and we danced the night away...

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!  Have a happy Monday!

So that's what cleaning looks like...

I admit it, I have had a lazy week.  

I did some digging, some painting, & some eating.

 

I wish I could say I have been more productive.  

But look, I DID do things.  

I ate lots of raspberries from our back yard.  AMAZINGLY delicious!

I just didn't stay busy for EVERY SECOND!

I worked in my garden.  A lot.  I LOVE my garden.  I swore this year we would have an even bigger garden, but we were too busy planning for G's graduation from COLLEGE so we tilled the same size we had last year.  We did change some things around, and its pretty big anyway, but with a garden, bigger is better!

Here is some basil.   I have a few herbs.  

My banana peppers have got a little blight, 

but the green peppers look great.  

And the tomatoes!  We planted less this year - only four.  They are HUGE already!  

We also have zucchini, cukes, watermelon, string beans, ... um.  I am drawing a blank.  Oh!  We have LOTS of peppers.  The kids and I LOVE peppers.  

So I will keep you posted on the garden.  

However, I've also been working on another project.  This was from someone's trash, and previously I had cleaned it, left it that faded yellow color and used it.  But we left it under a pile of junk this winter, so it needed to be cleaned.  It really isn't the prettiest table ever, but I just cannot stand to see something perfectly good get thrown in the trash.  And believe me, this table, lounge, and 4 chairs are so sturdy that they could survive a house falling on them.

 So I washed it.

And scrubbed it. Look at that!  Hmmm... so that's what cleaning looks like...

And painted it with a plastic-perfect Krylon paint that was brown with gold flecks.  I wanted a granite shade with flecks but it wasn't sold at the store where I shopped.  The table has a granite-like texture on it.

I also thought of using a lighter brown but it was formulated for plastic and I didn't want to take the chance that any chipping would occur.  

What do you think?  See what I meant about the granite-like texture of the plastic?

Can you see the gold flecks??  

And oh, I also painted the basket.  

Trying to get out some Independence Day Decorations!  

...there will be more to come about this big ole table! 

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!!

 Since Saturday night's college grad party I have been sleep deprived, so I am wishing everyone a peaceful day at work (whether it be in or out of the home).  Tuesday at work I found myself sitting up staring at a spreadsheet...  and since no one was looking at my face, I have to admit that I closed my eyes for just a second.  JUST a second!  Boy, did it feel good!  

It also felt good that I was busy and productive today, but I did need that one second nap!  LOL


Looking forward to showing off my next project tomorrow!  In the meantime:

I wish you peace when times are hard
A light to guide you through the dark
And when storms are high and your dreams are low

I wish you the strength to let love grow ,
Oh I wish you the strength to let love flow...

(my gratitude to the Eagle's...)

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!

Bedside Book & Magazine Caddy

 Supplies Needed: 

One Funky Discount Table Runner from the Dollar Store for $3.50

 

 Here it is on my kitchen table... which is NOT what I bought it for!

 Can you imagine the book & magazine caddy?  I just accordion folded the runner to make pockets, and I sewed up both sides, creating the pockets.  Done!  How simple!

 Place the runner between the 2 mattresses on your bed, and the weight of the mattress will hold the Caddy in place.

 Here you can see I've put the top mattress down.  This is the room of my youngest, so I'm not completely free to show you her mess - I mean, room. 

 Here is the Caddy with the bed made...

 

This project took barely 10 minutes, and it was so satisfying!  However, you can see that the stripes run into each other a bit, so I think I'd like to add some ribbon to differentiate the pockets.  I'm considering black, but my daughter also likes lime green, so I might go with that.  I don't have any ribbon in green right now, so I'm going to have to go out to get some before this project is complete!  
 

I hope you get the chance to be creative today!