Wedding layout -- honor attendants

Today's scrapbook page once again comes from our wedding scrapbook -- which I'm still working on after more than a year of marriage :D
Our photographer took some great photos, including these two photos of our honor attendants with us. (I have other pages with them, too. They will appear in a separate post.)

I wanted an elegant page incorporating both "sets" of attendants.
First, I stamped an elegant border and the title on cream-colored cardstock. I cut the title out, rounded the edges and "popped" it up, using pop-up dots. I accented the border stamp with purple rhinestones and added two daisies, one dark and one light, from our wedding flowers.
For the girls' block, I used a cream-colored paper with a quilted texture.
I printed all the attendants' names and bulleted them with a purple rhinestone.
Finally, I added lily of the valley to the bottom right corner for some added pizzaz.
And there you go. A simple and elegant page honoring our dear friends and family who stood up with us.
Tomorrow.... Lasagna!

Chore Charts and Trying to Teach Responsibility

Brian and I are big believers in trying to teach Hannah to take responsibility . . .  for the things she has and for her actions (or lack of action).
Keeping that in mind, we have tried different methods in the past to teach her -- from chore charts, groundings, earning money, positive reinforcements, negative reinforcements, etc. But she is still a little girl and like most children, she doesn't really like to do what she doesn't WANT to do. And many times she complains . . . LOUDLY.
But we keep on training her and showing her by example that it is very important that we keep a clean house and body, and that sometimes we all have to do what we may not consider fun. But all in all, if we all do what we need to do, it leads to a much happier and peaceful home and family.

So I'm trying once again, to make "chores" fun . . . or at least less of a dread. I scour the Internet -- especially Pinterest --  looking for ideas and I found one I though might actually work. A mini chore and things to do chart.
The trick is to make it cute and small so that it's easier for the kids to look at it.
Here is the original link ...    http://www.brownpaper--packages.com/2012/08/chore-chart-on-ring.html

And now for "Hannah's Chores and List of Things To Do"

The first thing I did was type in the title and then each day and lists of the things she was responsible for each day. Notice that not all things are chores and they do change slightly from day to day. All things are age appropriate and I have carved out 10 to 30 minutes of reading time each day except Tuesday, depending on when we have family worship or personal study. Since worship and personal study both entail a lot of reading, I shortened those days' reading time.
Then I printed them out on different sheets of brightly colored paper, cut them out and laminated them. I cut them out again and rounded the corners. (I hate sharp corners, they hurt more than you would think they do)
After that, I put them on a ring. (You can buy a package of about 8 to 10 rings at the most stores for less than $2)

Then I decorated each page with cute little dragonfly and flower pop-ups.
Finally, I hung the chart up on the front of our refrigerator to help remind her to do her chores. I really like the magnet hooks I found. They really make putting things on the refrigerator a lot easier.

We just implemented it this week, so we'll see how it goes. Hopefully, this one will work!

Do you have any ideas to help kids learn responsibility?

Cream Cheese Stuffed Jalapenos

It has definitely been a hectic week.
Hannah started first grade Wednesday and she's enjoying every minute of it.
I've been playing catch-up on getting reorganized. It's amazing how far behind a person gets when they have a very active 6-year-old at home :D

Today's recipe is a simple one from my sister-in-law, Cynthia. When she and my brother-in-law David were visiting a few weeks ago, she made the most delicious stuffed jalapenos. They tasted so good, I was surprised they were so simple.
So here it is... The recipe.... Get ready....

• Jalapenos
• Cream cheese
• Bacon

Yes, that is it!
Now here are the steps...

First, cut the jalapenos in half and take out the seeds. A word of advice... WEAR GLOVES. (I found that out the hard way. My hands burned for two days!)
Next, put cream cheese in the jalapenos. At this point, I put some jalapenos back together and left some halved. I preferred the ones that remained halved.

Now, slice bacon slices in half and wrap around jalapenos. Secure with a toothpick.

Then bake in a 350 degree oven for 20 to 30 minutes, until bacon is cooked. Broil for another 5 to 10 minutes, until bacon is crisp.
This is what you get...

Finally.... ENJOY!
We enjoyed these so much, I'm making them again tonight. This time I'm trying banana peppers and some milder peppers Brian bought at the farmer's market.

Cooler Weather and Mirror Pages

The weather has been so nice today. In the 70s and a nice wind blowing. So very much nicer than the more than a month of 100+ degrees!
I sat outside for a couple hours today, watching Hannah ride her bike. I actually needed a small wrap because I got a little chilly.
Hmmm. Chili. Maybe I'll have Brian make is "Oh so good chili" next week.

Today's post is about the mirror pages in our wedding album... "Bride" and "Groom."

The photos themselves are pasted on torn mulberry paper to soften them up.
On the sides of the pages I tore a piece of white cardstock and a sheet of purple cardstock and glued them to the sides with the torn edges showing.
On top of those I took leftover silk flowers from the wedding and, using pop dots, glued three of them on the side of each page.
For the title I inked the edges of a white piece of cardstock and, once again using pop dots, glued them below the photo, placing a pretty little lilac daisy in each corner.
I used glitter glue for the stenciled and cut out letters to bring attention and give the page a little bling, cause I have to have my bling!
And that's that.

And now I'm off to fix Hannah's hair for her open house tonight.
I wonder if I can talk her out of wearing her pink dress?

The Cherry Clafoutis Experiment... not as difficult as it sounds

After hitting a sale on cherries a couple weeks ago, I desperately needed to find a recipe that used my beautiful bing cherries because, as I was the only one eating them, those cherries just weren't disappearing that fast.
After searching for a while, I stumbled upon a Cherry Clafoutis recipe.
That's right.
I was going to be speaking French by the end of the night!
Ok, maybe not, but the title sounded deceptively complicated and just intriguing enough that I had to try it.
It's basically just a French custard with cherries. You can make it with other berries and fruits, too.

So here it is. My attempt at Cherry Clafoutis.

Cherry Clafoutis

Ingredients:

• 1 pound cherries
• 1 cup milk
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons melted butter
• 3 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Spray cake pan generously with non-stick cooking spray.
• Wash and dry the cherries and remove the stems and pits. The recipe I found said not to remove the pits because it adds extra flavor, but I really didn't want to bite down on a pit.
• Distribute the cherries in the pan.
• Whisk together the flour, sugar, and salt in a mixing bowl. 
• Whisk in the milk. 
• Whisk in the eggs, melted butter and vanilla extract. 
• Pour batter on top of the cherries.
• Bake for 45 minutes or until the custard is cooked through.

 Can be served warm or cold.

See... Simple. Just the kind of recipe I like.
Mine didn't turn out as pretty as the other pictures I saw, but it tasted good anyway.
Next time I'll try another fruit.

Lack of Lasagna and Two More Wedding Pages

Well, I was going to write about my attempt at making lasagna rolls, however, last evening when I was gathering my ingredients I discovered that someone (ahem, my husband) had eaten the cottage cheese!
Disaster! What's a girl to do when she has all the makings of lasagna but no cheese!?! AND she's already started the sauce?!?
Well, what any normal girl would do. We had Pasta alla Reg! A.K.A. my tomato and meat sauce with rigatoni pasta.
It turned out good and I was able to try a little trick I heard about and had never tried. I added a bit of half and half to my sauce. Brian and Hannah couldn't tell the difference, but I could :D

So in place of my lasagna rolls - which I will attempt to make again in a couple weeks - here are two more pages from our wedding scrapbook.

This page is the first page of our book...

I used two of my favorite photos of Brian and I. I put them on a pretty lilac colored background paper with raised ivory swirls.
The top right journaling block is titled "Just One Day in our Story" and documents the important dates in our relationship -- from the day we met, to the day he proposed, to the day we joined our lives together.
I love bling and had some beautiful lilac-colored beads with rhinestones on them which I used to "bullet" the dates and add a bit of sparkle to the page.
On the bottom left is a broach I have had for years. I used to wear it on a necklace but it's not really my style anymore but it was just too beautiful to give away or sell. I knew I kept it for a reason! The colors go great with the page and it adds just a little something extra to the page.

This next page is the second page of our album.

The Bible is very important to us and we use it daily. It is the basis of our relationship and family and is what we base all our decisions on -- large and small. And it played an important role in our wedding ceremony. Most of our guests also share our faith and so many of them brought their Bibles to the ceremony.
Our wonderful photographer knew how important the Bible is to us and he captured an open Bible in one of our guests hands. I took the opportunity to scrap one of the many scriptures read during the ceremony, 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, and titled the page "Love is..."
It was a simple page to do. I printed the title letters in a pretty cursive font and cut them out with an exacto knife. Then I printed the scripture on pink vellum and attached it with four brads.
Simple.

Well, I'm off to make sure Hannah's new backpack is still organized for school next week. My husband's wonderful parents took her (and two of their grandsons) shopping yesterday for school supplies. Hannah had all of her supplies except a new backpack.
And what backpack did she get?
What else but a Hello Kitty? With animal print!

Multi photo wedding page

When Brian and I were married last year, it was the first (and last) marriage for both of us and we wanted to do it right. Something classy and elegant, but also comfortable and fun. We toyed with the idea of a very small wedding with just family and very close friends, but in the end we decided we wanted to share our joy with as many people of our friends as we could.
Brian's a good sport and let me choose the color palette and most of the decorations. I'm just glad he actually likes purple and silver.
I like this page because it captures the feeling of the entire wedding and reception. Plus we had an awesome photographer who took hundreds of great photos. There is no way I will ever be able to use all the photos in a book and this was a way to get many of them on one page.

I use Shutterfly to develop most of my photos and when they send pictures back, they include a proof sheet in the package. I saw all those tiny little pictures and thought "What great idea to make a page with all of these!"
Halfway through the page my thought was "What was I thinking?!?"
But I have to say, I really love the way it turned out. It was worth the hours of work.
The large photo is an artsy shot of the entrance to our reception. I love how our photographer managed to capture the beautiful chandelier in the hotel.
Surrounding the photo are the tiny little proof photos. In between all of the photos are strips of purple ribbon and pretty little white daisies with rhinestone middles are scattered throughout the page.
On the right side of the page I used two small strips of silver ribbon.
I also wanted to bring attention to one of my favorite photos of Brian and Hannah dancing, so I used a pop-up dot to pop it up from the page.

And finally, I used a couple of heart and swirl stamps in the white space I left. I highlighted portions of the stamp with my liquid glass from Close to My Heart.
In this photo, you can also see the little daisies I used on the page.

And that's it!
It was time consuming, but totally worth it!

Mini Quiches and Wrapping Papa Around Her Little Finger

Well, we're back from my parental units. I really wish they lived closer and we could see them more often. Two and a half hours is too far, in our family's opinion.
Hannah loves spending time with them, especially when Daddy lets her ride on the riding lawn mower with him. But with the drought we've been having here in Missouri, he hasn't had to mow in well over a month. But Hannah still manages to wrap him around her little finger and get him to play games with her. My parents are truly enjoying having a granddaughter.
Her current favorite game is marbles. And she's getting pretty good at it. She's even beat me a couple times.
I took my camera but forgot to take any pictures. That's really strange for me, but we didn't do much but spend time together and relax. Brian and I are both bad about not relaxing but going away actually forces us to relax because we don't have a long list of things to do around the house.
So no real adventures. Oh! Except Hannah was pleased to discover that the Gainesville, MO, library DOES have a children's section. Mom and I heard her asking the librarian all sorts of questions about weather books. Yep, she loves learning about weather.

So, since there were no adventures in Gainesville, today's post is about the mini quiches I make my husband for his weekday breakfasts.
They freeze well, although Brian says that when I freeze them they get kind of watery when he heats them up in the morning. So I suggest using them fairly quickly, say within the week, for best results.
This recipe is extremely simple and makes 12 mini quiches.

Regina's Mini Quiches

Ingredients:

• 9 large eggs
• 1/4 to 1/3 cup half and half (you can use milk, but half and half makes them fluffier)
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Assorted chopped veggies (I usually use assorted peppers, onions, olives. This week, I cut up a jalapeno, too)
• Shredded cheese

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Coat muffin tins with nonstick cooking spray.
Whip together the eggs, half and half, salt and pepper. Pour equal amounts into muffin tin.
Add in veggies. Sprinkle cheese over top of quiches.
Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until quiches are puffy and golden brown. Allow to cool before removing them from the muffin pan. You may have to run a butter knife around the edges to loosen them up a bit.

And that's it!
Simple, right?

Tomorrow, one of my scrapbook pages from our wedding.

Cupcake Time!

Sorry, folks. Time got away from me yesterday and I forgot to post. I took Hannah to my in-laws for a few hours and I guess I was enjoying my alone time. :D
Here is my "Cupcake Time" scrapbook page. Last summer, shortly after Brian and I were married, Hannah and I took a day to make and decorate cupcakes. I, of course, took lots of pictures and Hannah gladly posed.

A couple weeks ago, I finally got around to scrapping the day. I chose pink as the main background color because of Hannah's shirt. The pink paper with the white polka dots were a good complement to the pink and green main paper.
I cut out a large white rectangle with my beloved deckle scissors and used some cute flowery letters I bought at a discount store a couple years ago. I used my purple stamp to add some dimension to the edges of the rectangle. I did the same with the journal block on the bottom right.
My friend Keri had a wonderful little cupcake stamp that I cut out and used pop dots to glue them to the page. I then used my liquid glass to add a little shine.
And there you have it... my beloved Hannah and her cupcakes!
And now I'm off for the weekend. We are going to visit my parents and other friends. I'll be back on Monday with possibly an adventure from this weekend. :D
Til Monday...

Sesame Chicken Vegetable Stir Fry with Rice Noodles

As a family we are trying to eat healthier. But I'm a big believer that healthy doesn't mean tasteless. So I decided to try my hand at my own version of chicken vegetable stir fry.

I decided to use rice noodles because they are lighter than pasta... and I didn't feel like making rice.
I stir fried the chicken first. We got a good deal on a bag of frozen chicken breasts this past weekend, so I used one breast since they were so large. I cut the breast into bite size pieces and put them in a large frying pan on medium heat.

To the chicken I added:

• 1 tablespoon low sodium soy sauce
• 1 teaspoon sesame oil
• 1 teaspoon coriander
• 2 teaspoons sesame seeds

After cooking the chicken, I removed the chicken from the pan and threw in my cut up veggies. I used onion, zucchini, green bell pepper, yellow bell pepper, red bell pepper and mushrooms. I added the mushrooms when the veggies were almost done.

To the veggies I added:

• 1 tablespoon low sodium soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon sesame seeds
• 2 teaspoons sesame oil
• a splash of white cooking sherry or wine.

While cooking the veggies, I start to boil the water for the rice noodles. Rice noodles just need to cook a couple minutes or they will get mushy.

After cooking the veggies, I add the chicken back in to the stir fry.
And you end up with a beautiful platter of food. Enough for our family and plenty left over for my husband's lunch the next day.

Tomorrow... a cute little cupcake scrapbook page.