Happy New Year

Well, today is the last day of 2011. I hope it has been a blessed year for you. God has been with us through some really great times this year and through some difficult ones as well, but in the end God is Good all the time! We have been blessed and are thankful. I thought I'd share a favorite recipe of the holiday season with you today. We love these Graham Cracker Pecan cookies. I only make them at Christmas because the are very rich. Pecans just scream Christmas to me!! OK here is the recipe: 1 1/2 pkg of graham crackers, 1 stick of butter and 1 stick of margarine, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 to 1 1/2 cups chopped pecans. Layer the graham crackers on a jelly roll pan. In a sauce pan add the butter and sugar and bring to a good boil. Boil for 5 minutes or until golden brown. Pour over graham crackers and spread evenly, Sprinkle pecan pieces on top. Bake at 300 degrees for 10 minutes. Break apart and cool on wire rack. So easy and so good!!!! Enjoy. I wish you all a very Blessed New Year.

Yikes! Christmas is here

Like it's some big surprise, December 25th comes around every year and I'm never even close to ready. Of course when you do the most of your shopping on the 22nd should you really be surprised? I love to make cards of course, bake, attend Christmas events at church and in the community, but I have realized I love to do all these things with company! It is most meaningful to me to stamp with my stamping sisters and bake with friends or family members. So thank you to those who took the time to give me your gift of friendship and time. It was most appreciated! I have a couple Christmas ideas I want to show yall. I made these little tags for the goody bags for Cadie's preschool class. They turned out really cute IMHO! The reindeer are made with the stocking punch #124095 and the antlers are one of the snowflake sizzlets. Most of the noses were just punch with a hole punch and covered with Crystal Effects. The angels for the girls were made with the Pennant punch, the Butterfly punch and 3/4 circle punch. The butterfly angel wings were run through the Big Shot with the Elegant Lines embossing folder for texture. These were really fun to make. I layered them on a scalloped circle so they could be hung on the tree as an ornament. Well, that's it for today. I am wishing yall a great Christmas season and don't forget the Reason for the Season. Be a blessing and you will be blessed.

Keep it Blue

Not a great picture, but a cute card. I made this card for a stamp a stack of simple cards. The card stock is Night of Navy and Whisper White. The Whisper White piece is run through the Big shot with the Polka dot textured plate. The stocking is stamped with Night of Navy ink using a stamp from the Stitched Stockings stamp set in the Holiday mini and punched out with the stocking punch. Can you see the 2 mini jingle bells tied on the corner with Cherry Cobbler and white bakers twine( love this stuff)? There is a rhinestone jewel in the center for some added bling. What are your thoughts on this one? Leave me a comment and let me know. Thanks for looking, gotta go. Be Blessed today and Bless those around you!

Christmas in Blue

I know Red and Green are traditionally Christmas colors, however I love Blue. It has been one of my favorite colors for years, All shades from Navy to Baby! Almost very year I make my Christmas Cards in blue. I haven't decided for sure this year ,but I have a couple of samples that might just be this years card. The card uses the Sounding Joy stamp set from the Holiday Mini. LOve LOVe LOVE this stamp set. I like to do cards that reflect the true meaning of Christmas for Tombo and I. "For God so love the whole world, He sent His only Begotten son..."This is a real reason to celebrate! So give me your vote, should this be this years card? Cardstock is Night of Navy, Bashful Blue, and Whispher White. Ink is Bashful Blue and Night of Navy also. I'll show you another one next time, if you love this card and want to make them, shoot me an email and I'll help you get started, but hurry there are only 15 days left til Christmas 2011. Of course you could get a head start on Christmas 2012 them you have 380 days! Blessings to each of you!

The Marriage of Two Recipes

Good morning. This is not a stamping post today. My other love is cooking. I have loved to cook since I was very young. I even entered the Autauga County Fair with I was 13 or 14 and won first place for a sour creme surprise pound cake! I also won prizes for my biscuits and cornbread muffins. Of course, this is not a big surprise as my Nana and mother were both excellent cooks and bakers. My mother still is, but Nana is probably cooking up a storm in heaven. Well, recently I need to make something with left over Turkey. I am a big Pampered Chef fan and used to sell Pampered Chef cooking tools, so I thought of the Turkey Cranberry ring that was very popular several years ago. Unfortunately I didn't have most of the ingredients. I did have turkey, mayo, celery, and cranberries. One of the most important ingredients in a ring is the crescent rolls, didn't have these. What to do?Well, I had biscuits- an idea is brewing. Criss-cross apple crowns use biscuits!!! So I substitute biscuits for the crescent rolls, then I substituted Parmesan cheese for Swiss, pecans for walnuts and honey mustard for Dijon!! I rolled out the biscuits and put a large scoop of turkey mixture in the center and pinched the bottom together placing them in a stone muffin pan. I have to say, it worked great and they came out delicious. We had individual turkey cranberry stuffed bundles! They were great that night for dinner and the next day for lunch! Sometimes thinking outside the box can be a good thing. Substitution can produce a great new recipe, however, I don't suggest using frosted flakes in place of corn flakes on top of a hash brown casserole-that's a story for another day! Have a very blessed day and bless some one else today.

Lots of projects, no time!!

Well, it's 18 days til Christmas, are you ready? For those of you who know me, I'm months behind!!!! I still have Halloween projects I wanted to share! And we won't even talk about how many Christmas cards I still need to make. We attended our first Christmas party of the season Sunday at the home of Mike and Diane, sweet friends from our Sunday School Class. It was a blast. We played Dirty Santa. Here is a picture of the lunch bag I stamped to conceal the silly reindeer tie Tommy took for his gift. It's a regular ole lunch bag, stamped with a pine branch and tied with Old Olive 1 1/4 inch striped ribbon. The reindeer tag is made with the Big Shot two tags die,the stitched stocking punch and one of the snowflake sizzlets. I love making different projects from punches. Of course I did not come up with the idea, but I'm great at copying!!!!There is a small bag of nuts attached to the bottom of this tag with a reindeer droppings poem on the back. Just an example of a quick and easy way to wrap up a gift that's really quite adorable! Need to get back to the worktable. Have a really blessed day and go be a blessing to someone else. Much love.