A special tote bag for "G"

It all started innocently enough. Scott and I went over to his folks house this morning/early afternoon to play with the dogs and see if his parents were around. They weren't, so we played with the pups, poked around, and I ended up in his mom's stamping room. To say it's like a candy store is an understatement. It's fantastic how much stamping stuff she has. So anyways, I decided, today I'm going to not do any of my chores and I'm going to craft instead. That sounds like fun. :)



Fourteen little tags later, I'd only just begun. I decided I was going to make presents for Genevieve, the little girl who was our flower girl at our wedding (and Scott's cousin's daughter) because we're going to see her next month. That's why all the tags have the letter "G".



After the tags were done, I decided to make a cute little tote for her.



I love the look of this gold thread (below) contrasting against the green.



I made a custom card and attached it with these two little tags too.



And in between making the tote and the card, I made a bunch of other stuff to fill up with stuff to put in the bag. :)



Now if I could just finish getting the stuff to stuff in the bag!

Cute cookies

Tonight I made my favorite White chocolate chip, cranberry, walnut oatmeal cookies. Yum. :D I even ground up the cinnamon and cloves in the coffee grinder (something I avoid usually since it's extra work) and I made a double batch. Now I have so many cookies that I've decided to give some away. :)

These ones are packaged up for special people at work.

Stuffed

Tonight I made stuffed chicken breasts with this recipe. I modified it a bit, I breaded the outside lightly, whereas the recipe said to add the breadcrumbs to the stuffing. I forgot until I'd already stuffed them and tied 'em up. :) Scott said they were good and I think he liked them. Not sure if I'll make them again, but they were a good way to use up some spinach in the fridge and I made yummy mashed potatoes to go with them. Mmmm. :) They seem like they'd make a good recipe someday when we have friends over for dinner too. Easy to make ahead of time, and they look sort of nice. :D



This is a quick pan sauce that went on top of it.

Recycling bin

I saw this and thought I'd post a picture of our trash can setup. Before we had a galvanized pail on top of the fridge that we'd put our newspapers and recyclables in. Everything kept constantly falling out though so I decided I needed something that was a little more contained and had a lid. I found this little guy (the one on the right) at Target for $30. It works great. :D I keep a grocery sack in it and that way it's easy for Scott to take out to the trash. And it uses up all those plastic sacks. :)

Great minds think alike

How interesting that I chose that image last night while browsing on flickr and I found it here tonight while browsing Apartment Therapy. That marinegirl must be happy her image is getting attention! :)

Test!

Sorry for this disruption. Will be back to normal in a day or two. :)

What to do for the gracious woman who washed my dishes?

Photograph by marinegirl

Today, when I went into work, I sat down at my desk and realized that our office's housekeeping staff had found my dirty mug behind my monitor and had cleaned it. I couldn't believe it. I a) was embarrassed and felt bad. I am really not a slob. Most people would call me the opposite, and b) I felt like I should do something nice for the staff member who cleaned my dishes for me. But I'm not sure how to figure out who it was and what to do for them. Leave a note? Get a gift card? What would you do?

Slipcover

This is my latest sewing project. It's an ottoman slipcover. I found $8 a yard upholstery microsuede fabric. Not bad for my first time making one. :)

Mother's Day

Photographs by Scott Morgan

This is the cake I made for Scott's mom on Mother's Day, all wrapped up.



And this is the homemade cake after it was cut. It's a pound cake. I used vanilla and orange extract, and I think the orange extract gives it a nice tinge of citrus flavor.



And this is the final plated version. :) Mmmm. I made homemade whipped cream (I love making whipped cream) and cut up strawberries and mixed them with fresh lemon juice, sugar and a little bit of orange juice. Then I topped it off with chopped almonds. And Scott even got to bring home a couple pieces for himself. :D




Here are a couple more pics of the present box.

Mother's Day

My mother-in-law's gifts all wrapped up ...



And ready to give. :)

A 'pear'fect cup

I think this cup with a little pear is so cute. It comes with a built-in mini dish. :)

My daily bread

I started using the Artisan Bread in Five method of making "No-knead" bread and I like it. For those who don't know, it's a way of making your dough, much like the more traditional no-knead bread recipe, only you don't have to bake it right away. You can choose when you want to make it and two hours before you want to bake the bread, you take the dough out of the fridge and let it rise. Genius!
So today I decided to make a loaf for my dad. We're going to see him today and I thought it would be fun for him to try my bread. I hope he likes it. :)