I did it!!!!

I'm so excited!! It does not look like the picture, I didn't want to do the big goblet thing, so I decided to do a bowl on a little tiny stand. I couldn't figure out how people got the bowl so perfect, so I looked up "Chocolate Bowls" on the internet and found that many people use balloons, coating it 3x in Chocolate with a pastry brush (freezing in between) then leaking the air out of the balloon. Well, my pastry brush is silicon, so it sucked for that. On the 3rd freeze, it fell a couple shelves in the freezer and cracked, so I did a 4th layer, but it just kinda fell off.

The truffles I used a truffle mold for and I totally love it! I'll be making LOTS more truffles in the future.

So, it's not nearly as pretty as the one in the picture, but the fact that it's done is incredible to me.

I took a picture of just the bowl first (in case it broke before the end). And in case you're wondering, yes, it is laundry detergent in the background. The laundry room is the coldest room in the house, so I set it out there to wait for the truffles to be done.

Then I put a few hearts on the back (instead of all the way around). I didn't have a heart mold, so they are free-handed- hence the different sizes The little flap on the bottom is where the 4th layer was falling off.

And here it is full of truffles!!!!

As for a Valentine's Update- my husband bought me a iTunes card so I could get the Lenka CD, 27 Dresses (the movie, not 27 actual dresses), Mountain Dew Voltage, Peanut Clusters, and some more yummy chocolate.

We also went to Red Lobster for Lunch (thanks Phylissa) and I tried scallops for the first time. YUUUUUMMMYYYY!!!

We had a great day!

Overly Ambitious

I am going to try to make Roger something fancy shmancy for V-day. Are you ready for this?

it's called True Love Truffles by Wilton

Yes, I know! The instructions are HERE and my mom is making teh truffles ahead of time (because I can't do this without her help).

Anybody else make this before?

PB and J Cookies

I told Xander the other day that we'd make cookies. I asked him what kind he wanted to make. He said Peanut Butter and Jam. Luckily, I have a magaazine from Rachael Ray that I remembered seeing a recipe for just that. I found it here: http://food.yahoo.com/recipes/rachael-ray/113034/penny-s-pb-j-cookies for all of you. It's the same recipe. I decided to test my patience level and let Xander do it as by himself as he could. I let him measure, pour, all that stuff. But first he wrote down the "recipe"

If you're wondering how they tasted, Xander gives it....


TWO THUMBS UP!!!

They are for reals yummy!

What's this? Me being domestic? *shock*

I made another, YES ANOTHER, yummy recipe tonight.

I call it Breakfast Lasagna
Ingredients:
 sausage
 salsa
 tortillas
 eggs
 milk
 cheese
 sour cream
Preheat oven to 350*
Cook sausage. Drain grease. Add salsa (to taste). Spread 1/3 of it in the bottom of a pan. Empty the rest into a big bowl. Put a layer of tortillas on top of that. Scramble some eggs (I made 2 8x8 pans, so I used an entire dozen eggs). Add milk as you scramble to make it stretch a little further. Spread half of the eggs on top of the tortilla. Add another 1/3 of the meat mixture, then another layer of tortillas. Mix remaining meat sauce and remaining eggs together. Put on top of tortilla layer. Add a layer of cheese. Put in oven 5-10 min, till cheese is melted. When serving, serve w/ sour cream. Green peppers would be yummy in the meat mixture too, but that all depends on how spicy your sausage is.

Enjoy!

A recipe, by me?!?!

 So I'm not that great in the kitchen (as evidence by my chicken broth post), but last night, i was genius. I knew I had the chicken cooked, so I browsed through a bunch of the Kraft Food and Family Magazines (if you don't get them, RUN to their website and sign up, they're free and genius). One caught my eye that was mac and cheese w/ chicken. It called for green pepper and diced tomatoes, so I closed the book and started thinking.

Ok, before you FREAK at the proportions, this was made for 2 families. I'm wondering if would freeze well...

Mac and Cheese Genius
3 boxes mac and cheese (3/4 c milk, 3/4 c butter or margarine)
2-3 lbs cooked, chopped chicken
1 large (or 2 small) green peppers, chopped
1 reg size can tomato sauce
1/2 c- 1 c salsa (we barely used any as to hide it from my son)
1/2 lb cheddar cheese, shredded
almost 1 tube ritz crackers.

Preheat oven to 350*. Make the mac and cheese accd to directions. Once it's ready, add in sauce and salsa. Stir. Then add chicken and green pepper. Separate into 2 8x8 dishes. Top w/ cheese & ritz. Bake 10 min (till cheese is melted). SOOOO yummy!

New Toys, Toys in Progress, and Sneaky Bread

First we'll start off with the bread. Today I was dead set on making French Dip Sandwiches for dinner. They sounded SOOO good. What do you need for French Dip?  French Rolls, Au Jus dip mix, onions, and roast beef. So I go to the store for the ingredients and I grab bread that looks like this:

Yes, it looks like French Rolls. I come home, make dinner and go to cut the rolls. They're not light and fluffy in the middle w/ a crispy exterior. No, no. I look at the label and they're PORTUGUESE ROLLS> What the crap are Portuguese rolls? Never heard of them in my entire dang life and they are VERY misleading on the top. THEY LOOK LIKE FRENCH ROLLS. And they're not flavorful like French rolls. They're heavy, dense, and not very good for French dip sandwiches. Maybe if you're making Portuguese Dip sandwiches, but who's ever seen THAT on a menu, eh? BEWARE of the Portuguese rolls!

Anyway. Next on the list. Remember a few posts ago I talked about wanting to change cell phone plans, but not being able to afford to cancel the old ones, then I updated in a new post later that we got a loan and part of it went to cancelling our old phones. We went from 2 AT&T/Cingular lines to 1 Cricket line. Our old phones were falling apart (literally- my screen was cracked) and couldn't be flashed to Cricket, so we got a new phone.
 


Isn't she BEAUTIFUL?!?! In high school I refuse to wear gold jewelry, but now I LOVE the color gold. I don't know why. When Roger told me which phone we got, I was giddy! Then when it came today I was in heaven. Anybody know where I can get some decent priced ring tones w/ out all the junk mail or spyware? Same with games? I need at least one good ring tone and one good game. Then my phone will officially rock.

And, since this IS technically a craft blog, I thought I'd share my craft in progress. It's my first Arugumi (Sp?). It's Scott The Bear from Lion brand yarn's website.

Oh, and one more. I also picked up one of my new favorite things and now a staple in my home:

Yes, yes it is on a shelf. In my living room.

Have a cupcakey day!!

Last night, I made some finger puppets for Xander to take to church today. Simple, yet cute. I got the ideas from Flickr, of course.











Today, we decided to do as much w/out the TV as possible. We decided since it's Sunday, we should do our best to keep the Sabbath holy and to spend family time together. Roger had the idea of decorating cupcakes. We had SO much fun. Keep in mind a few things:
1. My kids are 2 and 3
2. We kept the icing runnier than normal for easy use
3. We didn't use any decorating bags or anything like that. Just our hands and some flat knives.
Here are our creations!!
























Anyway, we had a lot of fun! I expect cupcake pics to be popping up on Flickr! LOL. No pressure. :D