Mama Nancy's Sweet Potato Casserole

We all know what sweet potato casserole is: sweet potatoes with a puffy marshmallow topping, right? Well, as much as I love big white puffy puffs of sugar, I really have never been a fan of the sweet potato casserole made this way. I grew up with my mother's sweet potato casserole. It's SO sweet but SO delicious!

Apple and Bacon Stuffed Pork Chops with Caramelized Onions and AppleCider Sauce

We don't eat turkey in my house.  We do a ham each year at Thanksgiving so Karly and myself decided rather than take part of the stuff off we'd do our own pork off.  BUT I didn't want to make up a ham so close to Thanksgiving as my husband and I would just be finishing the first ham when Thanksgiving finally rolled around.  So I went scrounging through my porky recipes to try and figure something else out that could be served at Thanksgiving or at least feels like a "fall" dish.  I think I succeeded.  Inspired by my husband's like of the stuffed pork chops from Trader Joe's and my own like of caramelized onions and sauces, I created this dish.  You know it's a winner when my neighbor who is a vegetarian stops by and says dinner smells good and reminds her of fall.  Then I informed her it's a pork dish and she responds, "Might be worth trying it still."  Yup, winner winner!

Meat Buns Anyone?

So I don't know about you all, but one of my favourite things to do with leftover turkey, or even chopped up chicky boob is to make stew and after a meal or two of stew I find everyone is getting a bit bored of that...  So then I take that stew and turn it into meat buns!!! I LOVE meat buns! Who doesn't? They are fast, easy, a full meal in the palm of your hand.  (hehe).

So here is a quickie "how to" on making meat buns.

First thing I do in the morning is set a batch of dough off in the bread maker, I use my usual bread recipe by the way. Just be sure you set it on the dough cycle!

Tiny Turkey Hands

My little boy is currently in a crafting/coloring frenzy phase.  Any time his sister isn’t around he breaks out his marker and asks for paper.  He loves creating little “projects” or “systems” as he sometimes calls them.  Many times during one of the two naps V still has during the day he and I will create something.  Whether it’s just plain coloring in a coloring book, creating a story, or making something for dessert he’s always a happy boy with the one on one attention and some sort of product to show his daddy when he gets home.

This week I decided to base our project off of something I did as a first grader.  So a LONG time ago I remember getting to make up my own stationary using our thumbprints to create little animals, I specifically remember making a pig.  I believe this stationary was then given to my mother as a mother’s day gift.  Anyway with all the turkey crafts out there that involve cutting which S really isn’t all that good at yet I thought this could be a cute way to make up some pictures and maybe make a card to send to the grandparents.

Well S had other ideas.

He decided he did NOT want to just use a thumbprint or a fingerprint.  What he really wanted was to do a handprint (probably because the last time we had the ink pads out we did handprints to mark 6 months for V and 3 years for S).  So I obliged and we have our craft to share:  Tiny Turkey Handprints.  Fingerprint turkeys will wait for another day.

Chicky Stew!

Friday is our normal day to spotlight another blog or person.  However, we also know  things happen.  What happened this Friday?  Well our featured blogger has been ill for the last week and was unable to be spotlighted today.  So instead we offer this recipe for some nutritious soup that's bound to make anyone feel at least a little better.



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Recipe: Campfire Cone Crunchy Munchies

I don't go on many road trips.  In fact, I hate road trips.  I get car sick, my kids scream the whole time, my butt hurts and all I end up doing is stuffing my face with food I don't really like just to pass the time.  With that said, we're headed on a nice 12 hour road trip soon.  Yay!  Woo Hoo! and FART!  I am not looking forward to it.  I will get sick, my butt will hurt and there's NOTHING I can do about the kids.  They just hate the car THAT much.  It seems the only thing I am able to change is what I stuff into my face as we drive with the music of the tantrums filling our ears.  I was looking through my cupboard at all of the junk food we don't have in there and started dreaming.  This is what I came up with:

Fall is here: Perfect reason for new clothing

Fall is finally here!  Which means it's time to break out our hoodies, long sleeved shirts, and pants.  Though being in S. California some would say we are still having lovely "summer" weather; however, there is just enough nip in the air in the mornings that I feel the need to bundle my kiddos up a little more and sip hot tea or hot coco.

In any case, S needed some new shirts to brighten his wardrobe in some of his favorite colors, blue and green.  I chose to do a short sleeved option since we layer with baby legs for arm warmers or just throw on a light jacket.  Long sleeves seem to be an issue for him with hand washing for as soon as the sleeves get wet he wants the shirt OFF!

For his shirt, I used Figgy's Tee for Two, a pattern I have returned to time and time again.  S loves the softness of knit and I love how quickly these sew up.  I think I've now made 4 or 5 of them and eventually will do the dress option for V (not that she's hurting in the dress department, I've yet again run out of hangers for her!).  Next for these shirts will be a bit of stenciling, I think, but that will have to be a mommy/son project for another day, after he decides exactly what it is he wants on his shirt!

Pattern Anthology

I was somehow able to test not 1, not 2, but 5 of the patterns from Pattern Anthology's new Winter Wonderland release.  I think it was a stroke of luck, because I really love these patterns!

Small FRY-Day Spotlight: Gramma Lollie's Broccoli Casserole

Hey everyone!  This month's Small FRY-day theme is "Family Favorites" although I'm still partial to "Thanksgiving Noms".  Anyway...what better way to start off that by posting a recipe from MY family?  My wonderful mother-in-law is a fantastic cook and always makes me gain like 15 lbs when she comes to stay with us.  I can not help but eat all of everything that she makes.  It's a sickness caused by witchcraft, I tell you.  Please enjoy this recipe by one of my favorite Culinary Queens.
-Crystal-

Pattern Review Halloween Style: My Little Plumcake- Cordelia

Halloween is my absolute favorite holiday.  I love dressing up and getting my kids dressed up and begging for candy.  I've always made our costumes, but since learning how to sew, things have gotten much more epic.  Aurelia and Obren's main costumes this year are the Queen of Hearts and the White Rabbit, respectively and can be seen here.  Well, she has a school parade and gets to wear a costume to school.  Here's the deal; I don't want her messing up her pretty dress.  She's crazy.  She is so crazy wild that I've already had to replace her new shirts that I bought at the beginning of the school year at the end of August.  She only goes to school 4 days a week and only  2 hours a day, so it takes some massive skill to ruin things that quickly.  I needed her to be able to be involved in the festivities, while still being in a costume that would allow her to be a crazy kid.  This is what I came up with:

Yabba Dabba Doo!

Flintstones!  Meet the Flintstones... well just Pebbles and Bam Bamm.  Mr. Viever was a party pooper this year and said he didn't want to dress up so no Fred and Wilma.  This is also the first year that I have made the kids’ costumes so I wanted to do something relatively simple, fun, and themed!

Small FRY-Day Spotlight: Cautiously Crafty

It's small FRY-day and our last of the month! We've had some amazing talent showcased and we have one more!  Today we're featuring Paige  with Cautiously Crafty.  She's got some awesome inspiration for ya!  Also, at the end of this post, we're having a linky party!  Everyone link up YOUR favorite homemade Halloween costume...the one you're most proud of.  This is just for fun and I LOVE costumes, so you can bet I'll be checking out every.single.one!  Ok, now to Paige!

-Crystal-
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Tricks or Treats? It's a party!

Sometimes I'm lazy, sometimes I'm really lazy and sometimes I'm just a little lazy.  When it comes to parties I vow to not be lazy.  I try my hardest to come up with awesome ideas and work hard to make sure everything pans out.  There are those heavenly times, though, that I can mix lazy and not lazy and still seem really cool.  That's what happened for the husband's 31st birthday.  Dan's birthday is exceptionally close to Halloween and Halloween also happens to be his favorite Holiday.  It didn't take much to summon the lazy bones out of the grave and combine the two occasions.  Then there was the phone call to the spirits of Martha Stewart and Monica Geller to pull it all together.  I decided to have a "Tricks or Treats Halloween Party" and this is what happened

Quick Chicken Pot Pie

My family loves chicken pot pie.  It's a winner with both kids, comes together quickly, and we typically have leftovers so we can eat it for two nights so it's a winner in my book too.  This particular recipe started off in The America's Test Kichen: Quick Family Cookbook and I've adjusted it to be a little more to our liking.  Usually I make up the filling during nap time as shredding the chicken can be a bit of a mess and then pop it into the toaster oven shortly before dinner but even if I have to make it all at once I love that it doesn't take an hour in the oven after having to cook everything together.  Quick dinner= AWESOME!

Painting Pumpkins

Hey! I'm here to show off one of our most favorite Halloween traditions. Back in 2010 during October, we were debating how to make our pumpkins. The kids were too young to be allowed to carve and well, carving pumpkins wasn't all that fun. Aevarie didn't like pulling out seeds (it was far too gross) and there isn't much else she could do. So my mother had the brilliant idea to paint our pumpkins instead. Perfect! And a tradition was born!

Vegan Dumpling Dessert

Hey all! This is Jenn here and today I want to share with you my easy go to fall dessert! and it is vegan so - win! (especially if you are an allergy family or if you ran out of milk and eggs but need something sweet in a hurry). If you don't want to eat it vegan go ahead and use regular milk and margarine.



I am going to put the recipe at the start, since I hate scrolling to the end for the recipe and then back up to get hints for steps.  Hopefully this order is ok for all you readers. So without further dawdling here is the recipe for Vegan Caramel Pear Dumplings!

Small FRY-day Spotlight: Ali Cat & Co.

It's Crystal here and that means that it's time for our third Small FRY-day Halloween post!  This time we bring you the mind behind the goddess body of Brianne from Ali Cat & Co.   Seriously, it takes a great bod to rock the Spock out of an invisible boat.

Just so you know, we love this gal.  She's cooky and crazy and totally CRAFTY!  Check out her blog after you read this post; there's tons of great stuff on there.  Anyway, without further ado from me to you.......

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Knit 2, Purl 2

I'm a self taught knitter.  In college (fall 2005) I picked up a kit to make a capelet from Target thinking it would be fun to learn.  My college BFF was a knitter (taught by her mother or grandmother, I can't remember) and I spent many evenings running down to her room (Okay, I'll admit it I took the elevator, she was on the 2nd floor I was on the 7th floor) or IMing her on AIM (remember that?!) with an issue or a question.  Fast forward 4 years from then to the birth of my niece L and that would probably be when I picked up the knitting needles again post graduation from college.  I made her a blanket and baby booties and my in laws a baby blanket for their house when she was born.  I again picked up my needles for the birth of S to make him a baby blanket AND because I discovered the world of wool and cloth diapers. This is where my knitting frenzy took off.

Wanted: Small Fries and a Cherry Coke!

Ok, maybe not a cherry coke, but if you have one...

This is Crystal and I'm putting this call out there to all of you culinary HEs & SHEs!  We need some of you to spotlight in our Small FRY-day posts for November and our theme is "Thanksgiving Nomming" (Well, THEY'RE calling it "Family Favorite Recipes", but I like Nomming).  If you have a favorite fall recipe that you think would be the bomb diggity on the Thanksgiving table, we want to feature you!  Fill out the form here and let us know what recipe you'd like to share with us.  If we pick you, we'll let you know all the deets (that's details in the language of "awesome") as far as due date and content.  We want to spotlight you and your kitchen couture...kitchen calamity...whatever!  Thanks for letting us show you off.

Nom Nom Nom,

Crystal

P.S. You do not HAVE to have a blog to contribute.  We want to hear from all of the lovely & creative folks out there!

Small FRY-day Spotlight: Diedelbug Handmade

It's our second Small Fry-day Spotlight of the month (and of "ever") and this one is going to knock your socks off, too! I'm telling you, there is some rockin' talent out there. This week we have Erin from Diedelbug Handmade showing off her "super" costumes that are guaranteed to turn you into a mega villain named Jealous Man.  She was even nice enough to share some how-to secrets with you.  Grab some candy corn and read on!  Also if you missed last week's Small Fry-day Spotlight, you can check that out here.  Thank you, Erin for joining us this week!

-Crystal-
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Well first off let me introduce myself. I’m Erin, the craftermind (inset evil laugh, well maybe it’s more of a cackle hehe) behind Diedelbug Handmade. I’ve just started to sell handbags but I mostly sew for my little monsters, umm I mean angels, 2 and 4 year old boys. Need I say more?  They’ve reached the constant picking and bickering stage. More recently I’ve started to dabble into sewing actual wearable clothes for me. I can only use so many bags you know? Ok, enough about me and back to the “angels.” The boys FINALLY decided what they each wanted to be for Halloween. I have to start asking in August because they change their minds daily. Who am I kidding? More like hourly. At one point I was going to have to come up with Optimus Prime. Really? I had no idea how I was going to make that happen for a 2 year old. Whew!

Last year Zander, my oldest, went as the Incredible Hulk, complete with crazy Hulk hair.

A Pixie Birthday Party

My little girl V is turning one on the 13th of this month.  It's so hard to believe that she's been with us a year while at the same time it feels like she's aways been with us.  At the end of last month we used part of Mr. Viever's paternity leave to travel to see friends and family and at that time through her birthday party celebrating her first year among our family members in Arizona at my in law's home.  We did the same for S when he turned one and it was so nice spending time with family and being with those who loved us most to celebrate the life of our child so we had to do it again for V.

V is a bit on the small side and I call her a little pixie, so a party theme was born! Now some random background, I'm not a fan of Tinkerbell.  Just plain don't care for her, her sass, or the fact that Pixie Hollow took over what used to be Ariel's Grotto at Disneyland- I know I'm a bit of a freak but Ariel's my favorite!  So when I was on my search for decorations, I wanted fairies but not of the Disney sort.  I found the perfect little cupcake toppers and matching garland on Amazon and suddenly two days before we were to leave for Boston for a week, (we're a little on the nutty side and planned travel to Boston for a week, one day at home, then drive to AZ for the weekend of party fun and a relay triathlon) I was struck with a NEED to make V a party dress to match the fairy decor.

Meet the SHE: Jenn

Hey All!

My name is Jenn. I love love love to selfish sew! (and thankfully have a job that encourages this) I also have 2 girlies that I love to sew for, a 3yr old and a 1yr old. I am trying to get myself to stretch some comfort zones and sew a little for the husband this winter and also some soft toys.

I started sewing when I had my oldest as I wanted her to have cute things but couldn't fund them all. I was soooooo bad when I started, mainly because I was scared I would hate sewing in the end and didn't want to "waste" money on patterns! lol. Don't worry - that ship has LONG sailed!!! I now know the value of a good pattern! You really should see some of that first sewing I did... I wish I had kept some of those pictures!

Meet the SHE: Karly

Hi! I'm Karly and I usually blog over at Paisley Roots. I have 5 little monkeys that jump on my bed (and everywhere else) and they keep me pretty busy.

 

Small FRY-day Spotlight: Life of a Compulsive Crafter

Crystal here!  It's October and that means Halloween!  We have decided to spotlight a "Small Fry" a week because we're all small fries too and want to see what you can do. We're spooking things up for the next 4 weeks to fit this haunt-a-licious time of year and we have some great posts coming your way from crafters just like you and me and the other SHEs.  Featured this week in our FIRST EVER "Small Fry-day" spotlight is Mae from Life of a Compulsive Crafter .  She's going to share her super fun and wild Halloween costume suitable for the at-home crafter.  Enjoy!  I know that I did!

Pattern Review- Deer&Doe Bleuet

As I mentioned in my introduction, I consider myself a newbie sewer.  I've been sewing on my current streak for about 7 months.  Prior to that I had made my first project, a skirt for myself, in 2007 when my mother in law took pity on me and agreed to teach me to sew using her sewing machine.  After that first project, there were many items that went unfinished and a few baby items I made as gifts, but my machine mostly sat lonely in the bottom shelf of my bookcase.

Meet the SHE: Ginger D!

WAAAASUP everybody?  I'm Crystal!  You may know me as the blogger over at Ginger Dimples...and you may not.  I'm not really THAT famous.  I'm a mom of 2 living in the desert and wishing it was the ocean.   My girl is 4 and her name is Aurelia and my boy, Obren,  is 18 months old. I started sewing almost 4 years ago because I was cloth diapering my girl and was too cheap to buy cute diapers.  I started making my own and then moved onto clothing and haven't looked back!  I now spend way too much time at my sewing machine making people think I'm way more awesome than I am.  I love to sing, sew and snack...perfect for blogging.  I enjoy sewing for myself, too and my best pics are selfies taken in the bathroom- flushed toilets only.

Meet the SHE- Vievey!

I'm Genevieve affectionately known by my friends behind the screen as Vievey or Viever. I have two rugrats, Little Boy S and Baby Girl V. They both keep me on my toes with all the new things they get into and activities they have going on. My craftiness currently revolves around them and honestly so does everything else!