Day 40--Pretzel crosses

Day 40!!!  

I felt like I needed to do something big on Day 40...just wasn't sure what it would be.  Being that it's Good Friday and the kiddos are home, I decided to make Pretzel Crosses.

Find the idea here about half way down the page.

These were super easy and the kids had a great time helping. 

The pin used vanilla Almond Bark. We had chocolate on hand, so that is what we used.  

The kids did the sprinkles can you tell?

The great thing is they don't take long to set up & dry.

Delicious & easy.  And a fun Good Friday project.

My 40 Days of Pinterest have been fun.  Like anything else, sometimes I wanted to give up & stop.  But I didn't! 

Thanks to everyone who read my posts, I hope you enjoyed them.  I still have a list of Pinterest ideas I want to try, so I will keep posting...just not everyday. :)

I will try to do a re-cap in the next day or so with my final thoughts on how things turned out.

Day 39--A Semi-homemade Cake

This recipe was pinned from here and is officially called Paula Deen's Mountain Dew cake.

I pinned it because it is a lemon cake recipe and as stated yesterday, Kevin likes lemon desserts.

The description on the pin gives the idea that you can make several versions of this cake--strawberry, orange, chocolate, carmel--you get the idea.  Basically any kind you can think of.

I had Kevin make me a strawberry cake using this recipe for my birthday.  It was yummy!!  So I made it again today for a cake I needed to make for Easter Hollow cake walk at our church on Saturday.

Here are the ingredients you will need 

Easy to follow recipe found in the link above.  

Mix well, bake and enjoy!!

I like using a Bundt pan. It's just easier than making a layer cake--in my opinion. :)

Doesn't it look great?!?!

Today I just used store bought icing.  It's doesn't need to be refrigerated which makes it easier for the church cake walk.

Kevin's birthday is Sunday. I plan on making the lemon version this weekend.

For his birthday cake I plan on making Marshmallow Cream Cheese icing. Find the recipe here. 

I enjoy baking, even if I make a huge mess most of the time.

I really like semi-homemade recipes.  Blame it on my lack of patience & laziness...

You will enjoy this cake, so pick a version & make one!

**From the description on Pinterest--other ideas** 

Paula Deen's Mountain Dew Cake 1 box lemon cake mix 1 (3.4 oz) box lemon instant pudding 1 (12 oz) can Mountain Dew 3/4 c. Vegetable Oil 4 large eggs. This is the recipe that I use for all cake mixes. For example: Choc cake, choc pudding, Coke: caramel cake, butterscotch pudding, Dr. Pepper: Strawberry cake, strawberry jello, strawberry soda: orange cake, orange jello, orange soda; white cake, watermelon jello, watermelon soda. Combinations are only limited to your imagination.

Day 38--Lemon Crinkle Cookies

The problem with Pinterest is that you can end up pinning the same pin or idea more than once.  I try my hardest not to do that, but it's unavoidable.

I must have really thought this recipe was a good one because I pinned it twice.  It was at least from 2 different sources, but still--same recipe. 

Kevin loves lemon desserts. So I bought what I needed for these cookies and made them today. 

You can find the recipe here.

They are only 4 ingredients!!  

Lemon cake mix (I used Duncan Hines)

1 large egg, slightly beaten

1--8oz. tub of Cool Whip

Powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Mix the cake mix, egg & Cool Whip. It will be STICKY!!

It took a little bit to get it all mixed thoroughly, don't give up!

Sticky, sticky, sticky...

I put the powdered sugar in the bottom of a bowl the roll the cookies in.  

On my first attempt, I put a blob of the dough in my hands & tried to roll into a ball.  Um...no.

Had to wash my hands & start over.

What worked: get a blob of the dough on a spoon, scrape it off the spoon with 1 finger into the powdered sugar.  Tap it around with the spoon to start covering it, then finish rolling it into a ball-like shape.  Place on cookie sheet to bake.

These spread out quite a bit so space them out.  Mine were a little big, so I had to bake them about 11 minutes.

See how much they spread?  Don't they look great?!?!

I took this picture to give you an idea of how sticky this stuff was...

These are really good.  Even with all the stickiness, I know we will make these again.  Any flavor of cake mix should work!!

Make & enjoy!

Day 37--Homemade Cheez-its

I recently pinned a post about Homemade Cheez-its.  They looked so yummy and I've always loved Cheez-its.  The recipe can be found here. I made some today...

The recipe was easy to follow.  I do not have a food processor, but I gave Kevin an immersion blender for Christmas that had a chopper attachment so I used that. It worked great.  The comments on the blog said you could use a blender or a regular mixer.

I wanted these to turn out fabulous and look like the pictures on the blog.  They didn't.  They don't taste bad, they just aren't really worthy of being called Cheez-its.

Savannah wouldn't try them (no surprise there), Landon said they were just medium--not good, not bad.

I gave some to our friends that we carpool with. Summer (mom) said they were okay, but kinda salty.  Sarah, Natalie & Sam (kiddos) did not care for them at all!  

Maybe I did something wrong.  It's only 4 ingredients so I'm not sure what went wrong.  The comments were all good on the blog I pinned from. 

That being said, I most likely won't try these again.  I will just wait until the preservative filled real Cheez-its go on sale and buy a few boxes of those.

Day 36--Ashley's Sausage Wontons

I searched Pinterest for a recipe for Sausage Wontons, just so I could pin it and write a blog about them.

The recipes I found were not the same as the ones my friend makes and they did not sound as good.  So here is my first blog post that is kinda my own. I will write it & pin it.

I don't even remember the first time I had these sausage wontons.  They are so yummy and I look forward to them every time there is a get together/party at my friend Ashley's house.  Luckily, she doesn't mind if I share the recipe.

Ashley's Sausage Wontons

These are really simple, only 4 ingredients and so good!

You will need:

--Wonton wrappers

--8 oz. cream cheese, softened

--1 lb. sausage, spicy or regular

--1 small can green chile peppers, drained

Makes 24 wonton cups

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Brown the sausage and drain.  I rinse mine as well just to try to get as much grease off as I can.  I prefer Jimmy Dean sausage, it just seems less greasy. But any brand will do.
Honestly, I like to make these with spicy sausage, but if you don't like spicy food, regular sausage works just fine.

I made these for my Bunco gathering tonight, so I used regular sausage.

Mix the cooked sausage, cream cheese and chile peppers.

Wonton wrappers--at my grocery store they are found near the produce by the salad dressings and herbs or with the organic refrigerated items.

Lightly spray your muffin pans.  Seriously, only lightly spray. You don't want them to stick, but you also don't want the bottoms of your wontons to be soggy.

Place one wrapper in each muffin cup & gently press down into the cups.

Spoon some of the sausage mixture into each wonton wrapper/cup.  I would say it's approximately 1.5-2 Tbs. in each cup.  I don't measure, just a spoonful and even amounts in each one.

Bake at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes. The edges of the wontons will brown and the filling will be a little bubbly.

Cool a couple of minutes (if you can wait) and serve warm.

So good and so easy!

Thanks to Ashley for letting me share this recipe!!

Day 35--Photos on Wood

I started gathering supplies for this project when I started my 40 days of Pinterest.  I had to have photos printed at Staples to complete it and I kept forgetting to do that, until Thursday.

I found and pinned the idea here. She has several ideas on this page. Transferring photos onto to wooden blocks is about half way down the page.  The tutorial is easy to follow, so I will just show you what I did.

Since she put in her instructions that you should let the process dry overnight, I started this project yesterday.

I had some boards in the garage from a previous project. I cut sections off that were slightly bigger than my photos which are 5x7s.  I couldn't find the wooden plaques she used from Wal-mart so I figured I would try what I had on hand.

You will need Gel Medium. I found this at Hobby Lobby and used a 40% off coupon.  It is in the paint section by the canvases, oil & acrylic paints.

I cut my pictures to size and spread the Gel Medium on the wooden blocks (following the directions in the pin).

Put the picture face down on the wood and press firmly.

Allow to dry overnight or at least 8 hours.

Today I got to see if it worked!! I started rubbing the paper off and could instantly start to see the photo.

Can you see it on the right?  Pretty cool!!

Her tutorial states that it takes several rubbings to get all the paper & residue off and that is true.

Can you tell there is still paper residue on this one?

Let it dry and rub off some more, it will eventually all come off. 

Have I mentioned before my lack of patience? That did not change with this project...I wanted to get it done so I could write my blog post!!

I think I still need to rub some more residue off, but I need to let them dry a bit.  When it's all gone & all dry, I will Modge Podge them to seal them.

Aren't they neat?!?!?  Rubbing off the paper, will distress the edges and make it look worn. Rub carefully, if you get carried away, you will rub off the picture--can you tell I did that on Landon's pants in the top picture?

Her blog also has a tutorial for putting photos on metal using the same technique. I also pinned this tutorial showing how to put photos on canvas with same technique. 

Next time I will try to find the wooden plaques at Wal-mart to transfer on wood.  The family picture above was a black & white photo, but turned out more sepia. And the grain also shows through quite a bit.  

But I still think they turned out so cool!! I have plenty of Gel Medium so I look forward to making more and trying the transfer on metal and canvas too!

Day 34--Freezer Paper Stencil

I have seen several pins on Pinterest using Freezer paper in arts & crafts projects.  Who knew you could use it as an iron on stencil?  I had to try it!

I pinned a LEGO man t-shirt idea a couple of months ago. 

Landon LOVES LEGOS, so I thought this t-shirt idea would be fun to make for him.  Find the tutorial here.

While I was at it, I picked up a small canvas bag for Savannah to put her initial on. 

The tutorial is great and easy to follow. She even has a link for a LEGO man face to print & use.

I wanted a different LEGO face, so here is what I did.

I Googled LEGO faces, copied & pasted one that I liked into a Word document.  Cropped it down and expanded it to the size I needed.  I bought a yellow, youth large shirt from Michaels. My face ended up being about 7 inches wide and 5 inches tall.  I changed the color to a light gray & printed.

I laid it out on the shirt and it was the perfect size!!

I cut a piece of freezer paper and taped it to my face.  Then I traced the features on to the matte side of the paper.

(Freezer paper has a shiny side & a matte side--the shiny side will be ironed down, so trace on the matte side.)

I chose to cut the features out with scissors rather than using an exact-o knife. It just seemed easier.

Next, iron the stencil onto the shirt.

So easy!!  I folded my stencil in half & made a small crease at the top to line up with the tag in an effort to center the stencil. It worked!!

I guess I forgot to take a picture of the painting part.

I used black fabric paint and painted 2 layers.

I couldn't wait so I peeled the stencil off before it was dry.

How cool is that???  I added the white part of the eyes after the black paint dried.  I just free handed that part.

Notice the wet spot on the upper left of the shirt? Ugh...

I was working on Savannah's bag at the same time.  A tiny bit of pink paint was on my finger & of course I got it on the shirt. Thankfully, Resolve stain remover took it off!! Whew!

I'm SO happy with how this shirt turned out.  The plan is to put it in his Easter basket.  But it will be hard to wait another 10 days to give it to him...

Here is Savannah's bag.

I used the same techniques as I did for the shirt. Picked a font I liked, measured how big it needed to be & printed.

Taped a piece of freezer paper to the "S", traced and cut.

The bag is a canvas bag from the Dollar Tree. The freezer paper did not want to stick to the canvas as well as it did to the cotton shirt.

I used pink acrylic paint that I had on hand. The bag probably won't be washed so I didn't use fabric paint.

The freezer paper stuck to the bag when I went to peel it off.

Not sure what happened but I was disappointed.

I guess it's just the different type of fabric--canvas vs. cotton.

After the paint dried, I scrubbed the bag lightly with water & a paper towel.  It worked fairly well.

The picture doesn't show it but in person you can still see the freezer paper just a little. But it's still a cute bag and I think/hope Savannah will like it!

This was SO easy and SO fun!  I already have big ideas for gifts I need to make using this technique.  

So excited!!

Day 33--Banana Chips

This is one of those pins that doesn't link to a tutorial, but has instructions in the description.

Banana Chips

Kevin & Landon both love banana chips so I wanted to try these to see if they would like a homemade version.

I cut two bananas into thin slices.  About the width of a nickel. Dipped in lemon juice and laid in a flat layer on a baking sheet.

Baked on 200 degrees for 1 1/2 hours, then flipped and baked an additional hour. 

They turned out ok. I tried one and they were sweet. Kevin said they tasted good.  Landon wouldn't try one because they look funny--we run into that a lot around here...

Honestly, I'm not sure I will try these again.  It takes over 2 hours to make these!!  

NOTE: I wrote this blog and made these chips before we went on our Spring Break trip.  The banana chips traveled with us, but none were eaten.  I tried one when I got back. It didn't taste bad, but it was chewy.  Not at all like banana chips you buy at the store.

I don't think I did anything wrong and like I said, I don't usually have over 2 hours to make banana chips.

Save your time and just buy in the store.  Or buy a dehydrator and make them that way :).

Day 32--Muffin tin for car trips

This is one of those ideas that made Kevin say:

"Great idea, honey...Pinterest?"

Of course it's from Pinterest. 

There is no need to have original ideas anymore when you can pin everyone else's ideas. :)

Feeding Kids on a Road Trip

I pinned this idea, many weeks ago.  It's one of those things that you see & think, uh duh...

You can find the idea here. As you can see, she was really awesome and packed meals to take & eat on the road.

I'm sure that is cost effective & more nutritious, but it was Spring Break.  I'm kinda lazy & we had Sonic.

I found the muffin tins at the Dollar Tree.  A 2 pack for $1!!  They are a tad flimsy but not terrible.  If you are worried about sturdiness, just keep the 2 pack together for a double layer.  A single tray worked well for us--one for each kid.

I also took leftover paper muffin liners to make for easier clean-up & storage on the road.  Savannah loves ketchup, so the liners made it nice to just throw away unused ketchup instead of having it all over the car.

The kids loved them too!!

Highly recommend this if you are traveling with kids and eating on the go in the car!!

Day 31--Car Pillows

My kids already have pillows that they usually use in the car. But I saw a picture for one on Pinterest and decided to pin and make some for our Spring Break Trip.

Car Pillows

You can find the idea here.  She actually sells patterns and kits in her Etsy shop to make car pillows.

I had leftover fleece, so I cut a piece for each pillow that measured about 30 x 12 inches. 

The picture above shows once piece of fleece flat & the other folded in half ready to sew.

I sewed around the 3 open edges with embroidery thread by hand. I left an opening to stuff with cotton batting, then sewed it shut.

Didn't take long to make and the kids love them. 

Even if they didn't use them to sleep in the car on the trip... 

Faking for a picture :)

Simple project and I'm sure that someday on a trip they will actually be used for a nap.

Day 30--Silver Dollar City

I grew up in Nixa, which is a town in SW Missouri. My sisters & dad still live there.  Growing up we went to Branson (30 minutes south) more times than I count.  In high school I visited Silver Dollar City more times than I can count!  

Fun times.  

 

Last summer, we had not gone anywhere as a family. Summer was slipping by quickly & we needed a fun trip. I found a good deal online so we decided to take the kids to Silver Dollar City for a couple of days--even though I had called the place Steal your Dollar City for years...(many people do :)

We had SO much fun!! The kids loved it! We met our friends the Hall family there and had a great time. I pinned it on Pinterest on my "Favorite Places" board. Couldn't wait to go back. Luckily, Santa brought us season passes for Christmas.

We took a trip to MO for Spring Break. It just happened to be opening weekend at SDC so we spent a BEAUTIFUL Friday & Saturday at the park. 

Friday we took my sister, dad, niece & nephew with us and met Kevin's brother & his wife there.  It was nice to have the extra help and ride the rides with lots of people.  My niece, nephew & brother in law are not fans of roller coasters. We managed to drag my niece on one of the bigger coasters and she cried the whole time.  We got my dad to ride the Electro-spin & the Giant Barn Swing.  That was hilarious! 

Some pics from Friday...for whatever reason I didn't take many.

This way to SDC!

My niece Ryleigh with Savannah--pretty girls!

Our daredevil Landon with Kevin on Powderkeg.  The boy will ride everything he's tall enough to ride...except the Electro-spin.

Savannah with my nephew Grant. He's 16 & riding the kiddie rides. The only coaster we got him on was Thunderation.  He doesn't know what he's missing!

Landon with his hands up on the giant swings. I think Grant is behind him to the right.

Savannah & I on the swings. My dad is behind us to the left.

Don't waste the powder sugar after finishing a funnel cake!

The girl was tuckered out...

Saturday it was just the 4 of us. Savannah is not a huge fan of the roller coasters, but she will ride them.  We always start our day in the Grand Exposition area so we can get the kids measured & wrist banded for rides.  I wish everyone did this. I wish SDC had more measuring areas. But it's a great area that has kiddie rides that we love so just as easy to start there.

Kevin & Landon on the small Pirate ship ride.

Kids acting crazy--for every picture I wanted to take, there had to be a crazy pic and a regular pic.

Kiddos waiting for daddy to ride the Electro Spin...

Poor guy had to ride by himself.  Couldn't get Landon on it, Savannah is too short & it's frowned upon to leave your 2 small kids so the adults can ride together.

She loves that she can ride this by herself!

Silly girl...

Both days were beautiful. I heard the park anticipated having 9000 people opening day and there were over 15,000. I would say there were at least that many on Saturday too.

Even with the crowds, we didn't have any problems getting on rides. The new roller coaster, Outlaw Run, opened this weekend. We waited 45 minutes each day to ride it. Not bad.

We also took a tour of Marvel Cave on Saturday. As Savannah put it--"It was awesome".  

Despite the look on the face of the lady/photobomber behind them, she was very nice :)

The boys rode the Giant Barn Swing.

I love this picture of them. Not sure what they are talking about. 

My kids have the best dad!

If you haven't been, this is the barn swing. Not the best video, but you get the idea. 

The kids were great and we had a great weekend. 

Can't wait to go back. 

Just a couple more sweet pictures. :)

Wilderness church--I love how the sun is peaking over the roof.

Waiting for daddy to buy Apple Butter. Landon refuses to put his arm around her or allow Savannah to put her arm around him...

Saturday was Landon's day to be tuckered out at the end.