Project Runway Play Day #2

I may just make this a habit.  My Project Runway challenge to myself today was to create a go to tshirt that is all season friendly.  Mission accomplished :) I can throw a cardigan over it and make it perfect or fall! Once again I did not use a pattern but I did order a couple vintage patterns from etsy yesterday so I may be using one sometime soon.

Welp my seester just showed up so I gotta run!

Happy Sewing!

Love, T

What's for Dinner?

Have dinner plans yet? If not this sure was tasty and pretty dang easy!  Takes about 2 1/2 hours to cook so it was nice to start early afternoon and it was ready just in time for dinner. My friend Kelley got me a handy little cook book called 500 casseroles as a wedding gift.  I haven't really had a chance to cook out of it since I got it because almost all of the recipes are "cold weather" recipes, you know what I mean? Since yesterday was the first official day of fall Johnny and I decided to get that handy little cook book out and pick something good to eat! We decided on Easy Pot Roast with Sweet Potatoes.  Seemed like a perfect mix of Johnny and me..he likes meat and I like veggies!  We made a few changes according to what we had around the house.  Here is the recipe and the changes we made :) Enjoy!

Changes: we used russet potatoes instead of sweet potatoes. 

We added fresh green beans, onions and carrots to the pot.

At the end once you have taken most of the contents out of the dutch oven, mix 3 T water and 2 T flour in a bowl and pour into remaining juices, bring to a boil on the stove top until thickened and poor over roast and veggies!

Works out for meat and veggie lovers :)

My little sous chef :)

Happy Cooking!

Love, T

Pumpkin Pancakes

I get so inspired by all the fall flavors I just can't get enough :)  After making the homemade pumpkin spice latte drinks for Johnny and I the other day I had quite a bit of pumpkin left so I threw it in the fridge for a day and decided to make pumpkin pancakes from the leftover! After searching online for ideas, I combined a couple different ones and adjusted them according to what I had here to work with.  These are quick and easy and semi homemade!

Pumpkin Pancakes

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups pancake mix

1 1/2 t cinnamon

1/2 t pumpkin spice season

1/2 t nutmeg

1 egg

3/4 can pumpkin

1 T vanilla

1 cup water

Mix dry ingredients together in one bowl. 

Wet ingredients in another.

Combine the two and make you some pancakes!!

They were such a pretty orange color!  I topped them off with some cinnamon butter!

Easy enough just mix butter and cinnamon :)

Enjoy!

Happy Fall!

Love, T

Playing Project Runway Today

Today is one of my days off for the week and all I had planned was to run, craft and read, three of my favorite things :) I haven't gotten any reading in just yet but I did get my morning run in and I've been crafting off and on all day!  For a couple of hours I played project runway in my sewing room.  I came up with a challenge, picked my fabric, no patterns aloud and started creating. 
My challenge: make myself something I can wear that I've never made before. So I made a lightweight cropped jacket! Here is the finished product.

It's not perfect but I sure do like it. I really do need to start using a pattern but it's just so stinking fun to see if my vision turns into reality.  Today it did. 

Happy Creating!

Love, T

3 minute Parfait

As easy as 1-2-3..

All you need is..

Any flavor of yogurt

raisins

granola

your choice of fruit

 All you do is..

Layer!

I did raisins, yogurt, granola and fruit

Enjoy!!

Happy Mornng!

Love, T

Seester Craft Night

You may have heard me talk about sister adventures..no? Well it is when my sister (Tara) and I have "sister time" whether we are thrifting, having a picnic or watching a redbox movie topped off with her homemade popcorn and a diet Dr. Pepper. It doesn't really matter what we do it is always some of my favorite memories :) Our most recent sister adventure was during our first slumber party here in Evansville.  We had craft night!  Just a little background info on this..My mom was always good about making things fun and creative for us growing up, from making homemade play dough to painting pumpkins every year around Halloween.  There were always festive decorations and our birthday cakes were aways homemade (probably why I hate store bought cakes to this day).  When we would all get together for "craft night" Tara would pretty much dominate each and every project we did.  This is not an exaggeration.  She would be working slowly but surely on some amazing piece of art :)  As we've gotten older we would have "craft night" with our friends making various things like picture frames and Christmas ornaments. Tara and  I finally got to have one of our craft nights a couple of weekends ago!  Like always it was so fun and her end product was ridiculously cute! 

 yes that is a fox wearing glasses :)

Tara gave me her adorable little fox and it is now hanging in our dining area :)  She has actually inspired me to do more with animal faces, so look for that in the near future.  You can find my finished project in my etsy shop HERE!  I hope you have siblings or friends you get to be creative with!

Happy Crafting!

Love, T

Fall Drink at Home

I always look forward to Starbucks festive drinks.  In the fall my favorite one is the pumpkin spice latte..yum! I decided to make my own at home :) Now you can too!
All you need is: 2 cups milk, coffee, 3 Tbsp pumpkin, 3 Tbsp sugar, 2 Tbsp vanilla, 3/4 tsp pumpkin pie spice, 1/4 tsp nutmeg and cinnamon for topping.   Start by brewing a small batch of coffee, for 2 drinks you will only need about a cup.  Once the coffee is brewing get started on your drink!

Add your milk, pumpkin, and sugar together and heat on medium heat until steaming.  Once mixture is steaming add vanilla, nutmeg and pumpkin pie spice.  Remove from heat.

Place mixture in a blender and blend for about 20 seconds to create a frothy texture.  Pour into 2 mugs.

Top drink of with coffee.  Gently stir.

Sprinkle cinnamon on top.  If desired add whipped cream too!

I hope you enjoy this fall treat.  It's not Starbucks but it is budget friendly!

Happy Fall!

Love, T

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Good Morning!! I have been neglecting my blog this week but I am here to update you :) My first week of working on the floor in the NICU went really well!  It really made me miss my old NICU crew but made me smile when I started thinking about all of our nights together, if any of you are reading this I MISS YOU! Although those days have come and gone I am excited for the future!  While busy with work and crafting I squeezed in a weekend trip to Lexington to stay with my good friend Ashley!  Very relaxing weekend with shopping, talking, dancing and just good ol girl fun :) My sister (Tara) and one of my other close friends Kristin went with me too, which made the weekend even better.  I really cherish these trips, no we don't talk everyday, maybe not even every week but when we get together we don't miss a beat!  I hope you have some buddies like this because they are the best.  Ashley is always the best host.  She made us brownies and had a tentative agenda for us to show us a good time. I snapped a few pictures through the weekend. 

Kentucky played a football game on Saturday so we all sported UK gear to support to cats! Of course I have on my Sookie Says UK shirt! Actually funny story, I originally bought it for Ashley but I loved it so much I kept it haha. I just broke it to her this weekend too :) Sorry Ash!

We had a delicious appetizer style lunch on the patio :) Such a pretty day!

After we got home from shopping Tara and Kristin decided to dye their hair dark for fall! I love how random it was.  Both turned out quite purty! I had to resist myself.  who knows I may still do it!

Yeah we were the spectators.

We ended the day with karaoke, cheesy dancing and lots of laughs :)

Happy weekend!

Love, T

PS If you haven't tried the fruit and maple oatmeal from McDonald's, you should! Kristin introduced me to it and I'm addicted!