thanksgiving dinner

So what is everyone having for thanksgiving dinner?  Here is what we are having
Deep fried Turkey
Roasted turkey
Mashed potatoes
Green beans made by one of my mother in laws
Stove top stuffing
homemade stuffing by my room mate
broccoli casserole
Deviled eggs
cheesy corn 
cranberry Jelly from the can  
dinner rolls
pecan pie
pumpkin pie
chocolate pie
coconut cream pie
chocolate cake
fudge
egg nogg
sweet iced tea
I am making cake and pies tonight.  Then working on all the other stuff tomorrow.  My son is making the deep fried turkey.

fall cocktail

this stuff is great

All you do is place all of the ingredient's in a large crock pot and let it get warm. This is a very good drink taste lake a caramel apple.

Ground Beef and Vegetable Soup

It has gotten cold here in Indiana. I hate the cold weather but I love the food that goes along with it. Vegetable soup is one of my favorite meals but I have to have it homemade ( no vegetable soup out of a can for me!).
Here is a recipe that tastes yummy but is just a little bit different than your normal everyday soup.

Homemade Ground Beef and Vegetable Soup

1 pound ground beef
onion flakes
1 tbsp. flour
1 can diced tomatoes ( I use the ones that are seasoned)
1 can tomato sauce
2 cups water
1 tsp Italian seasoning
celery salt
1 tsp minced garlic
1 cup elbow macaroni
vegetables of your choice

Brown ground beef and onion flakes. Drain and transfer to soup pot. Add remaining ingredients except macaroni. Cook for 20-25 minutes. Add macaroni and cook until done. Enjoy!

Cake Decorating Birthday Party!

Today my oldest daughter celebrated her 9th Birthday. We had a hard time coming up with a theme for this party but after doing a lot of talking we decided to go with a cake decorating theme. We like to do unique parties so this fit right in with that ( past  parties have been Strawberry Shortcake, Wizard of Oz and Rock Star).
Like most parties it all starts with the invitations. These are the invitations we sent out. You are only seeing part of the inside so my personal details are not shown.

Next came the planning. Although it didn't take a lot of planning it did take a lot of prep work! I knew I wanted to let the girls decorate cakes of course but I also knew I had to have a few more activities to do or I would have way to much free time on my hands with them. I tried to come up with something that would go with our theme but I finally gave up and just did crafts I knew the girls would like!
The day started with the girls arriving and serving lunch. I wanted to keep this simple so I just served pizza and potato chips. They had Capri Suns to drink.

Once the girls were done eating I sent them into the room to decorate little bags that I had picked up. While they decorated I cleared off the table and set up everything for cake decorating.

Once the cakes were set up the girls were called back in. Each girl had a 8 inch round cake to decorate. I had also made 4 batches of homemade buttercream icing.

 

 

The girls were showed all the yummy stuff we had to use for decorations and were given some paper and pencils in case they wanted to draw out their designs before just going crazy! They really got into it and came up with some cool designs.

 Once the cakes were done I put them in cake boxes with the girls names on them so we would know whose was whose a the end of the party. Next everyone put shoes on and went into the garage for the piñata!

Once the piñata was over back inside we went for cake and ice cream. Because I had made so many cakes we decided to order the cake that would be served to the girls.

Next we did presents. I am weird and have issues with how people handle this part of the party. I honestly can't stand all the kids crowding around and no one being able to see. To avoid this I bring in 2 chairs- 1 for the birthday girl and 1 for the friend  whose present they are opening. It works well and it gives the giver of the present a chance to feel special.

(My youngest one insisted on giving her sister her present today even though her birthday isn't until tomorrow.)
We had about 30 minutes left once the presents were open so we made one more craft. They painted wooden door hangers for their rooms.

Neither one of my crafts were fancy but the girls seemed to have fun doing them anyways.
When the girls left they all walked away with the aprons I had made them(tutorial coming soon), 2 crafts, a cake, a goody bag and candy from the piñata.

Overall I think the party went well and the girls seemed to have fun.
I can't believe my baby girl will be 9 years old tomorrow. Happy Birthday Emily. I love you very much!

Now to start thinking about my youngest daughters birthday in April!

Purse Tissue Holder

I have a craft show coming up on the 19th and I was trying to figure out what to make with all this scrap fabric I have. I finally decided to make some of the tissue holders. They are simple to make and don't take a lot of time. Best of all it will use up some of that fabric that you have kept because it was to big to throw away but yet still to small to make a lot of projects with!

First you need to cut 2 squares of fabric that measure 6 3/4 in by 7 1/2 in. Pin together with the right sides facing together ( which means the fabric that are you are looking at is the wrong side)

Sew around all 4 sides but leave a 2 inch opening on one side to turn inside out.

Turn inside out and press with iron if needed. Sew opening shut.

Bring the two ends of the fabric ( your short side) together, overlapping slightly. Pin and sew the edges of the fabric together.

Turn inside out and you have a tissue holder!

Girl Scout Fall Festival

Saturday I hosted a Girl Scout Festival. Both my co-leader and I have planned many events for Girl Scouts but nothing quite like this. An event this size took lots of planning( we worked on it for months!) and quite a few volunteers ( that was the hardest part!)
We were very lucky that my co-leaders sister is very talented and made numerous displays for us. It gave the gym such a carnival fill!
The games were mostly made although a few were store bought. This helped us keep our cost down and made some of the games more unique!
We started the day off by setting up the entry way. This is where everyone checked in. After checking in the received a brown lunch bag that had all their tickets in it. The brown bag collected all the goodies they would collect.

Once we got them checked in into the gym they went. We had 15 games to play, a cake walk and a silent auction. They also got a bottle of water and a bag of popcorn. Extra tickets could be bought inside also.

The cake walk was right in the middle of the gym and the games lined the walls.

We had lots of photo ops sitting around to.

These were all hand painted ( not by me though lol).
We had some really fun games

 Lucky cups ( guess what cup has the ball under it) Hug A Mug ( ring toss with the hug drinks)

 Plinko and Paratrooper Landing ( the guys with the parachutes had to land on a plate to win a prize)

 Sucker Tree and Chews Wisley(a bubble gum machine and the gum balls were made out of felt. Some of them had P's on the back and if they picked that one they got a prize)

 Bottle stand and Frizbee Toss

 Flip a Frog, Penny Pitch

 Bucket Toss

 

Feed the Elephant

Fish Bow, Tic Tac Tor and Can TossWe sold extra tickets

The Silent auction turned out to be huge!

We had 57 items!
My favorite part was the big box of popcorn!

I think everyone had a good time!

We ended up raising a nice amount of money for our Service Unit and it was worth all the hard work, If you have any questions about the games just let me know and will be more than happy to give you some more details!