Day 6 and 7- two easy gifts and a WINNER

Day 6.... Inexpensive gift for a girl friend ♥

I found this great recipe for a facial scrub while surfing youtube.



video is from Kandee Johnson... If you love make up I highly recommend you follow her on you tube, she is so fun to watch and knows her stuff!

This is a great gift you can make ahead. Simply take some organic sugar, I LOVE LOVE LOVE using a course Turbinado brown sugar (You can find this in the bulk section of Whole Foods or any health food store) and mix it with ornanic lemon juice. I actually like to find a small mason jar, fill it with sugar and lemon juice to create a simple paste similar to other sugar scrubs you would find in bath or body stores. Since lemon is a natural preservative... this should last a while. You can even decorate your package for your friend, making it a little more custom.

Day 7- Yummy breakfast treats...

So this recipe came out of sheer desperation after I came home from Brave Girl Camp. While there at camp, each day the girls would prepare some amazing snacks for us. Once of these being an Apricot Brie Tart. Well these little guys stuck with me (literally, I think I gained 7 pounds on these alone!) after I came home. Now just the thought of trying to create a tart sends me into a state of panic, I love cooking and love recipes... but I need it to be simple, easy and well inexpensive.

So this is my easy-peasy knock of version of the Brave Girl Apricot Brie Tart recipe... perfect for the morning especially for those special guests who can appreciate carbs stuffed with fruit and brie (that was just for you Holli!)

Pretty self explanitory- take cresent rolls (highly recommend reduced fat, as this combo is NOT exactly low fat) , brie and apricot preserves (I have also used Marion Blackberry from Target that was AWESOME!)

Lay out your crescent roll as usual, but before you roll it from the bottom to the tip, add a chunk of Brie and a small amount of jam.

Next, start from the wide side of your crescent and roll towards the point, folding the point over your roll and making sure to pinch and secure all of the goodies that are inside of your crescent.


Next lay your yummies out on a cookie sheet and bake according to your crescent wrapper suggestions.


After they are done cooking, take them immediately off of your cookie sheet and lay them to cool on a plate.



These are just to yummy for words, and you will enjoy pairing these with a tall glass of milk or even bacon (If you just decide to throw all caution to the wind,lol)

I hope you have been enjoying the little bits of treasures that I have been sharing here... and now for our winner.. thanks to ALL of you for heading over to Vintage Street Market. I received an email for one of the owners, and she said that she was so grateful for all of the new followers. If you noticed, they are doing a Christmas countdown.. lots of cute ideas, you will love and be able to share for years to come!

So as promised, here is our winner!

I LOVE that vintage store - thanks for sharing and I 'liked' it on F/B also. Your kitty is SO beautiful (as is your gorgeous little girl) - I'm going to miss you at the Expo in Feb....Merry Christmas to you and your family!

December 19, 2010 12:49 AM

Shercara said...

What a beautiful story - and wonderful reminder of a great lesson. It does feel good to help others reach their dreams and goals and to be a part of that journey too. Love Elmyra Duff by the way -Thanks for the memory! Oh - thanks for the tips on Vintage goodies too! I "liked" them on fb too!

December 19, 2010 7:30 PM

Sherry, email or facebook me your address and I will get these fun goodies out to you!!! Also, Crystal... I will be getting your prize out at the same time.

Thanks for participating! I hope you all are enjoying your holiday season and finding peace and happiness ♥


~Liz ♥

5th day- mutual loyalty

This morning I woke up to this.

A little back story on these two.

This is Chloe the cat. Chloe is what can be described as a typical cat. Next to her is our daughter... and our daughter is what I would best describe as one of these:


Yup... an Elmyra Duff. If you are not familiar with this Tiny Toons Character from the late 80's early 90's here is the Wikipedia explanation:
"Elmyra is quite young and obsessed with animals and cute things (which is probably why she works as a nurse at Acme Looniversity), even chasing after animals whom she knows are her classmates at Acme Looniversity, obliviously causing great discomfort or serious injury to potential pets from her overenthusiastic affection and complete lack of even the most rudimentary knowledge of pet care."

I mean this association thoroughly affectionately, and trust that NO ANIMALS ARE HURT during my daughters love fest with the kitties. I make sure to stay with in earshot of her. And equally, Chloe has been know to give a scratch or two. So together, during the day they tend to not get along very well. We call it a love/hate relationship.

So you can understand my curiosity when I see this in the mornings. I mean they sleep like this every night yet during the day they have a tough time seeing eye to eye.


Seeing this made me think of their (what I like to call) Mutual Loyalty towards each other. Although they may not get along during the day... most days. At night, they come together for each others needs. Honestly the only reason that Chloe sleeps with our daughter is out of pure necessity for warmth, but in return she is so gentle with our daughter, even though our little girl may be the reincarnation of Elmyra Duff. But this really made me think.

We all need each other. We can not do everything all on our own. And although there may be times that we do not see eye to eye, or that the giving and needs may be lopsided... never the less, we all need each other. We strive to find people that are like minded, share our same goals, thoughts and dreams. If we are lucky... we find people that want to help us reach our dreams. If we are not so lucky... we find people that want to take our dreams. Either way, we have control over who we let in and who we take out. NEVER FORGET THIS. It is a tough lesson sometimes... I know this all to well. I have learned to put up my boundaries and protect myself through the years. But even when I am sad or hurt by someone who has wronged me... I never give up hope that out there in this world, maybe 5 minutes from my house or maybe in a totally different state or country... there are like minded people. People that want the best for you and will stop at nothing to see you through your dreams. And if your lucky... you can help them capture their dreams too. I think that excites me most... knowing that I can be a part of someones dreams... help them succeed. There is no greater joy than being a part of someones success, especially knowing that there are so many out there counting on their failure.

We do. We need each other. We need to be cheerleaders for each other, push each other forth into their promised futures. Scream at the mountain tops how AWESOME THE PERSON NEXT YOU IS!!!!

LOVE ONE ANOTHER... isn't that what life is all about?


Funny that this sweet little picture would trigger these thoughts in my head. Now I am sure these thoughts were ready to come out, ripe for the picking... but I still can't help but look at this picture of these two and know there is hope for their future. And although they may not always be the friendliest, they have each other when it matters most. They put their differences aside for when they need each other most.


PS... speaking of friends seeing friends live their dreams... I can not be more proud of some of my dear friends who are taking a big step towards their dreams. They are the owners and creators of Vintage Street Market. Just after I had written this post my friend stopped by to share with me some of their new product line that will be release in the gift and paper crafting industries this next Winter CHA 2011. If you haven't seen them yet on Facebook... check them out. Just two moms (and their dedicated husbands!) making their dreams come true. Their products are spectacular and different than anything I have seen in the Scrapbooking industry so far (the textures alone are amazing, let alone the vintage designs!)





So please join me in WELCOMING this new company to the Scrapbook Industry! To help get the started, I would love to do a giveaway here on my blog. Simply check out their site and follow them on Facebook or Twitter.

As a giveaway, I will gather some of my own vintagy goodies that I have in stock, as well as some of my Scrapbooking stash. retail value of at least $50.00. After you have checked out their site and followed them on twitter or Facebook, come back here and leave a comment. I will pick a random winner from the comments here on Monday and post the winner Tuesday December 21st, 2010. As long as you get you comment in before I pick a winner... you are entered!

Thank you for taking the time to check this out... I hope that this stirs your heart this season and that you come to love Vintage Street Market as much as I do.

~Liz ♥

On the 3rd and 4th day-

So yesterday didn't exactly go as planned... I have been under the weather, and it finally caught up with my little guy. Luckily he was just starting with a head cold, so we kept all the kids home from school just to make sure they don't over do themselves and get a full blown cold.

So my day was filled with naps... tissues... and movies....


And as much as I wanted to be able to pop on here and share another inexpensive gift idea or family tradition... I realized that the place I needed to be was cuddled up in mommy and daddy's bed watching movies. So that is what I did.

But it made me think of a few things. I had a few other blog posts planned for yesterday and today, and well... being with my kids helped me to see a few things differently.

3rd Day- Change of Atmosphere.

One thing that I have adopted this season is burning a LOT of candles around my house. Now hear me out before you say, "Well this is nice and all Liz, but how is this "blessing" someone? Well... it blesses me. and Inadvertently it blesses my family. Quick little secret about me... I use to sell Party lite Candles. So although I have sold off a lot of my inventory, I still kind of have a bit of a candle collection (although I cheated on Party lite the other day and bought some Chesapeake Bay Candles, I mean they had a fragrance called "Sparkling" How could I resist?)


With this in mind, and well with all of us not feeling so hot, I have started to make it a point to light candles in the evening to change our atmosphere. And I have to say, it truly helps. If James or I have been having a tough day, it is very relaxing to come home to the sweet scent and flicker of candles.

picture courtesy of Google

picture courtesy of Google

picture courtesy of Google

So similar clusters to these can be found twinkling around my house. And what I have found is that by having not only the scent of candles burning, but also the beautiful lights that they give off this offers an inexpensive change of atmosphere that naturally soothes and relaxes. After a long day, for our family this does the trick. Also I think of the memories that our children will have when they grow into their own families, and I hope that they will remember the warm candle lit nights that we would cuddle up on the couch together watching our favorite movies.

And picture courtesy of Google

And you can't have a picture of candles with out this moment.... seriously WHERE WOULD THE ENDING OF SIXTEEN CANDLES BE WITHOUT CANDLES? (Sorry... just had to add this ☺)

Day 4- Little things

Last Sunday we went to Old Town here in our little city and took our family Ice Skating. Simple.
This is something that we have been wanting to do for a while and well with the hustle and bustle of life, have put off year after year. Well this year, we just got up one morning and went. We had a blast, and I still look at the videos of the kids and smile.

caught this shot quickly while skating

Now I could easily recommend taking your family out and going Ice Skating. I was talking with a friend just yesterday that lived in Arizona and she said that her daughter enjoyed going to the local rink that was only a mile and a half away. Skating rinks are usually still pretty accessible for everyone, but what I really want to share with this portion of the post, is TO GET UP AND DO IT. Maybe it isn't ice skating, maybe it is something else. But whatever it is that you have been thinking about doing, attempting or enjoying. DO IT. Why Not? I have found that my main reason for not experiencing some of the things that I would like to in this world have been either because I never had the time, or because someone told me it could never happen. Either way I have listened. I shouldn't have... I know that. But I just never took the time to tell myself otherwise.

So consider this your turn. Your turn to take a moment, stop what you are doing. Look at what it is that you WANT TO DO, and take a moment to decide if THIS is the time you actually do it.

So much of our decision making in life is not having enough time to make the right ones. And it is so tough on not only us, but those who depend on us that if we don't take the time to make an informed decision... we may spend more time trying to make things right after making the wrong decision.

So I hope for this last day that you will consider to take a few moments to yourself. Collect your thoughts, gather your mind and take a moment JUST.FOR.YOU.

You deserve it... always.always.always.


~Liz ♥

day two- Love your neighbor ♥

So for today... I thought it would be fun to share another fun recipe. What you may have already figured out is that well... I like to cook, but I also like things to be easy. At this point in my life (and probably most of Americans too) it always seems like I just don't have enough time. Time is such a valuable commodity and I have had to learn the hard way that time is the one thing I can always use more of.

Well with this in mind, I combined two of my favorite recipes to create a quick, easy and yummy recipe for Apple Crumble. This takes no time at all (most of the time goes to peeling apples!) and bakes in no time. This is the perfect gift if you are heading to a friends house or need something a little more personal. I use to make this for our neighbors when we lived in California and it was always a hit.

Apple Crisp

Filling (my sister in-laws recipe):
5-7 apples cored, thin sliced and peeled


1/2 cup of sugar
1 tsp. Cinnamon


Mix all ingredients evenly and place inside of a pie dish, this should be heaping over.



Crumble topping(My friend Maryha's recipe):
In medium bowl cut in 1 cup flour, 1/2 cup butter softened (should look very piecey)

Next: Add 1/2 cup packed brown sugar, 2Tbl. granulated sugar, 1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon and a sprinkle of nutmeg.

Mix everything together so that the crumble is even and still piecey.



Next lay over the top of the apples and bake at 400 degrees for 25-30 minutes.


Nothing beats a good easy recipe. Especially with pictures!

I hope that this gives you an inexpensive and easy outlet for holiday gift giving. Homemade is so nice, and I am sure that your neighbor, teacher, friend, family member will appreciate anything handmade that you come up with because it is from you!

♥~Liz

1st day of Blessings- Love one another

So some of you may have read this post on the brave girls blog about Random Words of Kindness. If you did, than you saw that Christy and Melody were inviting people to come together on black friday to share Randow Words of Kindness to strangers on the street along side with a cup of cocoa. So the girls on that cold day after thanksgiving grabbed some cocoa and shared these kind words for the good people of Boise, Idaho. Well I have to admit... the idea of giving random people words of kindness (and cocoa) kind of made me a bit nervous. Not very often do you have people doing things like this, and especially not with cocoa!

So with this in mind... my family decided to adapt the original plan of sharing words of kindness to the world, and stuck them to our christmas countdown chain. Since everyday the kids would take one chain off, why not stick a beautiful word of truth to it and share it with each other?

Here is our countdown chain

So each day we take off a link from our chain. And each day we talk about it as a family (usually me and the kids during the week since James leaves early for work) and after we have read it to each other, talked about what it means to each of us then we decide who we would like to share it with, and we give it to them. I love that I can share with my kids. That they can see each of us sharing some kind words into this world. I have been taking some pictures of some of the responses we have gotten. I will probably will share them sometime this week, so stay tuned... the people we have shared them with have been so grateful.

I hope this gives you a great idea of how easy it is to give a little sunshine to someones day. As crazy at it may seem to walk up to someone and hand them these few words... you would be surprised how much of a difference it makes in their day.

Ok so now for our WINNER of our blog hop giveaway.....

Crystal Cantu said...

I will definately be trying this recipe this year. I admire the strength and courage you have shown. So glad to know you!

December 10, 2010 10:24 AM

Crystal email me of message me of facebook your address and I will send you a few of my new favorite things to create with!

Thanks for playing along on our fun little blog hop... I hope that you enjoyed it and continue to join me for the next 11 days as we count down some special blessings.


~Liz ♥

12 days of Blessings...

When I was younger... my family had a tradition of celebrating the 12 days of Christmas. As I grow older, the things that I took for granted the effort and thoughtfulness that went into all of this. I know now that I was wrapped up in my own teenage world, and I understand the need of this for growth, but I still try my hardest to prepare my children so that when they get to this point of their life, they will be aware of the the growing needs around them and the value of those who love them.

With this in mind... I want to take the official 12 days of Christmas (December 13th-25th) and share with you all some fun family traditions... values and some homemade ideas for the holidays. I realize that most of you have small children and I hope that all of you can appreciate the dedication of these next few days to promote love, kindness, thoughtfulness and gratefulness not only my children but hopefully in yours too.

I often find myself thinking of what Christmas is all about for our family. If you celebrate any other holiday season during this time, I hope you can still find some joy in this effort that can be tailored to your beliefs. Christmas for our home is the beauty of selfless gifts and unconditional love. Now this is wrapped up in the story of the first Noel, but the feelings that the first Christmas gift are timeless... the thoughts of meager beginnings, humility and unconditional love and kindness. This is a treasure that we can continue to gift during this holiday season.

Television and advertisers have told us that the holiday season is about getting or giving the perfect gift, getting the best price, or for this one time contributing to your favorite charity or the person waving a bell outside of your favorite store. I do not blame advertisers for doing their job, my hope is that people and children alike will see through these advertisements as simple suggestions rather than the norm to live by...

So this year, I want to take some time to reflect and appreciate the growing sense of gratitude that this past year has given our family. I am not going to lie... this year has brought a roller coaster of emotions, days that have started with no way of success that have miraculously ended with victory, or even days (definitely plural) that have just ended with no excuse for the pain they have brought... but alongside with my family, friends and my faith... this whole year, even the tough days... I can add to the victory category of life. It really took me taking a back to my childhood, considering all of the sacrifices that my parents have made through the years and realistically looking at the past years offering and mirroring them with the struggles I have sen my own parents go through. And yes they did go through them, never stopping just going through them, coming out on the other end victorious. It is a beautiful gift to be able to look back now and see the beauty of this last year. Although there were times where I wanted to scream truth out on the highest mountain, I remained quiet. And there were times when I wanted to rectify all the wrong that I have seen our family and our friends go through, but I allowed my heart to process, rather than to act rash... I was able to compose myself and act rational. Time is a beautiful thing to have, it is free and we have an infinite supply of it... so why not take the time to think things through? Forge a plan of healing rather than to contribute to the destruction of the situation. It is not easy... and I am not perfect, but I do have good friends... that have gone through hardships, we have helped each other out tremendously this year and for this I am grateful. I have never had to open myself up as much as I have had to this year... and I am truly grateful to have good friends along side myself and my family as we go through the "yuckies" together....

So to contribute to this beautiful holiday season and the things I am grateful for I want to share the "12 days of Blessings" and take the traditional 12 days of Christmas and re-program our brains to remember the good things of this year... even for these 12 days. I will continue to take this throughout 2011, as I can see myself wanting to share so much more than what 12 days can offer... so I will probably repeat around valentines day, as well as a few other choice times in the year.

So to start this off, I want to re-introduce one of my easiest recipes. This recipe is not only super easy, it is quick and it also is a high impact gift. The taste alone will make your friends happy, yet when they find out that you made it... that will be so much more special...

So here is the link for the original post form 2007 I STILL have people Googling this through out the year, lol... so I hope that gives you the satisfaction that it is a yummy and easy recipe :)


Peppermint Cookie Crunch Bark





1 lb. white chocolate melts
1/2 cup of peppermint crunch
1/2 cup of crushed Oreos

Directions:

put white chocolate melts in a Pyrex dish and melt for 30 seconds and then mix. Continue to melt in 15 seconds increments until chocolate is smooth (like cake batter, but with no lumps ☺)

add crushed Oreos and peppermint crunch and mix thoroughly.

lay out on waxed paper and spread out evenly to a 1/4 inch thick layer.

let dry and harden for 45 minutes. (you can also place it in the refrigerator if it helps to chill it faster, just make sure it is supported on the bottom)

break up into pieces and eat till you get sick!

It also tastes really yummy melted in some hot chocolate! (seriously, this is awesome!)

Enjoy!

I hope this blesses you, your family and friends this season... and I do hope you will join me December 13th-25th for the "12 days of Blessings"

If you would like to join in on this... there are some other girls that are giving their kindness on their blogs.... Check out my sweet friend Candra George.... she has organized this weekends blog hop and giveaways... she is giving away a free photo session (she is the talented photographer that took our families pictures)

Candra has invited us to do a giveaway and spread some kindness!

1.Lauren Norkum www.lnicolewrites.blogspot.com
2.Ashley Meek www.hazelolivedesign.blogspot.com
3.Tayla Thomford www.taylasjourneyhome.wordpress.com
4.Liz Hicks www.blogerisms.blogspot.com
5. Candra George www.mycreativereality.com

So just leave a comment here and on the other blogs for a chance to win. Each blog has their own giveaway so there are many chances to win!

For my giveaway I will be giving away some of my favorite craft supplies right, now... vintage stuff, paints, trims and glitter of course! Just leave a comment on this post for a chance to win!!! I will pick a winner on Monday, December 13th... this will start our 12 days of blessings.

thanks for participating!


~Liz ♥