A new first

Doing anything for the first time is always a big deal. It's always exciting and something to look forward to. (well...perhaps not, if we are talking about the dentist or doctor) But let's stay positive for this post !

Big or small a "new first" always seems to give me little stomach butterflies. So you can imagine how excited I am when I get to see, enjoy and share so many "firsts" in C.A.P's life. And boy, there sure are a lot !

Even though he is still so young I love for him to try new things. I know, I know, he won't remember them all (or maybe not even one) but at least I know he experienced them and I was right there by his side. 

So for today's post, I'd like to share one of C.A.P's small and simple "first" with you.

Now before I do, I need to tell you how this all came about...

Okay - who remembers making cardboard box houses when they were younger ? So much fun right ? They were inexpensive, fun to make, and they kept us amused for hours on end.

Well since we are moving TODAY (I'll get to that in another post) we have had many boxes laying around the garage for while now, so I thought it would be fun to build (aka cut a door in a cardboard box the Mr. had already taped together) and paint a little house for C.A.P to play in. And that is just what we did !

I told you it was a "small first" but hey ! It's still a FIRST for him, so bring on the tummy butterflies for Mama. (Might be a mom thing...)

Here are the pictures of the making of the little cardboard house. Hope you enjoy them as we had a blast making it !



Appreciate & enjoy the little things.

Should be everyone's motto.

*********

I will be live from the new house next time I post (eeek)...which hopefully will be on Sunday with the Mr.'s favorite recipe. As long as our Internet/phone/cable guy shows up to "hook us up", I'll be all set ! Can't wait to share lots of new projects in our new home.

Before I go I wanted to send out a BIG Thank you  for all the wonderful feedback from Wednesday's post "A letter to the teenage me". I received so many personal emails and comments on how people enjoyed the post and how it really hit home. This is why I've decided to make "Letters to..." a permanent new monthly entry in my blog. Every month I will post a letter I have written to someone or perhaps some think, some will be funny while others may be a bit "sappy", if you will.

 Stay tuned for January's "Letter's to..."

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend !

Post ya later !

Bye.Cya

A letter to the teenage me

Since we are in the middle of a move this week...

I've decided to take a different route with this Wednesday's post. Hope you enjoy it !

Here we go....

****************************************************

Dear teenage Ashley,

There is so much I wish I could tell you.

You really do think you're always right don't you?
You think you know everything there is to know about growing up and living your "adult life" right?

Well, my girl, you are so wrong !

Even at 26, you are still learning new things about that "adult life" of yours. So how about you stop thinking you know it all and listen to some of the advice being given to you.

Go a little easier on your step-father - okay? He was put into your life for a reason. He makes your mama happy, and he truly is a great father figure. So let him be just that. Be polite to him, trust him, because he really is always looking out for what's best for you.

Take more pictures, be the girl that carries her camera around everywhere she goes. Don't delete pictures because you think "you look fat" or your having a "bad hair day". Those are tiny memories you get to keep forever. Memories of your friends you can always have. Trust me, despite the fact you think these girls will be your BFF's for life, you may be wrong. People do actually drift apart after being given that  precious diploma. So, cherish every single girl talk, sleep over, and embarrassing teenage moment because before you know it, they are all just distant memories you wish you could "relive" when you are having a bad "adult" day.

Really, really appreciate your mama, tell her more often how you feel about her. Sometimes she needs it, she has bad days too. She needs to know she is doing an amazing job at raising you and your brother. Thank her for letting you have the car for school despite only have one vehicle. Thank her for giving YOU the master bedroom, so you can have sleepovers with your friends, while she shared a room with your brother. You know, she really didn't have to do that, lots of other teenagers share rooms with their siblings, it ain't that bad! You've got one good mama on your hands, so let her know, okay ?

Stop worrying about having all the latest name brand clothing, because in 10 years they won't matter. You'll realise that material items are worth nothing compared to the love you have with your little family. Besides, in 2011, anything is in style, brand name or not, you can wear it all.

Don't talk about others behind their back. It makes you ugly. There is far too much bullying going on behind closed doors, and this isn't helping it. "Those" people you are taking badly about may have it harder than what you know. So stop it, it's rude anyway. Smile and say hello to them instead, you may even make their day.

Remember people's names, I know, even at 26 you are horrible at this. But try harder. Use their name when you talk to them, you'll be surprised at how much of a difference it makes.

Who cares if you aren't the most popular girl in school. There are far more important things in your life. In 10 years being the most popular girl in high school will mean zip. I swear.

Really, REALLY appreciate the fact you can put 3$ worth of gas in the car and see the needle move....a lot. Because believe me, things change.

Don't cut your hair into that short crazy hairdo right after graduation because you think "Britney Spears rocks it, why can't I?". Truth is, you really can't. So, just dont' do it.

Keep writing in your diary. Don't stop at 5 journals. It's not enough. I promise, you will LOVE reading through these when you are in your mid twenties. Memories, remember.

Stop eating those "poutines" in a bag everyday at lunch. Despite the fact they taste like pure heaven, they are bad for you. Enough with the extra cheese and gravy. Enough.

Stop worrying about what people say about you, who cares if everyone at school isn't your biggest fan. Don't let it hurt your feelings. People will always have something to say, good or bad. It's life. You'll be fine. I promise.

Listen to your mom when she tells you not to dye your hair. PLEASE listen to her. She is right, your hair will never be the same. I know you don't think so now, but your natural hair colour is beautiful. So please, keep it.

Keep up the calls to Nanny & Poppy every week. Those are 5 minutes out of your "busy teenage day" you will never regret. Ever. They aren't around forever...

Go to your Nanny's funeral. Your gut feeling was right, you will always regret it.

Stop worrying about what boy to date next. Who cares if you are "single" for more than a week.
You know the perfect boy you always picture yourself with?
The boy of your dreams,
The boy you could find in every single one of your favorite TV shows,
The boy who every night throws rocks at your window just so he can see you,
The boy that always seems to say the right thing at the right time,
The boy who plays lots of sports,
The boy who is every high school girl's dreams to be with.
Yeah him.
Well you marry that boy.
Actually, you marry an even better version of that boy. Better, than any Backstreet Boy, Dawson's Creek character or Much Music VJ. I swear. You do.

"If I knew then what I know now" really is a great quote. But, if this were true then you wouldn't have grown into the adult you are today.
 Everyone makes mistakes and takes things for granted when they shouldn't. So relax, enjoy the little moments and stop being so hard on yourself, you are only human remember. I promise, you will love the life you make for yourself, as it is filled with lots of love, a perfect little family, 2 boys you love more than you ever thought was possible, and many great friends that hold a huge part in your heart.

Love,
The mid 20's Ashley.

*************************************************

That sums up Wednesday's post !

Come back Friday :)

Bye.Cya

Oopsie daisy.

Blame it on the food, the spiced eggnog, the excessive amounts of chocolate, my attempt at learning to play guitar, the travelling, or the AFV Christmas marathon. Whatever the reason was...I didn't turn on a computer for a whole 24 hours. Oops !

So, today's normal (LATE...double oops) Monday post will be 2 in 1 - the Mr.'s favorite and a little somethin' else.

The Mr.'s favorite this week was...pretty much every meal we started eating about 48 hours ago. Massive, delicious, finger lickin' good meals. For the last two days we have literally eaten and drank "adult" drinks all day/night long (while being responsible parents of course...have some faith in me would ya.). The only form of physical activity we have done is move from a couch/chair/or bar stool to a kitchen table, then back again, and tonight, we are the most tired we have been this month. Isn't that funny ? Actually now that I think back, it may be classified as a bit sad. Well that OR it was a totally successful Christmas weekend. You decide that one.

Instead of sharing a whole meal with you my Mr. has decided to pick just PART of a meal.

These are the best Hash brown morning potatoes you will ever eat. Plus they are easy !

Introducing...

"Hash brown goodness"

They do look like pretty plain hash brown, but bare with me for the recipe and TRY them !

This is what you will need...

1 large bag of frozen hash browns

1 cup of chopped onions

1 can of creme of chicken

1/2 cup of melted butter or margarine

2 cups of grated cheddar cheese

Salt & Pepper to taste.

*Mix all the ingredients together in a casserole dish.

SIMPLE OR WHAT.

After this is done take...

1 cup of cornflakes

1/2 cup of melted butter or margarine

*Mix together and spread over your mix in the casserole dish

Cook this at 350 for about 45 minutes or until potatoes are ready ! Enjoy !

(Okay, post number 2 below ;)

PICTURE POST ! Literally....this post is ALL pictures. I thought since it was a Holiday weekend, I would switch things up and just share a few pictures from our busy but great Christmas !

We got snow !

Everything about this picture makes me smile.

 C.A.P's footprints aren't much smaller than Mama's feet !

 I decided to make a couple more wreaths. Click HERE for the tutorial on these puppies.

 Hi there.

 C.A.P's gingerbread house

Polaroid love.

 Neat-O

Hope everyone had a fabulous 2011 Christmas !

Stay tuned to my blog as there will be lots of DIYs, room decorations, wall painting, before & afters and a few other little surprises coming your way in near future ! All because...it's MOVING week ! (Yippee times 109238) We move into our new home this Friday coming.(Yippee times another 109238)

Check back Wednesday for a new post !

Thanks for reading my blog.

Bye.Cya

Baking & Picture taking

Christmas week = B-A-K-I-N-G ! Whipped shortbread cookies to be precise.

Now, if you are looking for a healthy cookie recipe (ps -cookies and healthy should never be placed in the same sentence.) - you won't find it in this post ! But boy are these puppies delicious.

Here is what C.A.P and I did yesterday. These are SO fast and easy to make if you are looking for a last minute "potluck" idea. Everyone loves cookies right ?

This is what you need :
1 cup of butter (softened)
1/2 cup of sugar
1 1/2 cups os flour
1/4 cup of corn starch
Jam of your choice

Hrm. I told you these aren't good for you...please look at that chuck of butter, and let me tell you...I didn't use the small part of it either.

Okay, you've looked enough, now erase that image from your mind (well...just scroll down, this will do ...) and start baking these !

C.A.P taking his cookie duties very seriously.

Whip your butter and sugar together until fluffy using a hand mixer, then add your other ingredients and continue mixing until it to looks like this.

Now comes the "shaping of the cookies" part. Pressure was on since we had an audience watching.
Introducing C.A.P's favorite buddies. Blue bear (Yep. He's a dog. I realised after I gave him the name,so let's keep that one a secret, okay?)Red bear (Yep. Same rule applies to this guy.Who taught me my animals anyway?) and Teddy. Very original names you say ? Oh...I know.

You want to make your dough into little balls. Pretty small ones, as you normally want these babies to be bite size. (You'll thank me later, I swear, they are very addictive, so limit your intake to 2 or 3 in one sitting. Since they are bite size it really means you just had like one normal sized cookie. BUT technically you've eaten three. You're welcome.)
 Press your finger into the middle of each cookie so they look like those in the picture below. This is so the jam sits nicely in the cookies after they are done baking.

 "Coocas"

I baked mine at 350 for 8 minutes. BUT my oven is possessed. It usually overcooks/burns 98 percent of the things I cook. (Yes, it's the oven's fault, not mine okay. I'm proud to say that we have learned to get along and I now never let her win a cooking battle.)

Back on track...if your oven is normal, then cook your at 375 for 12-15 minutes.

 I made 45 cookies with this recipe. But remember mine are bite size !

Enjoy ! Num.Num.Num.

Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas ! Enjoy the weekend !

 Check back Boxing Day Sunday for the Mr.'s favorite meal of the week. It will be a good one, because it's Christmas week (seriously is anyone counting how often I have said these two words ? Scary.)

Post ya then !

Bye.Cya.



Chocolate love.

On Monday, I promised you another Christmas themed post, and I WILL deliver !
I was so excited to make these with C.A.P., first reason is that he is at an age now that he enjoys doing crafts and helping "mamas" bake/cook. (Yes, "mamaS", he seems to have picked up a Newfoundland accent despite the fact he wasn't born there - I just loves it.) Second reason is because it involved me getting to eat chocolate. One of my favorite joys in life. Let me tell you I have many but this one surely makes my top 5.

So here they are, our Chocolate spoons ! (Eeep. Be warned, you are about to view a lot of pictures.)
Now I won't show you the finished product until the end...this way you have to read MY WHOLE post to see what I'm really talking about. (You want to learn to make a cute yummy treat, I want more readers. It's really a win win situation for all of us.)

So to begin, this is what you will need, or should I say, this is what we needed. You can use whatever floats your boat !

*Plastic spoons (I wanted clear but had no luck finding any at the store - they must the a "hot buy" right now?ha.)
*Marshmallows - the minis
*Chocolate chips.( Now, I'm a no name kind of girl, but please DO NOT cheap out on these, you will regret it if you do !)
*Plastic wrap - (told you, I like my no name.)
*Left over ribbon from a wreath I made (Please click here post for the wreath making tutorial-its a gem)
*Icing - (Scratch that. I changed my mind !)

First step -  melt your chocolate chips. I used the microwave for a quick fix, as C.A.P's nap time was fast approaching and we DON'T mess with that !
After melting your chocolate, I've found that the easiest way to place it on your spoons without making a complete mess is to put the chocolate in a baggy and use it as an icing bag. (Unless you have a icing bag, in which case use that. But who really always has those on hand? )

 Well...okay, I still made a mess. Just make sure your bag is closed before you start to squeeze it. (Oops. Is it nap time for me too?)

 Now that all of your spoons are full of heavenly goodness....

Place whatever you would like on them and pop them in the fridge for a couple of minutes so the chocolate hardens. We decided on 2 marshmallows. (Cchocolate, marshmallows and milk, that makes something right?)

SIDE IMAGE:  This is the dish C.A.P made for himself while I was placing the marshmallows on the spoons. Fake corn and marshmallows. (Solid meal if you ask me...) 

 Ding.Ding.Ding. 4 minutes are up - the spoons are ready ! If you are using the no name chocolate and your spoons aren't ready in the 4 minutes, don't say I didn't tell you so !

From here, I simply covered them with a small piece of plastic wrap and tied a piece of ribbon around them to dress them up a tad. I wanted to add a little note to each saying "Just add warm milk" but my my printer isn't set up and at that point it was WAY PAST C.A.P's nap time, and like I said before you DON'T want to mess with that. (For both of our sakes ;)

Please feel free to use the little note idea, I think it would add a nice touch !

Alright, I've made you wait long enough, here they are !

Aren't they cute ?

Before I go, I want to share a picture with you I took this morning. This is the sign outside the Mr.'s work place. They change it every week, one side normally has their company phone number etc. and the other  side has a funny thought or quote. I love the idea and they get lots of great feedback from customers.

Here is this week's funny side.

Post ya Friday ! Make sure to check back then !

Bye.Cya.

It's the most wonderful WEEK of the year.

It's CHRISTMAS week ! How exciting...expecting big things from Santa ?
I've decided to set the Christmas mood this week and make all 4 of my weekly posts about...you guessed it, CHRISTMAS.

So for today's post, I'll have 2 different sections. First being a "Something we made", and yes, C.A.P did help me out on this one I promise. For the second part, I'll show you a couple of different ways to make some "quick" Christmas decorations for around the house. Bonus, they won't cost you much !

Alright moving on the part UNO : Here is one of the crafts we did last week. Yes, I know these are ALL the rage on Pinterest, and there are a few different ways of doing them (...I'm sure all you pinners have already read them)  

The Christmas wreath.

The pictures aren't the best, I really need to invest in a great "high tech" camera to pick it up a few notches. (Santa, do you read blogs?)

 Here is the LINK on how to make the version we made.

I decided to spice it up and add a ribbon around it. Here is what it looked like before the ribbon...still pretty cute if you ask me. (Side note 1 : I used about 50 bulbs (different sizes) for this wreath. Side note 2: After closing the hanger I noticed a few empty spots that could have used a couple more bulbs, so I just hot glued a few other small bulbs to those areas.)

To make sure the ribbon stays in place, I used the glue gun and glued the ribbon to the back of the wreath - using very small dots of glue.

 I used the remaining ribbon to hide the top of the hanger...you could do this many different ways.

 Et voila ! You're done your wreathe. Simple or what ?

I know Christmas is VERY CLOSE, but now (and at the boxing day sales) if the PERFECT time to buy lots of bulbs, as they are getting to be really cheap. This way you have lots of bulbs to make wreath's for next years Christmas. PS- they make great gifts for friends and family !

Happy wreath making !

Now for the second part of the post. The cheap and quick way to add a few more Christmas themed decor in your home !

It's your lucky day really because, originally I was just going to post about the wreath we made; however, last night...like every Sunday, older DM invited us over for a Sunday night family supper. (Well that or we showed up just before supper time...convenient ? You think whatever you want...)

Anyway, as I was waiting for our yummy supper to be cooked I started thinking about how it would be nice to share some of older DM's secrets with you ! (shh)

So here they are, a few pictures of the simple and cheap, yet very good looking Christmas decorations she made for their home ! Enjoy and please USE some of the ideas :)

Acorns she picked from her back yard - Can't get any cheaper than this right ?

First - bulbs in bread basket. I LOVE this. SO simple !

Second - Branches and pine tree pieces (from backyard) placed in vase/pot, and a couple of Christmas flowers and ribbon. Simple AND pretty. Yes sir.

The mini trees !  Now this pictures really doesn't do any justice, so BIG apologies for this one.
Both trees are made out of bristle board that she rolled up and taped together to form a cone shape.
 The bigger tree - she glued silver ribbon around the whole thing. (1 buck at the Dollarama).
The smaller tree - she glued tin foil to the bristle board, then hot glued a few buttons that she had spray painted silver. This one is my personal favorite.
So the trees cost her a total of 1 dollar each ! Pretty good since these suckers sell for  about 15 dollars (and up) everywhere I've seen them ! You can decorate your trees with anything you have around the house - the possibilities are endless. (I sound like a bit of an infomercial...)

That's a wrap for this Christmas post, but come back Wednesday - I'll be sharing what C.A.P and I are making today !

Post ya then !

Bye.Cya.

It's dinner time !

This week the Mr. decided to pick the stuffed chicken and salad as his favorite meal of the week. The picture itself didn't come out very appealing, so my appologies for that. The dish looks kind of plain with just a chicken breast and little salad. But I swear it was VERY tasty !

Okay before I start, I just want to mention that I'm sure you all know how to make stuff chicken breasts, as it's pretty simple. However, I took a few pictures during the "making" and wanted to share,  in case they could be some help to someone who may be a stuffed chicken virgin ! :)

Mini cutting board and kids plastic blue plate = Most of my dishes are packed away for the move next week ! (woo-hoo)

Just a little FYI, this is not a slab of butter, it's a piece of cheese. You can really use whatever type of cheese you want to stuff your chicken. I decided on the yummy Baby Friulano cheese which was purchased at a little Italian store out of town and province. My father in-law always gets this sent from a little store in Ontario, he is Italian and you know how they love the GOOD cheese! (Ba-Da-Bing ! Ba-Da-Boom !)

Now after rolling the chicken breats up, I covered them in these bread crumbs - I got this type at Cosco.

Here they are ready to be baked

Cook at 350 for 35 minutes

When making a salad for supper, we normally make our own dressing, by using a little bit of balsamic vinegar, some olive oil and a sprinkle of PC glaze (see picture below). Be careful not too use too much balsamic vinegar as it is quite strong and may be overpowering.
I purchased this stuff at SuperStore for about 3 dollars. I've never checked, but I'm assuming you could buy it at other places. (a different brand, as this one is SuperStore's own brand)

Tad DA. You're done !

Simple right ?

Hope you enjoy this supper. Come back tomorrow

Post ya then !

Bye.Cya.