Intentions For This Blog

Craft sharing was my primary intention for this blog with a little sprinkling of food/family/country living.    I love all things crafty.  I have etsy shops, do craft shows every fall and crafting is always, always, always intermingled in my everyday thoughts.  It's simply a part of my soul.  However, time is short in my life right now.  Cancer is currently part of my family and I spend as much time as possible with this person...on top of caring for my own three children and husband.  I simply do not have time to do any extensive crafting.  What I am working on are stitchery patterns because I can fling the needle around while I'm visiting.  If I can figure out how to, I will start at least sharing some free patterns. In the meantime, writing is sporadic at best.  Life simply gets in the way sometimes.  But life is rarely simple, is it?

A Look At Siesta Key, Florida

 We were lucky enough to spend last week in Siesta Key, Florida.  It's a lovely place but it was extremely busy last week.  

It truly has white powdered sugar sand and beautiful aqua water.  The heron was at the Myakka State Park.  A must see  place if you go to the Sarasota area.

NEXT STEP RECIPE ORGANIZATION

I have no doubt that you have flipped through your new binder full of recipes since you visited last.  Hopefully, you have weeded out a few in the process.
     Now, it's time to make some dividers.  For this, you can simply buy some dividers with those little tabs on the side or you can make your own with some tag board and those nifty  sticky tabs.  These are great because they stick like a post it but they are movable so you can move the tabs on your dividers as you add additional dividing sheets.
     Now, let's decide how to tag your dividers.  I separate the "proteins" into the following:  beef, chicken, pork, fish, tofu, meatless.  When it comes to salads I also separate into several catagories: green, pasta, grain, vegetable, etc.  I do the same with veggies.  There are so many potato dishes I have a separate divider for just potatoes.  You can use tags such as greens, root veggies, corn, etc.  It really depends on what you make a lot for your family.
      So the assignment for this week is to make dividers for your recipe stash and try out a few more recipes, deciding whether to keep them or recycle them.  If you like them just put them into the front of your binder for now.  Don't be afraid to write on your recipes.  I note whether to add more or less of something, any changes in heat or timing, etc.  Making these dividers isn't something that you have to sit down and take 20 minutes to do.  While waiting for the water to boil, taking a phone call, or sitting in the dentist's office, jot down a few dividers.  Before you know it they will be done and it didn't cost you a block of time.  In the meantime, your binder is useable!

Those Three Hole Punched Recipes

     Now, what to do with that stack of recipes that you hole punched last week???  Remember, I said I needed a system that was  simple and streamlined to deal with this pile of tear outs that I had been collecting. And I didn't want to spend a big block of time dealing with it.   If you are anything like me, the number of tasks on your DAILY TO DO LIST  far exceeds the number of minutes in the day.  I needed to break it down into quickie  steps.  Your next step is to simply put the whole pile into a binder.  Yes, unorganized and all types of dishes together in one place.  Don't worry, further organization is coming!
     So, now that they are all in a binder you can AT LEAST flip through them and zero in on some recipes to try.
     OK, that took you maybe 10 minutes, tops.  You can be done for now-OR- you can choose 2,3,7 recipes to try this week.  I put my choices in a little folder and tucked them into the binder.  You can simply put them at the top of the pile if you want.  When you make them this week, keep those that you like,make notations on them and put them on the top of the pile in the binder.  Guess what you are going to do with them if you don't like them.  You are simply going to recycle them.  Put them in your recycle bag and take them to your local school or library.  Or make some plant starter pots.  More on that this week.
   

Skillet Chicken Pot Pie With Biscuit Topping

I have had ZERO time for crafting these days so I am going to share a Skillet Pot Pie Recipe that I found on the internet.  I had to tweak it a bit so I'm going to give you MY version.  You can find the original on www.mealsmatter.org.

There is a yummy biscuit recipe that goes with this but I did not have the heavy cream that it calls for so I skipped it.  Normally, I would have made a healthier biscuit, but this time I grabbed a box of Bisquick(which I know is not healthy) and added some goodies to dress them up a bit.  You can even use biscuits in a tube.
Find the biscuit recipe on the box, whip that up but add 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese.  Once they are out of the oven, mix 2 Tblsp. melted butter and 1/8 tsp garlic powder together.    Brush this mixture on the hot biscuits.  Set these babies aside while you make the pot pie mixture.

Ingredients:

1 1/2 pounds chicken breasts(I used thighs)
4 tbl. unsalted butter
1 medium onion, minced (1 cup)
2 ribs celery, sliced thin
4 small potatoes, peeled, diced
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup flour
1/4 c dry vermouth or dry white wine
2 c. chicken broth(I boiled my chicken and used the broth from that)
1/2 c. evaporated milk
1 1/2 tsp minced fresh thyme leaves
2 c. frozen peas and carrots, thawed
Dash of pepper


In a pot, add your chicken and 2 1/2 c. water.  Bring to a boil and cook until chicken is done.  Remove the chicken and add the potatoes to cook in this broth.  When the chicken is cool, cut into bite sized pieces.  When potatoes are soft, put aside.
     In your skillet, add 2 tbl. butter, garlic, onion, celery and  cook 5 minutes or so, until onion is softened.  Stir in the flour and cook stirring constantly, until incorporated, about 1 minute.
     Stir in wine and cook until evaporated, about 30 seconds.  Slowly whisk in the broth from the chicken, evaporated milk, and thyme.  Bring to a simmer.  Add chicken, potatoes, and mixed vegetables.  Simmer 5 or 10 minutes to combine.

To serve, ladle up a bowl of the pot pie mixture and top with a biscuit.  Mmmm, comfort food!

  And it doesn't take long to whip up.  It's much faster than making a crust and baking.  If you could plan ahead and have the chicken cooked that will save you time during the regular preparation.  The original recipe  has you pan browning the chicken but since my chicken thighs were half frozen I chose to boil and use that broth!

Let's Tame Your Recipe Tear Outs and Simplify Your Dinner Recipe Search

     If you are a recipe and cook book hoarder like I am you have torn out recipes in piles, folders, boxes or strewn about on counter tops, in files, and tucked into the magazines they were extracted from.  Actually, I'm not that bad. I do have all of my tear outs and newspaper clipped recipes in a pile in my cook book cupboard.  Do I EVER make any of them.  Ah, no.  And why not?  Because I won't ever go through the pile to find that recipe that I ripped out months ago.  Who has time for that? But, I tear out some really yummy looking dishes and hope to make them "Someday".  That's the 8th day of the week - "Someday" - the one that never comes.  Long ago, when I had time,(BHAK(before husband and kids)) I would actually cut out the recipe and glue them on paper and tuck them in a binder.  I have three of those binders and I use them often.  Well, I just don't have time for that anymore  so I tried to come up with a way to streamline that idea so that I could use those recipes without investing a lot of time finding them.  It's not perfect and it's not really pretty, but for me, at this point in my life, it is functional.  That's as far as we can go sometimes, isn't it?
     Here is your first step to using all of those recipes.  This week, I  want you to  accomplish three tasks.  The first step is to collect the clippings and  put them all in one place.
 
     The second step is going to involve a hole punch - preferably a three hole punch.  It will make your life much easier.  Now, three hole punch your stash of recipes.  Actually, you would be surprised at how quickly this will be accomplished with a three hole punch.  If need be, take five minutes, here and five minutes there to get this done. Do it when you are waiting for the onions and peppers to fry or the toast to pop.

     Step three will help you with dinner this week.  During hole punching sessions, pull out a few recipes that you can make for dinner this week.  Now, put all of the recipes back in your pile, file or bag and sit tight 'till next week.  Enjoy those that you pulled out for dinner.  If you liked them, note that on the recipe and put that on the top of your pile.   If you didn't, pitch it.
    That's it for now.  If you don't have time to punch, just collect and stack this week.  Next week we'll put them somewhere.

For next week: You will need a binder or two, depending on the height of your recipe stack.

200 Creative Crafts For You & Your Home - Time for another book review...

I buy books that inspire me.  It is very rare that I actually use a pattern straight from a book.  I swoon over the pictures, log the basic idea in my mental file and learn new techniques that I can apply to my own creations.  Some of my favorite books are older publications that have some great basic retro-type ideas.
     This book, "200 Creative Crafts for You & Your Home"  is packed with exactly what it says, 200 pieces of inspiration.  Most of these ideas are simple and fast to create.

There are two sections to this publication.  The first section, crafts for you, contains more personal craft projects like jewelry, bags and accessories.

The second half of the book has projects for your home including frames, vases, teaspoon coat hooks and furniture.  There are 312 pages of goodness here.

There are so many ideas I have tagged in this book I'll never have the time to make them all, but if you are looking for a quick project-some of which can be kid/teen friendly, give this publication a looksy.  Take the basic idea and embellish to your heart's content.   Out of 200 ideas you are bound to find more than a few that pique your interest.