Stuffed Squash

2012 will be the Year of Vegetables for me and my family. This is a great, easy and satisfying dish to get the ball rolling. Honestly, it makes a great fall dish and should have been included on here back then, but time has gotten away from me and I am very slow to post. However, as long as acorn squash, or any other winter squash is available in your market, then this recipe works.

There is a ton of give to this recipe. You can replace the sausage with any kind of meat you'd like. You can replace the stuffing with any flavor, or try rice. You can replace or eliminate the cheese. You can use any kind of squash. You can add anything to the "stuffing" that you might like. So many options.

Stuffed Acorn Squash

Italian Sausage
Stove Top stuffing - pork flavored
Mozzarella cheese
1 Acorn squash, halved and seeds removed

Roast your squash. There are a few different methods out there for this. I place mine cut side down in a glass pan filled with about 1 inch of water. Bake at 375 degrees for 30-45 minutes or until tender.

Remove the sausage from the casing and saute it with a bit of olive oil. Meanwhile, prepare the stuffing according to the package directions. (In the microwave is easiest) I ended up using about half the box in this dish.

Let your squash cool a bit then scoop out the middle meat. You want to leave about a half an inch of meat in there to serve as the 'bowl' which will be stuffed.

Add the cooked squash to your italian sausage and cook thoroughly. Add the cooked stuffing. Fill your squash bowls with the stuffing/squash/sausage mixture and top with grated mozzarella. (mine were heaping!)

Return the stuffed squashes to the oven and bake about 20 minutes or until the cheese is bubbly.

I read about this dish on a Mommy Forum I frequent on babycenter.com. I can't believe I never thought about stuffing squash before or thought about using stuffing as stuffing for any vegetable. You don't have to add any other seasonings or bread crumbs and you get that perfect stuffing texture! It would be great in zucchini, butternut squash, pumpkins, mushrooms, peppers, tomatoes, cabbage, the list is endless. It's a great way to feature vegetables without feeling like your meal is lacking carbs or protein. (which this one certainly is not). I'm going to serve stuffed vegetables a lot in this new year, both with meat as a main course and without as a side dish. The next combination will be brown rice, ham, cheddar and fresh herbs. Look for it!

Now Look What I've made! (no sew!)

I know it's already halfway through December and this is my first post for the month! It's been a crazy month, which I love, but that means putting some things off. Next week will be much slower so I am going to try to make up for the lack of posts. In the meantime....



As promised, a No Sew Christmas shirt, and many more cutey pictures of E in the shirt AND skirt that her mama made!

I also found this on Pinterest.  I only saw a picture of it, I never read the article or looked at a tutorial. I think some out there are being sewn, which you could easily do, but for this shirt I used Heat n Bond. It worked great. I bought the white onesie at the dollar store though, and that was a mistake. It is super thin and the the buttons were crooked, making the entire top crooked, especially after I put the design on it. It was an easy enough fix however, I just cut off the snaps and turned my $1 onesie into a $1 t-shirt. I think it goes better this way with the skirt anyway, because then it doesn't have to be tucked in. In the pictures it is still a onesie. The ribbon that I bought is from the Target dollar bins. Each spool had six different patterns on it. Each pattern had 3 feet of ribbon. I only used inches of each and didn't even use all six. I could make dozens of t-shirts from $2 worth of ribbon. Awesome. This was a really fun project that I am so pleased with. I did almost the entire thing during naptime yesterday and I think it is as cute as anything you would find in a boutique for MUCH more than I spent on it. Enjoy the pictures and let me know if you have any questions! I swear, anybody could do this!

Slow Cooker Italian Chicken

Happy Thanksgiving! As the holidays usually are I have been extremely busy traveling and visiting friends and family. Brian and I got to spend Thanksgiving in Mississippi showing off our super fun, silly, sweet, smart, sassy and a little sneaky now 15 month old to her Grandparents, Aunts, Uncle, Cousins and mommy and daddy's oldest friends and their little ones. We had a blast and she did too.

In honor of Thanksgiving I am posting a recipe that has nothing to do with the holiday. It is, however, fast, easy and delicious, which is exactly the kind of meals we need this time of year.

I have been and will continue to post a bunch of things I have tried that I got from Pinterest. But that's the point of Pinterest, isn't it? To get inspiration and ideas, try them out, then share with the web your results. (So then maybe someone can repin it, right??) This recipe is all over that site and all the comments talk about how easy it is. Well, as if a slow cooker meal isn't easy enough, this one is by far one of the easiest I have tried. The recipe is so simple. Through Pinterest I read two different blog posts about it. The recipes are basically the same and I will post it also, but I'd like to give credit to the actual recipes I used which can be found here and here. The only difference as you can see is that I used vegetable spiral pasta because it is what I had on hand.

Slow Cooker Italian Chicken

1 pound (or so) chicken breasts or tenders
1-2 cans Cream of Chicken soup (I used 2, I'm sure Cream of Mushroom would work too)
1 8 ounce block of cream cheese
1 package Italian Dressing Seasoning
Pasta of your choice

1. Combine the soups and cream cheese in a sauce pan.

 2. Place chicken in bottom of slow cooker and cover with the Italian Seasoning.

 3. Cover the seasoned chicken with the soup/cheese mixture.

4. Cook on high for 6 hours.
5. The chicken can be served whole, cubed or shredded at this point. I cut mine up into large chunks.
6. Serve over pasta!

Look What Else I Made!

I'm getting handier on my sewing machine! I am finding inspiration and motivation on Pinterest and other blogs and making it a point to keep my sewing machine out so that when it hits, I can sew! I want to make myself a ruffly pettiskirt like this one. I decided to practice by making one for Everleigh first. I already had this fabric so this was more like an experiment. It turned out great though and I am really proud of it. The most important thing that I learned while making this one for the baby is that before I buy nice fabric and try to make one for myself, I MUST get a rotary cutter and cutting mat. Hello, Christmas present.

Other than reading the tutorial for the skirt mentioned previously, I did not follow any particular patterns or instructions. The fabric I used is a shiny jersey knit type fabric. I knew how to make ruffles already, although I had never done it. Turned out pretty simple. I used one of E's current skirts to figure out the basic shape and size to cut the foundation. The skirt is a 2T and she only wears 12-18 months. I planned on putting in an elastic waist to ensure a good fit and knew that it would make for a very full ruffly skirt. I was okay with this. This way it will last a while. Also, being this slightly shiny, black fabric, I was worried this style would look too mature for a little baby. So I made sure it was fuller, more tutu-like, so that it was still appropriate for her.

The only concern I had and never really solved was lining up the front ruffles and the back ruffles when sewing the two pieces together. It turned out to not be a problem. It is so full and ruffly that you can hardly tell, plus since it's black you really have to look closely. I think if and when I make this skirt for myself I will try harder to line the ruffles up. I think using the rotary cutter and measuring more accurately (or measuring at all) will solve this problem.

Also, the skirt ended up coming to a point on the sides that were sewn together. I just cut around the bottom to make it more even and look how I want it to. The one necessary point to this skirt is to use a fabric that does not need to be hemmed. That way if a ruffle goes wonky, it's easily repaired.

Cutting out the foundation.
The skirt at the very top is the one
I used to make my pattern.

These are all the strips I cut to make ruffles.
Each one is about twice the width of the skirt.

I sewed one line at the top of each strip and
pulled the extra thread to make it ruffle!

I made a whole bunch of ruffles.

I unruffled the strip until it was the
right length and pinned it to the skirt.
For the shorter, higher up widths
I just cut off any excess ruffle.

Repeat to create many rows of ruffles.

I took care to sew the top of the top ruffle
carefully since it can actually be seen.

Front and back, full of ruffles.

Front and back together, right sides facing.
Seam is pinned for sewing.

Complete, except without the waistband.



Pretty Ruffles. That extra fabric on the top was turned under
to form the waistband so the top of the
skirt is the top of that first ruffle.



Adorable baby in an adorable skirt.

I have many more pictures of her wearing the skirt that I will put in a future post as I made the rest of the outfit as well! :)

I hope I offered some inspiration and motivation to make your own cute things. If sewing is not your thing, keep a look out for my no-sew shirt I made to go with the skirt. All kinds of adorable.

Pumpkin Muffins

I love pumpkins! That is a total understatement. I mean I really love pumpkins. I love the color, the flavor, the smell, the actual thing. It goes on and on with me. I collect them and I treasure my collection. They are on display year round but in September, I pull them off their shelves and distribute them around the house to celebrate pumpkin season (which does not end until after Thanksgiving.)

My daughter loves muffins. Being that she is becoming quite a picky eater (:-/) with a very limited palette, I get very excited when I find something she likes. She likes muffins and other breakfast breads. (She can put away waffles like nobody's business.)

So the natural muffin of choice for Fall is of course, Pumpkin! Luckily, (deep sigh of relief) she likes them! (I spent a very long time and took some very beautiful pictures of some savory zucchini muffins that she would ONLY spit out at me. I think "savory" is the off-putting word for her. Personally, I did not find them too great either, so I am not going to share that cooking experience. Bummer.)

I found this recipe on Allrecipes.com and it calls for honey and whole wheat flour. Therefore they are somewhat more healthy than what they could be. There is only 1/2 cup of sugar (brown sugar) in the whole recipe which I think is pretty good and the whole wheat flour adds some essential nutrients. It also calls for raisins which are a favorite in my home. (A favorite of Everleigh's that is, I won't eat them unless they are in a baked good!) I used golden raisins because that is what I had. Also, we are a nut free home so the walnuts were eliminated.

Here is the recipe directly from the source:

Pumpkin Wheat Honey Muffins

Ingredients:
1/2 cup raisins
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
3/4 cup canned pumpkin puree
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 12 cup muffin pan, or line with paper liners. Place the raisins in a cup, and add enough hot water to cover. Let stand for a few minutes to plump.
2. In a large bowl, stir together the whole wheat flour, brown sugar, pumpkin pie spice, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Make a well in the center, and put in eggs, pumpkin, oil and honey. Mix just until the dry ingredients are absorbed. Drain excess water from raisins, and stir in along with the walnuts.
3. Spoon into muffin cups so they are about 2/3 full.
4. Bake for 18 minutes in the preheated oven, or until the tops spring back when lightly touched. Cool in the pan before removing from cups.

Happy Halloween! just a little late

We had a fantastic Halloween! Every year since I can remember I have eaten chili on Halloween night. It's a great tradition passed down from my mother that I intend to carry on throughout Everleigh's childhood. This year, we took E trick or treating in my mom's neighborhood, so we ended up eating her chili yet again. I, of course, got my recipe from her and have changed it very little. I know that chili is a common Halloween dinner tradition and I have heard a lot of people traditionally eat pizza. What other traditional Halloween dinners do families enjoy?

As an added bonus, I brought pumpkin truffles to dinner. They are all over Pinterest (or they were around Halloween time) and were pretty easy to make and totally delicious. I was not able to take any photos though, sadly. They take two hands to make and are pretty messy, so holding a camera in between mixing, rolling and coating the truffles (not to mention in between feeding and watching out for the one year old) proved a bit tough. However, you can find the recipe I used here, as well as some gorgeous photos. The only change I made was I used only graham cracker crumbs, no gingersnap. And I used orange extract instead of orange zest. I sprinkled various Halloween sprinkles and sugars over the top because I had it on hand.

I was thoroughly impressed with my Fairy Princess at her Trick or Treating Skills. Mostly she would just stand there at the door, staring at the person trying to give her candy. But she really enjoyed walking up to people's doors, looking in their homes, petting dogs, and laughing at fellow reveling passers-by.

For her costume, Everleigh wore her birthday outfit. I added an elastic waistband to the too big tutu I'd made for her and it fit great! In addition she had tights and furry pink boots. Because Fairy Princesses wear furry pink boots. She had wings that I found in the dollar bins at Target. (I LOVE the dollar bins). Her foam and glitter tiara was found as is in the craft section at Walmart. And I made her wand out of a wooden dowel, pipe cleaners, ribbon and a flower decoration I'd had for her birthday party. I spent about $3.75 total and the rest was stuff I had at home. I wasn't trying to save money on the costume, but this ended up being what I found and it totally worked. Every single fairy/princess/fairy princess costume I found in the stores was either extremely cheap looking or was a character princess. I have YEARS ahead of me to have to dress her up in whatever Jasmine/Ariel/Cinderella type lady is popular in the future, so I really wanted to try to avoid it this year. I loved her costume. She seemed warm and comfortable in it. And my mom's neighbors seemed to think she was the cutest fairy princess they ever did see.