Crockpot General Tso's Chicken For Two

I was really craving Chinese food the other day and because the hubby and I are, a.) trying to save money and b.) trying not to die by eating Chinese food from the sketchy Chinese restaurants in this dinky-little town, I decided to make some crock pot General Tso's Chicken. Yummy!


There are a few steps to this, but once it's in the crock pot, you leave it for about 3 hours and you're good to go!

Yummy, yummy, yummy!! :D

 You want to make this delicious meal and avoid getting poisoned by your sketchy Chinese restaurant too? Yes?! Ok, here is what you'll need.

Ingredients:
1/2 Cup Honey
1/4 Cup Soy Sauce
1/4 Cup Ketchup
1/4 of an onion. Chopped
1TBS olive Oil (to cook chicken)
1 Clove Garlic, minced (or substitute garlic powder)
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes. (more or less depending on how much heat you like.)
1/4 cup Flour
1 large chicken breast, cubed

***Note, the Corn Starch is to thicken the sauce if needed. I'll include instructions to do it (See ***), but I ended up making mine a little too thick, so you may not need it. (You be the judge.)

At this point, add the chicken to the crock pot, cover in the sauce and let it cook for 3 hours on low heat. 

***If your sauce is too thin after those 3 hours, mix together 2tsp Corn Starch and 3 TBS water and mix into the sauce.

So, there you have it, a pretty easy and poison proof dinner! :D

Enjoy!

***EDIT***

It has been brough to my attention that I forgot to include the amount of ketchup that goes in this recipe! I am smacking myself in the forehead as I type this! It is fixed now. :) Thanks Chelsea Wildman for helping me out!

Fall Blocks

I have an obsession with wood crafts lately.  I'm not sure what it is. Perhaps my motive is to squeeze the last little bit of manual labor out of my husband before the school year gets into FULL swing and he's too exhuasted to help me. ;)

My poor husband. It's a good thing I put bananas with cheesy notes in his lunch box or else he may never help me.

Moving along.

In the process of milking my husband for manual labor, I made these cute little guys using ispiration from pinterest (go figure)!!

Seriously...SO STINKIN' CUTE! They require no stencils either, becuase they are supposed to look rustic.  

 So, as always here's how you do it:

 

 

Now, I will admit...Fall is not my favorite season. I hate the time change and the darkness and the general BLAH of the sky when it's fall time; however, these cute punkins I've been making are really starting to heighten my excitement for this season! :D

New & Improved Craft Space

This post is mainly for my sister, because all of our lives she has been tidy, perhaps borderline OCD about organization. (I can only say this because I love her LOTS!) For years her ability to organize, do laundry, keep the cleanest room in the house and put her clothing in rainbow order has intimidated the ever-living-crap out of me! I tend to be the opposite. My house is clean, but cluttered; my organizational skills are lacking and when I get crafting it looks like Martha Stewart got together with Good Housekeeping, had a little to much to drink and vomited all over my living room.

ANYWAY (I have NO IDEA how I got that off track.) so this post is to show off one of my most exciting accomplishments. I did some crafting by painting an old desk, attaching fabric to the back and gluing fabric rosettes to it. Then I used that desk to ORGANIZE my craft space! Say What?! Yes, you heard me...I ORGANIZED IT! This is where I'm a terrible blogger. I forgot to take a before picture, but you should know that my craft space resembled something off of a Hoarders episode.

No, for real.

Don't you for a second think I'm exaggerating. Ask her, go ask she-who-cleans-house-on-hands-and-knees-three-days-a-week (love you sister!) how messy that space was!

I went from THIS:


Yep. That space was bad enough I could have done the WHOLE season. (Ok, now you should probably assume I'm exaggerating.)

To This!!!:


Look at it! Look at it shining it all it's organized glory!!

Sister, look closely. That paint up there on the top shelf it's organized in rainbow order!! Woah! I went there. Now, as you can clearly see, part of my cluttered brain is showing through. I mean, look at all those sunglasses hanging up there. Quick, call Hoarders. I'm never going to get better.


Now, for a few pictures of this desk! *rubs greedy hands together* (Obviously I didn't learn my lesson in humility as well as I thought.)

 

Welp, there you have it, a craft space suitable for my sister that I adore. :) I will forever be in the shadow of your ability to organize, but here is a small start.

 

 

P.S. I wanted to add this adorable little tid bit! Look what hubby got in his lunch today! :D

 

Just a little reminder so he knows that I just love him to itty bitty pieces. (Ok, enough cheesiness.) 



Fall Wreath Failure turned AWESOME Picture Frame

You ever have those moments when you're like "I'm totally going to do this, and it's TOTALLY going to be awesome and EVERYONE is going to love it and I'm going to be the best crafter on the face of the planet!!" (Followed up by evil laughter and the rubbing of your greedy palms together.) Oh, you don't ever do that? Guess it's just me.

Well, I should tell you: this time...it was a TOTAL failure. I was all I'm going to make this adorable wreath.  And the wreath was all, YOU WISH! So, needless to say...I had this wreath(ish) thing that I wasn't sure what I was going to do with. Those that know me also know that I'm not raking in the cash; therefore, I REFUSE to throw away a project! Grr! So you ask "WELL, what the heck did you do with it then?!" And am I ever so glad that you asked! I turned it into this!

It's still a wreath...right?! It just needed a little help. It is now a wreath that frames my mirror! YAY!

I'll go ahead and show you how to make a wreath failure/AWESOME picture frame, just in case you're interested. :)

Materials:
Old Piece of Cardboard
Paint
Leaves/Other Decorating Stuff (I hate the word stuff...why did I use it? I don't know. On to the project!)

Trusty piece of cardboard rescued from the cardboard dumpster at the school. (Isn't that illegal or something?) :/ ALL IN THE NAME OF CRAFTING I TELL YOU!

Cut out a rectangle, or square if you wish. You're choice. Mine was about 2ft long by 1.5ft wide.

This once sad looking wreath now looks astounding amongst the other fall decor in the house. Best. Failure. Ever.

Perhaps I did learn a lesson in humility. Enjoy. :)

Oh! P.S. I had a little fun over at Seven Thirty Three and Sew Much Ado today and joined a link party! YAY! If you want to play along visit their blogs, grab a button (I put my super cute buttons in my sidebar) and have some fun!

Back to School...

Back to school, to prove to Dad that I'm not a fool. I got my lunch packed up, my shoes tied tight. I hope I don't get in a fight. (Anyone else out there a Billy Madison fan?!) Anyway, Hubby goes back to school tomorrow. LET THE MADNESS BEGIN! This year's class size is so big that instead of teaching 5 periods and having a planning, he has to teach through his planning. HOLY-TOO-MANY-KIDS-IN-8th-GRADE-BATMAN!

So, to comfort him and his teaching team as they enter the battle zone this year, I used this cute tutorial to make them snazzy pencil holders! YAY ME! It's pretty simple, super adorable and makes a great teacher gift. :) What's that? You wanna make one?! Well of course you do!

Here's how you do it!
You're going to need a 2x4 cut into 7in blocks. You can make these as big or small as you want. I made some that were only 4in long.
Paint, glitter, stencils, and anything else you want to decorate with.

Cut your 2x4 into 7in blocks. You can see here my mini pencil holders. Those are 4in. (Cut them however it makes you happy.)

Drill holes starting 1/2in from the side and then going every 1in from there. (1/2 in, 1 1/2in, 2 1/2in, 3 1/2in...etc)



Sand the edges to make sure you don't get splinters.

Paint it all up and add some cute lettering.

 

 

I wood glued some clothes pins to the back of mine. Want to know which student borrowed a pencil? Make them write their name on a slip of paper and put it in the clothes pin.  You have a meeting coming up in the afternoon and don't want to forget? Leave yourself a note. I'm sure there are many other things you could do with these.

And there you have it. A pencil holder for your most beloved teacher. :) Or hubby...

Punkins & Pretty Walls

I’ve been in an extremely festive mood lately! I have been itching to get my fall décor out, but I knew my fall decorating needed a little help. So, with the expertise of a husband who knows how to use power tools we whipped up this ADORABLE wall hanging so I could put my fall wreath on it and made these SUPER ADORABLE punkins! (Yes, I just said PUN-kins. :D) I am BEYOND excited to show you how to make these!

Wall Hanging

Materials Needed:*1piece of wood about 8ftx5.5 in
*1piece of wood about 5ftx1.5in
(*If you have scrap wood, you can substitute anything you want for your desired look.)

Start out with a piece of wood aproximately 8ft long by 51/2 inches wide. (You can change the size of wood to accomodate how you want yours to look.) Then cut the wood into 3 equal size pieces. Or you know, have your sexy, strong-bodied, husband do it for you. ;)

Arrange the pieces on the floor so you can measure the width and add your smaller pieces to the front. (Check out those sexy toes! I love me a nice pedicure!)

This is what it looks like before it's coat of paint! It's coming together!
 

Add a coat of watered-down white paint and it's good to go!
 

So Festive! So Adorable! YAY! :D



Now, I mentioned before how my fall decorating needed a little help.  So, to fix that problem...I made these SUPER cute PUNKINS! (I just can't get enough of the word punkin. lol)

 

Here's what you'll need:
1 4x4
Twigs (that you find in your yard)
Leaves, wire or anything else you want to decorate your punkin

I made my hubby WORK today, friends! ;) Cut your 4x4 into 3 peices.  I did 16in, 12 in and 10in. (Feel free to do what you wish.)

Drill holes in the tops so your twigs fit SNUG. (If you drill your holes to big just hot glue or wood glue your twigs in.)



Add some orange paint, wire and hot glue a leaf.  I also sanded the edges of mine to give them a little distressed look. :D And you're finished!

I'm sure I'm going to be doing more festive crafts. I really want to make this wreath, and this cake stand, and these punkins, and this table cloth. Ya'll (I just went southern on you, so now you know I mean business) I have BIG plans for this seasons decorating! Just stay tuned.

All Things Homemade: Cleaning Agents Edition

Friends, I really have no excuse for not posting in the past few weeks. I've been doing crafty things and cooking pretty much every day since my last post, but I just...I don't know what happened.  It was partly laziness, partly writers block and partly having no patience for the slowest Internet south of the Mason Dixon Line!

No. Seriously.

I've told you all before, but I'll make sure you understand...WE LIVE IN THE MIDDLE OF NO WHERE! Take for example the fact that I attempted to make this recipe for Black Bean Salad (original recipe) the other day and guess what? The local grocery store didn't have AVOCADOS! Seriously?! Yes. Seriously.

I can't make this stuff up people. 

However, you should know that the recipe was still SO DELICIOUS! I went to have lunch with the hubby and the other teachers on his team and brought some in with me, the salsa (which is what I call it because, well it tastes more like a salsa than a black bean salad) got RAVE reviews! :) 

Anyway, so today I'm going to share with you quite a few things, because I have pictures of them and I figure I might as well make up for time lost.

The first is an All Purpose Orange/Lemon Cleaner. 
You literally need Orange and or Lemon Peels, White Vinegar and a Quart-Sized Mason Jar. Combine everything in the mason jar, allow to sit for 7-10 days and it's good to go! :)  The vinegar is scented by the peels and the cleaner leaves the house clean and shiny. 

 

 

 

Because I started making and using my own homemade laundry soap (which I LOVE), I also decided to use this recipe from www.thefrugalgirls.com to make my own fabric softener.  They have TONS of other really cool stuff. Don't go unless you have lots of time to get sucked into their site! Anyway, here's how you do it.

You'll need white vinegar, conditioner, and boiling water

Add your conditioner to a large bowl.

Carefully add the boiling water

Then add the vinegar.  Stir everything together and make sure there are no clumps of conditioner in the bowl.  Let it cool and put into a container for storage.

 

I add about 1/4 a cup to my laundry sometimes even 1/2 a cup.  The original recipe calls for significantly less, but I found that it really doesn't work unless you use more.  However, it is SUPER cheap to make so it doesn't bother me to use a little more.

 

The last thing I have for you is a homemade dishwasher detergent. Honestly, my vote is out on this one.  It does the job and I'm positive there are all sorts of benefits to making your own as far as knowing the chemicals that are going into your dishwasher, which you can read about here, but I don't know about the price comparisons. Also, my glasses are becoming cloudy the longer I use the homemade dish detergent. Nevertheless, here's how you do it.

 

You're going to need:



Borax
Washing Soda
Salt
NO SUGAR ADDED Lemonade Packets (not pictured)

Add all of your ingredients into a bowl and mix well.

Then add to an empty container! (I knew there was a reason my Mom saved this for me!)

You add about 2 TBS per load and 3 DROPS of dawn dish soap. If you do anymore than 3 drops you'll have a foam party in your kitchen. (Just trust me on this one!)

 

 

Phew! Hopefully that will make up for the weeks without one single post. :) Hope you enjoyed!