Friday, May 27, 2011

Zucchini Herb Casserole


I love zucchini and luckily so does my hubs.  I mostly love it grilled or in stir fries but I thought I would try it in a casserole.  I found this excellent recipe at my favorite site, AllRecipes.com and we absolutely LOVED it.  Luckily I made a double batch and were able to eat it the next day as well.  I made it as stated but used instant rice since I was in a hurry and was hungry. 

I love this recipe and will for sure make it again.  It is great as a complete vegetarian meal or if you add ham, sausage or something else, I bet it would be equally yummy.

If you were to make this recipe, it would excite you!  The colors are amazing!  I don't know why but a colorful dish always does it for me.

Kids bathroom project

I have recently undergone some big projects. They may not seem too big for a normal self proclaimed do it yourselfer, but for an over eight month pregnant diy'er the projects I am undertaking are quite strenuous. 
First of all, I have decided to redo the kid bathroom.  It hadn't changed anything since we moved in three years ago with the exception of an ugly paint color that I thought I would like from the oops section of Home Depot and some wall art, shower curtain, etc.

I knew that I wanted to neautralize the space, make it brighter and gender neautral without a "theme".  I decided to paint the walls my favorite color from Behr which is Antique Beige and painted the wod trim a beautiful glossy white. So that is what I did.

I also knew I wanted to make something to hang Jude's and Gwenyth's towels that were one of a kind and cute.  This is where this post comes in.  

I found two of these wooden shields (?) at Goodwill for .99¢ each a long time ago not knowing what I would ever do with them.  I decide to turn them into the kids towel holders.  I started with priming them since they had been stained previously, I then painted them the same white gloss as the trim.  I wasn't sure what I wanted to do next and remembered that I had bought some Mod Podge which I had never used before but wanted to give it a whirl someday.  I then found some fabric from my stash and traced the shape of the shield and cut it out.  I printed out the numbers 1 and 2 on the printer and cut them out.  I traced them onto the center of the cut fabric.  I painted in the numbers with fabric paint and allowed them to dry.  Then I Mod Podged them to the surface of the plaques.  I was instantly nervous when I saw the Mod Podge made the fabric paint look dull.  I was hopeful that when it dried it would be bold and bright again.  If not, I would have simply had to of painted over it again once the adhesive had dried.  Luckily, the problem fixed itself.  After being satisfied with the results I needed to decide what would hold the actual towels.  I thought of using a bent spoon or fork and drilling it to the plaque, I also found a know with each child's first initial on them that I thought of using, but then settled on a standard hook for each of them.  The knobs just seemed less practical as they were ceramic and I thought the towels were more likely to slide off. 

The original look of the shields/plaques.  Boo!

  My fabric choice and my primed and painted plaque.
Shield traced onto fabric.
Perfect fit.
Number one traced onto center of cut fabric.
  
Mod Podged to the surface of the plaque.

And for the final result.......


What do you think? 

I personallly love them.  I especially love that I had everything except the hooks on hand.  So it was practically free to make two of these babies!  I plan to hang them behind the door in the kids bath as there is no other great spot for them due to the placement of the towel rack that is in there now. 

I will soon be posting pics of the bathroom and the other changes I have made in that space....so keep your eyes peeled!

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Introducing Gwenyth

At my most recent ultrasound this past Thursday we got some wonderful pictures of our beautiful baby girl.  The doctor was worried that she was going to be quite small based on the measurements taken of my belly.  According to the ultrasound, that is definately not the case.  The ultrasound actually indicated that she is already at 5.8 lbs!  I texted a friend who is a doctor who confirmed that these are not exact.  If she is in fact that large now,  she could possibly be a 9.5 lb. baby!  That is scary since I was a 10 lb. baby. 

From the ultrasound pictures it is obvious she has my nose and Clint's lips just like Jude.  The technician also confirmed that she had a head full of hair which excites me.  We cannot wait to meet out pretty baby girl.



Snack organization

I did a small project recently that has saved me a lot of headaches at snack time.  Previously, we kept all "dry" snacks in a HUGE lidded jar and every time Jude wanted a snack I brought it out of the cabinet and we would have to pull a million snacks out to get the one he wanted. 

PROBLEM SOLVED! 

I picked up four if these wonderful lidded jars at Salvation Army for $2.00 each.  (Yay)!  I didn't like the wood finish on them at all so I decided to sand them and paint them a more fun color. 

I was able to remove the lids off of two of them but the other two we're stuck on there tight.  Also, it was obvious that these hard were heavily used ir right next to the stove if the previous owners because they were quite grimy.  It took awhile to get all the yuck off of them before I was able to give them a good sanding.

I am so happy with how well they turned out.  It's been nice to just go to the counter and simply see what the choices are and grab it.  With the cost at just $8.00 since I had the sanding block and paint on hand, it makes it even better!



Thursday, May 5, 2011

Vote for my Hubby!

I nominated my husband at a wonderful photographers website for a contest to win a free photoshoot.  I
thought that with Father's Day nott too far away, it would be a great way to recognize him.  Please follow this link, read our story and leave a comment at the bottom stating that you "vote for Clint".  I would greatly appreciate your support and will be thrilled to share the photos on my blog if we win!