Some of my very favorite recipes!

I haven't posted a recipe in a while and thought I'd take a few of our "go to" easy favorites that don't take too long to whip up. I made this first one for Doug and Lindsey when we visited them in Texas for the baby blessing last week.

Spiral Stromboli from Taste of Home's Quick Cooking magazine

1 tube (11 0z) refrigerated crusty French loaf

3/4 to 1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

3/4 to 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese

1/4 lb EACH thinly sliced deli salami and ham

1/4 cup chopped roasted red peppers OR 1 jar (2 oz) pimientos, drained

1 Tbsp butter or margarine, melted

2 to 3 Tbsp shredded Parmesan cheese

Unroll the dough and pat into a 14"x12" rectangle. Sprinkle with cheeses to within 1/2" of the edge. Top with meat and red peppers. Roll up jelly-roll style, starting with a short side; seal seam and tuck ends under.

Place seam side down on an ungreased baking sheet. Brush with butter; sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. Bake at 375 degrees for 25-30 minutes or until golden grown. Slice with a serrated knife. YIELD: 4 servings.

Notes: I've made this with reg. bread dough (store bought or my own) too - just so long as you have a nice bread in which to roll up the goodies I don't think it matters. We always use the pimientos - .68 at Walmart. I bet you could use diced (non roasted) peppers too if that's what you have on hand. Taste-wise the salami is the KEY to this yummy dish. I bought some and froze it Ziplocs so I would always have some on hand when we get a hankering for this.

And from this same issue (also pictured above - this page in my magazine is well used)

Cheesy Floret Soup

3 cups fresh broccoli florets

3 cups fresh cauliflowerets

3 celery ribs, sliced

1 small onion, chopped

2 cups water

1/2 tsp celery salt

3 Tbsp butter or margarine

3 Tbsp all-purpose flour

2 1/3 cups milk

1 lb process cheese (Velveeta), cubed

In a large saucepan, combine the first six ingredients. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 12-15 minutes or until veggies are tender.

Meanwhile, in a small saucepan, melt butter; stir in flour until smooth. Gradually stir in milk. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 2 min. or until thickened. Reduce heat; add cheese. Cook and stir until cheese is melted. Drain veggies; add cheese sauce and heat through. YIELD: 4-6 servings.

Notes: This is only reason I ever buy Velveeta - this soup is SO good. I sometimes steam instead of boil the veggies and have omitted celery salt (I eventually bought some just for this) and it turned out fine.

I often make this with Cheddar Bay Biscuits (from allrecipes.com)

4 cups baking mix (like Bisquick)

3 oz cheddar cheese, shredded

1 1/3 cups water

Mix these with a fork or spoon or whatever you like. I always eyeball the cheese - too much work to divide my loaf of 32 oz. of cheddar visually into a 3 oz. section. I shred until it looks good.

Spoon up some dough and drop onto ungreased baking sheet. Bake at 375 degrees for 10-12 minutes or until lightly brown on top (this will take longer if you make bigger biscuits).

Meanwhile mix up the yummy topping! Mix the following in a bowl and brush over biscuits with a pastry brush when they come out of the oven.

1/4 cup butter, melted

1 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp salt

1/8 tsp onion powder

1/8 tsp parsley (just eyeball it - I add more because I like the color)

$10 off $25 at Lowes

Use your Visa and the coupon found here. You can only use it once between now and July 30th.

Oh...

and I fixed the link to my Coverwear blog. Looks like I forgot the "www" at the beginning of the address - whoops!

Cheap Makeup

E.L.F. is has some coupon codes out that make for a pretty nice deal on makeup if you're interested. Go to eyeslipsface.com and enter $18 worth of stuff (most of it's $1). Then use coupon codes RADIO and ECTAPDY for $6.50 off and free shipping. Total = $10.50

Their lip stuff is supposed to be good, as are the brushes. The blush, bronzer and eye shadow look good and I've also heard the mascara is decent. I would avoid foundations, but that's just me.

They are busy and shipping 12-14 days out so don't plan on a quickie gift!

Also, you can get points through mypoints for this - so if you need a referral for free points just send me an email! (Shhhh - Rick is getting a $50 GC for HomeDepot from my mypoints redemption for Father's Day! I love mypoints!)

New Coverwear Blog

This is still under construction but I've put up a Coverwear blog to keep everyone up to date on sales. I've spent quite a bit of time to give you lots of helpful FAQs and info about the shirts as well so please check it out! I'll be updating it whenever we have new colors, sales, etc. You can just add it to feedblitz, or google reader or bloglines or whatever you use to keep up to date on your favorite blogs.

Apple Pie Bars

Rick has requested these for Father's Day. He is certain that I have made these before for him since we've lived here. Two to 4 years ago he says. I can't remember this at ALL! I've found a recipe online but I'd really like to make him whatever it is he is remembering. Did any of you give me a recipe? Or see one on a site that we both frequent? Or remember me mentioning this at all? I'm stumped. I can't imagine that I would forget making this. It seems like a lot of work. I do not enjoy rolling out pie crust (I can never get it the shape I want) and cutting up a bunch of apples seems a lot of work. I should remember making this!

Labels

Did you see that the posts have labels? I actually went back through all of my previous posts and labeled them for easier access for all of us. Wow - that's a lot of work!

I wish I could remember to label my new posts when I'm writing them! I keep having to go back and do that.

If you said no...

On the poll.... Why is that?
Is there anyone that I actually know who wouldn't sign in? Or is it just random people browsing?

Milestones

Here we have SMILING!!! This has been my favorite thing that she has mastered. It makes my baby seem like a real person. It's so nice to interact with her!

And some JABBERING for good measure. After these the only thing you haven't seen yet on her list of accomplishments is sticking her fists in her mouth and sucking on her clothes.

Memorial Day

We had a fun Memorial Day breakfast with some folks from church. The weather was cold but no rain and minimal wind! The weather always seems to be crummy for Memorial Day! We have an police officer who lets the kids borrow the big trikes to ride and Ashlyn loved it! Nathan didn't get the hang of it but together they did wonderfully!






I also had an eye-opening conversation with said officer. He has an obviously hispanic last name and we were talking about when his son was going through some big military ceremony and a higher-up officer was going through and meeting/greeting/congratulating the men and women and their families. When he came to this young man, he saw the name on his uniform and (being of Hispanic origin himself) he asked if the yound man was bilingual. Now, the young man hadn't ever learned Spanish, but he did serve a mission in Germany so he answered, "Yes." The big wig then rattled off something in Spanish. Not understanding a word, the young man rattled right back in German. :) The older officer laughed and said something about him showing him up and that the young man would go far! :) Anyway, that led me to ask where exactly our police officer's family was from. He said Colorado. I said, "No, I mean before that." He said "Colorado." His family has lived in Southern CO since before it was in the United States! So cool. Our policeman's dad never learned English. It gave me a new perspective on the "You live here - learn English" attitude. Maybe I should brush up on my Spanish, huh? They were here first! :)

More than dirt

Now we have more than dirt in the front yard! We haven't had anything (plant-wise) since we pulled out the huge junipers that were in front of the house when we bought it. Love the Home Depot BOGO shrub coupon. Those trees count as shrubs!

Here is a close up of one of those sides.

We moved all of the iris into a row along the back of the bed. The light green shrubs are Gold Mound Spirea. The darker one is McKay's Potentilla. But both of the Potentillas have since died. All of the ones we saw at the store were also dead so there must have been a funky shipment. Oh well. So now there is a hole there. I'm thinking about "Wine & Roses" Weigela for that spot (but then all of my shrubs would have pink flowers) or maybe Korean Spice Viburnum. They say these smell great - but "Korean Spice" doesn't really connote "smells great" to me. Any of you smelled it?

I also have some Sweet Woodruff scattered around. That's all for perennials. We have the pansies and lavender still, and some yellow daisy thing for our annuals. Rick put in an irrigation system so I think that these will grow and thrive! Remembering to water plants is not my forte.

We have also ripped up the front lawn again in preparation for the sprinkler system and some new plants. We are decreasing the lawn size in hopes of increasing its chance to live. Maybe we'll do better after it gets watered automatically instead of at our whim. :) We are also going to put a bit more time into soil prep this time so hopefully we can grow some grass in our clay!

My website's up!

I finally shelled out and got my very own Coverwear website. I've been hemming and hawing for a while and decided to go ahead and do it in time for our next big sale. Now you can order through me online with no hassles! And I have the benefit of keeping track of your orders myself when you order through my site.
So go and bookmark it!
And if you're not getting my email updates on sales and you'd like to - just send me your email addy and I'll put you on my list!
:)

Barnes and Noble Summer Reading Program

Hey! Summer's here and for us that means Summer Reading! You may have read my post last summer about our library's awesome program and all the fun freebies they give out. They even have an adult program! Make sure you check out you own local library and see what they offer.

I wanted to mention a nationwide program at B&N for grades 1-6. You read 8 books, write down your fave part of each and turn it in for a coupon for a free book. Program details and forms you can print are found on their site.

Happy Reading!