do you ever wish you could trade places with your dog, just for a day? jackson’s most difficult task all day is readjusting to stay in his sun spot. it is a hard life he leads.
weiner dog wednesday – naps in the sunshine
categories: Uncategorized
blooming in my living room
i put away my spring decorations,and decided it was time for summer.
i learned how to make paper flowers when betsy (friend and younglives leader) taught our younglives girls a few weeks ago.
i needed a refresher, so i looked to a few ofthe great tutorials out there in blogland.
some didn’t turn out well. they went into the recycle bin.
all of the decent flowers went on green fuzzy pipe cleaner “stems”and then into my mason jar collection.
i made 3 different sizes for 3 displayson a bookcase and 2 end tables.
the photo effect used is “1960s” on picnik.
they were fairly quick and easy to make, and cost almost nothing.
i think they make my living room come alivewith bright colors and fluffy blooms.
are you ready for summer?
i’m linking to: 
weiner dog wednesday – the one where jackson imitates a seal
categories: family
why is my dog sitting like a seal on the beach? i have no idea. he always sits with his paws neatly together, except for this instance.
jed noticed it, and made me take a picture.
jackson is an odd little critter, but we love him.
welcome to texas. let’s make breakfast burritos.
first things first. grab a cup of coffee. this is my favorite mug, from our honeymoon in charleston.
until i married jed, and we moved to texas, i had never heard of a breakfast burrito. when he offered to make them one morning, i was confused and doubtful. he cooked them for me, and my life was forever changed. seriously. we eat them at least once a week for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. there are a million different ways to make them, but here’s how we do it. put your bacon on first, 2 slices per person. we use lean turkey bacon. we tried the extra lean and it was basically turkey jerky. the lean still has flavor but is better for you than the real stuff. feel free to use the real stuff or even breakfast sausage or chorizo. you can’t go wrong.
the next thing you need are your hashbrowns. we use these fresh, never frozen babies from simply potatoes. they don’t have anything added, and are just less work.
brush olive or canola oil on your pan and then lay out the hashbrowns in a thin layer. we use 3/4 cup per person. cover them and let ’em sit for a bit on medium heat. you will need to flip them once.
grab your eggs next. we use 2 per person (sometimes 3 for boys).
beat those huevos, then add 1/2 cup grated cheese of your choice. we like colby jack. add the egg/cheese mixture to your hashbrowns when they are about done.
breakfast burritos are best on freshly made flour tortillas. it is just science. we are trying to be healthy though, so we are using these tasty wraps.
your bacon should be cooked, so slice it up.
toss the bacon in with everything else, and mix it up.
load it on your wrap or tortilla and you are ready to go.
the only seasoning we use on the burritos is tony chacere’s. it is great on everything, as advertised. you might add salt and pepper to taste.
i like to put a little salsa on mine. jed prefers his without. the choice is yours. sometimes we add refried beans to the mix, and it is never wrong.enjoy your taste of texas. 
what is your favorite breakfast food?
what is your favorite breakfast food?
frugal friday – estate sale decorating
we love estate sales, and have had a lot of luck with great finds lately. here’s the big one…
isn’t she lovely?! we had an ikea ektorp couch that was great, but we needed more seating. jed loved the back support of the ektorp, and wasn’t liking anything else. please excuse the ugly rug. it belongs to our landlord and she makes us keep it to “protect the floors”. u.g.l.y. you ain’t got no alibi…
at an estate sale in a ritzy neighborhood, we found this bigger 2×2 ikea ektorp sleeper & storage couch. it is $1200 new, and the people bought it one year ago. they had an extra brand new cover for it worth $200. they wanted $800. we bought it for $600. cash works. we loaded that sucker in the back of the truck, stuck the wicker set up front, and rolled through the ritzy part of town like the beverly hillbillies. it’s ok, i’m from arkansas. 
we called a friend to help us move the couches, and he bought our old one on the spot for $300. so, we basically got my dream couch for $300. amazing! 
what is your favorite estate sale/thrift store/flea market find? what would you love to find? now i just need some new throw pillows…
frugal friday – dinner @ home
last august we made our very first budget as a family. to figure out how much to budget we had to look at what we actually spent in a month. whoa. it was disturbing. the biggest shocker was how much we spent dining out. oh. my. goodness.
we are both work full time, and often when we come home we are too tired to cook, and dallas has so many great restaurants. the combination was proving to be destructive to our finances. we decided to set a relatively low dining out budget at $150 per month. you can spend that much on one good meal in dallas pretty easily. when the money is gone, we are done dining out. we have stuck to it since then, and it has been good for us. it is very difficult, as i’m sure you know, but we are trying to cook at home as much as possible. here is a meal we had this week:
we had a big batch of fresh strawberries that we sliced up, for 99 cents a lb at aldi. i looked at bagged lettuce and it cost $6.99 for red lettuce and spinach. i bought a head of each for $2.69 total, and they made double the salad. i added some low fat feta and black pepper. we used balsamic vinaigrette one night and raspberry vinaigrette another night. 
we also tried the barilla plus pasta this week, and it was actually good. i’ve had bad experiences with whole wheat pasta in the past, but i’m loving this kind. it has to cook a little longer, but that’s ok. we browned some lean ground turkey and added it into the mix. we tossed it together with organic vodka sauce and fresh parmesan. the whole shebang took way less than 30 minutes, and unlike rachel ray my lettuce does not show up shredded during commercials. i love dinner @ home.
dining out was our budget buster. what is yours? have you conquered it or is it a work in progress?
i’m linking to:
to the one i love….
today is my sweet husband’s birthday. i love him more than i ever thought possible. he is so good to me and loves me so well, because that’s how jesus loves him. he is a godly man who sacrifices his time and energy so that high school kids can know the love of jesus. he is the hardest working person i know, and will make an amazing father when the time is right. i am so thankful for him. happy birthday jed!
picket fence wall art, finally finished
remember that piece of picket fence i picked up off a curb, cut into pieces, and hung on my wall? you can see that project here. my crafty to-do list is approximately 9 miles long, and i’ve been meaning to finish this piece off by adding hemp clotheslines and some of our favorite pictures. the inspiration was this: 
this is the barn where we held our wedding reception. we had clotheslines hung throughout the barn with our favorite pictures attached with little wooden clothespins. one line held my pics, another held jed’s. at the end of the barn were 2 lines hung with the pictures of our dating and engagement story. my life, his life, and now our life together… 
we still have all the hemp cord and pictures mounted on cardstock. we picked out 6 of our favorites and i hung them with the same cord and wooden clothespins. now we have a piece of our wedding reception in our bedroom, just in time for our 2nd anniversary next week. 
i love it! we’ve included pictures from my baptism, our engagement at disneyworld, jed with his brother and daddy, jed and one of his best friends, our first date, and me and one of my best friends. we can always change them out later and mix things up. 
it cost absolutely nothing, and is so personal for us. it makes my heart happy every time i look at it. that, my friends, is my new decorating rule. what in your home makes your heart happy every time you see it?
i heart avocados… so let’s make some guacamole!
first – go enter my giveaway to win some of my designs and a $25 pottery barn giftcard. click here to enter.
almost every thursday we head over to our friends’ house for tacos. typically a big crowd shows up, anywhere from 8 to 20 or so folks come over, and the berres always host. how do they host this dinner each week with out going broke? they ask everyone to bring one item, and do tacos every time to simplify things. the last 2 weeks we have been in charge of the guacamole, so i thought i’d share my method.
i use fresh ingredients, no mixes or pastes. for our group (which can put down some guac) i use 8 large avocados, 2 tomatoes, half an onion, and sometimes one bunch of cilantro.
cut the avocados in half.
de-pit those beauties. watch your fingers. you’ll see why. 
scoop out the goodness. get all the way down to the skin.
taking out the pit is the hardest part. this is not my first avocado injury.
mash up those avocados with your trusty potato masher. then add salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder and garlic to taste. squeeze the juice of 2 limes on top and then stir.
this dip is husband approved. he tests it to make sure all the spices are just right.
there you go, delicious guacamole for 10-12 people. make some to share.
the golden touch – new sandals inspired by anthropologie
first – go enter my giveaway to win some of my designs and a $25 pottery barn giftcard. click here to enter.
i found these lovely “rosalita” sandals on anthropologie last week. i fell in love, but they cost $148. that, my friends, is not in the budget. here they are:
i then went to old navy and found these beauties for only $19.99. that is a little more in my price range.
i made 4 fabric roses using this silky vintage fabric i bought at an estate sale. i backed them with felt, and attached them to the sandals.
here is the finished product. they are a little different from the inspiration shoes, but i love them. i especially love that they didn’t cost very much. that makes them even more fabulous. if you want some lovely vintage fabric rosettes to add to your favorite sandals, let me know.
i’m linking to: 
thrifty thursday! 
