Cranberry-Orange Scones

We have been on a little bit of a scone kick lately.  We always buy them at the grocery store cause they look sooooo good.  That's fine and all, but I wanted to find a good recipe and try to make my own.  I found the perfect looking one: Simple Scones.  It's all in the name right?

I read through the comments to see if this was the recipe I wanted to use.  I always start at the negative ones and read the problems that people had with the recipe.  Then I go to the positive ones.  There were a couple negative comments that the scones were too dry, but there were positive ones saying they were very moist.  I figure those cancel each other out.  It was probably the way the people followed the recipe anyway.  So it was in the comments that I found some extras that people had tried.  There was this very yummy sounding glaze:

Orange Glaze
1 cup Confectioner's sugar
1 1/2 - 2 tablespoons orange juice
1 teaspoon almond extract

Mix confectioner's sugar with orange juice until desired glaze consistancy.

****
These were very good.  I got very good feedback from everyone that tried them.  The dough was a little crumbly and a little hard to work with, but it was well worth the "trouble".  Next time, I will soak the cranberries, to make them softer, and I will probably skip the glaze (VERY good, but it didn't really need it).

What parrot?!?!

The restaurant that I work at has these shirts:

I hate wearing them, because everyone always asks me about the saying.  They think there is a really good story behind it.  There really should be, but there isn't.  I can't even think of a really clever one to lie to them entertain them with.  I just end up telling them the truth, "There's no story behind it, it's just a shirt." :( The restaurant has a pirate/nautical theme to it, but that is the closest to anything about a parrot.  If anyone can think of anything to help me out, I could probably find some prize for the winning story.

Now the hard part...of waiting.

Every step is a little closer to officially being HOME OWNERS.  There was A LOT of paperwork that seemed to be neverending.  We just got the confirmation that the buyers got our signed copy of the contract.  I really don't know what's going on.  I'm so lost about the whole thing, it really doesn't help at all that I'm 400+ miles away.  I'm sure that the hubby (and more importantly, Nate-the realtor) knows what they are doing. 

The hubby tells me that he talked to "his people" and the inspection should be done in the next 7-10 days.  This is the big one.  The big, BAD, SCARY inspection.  It's not just a home inspection, this is the one that determines if the house qualifies for the loan that we are using.  I've heard really nasty things about this loan, that it's really hard to pass everything.  It sounds like the criteria is really strict. 

I'm nervous, but I seem to be the only one that is.  I wouldn't expect my "better half" to be nervous (he never is), but the realtor and the credit agent aren't either.  I should probably be comforted by that fact, but I'm not.  I am just going to hold my breathe until everything is a go, and then I will relax.

Crossing my fingers, and praying really hard for good news.

Tutorial: Altoids pincushin

I've been wanting to do this for a while.  I found an old stash of Altoid tins (I used to collect them...long story).  Every since I found them, I've wanted to do something useful with them.  Kind of a way of saying, "I told you I would need these someday," to my husband.  So, today, it all fell into place: Monkey went down for a nap, Goose is napping in her room being quiet, I finally had a moment to myself to get my craft on.  I just don't trust Monkey around the hot glue gun.  That would be just my luck, and then I would be banned from hot gluing anything by my husband.  Anyway, onto the good stuff...

(be gentle, this is my first time doing this...)

1.  Cut fabric to a 4 1/2 " x  5" rectangle.  This will give you enough height to stick pins in it, and enough to fold under the edges for a nice finished look.




This was before I cut my rectangle, so it's not to scale.

 2.  Fold and press a 1/4", first on the two long sides, and then on the two shorter sides.

3. Cut batting in a 9" x 10" rectangle.  This will make the thickness x4 when you stuff it later.

4. Start on a long side, hot glue the tin, not the fabric (that way if you want to redo it, it's easier to get the glue off the tin.  Plus it's just easier to handle.)  Attach the fabric to one long side and then the other.   Try to get the fabric as close to the lip of the tin as possible.  This is prevent any of the label color to show.

5.  Make sure you have glued the entire long side (all the way to the end of the fabric).  Then simply fold down one of the short edges and glue to the tin,leaving one end open.  Make sure you glue the corners too, otherwise they will flap around.  This makes a nice "giftwrap"  fold.


6.  Fold the batting to the size of the tin top.  Carefully stuff the batting into the "pocket", making sure you stuff into all corners.  Then follow the same technique as the other short side, and glue that end closed.

Ta-da!!!

And the best thing about it is that you can keep your pins in the tin!!!  Two-in-one, LOVE it!!  Pretty and functional.

Whoo, that was fun. Hope you like.

National Book Week

One of my Facebook acquintances informed me (via her status) that it was National Book week this week.  Hmm, ok.  Sounds alright to me.

**It's national book week. The rules are, grab the closest book to you, turn to page 56, post the 5th sentence as your status. Don't mention the title. Copy the rules as part of your status.**

"Burn each of the "stitches" with a light touch of the tip of the tool."

A little wierd, I know.  But that was the closest book I had.  Who am I to not follow rules...don't answer that.

What a difference 24 hours makes.  The view outside my window has changed completely.  Unfortunately for me, it was not the change I was hoping for.  Fortunately for Goose, she loves it.  At least another week of snow-people in her our future.  Yesterday, about this time (naptime) I was comfortably watching the afternoon news thinking how silly all this talk about 4-6 inches of snow sounded.

It worried me a little when I saw the huge flakes falling.  But they didn't last very long.  I went to the Y to teach swim lessons around 5pm.  When I got out, there was a lot of wind and probably about an inch of snow.  Still I thought, silly to think we are going to get 4 inches, just ridiculous.

I apparently jynxed it.

This is pretty much the same shot as before.  Quite the before and after.  Of course I told Goose that we could play outside in the snow in an effort to get her dressed this morning.  An true to form, she did not let me forget my promise.  Memory like an elephant, that one.  After an hour of nagging asking, I gave in.  I had to shovel (yes, shovel) the car off to get my bibs out of the trunk.  After that it was all play.  Goose asked if she could brush the snow off of the snow.  Nothing like an impossible task to keep a 3 year-old busy. 

PINK as in...

PINK...

...as in amoxicillin.  Monkey has been sick for about a week now.  He just hasn't been his happy, smiling face lately.  Today was his 9 month check-up, perfect timing.  We got both doctor visits done at once (the check-up and the being sick).  Turns out, little Monkey has ear infections in both ears.  Poor little guy.  That definitely explains all the crying.  I feel bad saying it, but I love how cuddly he is when he's not feeling well.  But, I will be very happy when my smiling Monkey is back.

...as in "oops I forgot to post this at Valentine's Day."  We made chocolate covered everything for Valentine's Day.  I can't believe how much they charge for chocolate strawberries the week of Valentine's.  It's crazy.  We saved a ton of money for about 5 minutes worth of work (3 of those minutes were spent waiting for the chocolate chips to melt).  We bought strawberries, which were a little expensive, but we had the chocolate chips in the pantry.  One bag of chips is way to much for a carton of strawberries.  We searched everywhere for anything we could dip in chocolate.  We ended up dipping strawberries, pretzels, and marshmallows.  Since it was Valentine's we used pink and red sprinkles.  Goose was our official sprinkler.  I think she did a really good job, especially since it was right before naptime.  I wasn't sure the colored sugar was going to work because the chocolate was so dark, but it turned out really nice.  Next time, I'm going to try white chocolate, too. 

That's a pretty cool thing.  It means we are one step closer to being home-owners.

Winning...duh

Yay!!!

They picked us!!!

We won the bidding war!!!

The seller accepted our offer.  We are officially in the proccess of buying a house.  That was the next step in the long proccess, but it's a step in the right direction.  Since the hubby's birthday is Friday, he is going to contact the bank on Monday to get the inspections going.  Hopefully, the house passes all of that.

There's still a long way to go.  I'm saving my celebration for when everything is final, but I can't help but be excited.  It feels really good to hopefully be together May 16th.

The Word: Good Eats

The tempter came to him and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.' "

– Matthew 4:3-4

Good news, Bad news...

... and news that make the bad news not so bad.

I called the hubby to tell him a a funny story and he told me,"I have good news, bad news, and some news that makes the bad news not-so-bad."  What is that supposed to mean?

We made an offer on a house that we had found.  Here's the new-es:

Good news: The offer was recieved.

Bad news: There is another party interested.

Other news: This other party has been locked in negociations with the seller and can't find a price they can agree on.

Ok, so now what?  The deal is now that we both (us and the other party interested) make our best offer and the seller will pick one party to negotiate with.  We didn't change our offer, we left it as it was, and fingers crossed, prays being said, they pick us.

There's a lot of waiting in this game of buying a house.  I'm so nervous about having our offer accepted.  I shouldn't be though, it's still very possible that the house doesn't pass inspection, that's my biggest fear worry.  How disheartening that would be, to win the bidding war, only to lose because of the inspection. 

Time will tell how everythng works out.  I wish someone had told me how hard it is to be a FTHB (first time home buyer)  It's no fun.  I have to keep reminding myself that if it doesn't work out, it wasn't meant to be.  Sometimes, I wish God would be more direct in telling me what His plan is.