PROJECT PINK: Breast Cancer Awareness Month

In honor of Marilyn's Project Pink, I'm honoring a breast cancer survivor close to me.
My grandmother, who is currently 97 years old, has had issues with lumps for 20 years, but it was just 3-4 years ago when she had to undergo a mastectomy.
Yep, at 93 she had one of her breasts removed. The surgery was of course scary to all of our family and church members, but my faith was stronger than my fear! Truely.
My grandmother was scared though...and she has rarely shown fear and sadness in all my 29 years of living. :-)
We knew the odds of a patient at her age undergoing such a surgery and surviving with any recurring problems was slim.......but that is exactly what happened. All of her follow up visits as well as her recovery have been smooth sailing.
 Of course she still has some pain but that's nothing compared to cancer. Faith and prayer without worrying does wonders.
I still remember telling her after her surgery, while she was still in her hospital bed, that the next time we'd be going to a hospital will be because of me giving birth. That was my way of calming her nerves (though she got teary-eyed with worry, since her sister died of cancer 20+ years ago) and speaking into existence her being alive to see her great-grand children.
I'm VERY close to my grandma and so proud and lucky to have her!
Whenever I get the chance, I donate....but I'd like to find a "Run for Breast Cancer" in my area.


Do you know anyone effected by breast cancer? Share your story on Marilyn's page.

Pin-Inspirational Thursday...Mini Pumpkin Bundt Cakes

Today, I'm linking up with Marilyn, over at The ArtsyGirl Connection. She gave my Mini Strawberry Pizza Cookies lots of love. Yay, thanks Marilyn!!!  They truly ARE delicious. :-) Right now, my crafts are food....because I'm preparing for holiday feasts and [holiday] friends parties. Not to mention, food is fun to me. My pin-inspirational item are chocolate mini bundt cakes, with 2 put together to make a pumpkin.

How I Made Them:

I added 2 oz. of cream cheese to a boxed chocolate cake mix and poured them in my mini bundt cake pan.
For the topping: I melted 2 squares of Maker's Mark Semi-Sweet chocolate and mixed it with a little milk and that was it. Oh...and for the 'pumpkin' look, I used a pecan as the stem garnish. These were definitely tasty and the cream cheese made the cakes extra moist.

I like the mini bundt cake pan because when making 'mini cakes' (like pineapple upside down) you can keep the size contained. And you don't need cupcake liners. At parties, people can literally take them and eat them like a donut. Plus...bundt cakes pans are just cute. But....you cannot successfully use regular icing if you're not a professional <---my original Fall Crawl craft gone bad.


Do you have any pinterest inspired recipes or items? If so, what? Well, then link them up at Marilyn's here!

Later Lovelies!!!

One of Those Weeks.... & Halloween Costume Ideas???

Have you ever had one of those weeks where you are so busy that you have NO time for anything? Yes...no? Well, I have ---- this past week and maybe a couple weeks before this last one, I literally have been busy all day and every day. I don't even know with what because I haven't done any fall cleaning nor early Christmas shopping. Its just been one of those weeks.

Tomorrow, my tot's preschool will have a mini costume parade and I'm going to volunteer for that. I 'm soooo excited! These little tots are sooo cute, even with all the extra work, stress and patience they cause. Right now, I'm in the stage of more unnecessary and ridiculous tantrums and being told "no" a lot. Sigh....is all that I do. I think I may start drinking a glass of wine every night and

Sidenote: in my down time, I catch up on my guilty pleasure shows....so though I'm busy, I still get my laughs in.

Halloween Costume Ideas????

So for Halloween, we're dressing our boys up as little puppy dogs! The costume suits are really cute...but now my husband and I don't know what to be. He wanted to dress like a bag of dog food, but I really don't know what to dress as. I'll come up with something I guess.

What are you guys going to be for Halloween? Are you dressing as a family or having your own separate costumes?

Pinspiration Food - Mini Strawberry Pizza Cookies

My Strawberry Cookies!

 
This is my first time being apart of a group called MOPS - Moms of Preschoolers. So far, its been fun and kind of cool getting to know other 'new' or recently 'new' stay at home or part-time working moms in the area.
We meet every other week for 2.5 hrs and have a big group meeting that includes breakfast, crafts, speakers and childcare.
Both boys love the childcare, so that makes me okay with being apart of it.
Anyway, it was my mini-group's turn to bring breakfast and we all signed up for a dish. I decided to bring 'fruit.'
I didn't want to do traditional fruit, because every time we have a meeting the ladies from other mini-groups bring delicious meals...not so breakfasty. Like one mom brought oreo cheesecake cupcakes. Soooo delicious and so not cool!
It was so good, I wanted to lick my cupcake liner! They looked similar to the below photo, but with the cookie at the bottom.
Having the cookie on the bottom made it just that much better, because the cheesecake filling softened the cookie, just enough to make it perfect! I can't wait to make these during the holidays.

Anyway, I saw mini fruit pizzas on pinterest and decided to do the same instead taking the same ol' boring fruit tray. Here's my version.....

My husband claims this is the best cookie he's ever had! :-)

I made 24 cookies and separated the layers with wax paper. Needless to say...my dish was empty! :-)

Directions:
Bake Pillsbury sugar cookies according to package. Next, make cream cheese filling by combining 1/2 cup of heavy cream with 1/2 block cream cheese  with your hand mixer. Then, add 1/4 or 1/3 cup (to taste) of granulated sugar and 1 tsp of vanilla and mix. Spread a thin layer of the cream cheese mixture on room temperature cookies and add your fruit of choice, sliced. My kid loves blueberries and strawberries so that's the fruit we keep on hand weekly. Voila, enjoy!

Use the leftover filling for more cookies, as fruit dip or bagel spread, which is my favorite!

*My cookies sat in the fridge overnight and I think I may prefer them this way. The cream cheese softened the cookies just enough and all the flavors (cream cheese mixture, strawberries and cookies) softly meshed perfectly. These things are addictive.


These are a MUST TRY! I promise you won't be disappointed. Let me know how yours turn out!

**the portions for the cream cheese mixture was actually enough for 48 cookies, so you may want to make half of what I suggested if just making one 24 package. I had to make some for the hubs and fam.....plus I wanted some more too.  :-)

Inspiration Hairstyle

I haven't been really doing anything interesting with my hair. No big and curly styles, but checking out this video by lilithedarkmoon on youtube, I was inspired to do a simple braid to keep things simple with my baby-hectic lifestyle that I still have not become accustomed to. Some weeks I plan ahead activities and some weeks I don't. This past week has been one of those weeks. Anyway, lilithedarkmoon on youtube does not have ethnic hair but you don't always have to copy styles of people with similar hair textures. One day, I'll be bold enough to try the complete "Dutch Crown Braid" style by lilithedarkmoon.

My novice and modified version:

I think it may be easier for me to try on blown out hair so I dont have to deal with those irritating tangles. vheck out lilithedarkmoon when you get a chance. I heard about her from Shelli @ hairscapades.

Pumpkin Patch & Pumpkin Craft

Last weekend, my hubby got a little too comfortable at the bar and got completely drunk. I guess he thought he could do things like he used to but instead was out of commission for all of Saturday. :-( We still managed to make it to the pumpkin patch with friends (actually the friend he got drunk with). Needless to say, I was not happy about it....but I laughed a lot.
His birthday was this past Wednesday and we kept it very low key, since he already celebrated the previous Friday at the bar. Anywho.....HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my honey! I'm thinking we'll celebrate, just the two of us, at the end of the month when my mom gets here and after he takes his PE exam.

Once we got home, Double D and I made a pumpkin for him (even though he treats them like basketballs). He helped put stickers of spiders and spider webs over half of the pumpkin and tried throwing the rest of them....as well as sticking one on his face. I finished putting the stickers on and stuck the self-adhesive rhinestones on, so it could match my other ones. :-)

HAPPY FRIDAY! Hopefully this weekend I'll get some time to myself because these boys have been driving me crazy all week. Mommy needs a break.

Tasty Eats - Sausage, Peppers and Onions "Stoup"

My husband first saw this on Rachael Ray a couple years ago and ever since its been a staple in our house.

Served with an oven-warmed Hawaiian Roll.

Ingredients:
-1 to 2 tablspoons of olive oil (EVOO)

-Italian sausage --> we use a whole package of Hillshire Farm's and take the 'skin' off
-1 tablespoon of Balsamic vinegar
-1 can of diced tomatoes, drained
-1 whole onion, chopped (I prefer red onions)
-1/2 green pepper, chopped
-1/2 yellow pepper, chopped
-1/2 red pepper, chopped
-1 tsp of minced garlic
-2 cups of chicken broth (bouillon cubes work too)
-Italian Five Cheese blend (shredded)

*Its a very fast meal which also keeps it at 'favorite' status in our house, but we've made our own modifications that feeds us for 2, sometimes 3 days.

To see the actual recipe, go here. We also cook our rice in our rice cooker while the stoup is cooking.

Directions:
Cook the italian sausage in a large pot with the olive oil. Once the sausage is cooked through. Add the onion chunks, stir and let them cook for a few minutes. Then add the peppers and garlic. Once all the peppers and onion chunks seem to have cooked with the sausage for a few minutes, add a the balsamic vinegar to deglaze the bottom of the pot. Next, stir in the tomatoes and the chicken stock. Let simmer together for about 5 mins and then serve over rice. Lastly, add the cheese on top and voila!

I hope you try it......and let me know how it is when you do!

Fall Inpirations.....

The weather is beeeeeauuuuuutiful.

Beautiful array of Fall.

Mmmmm....smores!

Made of leaves....

Pumpkin Patch!

Just a great shot.

The Most Amazing American Innovator Steve Jobs

Its weird to think that so many people, including myself, grieved a little for someone that we don't know, have never been close to meeting and rarely see [on tv]. But then again, not really......because we all have 'him' or his brain child at our sides at all times. Even if you don't have an iPhone, but a smart phone (and not a jitterbug type phone, ha ha), then you still have him/his brain child next to you. He. Set. The. Bar. All phones compete against or aspire to be like the iPhone. And we don't even need to talk about the iPads, iPods, and Macbooks. Even cracking the code on a NookColor is trying to use the device like an iPad. ;-) I don't really use tons of apple products but I think that might be changing in the near future.

That type of genius is so rare and just like some of the other things that we've experienced in the prime time of our lives, I'd say witnessing Steve Jobs and his accomplishments with technology is up there. What an innovator! Its amazing how his passing has also become inspirational....at least for me.
I've prayed for several years now, asking God to show me what I'm meant to do. I hated where I worked. It was such a negatively manipulated place, where their intimidation of me was directly related to how I was treated by them. I stayed because I knew one of the owners and listened to others opinions. If I would've listened to myself, I wouldn't have been there for 4 years. I think staying in that dreadful environment taught me not to shrink my personality nor dim my light because of another's intimidation of it -- in my case, it was the other boss's daughter, who was the only other black female engineer. She copied my style and my personable ways...so in some cases I was an innovator for her. :-)
The next place I work at, I will be myself and keep my big personality, along with my creativity.
I will never shrink down again. My light will shine at all times.



Oh and instead of raising the next great politician, president or athlete......I hope to raise the next Steve Jobs. But boy he left one tough act to follow!

Rest In Peace Steve Jobs

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition."
-Steve Jobs

We have the same birthday! Yes!!! I finally have a cool celeb that shares my bday!

Wordless Wednesday

My big boy and my Buddah baby:::::::::

Double D & RD

"Don't let my cuteness fool ya! I can make you work."

Happy Hump Day Lovelies!!!

Bizzzzzy bizzzzy me!

I've been sooooo busy, that I haven't had time for anything! Goodness!

My hubby has a project, that he is the lead contractor on, that's located 3 hours away, so sometimes he stays the night where the construction site is.

That means I'm entertaining, yanking and feeding my two tots....by myself all day and night.

It is a lot of work and the time I do wind it down, I'm catching up on my DVR'd shows.

Whew!

I have so many blogs to catch up on, but hopefully I'll be able to do so tonight when he gets back.....but then he'll go back out of town again tomorrow. :-(

Talk about stressful......two babies under two....and not twins!