Let Them Eat Coffee Cake!

Today was baking day. I made our favorite coffee cake. It asks for Smucker's Cherry Preserves but I have not been able to find it at our local supermarket so I substituted Smucker's Raspberry Seedless Preserves. I'm sure you could use any other type of preserves and it would taste just a good. Cherry Swirl Coffee Cake

1 1/4 cups milk
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup Crisco All Vegetable Shortening
1 package (1/4 ounce active dry yeast
3 1/4 cups all purpose flour
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cu Smucker's Cherry Preserves
1 cup powdered sugar
Milk
1/3 cup sliced almonds ( I used chopped pecans)

Heat 1/14 cups milk, salt, granulated sugar, and shortening in small saucepan just to boiling; cool to lukewarm. Stir in yeast; transfer mixture to medium bowl. Add one cup of the flour to milk mixture; beat well. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well. Stir in enough remaining flour to make a thick batter; beat until smooth. Let rise, covered, in warm place, free from drafts, until doubled in bulk, about one hour. Stir batter down. Pour batter into two greased 9" round cake pans; let rise in warm place until doubled in bulk, about one hour. Make a swirl design on top of batter with a floured spoon; fill grooves with preserves, using 1/4 cup for each coffee cake. Heat oven to 375F. Bake coffee cakes until golden, 30 to 35 minutes. Remove from pans. cool on wire racks. Fill grooves with remaining preserves. Mix powdered sugar, with enough milk to make thin glaze consistency; drizzle over warm coffee cakes. Sprinkle with almonds.

Hope your give it a try.

Hugs :)

Irma

~~PAY IT FORWARD~~

Pay It Forward

I'm finally getting my chance to jump in and join

PIF thanks to

Crafting in Tataville

If you also want to join in, but haven't had the

opportunity to yet,
then this invitation is for you!
Here's how Pay It Forward works:
I've signed up with Crafting in Tataville
and committed to send the next 3 people who sign
up here with me on my blog a handmade item
and goodie package within 365 days.
By accepting my invitation, YOU agree to Pay It
Forward to the next 3 people who sign up with you

(on your blog) and send them something within 365

days.

Want to join the fun and Pay It Forward?

I'd love to have you sign up

with me!!!

Please leave a contact email so I can confirm the

details with you.

Let's keep the PIF going strong!

Hugs, Irma

~~PINK SATURDAY~~

Are you ready for PINK SATURDAY ? It's that time again for everyone participating to show their Pinkness. So go visit Beverly of "How Sweet The Sound" http://www.howsweetthesound.typepad.com/ and see the list of everyone showing their Pinkness.

I found these dishes (6 dinner plates and 5 small desert bowls) at a garage sale in our town. Can you believe,they were selling these dishes with another set (I'll show these at a later post) for $5.00. I was then lucky enough to find this pattern at our local hospital thrift store for the fabulous price of $5.00 also, couldn't believe it. I don't have any cups and saucers...but I now have a total of 15 dinner plates, 12 luncheon plates, 8 soup bowls and 5 small desert bowls. I am now on the hunt for the cups and saucers. Maybe I'll be lucky someday.

Have a great Pink Saturday!

Hugs :)

Irma

The Garden is Ready

We finally cleaned the garden of all the weeds, as you can see DH finally got the "Little Green Thing" (John Deere Tractor) to finally plow the garden. Yahoo! We no longer need to depend on our fantastic wonderful helpful neighbors we have to come and plow for us. I think we will keep our "Little Green Thing" after all. Now we have to wait for three days to plant our seeds as I sprinkled the Preen so we won't have a lot of those nasty weeds. That stuff really works great!

As DH was plowing between the third and fourth row he kept saying that he felt a piece of rock or something. Well it turns out that there was this big piece of cement slab as you can see below. Well we did end up having to get our helpful neighbor to bring over his big red tractor to pull this slab out of our garden. No wonder last planting our plants kept falling over on this section of the garden. We could not figure out why. Well this is why, this big piece of cement. I told DH that this would now be his pouting stone. So he better behave. LOL. I guess I better go make a sign so he doesn't forget where he will be sent if he misbehaves.

Hope we get some rain soon, well maybe after I plant, that would be helpful.

Hugs :)

Irma

PINK SATURDAY!

Welcome to another "Pink Saturday" hosted by Beverly at "How Sweet The Sound" http://howsweetthesound.typepad.com/ , please head on over and visit her to see the list of all who are participating this week. Today I am showing two of my cookie jars. The white kitty with the pink bow is one I purchased at Walmart several years ago. The other is a cookie jar that my Aunt Dorothy bought for me during one of our thrift store outings. She knows I love cats and wanted to add this to my collection of cookie jars. Love the little pink nose it has.

I hope everyone is enjoying "Pink Saturday".

Hugs :)

Irma

TREASURE HUNT PICTURE ANSWERS!

Today I participated in the Treasure Hunt at Moonlight Hollow. Below are the clues we had to answer with pictures.

1. What soap opera about the Abbott, Newman and Winter clans is set in fictional Geona City?
2. What are you studying if you're into oology?
3. What writer was expelled from West Point for showing up for a public parade naked wearing only a white belt and gloves?
4. Show me a picture of my acting partner.
5. He lives at 1313 Webfoot Walk, Duckburg, Calisota.
6. A typical American eats 28 of these in his/her lifetime.
7. If you plant this by your doorstep, you will keep witches away.
8. Texas Tech University Red Raiders have two mascots. Show me one.
9.What was created by French monks in 610 A.D. and was designed to resemble a little child's arms in prayer?
10. Bingo is the name of the dog on a box of these snacks.
11. Caeser and Cleo were their early stage names.
12. At one time, this painting hung in Napoleon's bedroom.
13. Who was the Lone Ranger's great grand-nephew?
14. Show me a picture of my grandson, Tango, in the pumpkins.
15. What would you be afraid of if you found a sign written in Latin that said "Cave Canem"?
16. What favorite recipe of her and her husband's did First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy have taped to the wall in the White House kitchen?
17.Animal Crackers boxes were designed with a string handle so they could be hung from what?
18. Show me a picture of my granddaughter, Madisyn, in a Christmas setting.
19. What is "waggar pagger bagger" slang for in England?
20. Where does the expression "out of the mouths of babes" come from ?
21. Howdy Doody had 48 of these..one for each state in the union.
22.Country music comedienne who always wore a hat with a price tag on it when she performed?
23. Who said: "Never eat more than you can lift"?
24. Find and display the childhood picture of my husband, Lurch, which appeared on the front page of the Abilene Reporter News.

Following are the picture answers I submitted.

My DH was laughing at me as I was trying to get all of the answers. He said I would most likely come in last place as we do not have high speed internet. In trying to find the pics, my computer froze 4 times, I had to let the dog out to pee, and the nerve of my DH and son wanting me to fix them dinner. Can you imagine they wanting food during my treasure hunt, how dare they...there is peanut butter and crackers in the pantry. Now of course I did have to make time to speak to my odest son who called us from Chicago. Oh, well, I did have lots of fun looking up the answers. This was a fantastic Treasure Hunt. Thanks Malisa for a fun time.

TREASURE HUNT!

There's a Treasure Hunt happening tomorrow. Today is the last day to sign up so run on over to Moonlight Hollow http://moonlighthollow.blogspot.com/ and sign up. Hurry now, run, you still have time.

HAPPY PINK SATURDAY!

Welcome to another "PINK SATURDAY" hosted by Beverly at "How Sweet The Sound" http://www.howsweetthesound.typepad.com/ . Stop by her blog and see the list of all who are participating.
Thought I would show you my little bowl of "Pink Mice".


Happy Pink Saturday!

Hugs :)

Irma

"PROJECT FRIDAY"~~~~GLITTERED EASTER EGGS~~

Sorry for being a little late, OK, a lot late. But I have my project ready. Today is "Project Friday" hosted by Rosemarie at Sugar Plum Cottage, http://sugarplumcottage.blogspot.com/ . Please go and visit her for the list of participants and their projects. Today I am showing you how to make Glittered Easter Eggs, using the plastic eggs.
List of items to get:
1. Plastic Eggs
2. White glue (I used Elmer's) 2 parts glue to 1 part water
3. Pages from old books ( torn into small square pieces)
4. Glitter
5. Ribbons, buttons and other items to decorate eggs.

In a bowl dilute the white glue (2 parts glue to 1 part water) with water. Tear the book pages into small square pieces and dip them in the glue mixture. Now this will be a little messy. Place the torn pieces over the egg and smooth out the creases

While egg is still damp place in bowl with glitter and roll it around or you can get a plastic spoon and sprinkle the glitter over the egg.

You will need to let dry over night before decorating the eggs.

I used ribbons, small roses, buttons

and little pearls hot glued onto the eggs.

And look how cute they look inside the small Easter Baskets which I made for last week's Project Friday.

Hope you enjoyed this weeks project.

Hugs :)

Irma

SOUP'S ON

Here is a quick and easy soup to make when you really don't have a lot of time.


TACO SOUP & SWEET CORN BREAD
Taco Soup Ingredients:

1 lb ground meat
1 can whole kernel corn, drained
1 can pinto beans
1 can kidney beans
1 small can tomato sauce
1 pkg. taco seasoning
(If you want to make it a little spicy, add 1 can Rotell tomatoes w/ chilies)
Sour Cream
Shredded yellow sharp cheddar cheese

Brown ground meat. When cooked, drain grease if any. Add taco seasoning, tomato sauce, beans and corn. Stir, and let simmer for about 20 minutes.

Serve and garnish with shredded cheese and a dollop of sour cream.

Sweet Corn Bread Ingredients:

1 Cup Flour

1 Cup Corn Meal

1 Tablespoon Baking powder

4 Tablespoons Sugar

1/4 cup oil

1 1/2 tsp. salt

1 cup milk

1 egg
1 can whole kernel corn, drained

Mix all ingredients and pour into greased pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 min.

Now serve yourself a bowl of taco soup and a square of sweet corn bread. Yummy! Yummy! Good for your tummy! Enjoy!

Now I'm off to finish my project for "Project Friday". Come back on Friday to see what I'm making.

Hugs :)

Irma

IT'S PINK SATURDAY!

It's "Pink Saturday" hosted by Beverly at "How Sweet The Sound" http://howsweetthesound.type.pad.com/ . Please go over and visit her and see all who are participating this weekend. Today I am showing a few of my vintage nut cups, one is a crepe paper rose held up by a thin spiral wire wrapped in green crepe paper. The nuts or mints would be placed inside the rose. The other is a a cute little paper nut cup made to resemble a little basket and has a handle with some little paper flowers on it. The cake is just a little plastic trinket box which the cake top can be lifted and filled up with your goodies.

Have fun visiting all of the other participants and have a wonderful weekend.

Also, please go and visit Tristan at Enchanted Reverly http://tristanrobin.blogsot.com/ as he is celebrating his 50th Follower with a lovely giveaway.

Hugs :)

Irma

PROJECT FRIDAY!

Welcome to my first "Project Friday". Our host for this fun weekly event is Rose at Sugar Plum Cottage, http://sugarplumcottage.blogspot.com/ . Vist her to check out her project and the list of all the participants. My "Friday Project" is : A Small Easter Basket Favor

The list of materials needed are as follows:

1. Peat Pots ( I found mine at the dollar store 16 peat pots for $1.00)

2. Acrylic Paints

3. Crepe Paper

4. Pipe cleaners

5. White Glue (Elmers)

6. Glue gun and glue sticks

7. Easter decals

8. Bamboo skewer or anything with a sharp point

First get the bamboo skewer and poke a hole on two opposite sides of peat pot. This is for the pipe cleaner handle.

Then you can paint your peat pot. Paint the bottom and the top rim also. Let dry before the next step.

Take your peat pot once it is completely dried and put in the pipe cleaner through the holes on each side and twist the ends up around the handle top.

Now you can glue your Easter decal using the white glue.

Next I used crepe paper from the role and just stitched up the middle of the crepe paper on my sewing machine on the longest stitch and it created little ruffles. You can pull the threads carefully if you want the ruffles to be a little tighter but be careful as it can easliy rip.

I then hot glued the ruffles to the inside of the peat pot. I matched the sewing edge of the crepe paper to the top edge of the peat pot inside and glued it just a bit down so the thread on the crepe paper would not show on the outside of peat pot.

You can then add embellishments such as ribbons and bows onto the little baskets. Then fill them with Easter grass and your choice of goodies.

Hope your liked my project and will give it a try.

Hugs :)

Irma