Homemade Chicken Broth-Individual Style

We made chicken drumsticks last night on the grill (with green beans! so tasty!!) and had the bones left over. I decided to make chicken broth with the left overs.  I use chicken broth in soups, gravies, mashed potatoes and sauces.

We pulled off the meat from the bones (which we used for sammys!) and then I tossed the bones in a pot with some water and a chicken bullion cube! You can add in celery, carrots, onion and other spices/herbs if you want, but because I use mine for a bunch of different things, I opted to keep it plain and simple. (Check out TasteofHome for their recipe) Once you've got everything in your pot, just let those little guys boil away.  The longer it boils, the more "chicken-y" it gets!

I usually put it in one big container, but realised that was pretty silly! So I saw (on Pinterest, of course) from theKitchn and she froze chicken broth in ice cube trays! GENIUS! Just let your chicken broth cool, pour it in the cubes and freeze! Bingo-bango-donezo!!!

Do make sure to wash your trays after you've used them or else your next drink will taste like chicken! Eeek!


PS: These little babies make a fantastic dog treat in the heat! Jasper loves them and ate it so fast I couldn't get a picture of his happy doggie face!

Gnarly Nails No More!

Okay-so...if you're like me, I often look down at my finger nails and go "ooo...those are a HOT mess" I blame it one having to clean and do dishes. I try to use this as a legitimate reason to get a maid, but the Mister doesn't agree.  ;)

I don't usually spend money on going to get a manicure, but thankfully my Momma taught me how to paint my nails :) I actually have the time today to do my nails because Jasper is at the vet getting to ol' snip-snip.  It broke my heart to leave him there and we've only had him a week!!!

But onto the nails!  Also-please note that I am not a licensed beauty stylist-just a lady who does her own thing.

Here is a great video on Youtube from fictionwriter04: How to give yourself a manicure. She uses a couple tools that I don't have on hand, but I just used clippers and a cutical pusher/hoof stick. To maintain super soft nails I will use vitamin E (you can also use Vaseline) once a week over night (all other nights I make sure to moisturise!!!).  Just put it on your hands (and feet!!!), then put socks/gloves on your puppies and sleep the night away.  You'll wake up with soft hands/feet!


Look at those hangnails! Eeekkk!!

My fingers are saying "aaahhhh-so nice!"

Woo-pink! I love pinks and reds on my fingers and toes.

Remember to love your hands and feet, they are so important to daily life and deserve an extra hug every once in a while!

Sweet as Sugar-Twice as nice!

So, I made a cake today...mainly because I didn't really want to work on my thesis.  (oops!) I just used a plain ol' chocolate cake box mix, but added a box of chocolate pudding to make it extra moist! To do this, just add the pudding mix to the cake mix, stir it together and then follow the directions on the box. I had to add a little bit of water (about 1/4 cup) extra to get it the normal consistency of a typical cake batter, but you don't have to do that.  Just be prepared it'll be a little thicker.

Okay...That little sucker is right out of the oven and I realise I don't have any frosting. I can handle that I think, I will just make some with powered sugar and milk.  Uh...CRISIS! We are currently out of BOTH powered sugar AND milk! EPIC fail as a house wife! What to do, what to do?!

We are on a no-spend week, so I didn't want to go out and spend money on those things (especially the powered sugar-total non-essential!) So I put on my thinking cap and it dawned on me I could make my own powered sugar!

I "googled" how to make powdered sugar and it was super-de-duper simple! You can check it out on Wikihow.  There are even photos...but I took some of my own! :)

1cup of sugar, 2tablespoons of corn starch, a blender and a little bit of patience. 

Ohhhh-aaahhhh, watch the smoke billow out! SUPER COOL!  I may or may not have done this a couple of times to see the sugar dust come out...leaning more towards the may. ha!

Anywho! Blend the sugar and corn starch up until it becomes the desired consistency.

So after I had the powered sugar, I needed to make he actual frosting.  Easy Vanilla Butter cream here I come! This super easy recipe is from Taste of Home.

However, I still had this tricky little issue of no milk.  But then I remembered we had Non-fat French Vanilla coffee creamer! WOO! That'll work!

Whip up your butter, whip it real good. And yes...I have a hand mixer and a stand mixer-don't judge me!

Add your powered sugar, coffee creamer (or milk) and a splash of vanilla.  Mix it all up and you've got yourself a nice easy-peasey frosting!

The Mister is lucky I need to wait until the cake is cool to frost that sucker...or else it'd be in my belly.

Jasper the Dog

Meet our Jasper:

He is a 2yr (birthday is July 14) labradoodle, more lab than doodle! We got him off of kijiji (Canada's version of Craigslist!) and is the best thing we've ever gotten off of the Internet.  A family couldn't give him the attention he required and she was starting to feel guilty.  Lucky for us, we happened to be on kijiji as soon as she posted the ad and he became ours!

I had dogs growing up (Zeus-a golden, Spuds-a mutt and Angel-a golden) and I've been missing having a little love around the house.  The Mister had a dog growing up (Cody-a mutt) and loved him too.  We've been talking about getting a dog for ages and even made up a fake dog (which we named Jasper!) and would often talk about him. We wanted a larger dog because both of us are not fond of little dogs and the labradoodle is hypoallergenic.  My dear friend from Beautifully Contained and her hubster have two goldendoodles and she has pretty bad allergies and they are pretty well controlled (the allergies and the dogs!).  So, when we found this love, we knew it was meant to be!

He is the sweetest thing in the entire world and we are so glad we were able to re-home him.  While there are some things that we are adjusting to such as waking up earlier, the dog hair and the drool, there is nothing more satisfying and worthwhile then waking up in the morning or when the Mister gets home from work and Jasper is just so happy to see us. <3 <3 <3

Dresser Re-Do Part Two!

At last!!! It has been a crazy time for us recently (we got a dog!!! eee!!!!!) and our dressers have been sitting, filled with clothes, waiting for their debut! 

When I left off on my Dresser Re-Do Project, I had only finished stripping and sanding one dresser.  I got the Mister to help me strip and sand the second one!  We used a sander from our neighbour which made life so much easier! Handsome little devil hard at work!

 

So, we sanded them all down and then wiped them clean with a damp cloth to get all of the dust off. Then we applied the stain. I forgot to take picture when I was doing this (I blame the fumes!).  Anyway, we used sponge brushes, then waited 15 minutes and dabbed off the extra with a clean lint free towel.  Then you have to wait a couple of hours and you can apply another layer of stain if you want it to be darker.  I think we ended up doing...3 layers? Each time you have to wait the appropriate amount of time between coats.

Then we applied a coat of polyurethane, let it dry and called it a day!  We found some inexpensive knobs to use while I look for one that fit the dressers perfectly!

Dresser 1: 

Dresser 2:

Before: 

Not bad for the first go! Have you re-done any furniture?

Dollar Store Art

So, I'm a fan of the dollar store for certain things.  You can usually get a pretty good deal  on stuff verses buying them elsewhere.  I will usually get certain spices (pepper, oregano, paprika), flower pots (terracotta pots), candles and art supplies.  I mean, sure they aren't the name brand stuff (usually) but for a buck, you can't beat it!

My most recent dollar store trip lead me down the path of art work. It is a bit of a combination of this neat-o idea from Peace, Love, Yoga, Cupcakes (check out her blog: it's truly inspirational!) Pinterest Board (check that out here).  The glue I had on hand was a bit too runny to do this, but I liked the idea.  Then I saw this idea from Domestic Imperfection (another great blog) and really liked THAT idea too.  So I merged the two! Paisley print on canvas!

The dollar store near us sells canvas, paint, brushes and stencils! WOOP! So all in all...the project cost me $7 (two canvases, 2 paints, stencils and brushes), which is not too bad!

So I painted each canvas (green and grey).  They were a little streaky (a downfall to dollar store products), so I painted the back of the canvas and that fixed the problem! Let them dry completely!

Then just lay out your stencil and dab the paint on.  Don't use a lot of pain, or else it will bleed! I alternated the colour (so green on the grey background and viceversa). 

I used two different stencils...and this is how they turned out! I like the silver one better! I think I'll put them in the washroom!

Quick Chocolate Fix

Okay, so I love chocolate. I'd like to say that I could live without it, but I know that would be a lie.  I like darker chocolate (around 70%) and the mister loves the hard stuff (90%-99%), he's hard core.

So I stumbled across Chocolate Covered Katie's blog and couldn't WAIT to try some of her recipes. The mister is a huge fan of Reese's Pieces (and peanut butter in general), so when I saw her Reese's Pieces Fudge Frosting, I knew I had to make it. You can find the recipe here.  It is delicious! Like, lick off the batter, the spatula, the bowl, your fingers good.

I did tweak it a little bit...I used chocolate milk and added a touch of powdered sugar.  I also used my little hand blender to mix it all together as I don't have a magic bullet and didn't feel like lugging out my blender!

So just measure out all the ingredients (start with 4tsp of maple syrup and add it one tsp at a time so it isn't too sweet).  Then whip it up!

 Within a few minutes you have a lovely frosting...make sure you taste it before you put away the blender and add more milk or syrup depending on the texture and sweetness you are going for!

So now that I had this lovely frosting, I needed something to put it on! I didn't want to make a whole cake so I decided to give her One-Minute Chocolate Cake a bash (check it out here) Oh heavens! for 45 seconds...THIS IS AMAZING. I put it on a pretty little plate (do make sure you let it cool before taking it out of the dish), put some of that delicious frosting on it and dug in! A perfect and simple chocolate dessert!