Friday, October 24, 2008

Halloween Treats

Although Halloween is probably my least favorite of the cool weather holidays, I have found some really nice decorating and craft ideas that I thought I would share with you.
Witches Kitchen : The Aranameurta Blog has a terrifying tutorial on creating your own "Witch Kitchen Jars". These are jars of things that witches would keep around their cauldrons - Garden Gnome Heads, Snake Oil, Skulls, and Nightmare Larva. All you need to get started are some jars, some regular household items or things that you can collect outdoors - leaves, moss, seed pods. The blog post also shows you how to create your own aged looking labels, as well as decorating the bottles. An additional tutorial is posted that goes into more detail about creating shelves to display the jars on, completely with LED lighting. Spooky!
Vintage Halloween Luminary : Nothing says "Happy Halloween" like a flickering candle and grinning Jack O'Lanterns. Here is a Halloween luminary craft that is sure to grace your table, mantle or window sill this year. You can make it yourself with some glass, glue, copper-foil tape, and some spooky vintage images from the early 1900's - when they really knew what Halloween was all about.
Halloween Tree : Do you remember going out before Christmas to pick out the Christmas tree? Searching through dozens of shapes and sizes, to find the one, perfectly shaped tree? Well, picture your search for the perfect Halloween tree: "Nope, not dead enough... Not twisted enough... Not quite ugly enough... " That's what I found myself saying as I hiked through the overgrown acres of a local park. I pulled out plenty of dead branches, but only one was the perfect, gnarled, twisted and very dead branch I wanted for my perfect Halloween Tree. Trust me. You'll find yours, too. And you'll love potting it in this hand-cast Plaster of Paris Jack O'Lantern base. And what's a tree without decorations? Here's a Halloween Witch Ornament, Halloween Clown Ornament, Halloween Pumpkin Ornament, and Halloween Chenille Figures.

Thursday, October 23, 2008

It's A Wonderful Life!

I seriously can't believe I found this! The FULL LENGTH video of my favorite Christmas movie classic! Now I can watch it year-round instead of having to wait until December to view it on cable.
Click the picture to watch 130 minutes of pure Christmas tradition. Enjoy!

Stuffed Green Pepper Soup

I went to Krogers the other day with the intentions of buying everything I needed to make Stuffed Green Peppers, which is my favorite comfort food. However, when I saw the price of green peppers and started figuring how much it would cost to make enough of these little buggars to feed my family of 7 (yes, I said SEVEN), I relized this meal was deifinately not in my budget. So, I went home pouting and angry and settled for homemade mac and cheese. That evening, after the children (including the husband), were all nestled and snug in their bed's, I hit the computer and Googled "Stuffed Peppers" with the hope of finding a less expensive way to prepare them. Well lookie at what I found! Stuffed Green Pepper Soup! Half the cost, half the time, and ALL the flavor. But I still had to make mashed potatoes...I have wierd kid's. =) *Note: This recipe is doubled because the kid's eat last night's leftovers for after school "snacks" today...my bad. I can never get dinner on the table before 7:00.
Stuffed Green Pepper Soup
2# ground beef
1 lg. onion chopped
5 green peppers chopped

Brown the above ingredients and drain well. Now add:

6 cans tomato soup and 5 soup cans of water
1 can of beef broth and 1 broth can of water
2 tsp. brown sugar
2 small cans of tomato sauce
3/4 c. uncooked white rice

Simmer on low until the rice is cooked. If the soup is too thick for your taste, add another cup of water. I also added a couple good shakes of Worcestershire sauce, and some garlic powder.