New Recipe!

Spaghetti with Zesty Bolognese

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1/4 cup KRAFT Light Zesty Italian Dressing
• 1 lb. extra lean ground beef
• 1 can (15 oz.) tomato sauce
• 1 can (14 oz.) diced tomatoes, undrained
• 2 Tbsp. Cream Cheese
• 12 oz. spaghetti, uncooked
• 1/4 cup KRAFT Grated Parmesan Cheese

PREPARATION:

COOK onions in dressing in large skillet on medium heat. Increase heat to medium-high. Add meat; cook, stirring frequently, until browned. Stir in tomato sauce and tomatoes. Bring to boil. Reduce heat to medium-low; simmer 15 min. Remove from heat. Stir in cream cheese until well blended.

MEANWHILE, cook pasta as directed on package.

SPOON sauce over pasta. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.

You can find this great recipe at www.kraftfoods.com

When I made this recipe I cut the recipe in half for the two of us. We still had some extra. I thought it was a nice change from the traditional spaghetti. I also used Rigatoni noodles instead of spaghetti noodles. There a little chewier, and I like them.

Homemade Frosting

I made some homemade frosting the other day for my cookies and had leftover frosting, so I remembered something I had when I was younger. I would take 2 graham crackers and put frosting in the middle. It was always so good and it still is good.

Homemade Frosting:

1/4 cup butter, softened

1/8 cup milk

1/2 tsp. vanilla

Powdered sugar to thicken.

You can mix with a spoon really fast or you can use an electric mixer. You don't want any chunks.

Sale on CHI's

If anyone is in the market right now for a CHI straight iron, there is a website that is having a sale. GREAT DEAL!! This CHI original would be $72.99, that is a fabulous price, plus they are having free shipping on orders over $50 dolloars. The website is www.folica.com/brands/chi_2.html.
I used a CHI and LOVE it!

Sugar Cookies

I love making sugar cookies for the holidays, especially Valentines. And there is only one sugar cookie recipe I will use. The cookies turn out so soft and yummy!


Sour Cream Sugar Cookies

2 cubes butter, softened
1 c. sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 c. sour cream


Sift together:
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. soda
1/2 tsp. salt
3 1/2 c. flour


Combine two mixtures. Put in fridge to chill at least 1 hour.
(When I am ready to roll the dough out, I use very little flour. The more flour you use the harder and dryer the cookie is. I use just enough so it does not stick to the counter or the roller.) And I make my cookies pretty thick, so they are soft.

Bake at 375* for 7-8 minutes. (don't over cook, I take mine out even before they are golden brown, mmmm, so good)

3D Chuck

Last night we were so excited for the new episode of Chuck. Our friends invited us over. We ate baked potatoes with some amazing toppings (everything was really good), chatted with friends, and then we watched Chuck with our cool 3D glasses. We had a very fun night, can't wait for next weeks episode. Here is all of us.

Thanks for the fun night!

Homemade Syrup

Ingredients:

I hate store bought syrup, it has no flavor and I just don't like it. I have always grown up having homemade syrup and it has so much more flavor. I decided I would share the recipe with everyone.

Syrup

I mix everything in the same container I boil the water in and then dump everything in and stir until dissolved.

Whatever is left over, just store in the refrigerator for next time. Yum, Yum!

Check it out and vote!

The 2008 Year in Review contest. Everyone who reads this needs to go to heathertaylorphoto.com and vote. My SIL is a great photographer and is having a contest of all the pictures she has taken in 2008. We have some on there, so go check it out and vote.

Grandpa Taylor

Robs Grandpa Taylor passed away on January 15, 2009, and we will surely miss him. Rob and I would usually visit with him and his Aunt every other Sunday. We loved our visits together. Rob loved his Grandma and Grandpa, before we started dating he would visit almost every day after he got off work to get a creamy from Grandma and to visit. I know they looked forward to him coming. It is fun to hear Rob talk about his Grandparents and all the memories he has of them. Grandpa had a sense of humor and always made us smile. Now, Grandma and Grandpa are together again and it made it a little easier to see Grandpa go.

We were able to go over to Grandma and Grandpa's house later after the funeral and take pictures of the inside of the house, everything was just where Grandma and Grandpa left things. I took so many pictures, Rob would pull out a drawer in the kitchen where Grandpa kept some of his tools and have me take a picture, and a picture of Grandma's cookie jar in the corner of the kitchen. Grandpa's canes still leaning up against the counter. It was hard to see everything still there, I was half expecting Grandpa to walk through the door into the family room as we were sitting on the couches in the family room like all the other times we would come to visit. So many good memories are in that house, and we will always cherish them.

Sadly, the only pictures Rob and I have of Grandpa and Grandma are from our Wedding. They are not the greatest pictures, but it is the pictures we have of them and we love them.

Grandma looks worried in this one, it was starting to rain so they took Grandma and Grandpa inside to stay warm.

We love you Grandpa and Grandma!

Dehydrated Bananas and my 1st and 2nd injury of the New Year!

My mother and father-in-law gave us a food dehydrater for Christmas, so I bought some bananas to dry. I cut them all up and put some glaze on them and then stuck them in the dehydrater. I got three trays of bananas.

It took about 12 hours for them to dry, I could have let them dry a little longer, but we were going to bed and they were pretty much done so I unplugged it and let them cool down. In the morning they were stuck pretty good to the trays so we took them off carefully with a fork and put them in a bag.

I filled the sink with HOT water and let them soak. Then I took them out and ran HOT water directly on them and used a scrub brush to scrub the remainder of bananas off. Anyways, I reached into the sink full of water to release the plug and the water was warm, not thinking I put my hand under the HOT running water to rinse my hand off and wouch, oh it hurt. I hurried and turned the water to cold and stuck my hand under.
But, that was not the worst injury, there was actually another. I got my sewing machine out to make some sleeves shorter on a shirt I bought. I got that finished and then Rob asked if I could sew something for him, so in the middle of sewing I reached up to use the backstitch and then reached back down and started pushing the fabric through and somehow the needle got my finger. It happened so fast that it didn't hurt, but it left a hole that went through the top of my fingernail out through my skin on the other side. You can even see the track it left under my skin. Crazy, that has never happened to me before. The top of my finger is just a little tender.
I also broke my sewing machine, something happened when the needle went through my finger, because now the needle gets stuck when it goes down to get the thread from the bobbin. I guess I will have to make a trip downtown to get it fixed. Oh well!
Happy New Year!

Our finished project!

We have been working on our basement and just repainting and putting some beadboard up to make it our own. Robs dad has spent quite a few hours over at our house helping Rob install the bead board. We are grateful for the help. I think it turned out wonderful. This project cost us double what we thought, but it is done and I love it.

Here is a before picture:

After:
I still need to hang some pictures on the walls, but that will come later.

During this project we had an appointment down in Salt Lake, so we took a thursday and friday off work. We spent one night at Robs uncles house and then another night at Robs brother and sister-in=laws house and then our last night at Robs sister and brother-in-laws house. We had such a good time.
We even got some more pictures taken and I will post about those later.
On our first day in Salt Lake we stopped off at the RC Willey in Murray and bought some furniture for our basement. They are leather couches. We got them for a really good deal too, because they were not making this couch anymore so they only had a few left. The color we wanted were already all sold out, so we got a lighter brown which had an orangey tone to them. We bought them hoping they would work with the brown wallcolor. Knowing we had 14 days to try them out and return them if needed. So, when they delivered them, they actually were more of a reddish brown which worked out perfectly, since we have red accents.
We love them!


We also made it to Tai Pan Trading, after a while Rob got tired and found a chair to sit while I roamed and brought things back to the table next to him. He was such a good sport. I was able to find a lot of things for our new cabinet we bought for our front room. Everything fit so well.


We came home Sunday night, we had such a good weekend. Thanks to everyone for letting us come visit.