A Hearty Success!

I have to tell you it is so nice to have another new family approved recipe! 

Yesterday, I showed Matt the 3 new dinner recipes I had shopped for this week and told him he could select tonight's dinner. Matt chose Spicy Sausage Pasta which I found at the website Kevin and Amanda.

The recipe is so very easy to follow. I only made 3 changes. Instead of heavy cream, I used light cream in order to cut some of the calories. Also, I didn't add the scallions mainly because I forgot to buy them but it was probably for the best as Matt is not a big fan of onions and I already included the onion required in the recipe. Lastly, I chose to use gluten few penne pasta. Barilla now has a variety of gluten free pasta choices (penne, elbow, etc.) and I have to say it is one of the best tasting gluten free options I've sampled. 

The only thing I would do differently is cook the sausage (I used Hillshire's turkey kielbasa) a little longer to get a nice browning to it and a little more caramelizing of the onions. Other than that, it is a keeper!

Everyone here gave it a thumbs up! Try it for yourself and let me know what you think.

As always, thanks for stopping by!

Go to Meal

Late afternoon Monday was exceptionally rough for me.

I had been fighting a migraine the week before and the weekend brought another set of unknown aches. I thought for sure Monday would provide a bit of a reprieve and took it easy working out at the gym that morning. My day's schedule was light with just a hair appointment. Sounds like an overall good day but things were about to change!

Of course, about an hour before heading to school, another migraine started to take root. The bad part of this was that it wasn't a normal pick up day, Emily had a "make up" basketball game. UGH!!! 

I didn't want to pull Emily from the game so Matt and I sat in the hallway outside the gym while she played. Thankfully the muting of the sounds emanating from the gymnasium and the coolness of the hallway (I was sitting near the side entrance) helped to ease some of the tension. 

Heading home I wanted to take the quick way out for dinner and just pick something up but I knew I had a pound of ground beef that NEEDED to be used that day. Thankfully I already had a quick and easy recipe in mind to use. 

I found this recipe for Grands Unsloppy Joes at the Pillsbury website. I've tried several ways of serving sloppy Joe's - on rolls, in taco shells, etc. It seems that one person will like it one way and one another but never did we have a united "approval" of the sloppy Joe. So, this would be my latest attempt. It is so very easy. I used the reduced fat whole wheat Grand biscuit for the "pocket". You do need to roll each biscuit out to about 6 inches but that is the extent of the "work" of this recipe. The sloppy Joe mix was prepared as usual and then pocketed inside the biscuit with a little cheese then baked. I explained to the kids it is like a sloppy Joe empanada. 

Well everyone LOVED it and as a matter of fact Matt asked the next day at dinner time if we were having the Joe pockets again. Finally, we all approve on a sloppy Joe! Go ahead, give it a try and let me know what you think.

As always, thanks for stopping by!

Scalloped Hearts on Sunday

As most of you know, I teach the 4 and 5 year old Sunday School class at my church. 

This past Sunday's lesson was about Jesus loving the children and what an appropriate lesson with Valentine's day being this Friday. 

Although the lesson material does provide a coordinating weekly "craft" project, I've been trying to do a special craft with them once a month, especially around the holidays. This month's craft was all about the LOVE!!!

The craft itself, scalloped hearts, I found from my main arts & crafts source Pinterest through the website Alana Jones-Mann. 

I purchased from Michaels heavy card stock precut hearts. Then, used my Cricut cutter to cut 1 inch circles from red, purple and pink card stock purchased from JoAnn's. Now, I love JoAnn's for many things but I have to say I prefer Michael's Bazzill card stock. I have found that it cuts much cleaner on my Cricut machine than JoAnn's line of card stock. Just saying! 

We used glue sticks to adhere the colored circles to the heart shape. It is best to apply the glue to the back of the circle as you need to overlap the hearts. When we started the project, we attempted to do a pattern of purple, pink and red. A few of the kids were able to stay with the patterning but most of them did their "own thing" which was perfectly fine. The circles go off the sides of the heart, so at the end of the project scissors are use to cut the excess off defining the true heart shape. 

On the back side, I wrote for each of the kids (mainly for time purposes) who their heart was for and their message to them. Some were for mom & dad, brothers and sisters, even pets.

Here are a few of the kids with their hearts:

Daniela - age 4 

Violet  - age 4 

Anthony - age 5

Because our lesson was about Jesus' love,  I gave the kids a "love" project for Valentine's day. I told them to go to every person in their family give them a big hug and say, "I love you and Jesus loves you too" and that I would check to see who remembered to hug their family next Sunday. The funniest thing was one of the kids said she was going to do it right after church because she will forget to do it on Valentine's day. Love these kids!

As always, thanks for stopping by!

Strings and Hearts

It was so great today to be able to get back to teaching my Friday Arts & Crafts class. 

Due to our NJ weather and a few scheduled school events, I haven't been as organized as I'd like to be when it comes to completing projects in a timely manner. Today however, with the approval of the art teacher, I was able to have class with both the 3rd and 4th grade where we created and completed a Valentine's day project. Yay!!! 

I pulled this woven heart idea from the website Family Chic. I made a sample heart so that the kids would know what all their hard work would accomplish. Now, I did quite a bit of prep for the classes today mainly so we could complete the project in one 40 minute session. 

The heart frames are created using floral wire that is wrapped in craft paper. The site I took this idea from shows a large coil of the wire which you need to cut to length but I was able to find some already pre-cut at JoAnn Fabrics. In order to save class time for weaving, I structured all the hearts needed at home.  

I also pre-cut the yarn needed for both classes. The kids had the option of choosing this multicolored yarn which has varying shades of red, pink and purple and a dark garnet red yarn. The yarn was cut into lengths of 6 yards per heart. I would probably recommend cutting the yarn into 2 yards, giving them 3 piles each just so it is easier for the weaving process. Of course, they would need to knot each new section to the heart frame and then continue the weaving process. 

This project does require a lot of manual dexterity and patience. I did alert each class that this was going to be a little difficult but to just hang in there and pay close attention to the directions I gave them. As with anything in arts & crafts, some were able to get the hang of it easily, to some it came with time and for others it proved a little difficult. All in all though they did a great job. Thankfully one of the 4th graders took very easily to it and she was given permission to assist me in helping the 3rd grade with their hearts. 

Here are some of the students creations:

Curtis' heart - 3rd grade

Annabell's heart - 4th grade

Rachel's heart - 3rd grade

Jesreal's heart - 3rd grade

I was very pleased with how all the students did even though some of them felt they didn't do so well. Of course, I  tried to encourage them by saying when you do something the first time it may not be exactly the way you want it to be but you tried and that is the first step. You can always try again. Also, the more you do something the easier it becomes and you'll get the results you want. 

One of the best things that happened in these classes today was that when some of the students completed their heart they asked if they could help another student who was having a little difficulty. Helping one another, a byproduct of weaving hearts, now that is what I call a successful class!

As always, thanks for stopping by!

How Do I Love You? Let Me Show You!

I remember during my freshman year of college celebrating Valentine's Day with my good friend, Marti, by jumping on the bed shouting at the top of our lung, "we hate Valentine's Day!" Okay, it is safe for you to assume that at that time neither of us were in a relationship hence our disdain for the holiday.

I'm happy to say that I no longer feel the same way regarding the holiday. God has blessed me with a wonderful husband and two amazing kids and although I tell them I love them all the time I do try and express my love for them in a special way on Valentine's day. 

Three years ago is when I started a more creative/crafty way to express my love to them. Oh, and I have to give a big shout out to Pinterest because of course, these ideas came from pins I found there. 

My first year of being "crafty" was my most ambitious. I made for each of them - Dave, Emily and Matt - a love jar. Several weeks before the holiday (which was not an ample amount of time), I started to make lists of the many reasons and specific things I love about them. Of course, the idea was to write 365 reasons, one for each day of the year, but 365 x 3 is a lot so in the end I actually did 100 for each of them. I even took the time to type them in a cute font, print them on colored cardstock and cut them to fit in the jars. Every now and then I catch Emily reading hers. But I didn't just stop there....like I said it was my most ambitious year.

I also made hearts that had cute valentine paper on the one side and a written reason of why I loved Emily and Matt on the other side. These hearts were hung from string and across their doorways. When the kids woke up Valentine's day morning, they had to walk out through/under their hearts. The really loved this!

Last year, I used these same hearts to string across their doorways mainly because the kids kept asking if I was going to hang them again. I guess they really liked them! Emily's went up easily but Matt's gave me some trouble, so while he was sleeping I laid all his hearts on his floor so when he got out of bed in the morning he had to walk though the hearts.

But of course, I didn't stop there. I wanted the kids to participate in expressing their love for each other and Dave and I so I made these love buckets.

Each family member had their own personalized bucket. In the middle one, I had hearts cut in red and pink paper. Each day leading up to Valentine's day we wrote on hearts reasons we loved that person and placed them in their bucket. The buckets were on the sideboard in the dining room for easy access. Of course, I needed to highlight this area by creating the "Be Mine" banner with my Cricut cutting machine. After our family dinner Valentine's day evening, we sat at the table and each person got to read the reasons why we are loved by our family members. Some reasons were hilarious while other's serious, but all were loved!

Last year, I also decide to make something special for Dave for the holiday. My first attempt at making a shadowbox! A plain wooden 8x8 shadowbox was purchased from Michaels. The outside was painted a matte black and the inside a deep red. Glued inside is a piece of scrapbook paper that repeats "I love you" on it. I used my Cricut cutter to cut the heart "lace" piece and attached "Scrabble" like tiles that spell out love, you and me. To finish it off, dark garnet gems were adhered as an outline on the scrapbook paper. This shadowbox currently sit on my bedside table. 

So, now we come to this year! I'll admit I was not as ambitious this year and I did take this idea from a fellow pinner Skip to my Lou on Pinterest and I started a day late. Basically, on colored hearts, each night I place a heart with a reason or attribute I love about that person on their door. Saturday morning I used my Cricut cutter to cut hearts in colors of baby pink, dark pink, sparkle pink, yellow, mint green and purple. 

In order for the kids to understand what the hearts were about, I cut with my Cricut cutter the "I (heart) U because". Now, I'm also doing the same for Dave but I place his hearts inside our medicine cabinet so that each morning when he is getting ready for work he sees the reasons that I love him. I always like to reuse something from the year past so I took the "Be Mine" banner and hung that across the scroll work that is hung above our fireplace mantle. 

This is only the lead up to Valentine's day. I have a few things up my sleeve for the special day, so stay tuned.

As always, thanks for stopping by! 

2nd Quarter in the Books

It is hard to believe that the 2nd quarter of school has been completed and report cards have come home.

Once again,  Emily and Matthew's hard work has paid off resulting in both of them achieving the highest academic honor of Principal's List. 

I always find these posts a little hard to write because I don't want to come off as a bragging parent, but I also want to showcase the hard work the kid's have put into their academics. 

Emily has had to really learn to juggle academics and sports this quarter. Although she participated in soccer, those practices and games seemed to be done by 6. This was not the case for basketball. In addition to the sports factor, a few subjects have been focusing on developing new skills (especially in math) which has required more time and effort on her part. I have to say Emily found a real groove through the month of December but when Christmas break occurred followed by several weeks where there were scheduled days off and snow days, she lost her focus and the last two weeks of the quarter made that apparent. Thankfully her earlier commitment kept her overall grade average very high. 

Although the new academic quarter has started, Emily has a few weeks to get back into her "groove" before volleyball starts. Volleyball is the sport she has really wanted to play. However, she has been advised by us that she needs to prove her focus and ability to handle a full schedule are in place in order to be allowed to play. Yes, it may seem a little harsh but that is how we do it here in the Wessel home. 

Matthew also has had a great quarter. One subject we've learned that he truly loves is history. Math he has little trouble with and grasps new concepts very easily but he will tell you it is "not my favorite". The only issue we really had to deal with is his lack of wanting to do homework. Yes, this included much whining and complaining but the consequence of 15 minutes taken off his weekend Xbox play time for every time he is caught complaining has help changed that. He still doesn't "desire" to do it but he keeps those thoughts to himself. 

So here we go another quarter and half the school year is in the books. 

I would ask that you continue to pray for Emily and Matt as they continue in their studies and for Dave and I as we give them the support they need to do their personal best. 

As always, thanks for stopping by!