So cute!!

Amy Epley's friend has a craft blog (and I think she is the Creative Activities Leader for her MOPS) and has posted this really cute idea. I intend to try it out, intend being the operative word. :) If you do, please let me know so we can post pictures of your cute nativity here!

Apple Crisp

So, I totally forgot to take a picture of my apple crisp fresh out of the oven, but hopefully you got to see firsthand what it looked like after you cooked your own on Thursday night. It smelled so good, I doubt I could have got my family to wait for pictures, anyway. My kids learned new vocabulary: apple crisp. And they tried a new food and loved it: apple crisp. Isn't apple crisp a wonderful thing? :) So educational.


If you need the recipe because you missed the meeting or lost your little paper, here it is. I would love to give credit for it, but I have no idea where the original recipe came from.

Apple Crisp 

4 cups tart apples (4 or 5 med. apples -peeled and thinly sliced) 

3/4 cup packed brown sugar 

1/2 cup plain flour 

1/2 cup rolled oats

3/4 teaspoon cinnamon 

3/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter 

1/2 cup pecans (optional) 

Butter 8' square pan or 11 x7x2 pan. Spread apples on the bottom. Mix remaining ingredients with butter until crumbly and then spread over apples and bake at 350 for 30-45 minutes or until apples are tender. cool slightly on wire rack and serve warm or at room temperature. Can serve with ice cream or whipped cream.

Sew, Mama,Sew! Handmade Holidays

Check out Sew, Mama, Sew!  For the month of November they are featuring tutorials for handmade items you can make for Christmas gifts. And October was Scrap Buster Month: ways to use your fabric scraps. And if you don't sew, you can buy many of the items on Etsy.

Sweet! Potato Pancake Recipe

I have to share this recipe with everyone. I found it at That's Not What the Recipe Says. These pancakes not only contain healthy sweet potatoes, but were yummy, fluffy and cooked without burning (that last one could just be that I found the sweet spot on my stove dial, I'm not sure).

I had 1.5 cups of sweet potatoes so I made 1.5 times the recipe. It made A LOT of pancakes, so if you are feeding an army (or growing boys), this is the perfect amount to make. And if you haven't yet discovered medallion-sized pancakes (use your tablespoon measure to pour them), they are "just my right size, Mommy!" as Lily says.

I like cooking with whole wheat flour, but I was afraid to ruin such a huge batch of pancakes by substituting too much, making them dense and soggy, so I did 1.5 cups of white and .5 cups of whole wheat flour. They turned out great, like I said.

Oh, and I added some nutmeg, cinnamon and vanilla, because they seemed a little blah without some kind of flavoring. It's up to you whether you do that, and how much. I thought they were delicious, but then again, I am partial to the smell of cinnamon and nutmeg cooking. Smells like holidays and home.

The caramelized bananas added a nice touch to them and I didn't need syrup. The kids didn't quite catch on to the whole eat-it-all-together thing, but at least they ate some of the bananas, which frankly shocked me.

Crafty MOPS has a New Look!

I am experimenting with a different template. I felt that the other one lacked...personality. Let me know if you have an opinion about this new look.

National Novel Writing Month

The goal: 50,000 words of a novel in 30 days. Did I say great words? Did I say Great American Novel? Nope. The goal is just to get the words onto the paper. You can fix it later if you want to. Or not.

I did NaNoWriMo last year for the first time. And in case you are gathering your thoughts to come up with excuses, let me just say: if I can do it while living with my in-laws in a conflict-heavy situation and only having access to the computer for a couple of hours in the evening, then so can you!

If you have a story idea or unwritten novel inside you (and honestly, I think a lot of us do), I say GO FOR IT! It was a lot of fun and a decent challenge. It wasn't impossible by any means, but it was enough of a challenge to make me feel I had accomplished something by the end. Which brings me to another reason I loved NaNoWriMo: As a mom, I don't get a lot of chances to accomplish something as momentous as writing a novel. My greatest life's work (my kids) is always in progress, and it felt REALLY good to finish something so challenging.

If you've already decided you might like to try this crazy thing, go to the website and sign up. Be sure to register for Charlotte as your home region so you can join the discussion boards and see the calendar for the write-ins and parties that are planned. Also for moral support.

Because the people around you, while they may be supportive, will not understand your struggle to reach your 2500 word goal for the day. The message boards are a great place to go to find others who not only understand, but themselves are struggling to keep up. And to find people who will encourage you and tell you that yes, you can do it!

One last thing about NaNoWriMo. I would not have made it last year without Write or Die. It is a little free program that plays an annoying noise if you stop typing for a certain amount of time. You can set goals for yourself and set it to different levels of strictness. Here is a link: http://lab.drwicked.com/writeordie.html.

If you decide to do NaNo this year, let me know! I would love to do this with someone I know.

Two Flower Crafts

I find so many cool craft ideas on the internet, and never have enough time to do them! So, I'll list them on here every now and then in hopes that someone can benefit from them. If you try them, let me know!

Here is a neat idea: some origami flowers made from baby wipes and paper towels and colored with food coloring. Very kid-friendly.

And here are some hair clips with felt flowers.