Saturday Soup for Supper

Is there anything better on a cold day than soup and fresh bread for dinner? Tonight we will be having Creamy Chicken Noodle.

One chicken breast

mushrooms

celery

carrots

half of a sweet onion chopped up

pasta of your choice

chicken broth

cream of chicken soup

Chop up veggies and place in a pot with a hunk of butter. Cook until soft. Add chicken breast and cover with a couple cans of broth. Boil until chicken is cooked through. Stirring occasionally. Add more broth to make it soup consistency. Add in a couple of handfuls of noodles. Bring to a boil and cook until noodles are done. Add in one can of cream of chicken soup and 3/4 of a can of milk. Stir until cream of chicken is well incorporated. Garnish with cheese and serve.

The bread is a new recipe from the latest issue of Country Living. It's called Mini Country Loaves. I love this one because of the oats that incorporated. It gives it a hearty texture that goes nicely with this soup.

Wreath Kit Winner

Karla was randomly chosen (using random.org) as the winner of the wreath kit! Yay, Karla!

Remember to enter the giveaway for the elf heads. I will end that give away this weekend!

Elf Heads, Elf Heads, Roly Poly Elf Heads (and another giveaway!!!)

Inspired by the awesomely talented artist and writer, Theresa Smythe, I decided to make up these little elf head pencil toppers for Santa to stuff into stockings. Another simple craft, you only need a fabric scrap for the hat, tinsel-like pipe cleaners, the nobby pipe cleaners in white, craft paint, wooden balls (mine were pre-drilled,) pencils, and hot glue.

The Give Away!!!

Comment on this post for a chance to win a kit to make your own elf pencil toppers. Everything except the hot glue and craft paint will be included to make 2 pencils.

Don't forget to enter this give away too and watch for our upcoming downloadable freebies!

Holiday Crafting: Tulle Wreath & Giveaway!!!

Christmas is less than a month away, time to get crafting for the Holidays!

I saw one of these out on the web done in black tulle for Halloween. But by the time I got around to it, would you believe it? Black tulle was SOLD OUT at my local fabric stores... loads of halloween crafting going on in my town I suppose.

Instead I bought a yard of white tulle and set out to make a beautiful vintage inspired piece.

I used:

1 yard of tulle cut in half over and over again until you end up with 32 rectangles (First I cut up the original fold, folded in half lengthwise and cut again, width wise and cut, lengthwise, cut and width wise again and cut. The pieces are about 8 inches long by 6?
1 bangle bracelet, something small and not too colorful
1 yard of ribbon for hanging
embellishments, I used a vintage clip on earring and some Christmas picks

I can't explain how to do this step, but can you see how it's done? It's a matter of folding the strips in half one at a time, wrapping over the bangle and pulling the loose ends through the loop. Use up all the pieces.

The Giveaway!!!

Comment here for a chance to win a kit to make your own tulle wreath! The kit includes cut tulle, bangle, ribbon, sparkly leaves, and one pretty button (all out of vintage earrings sorry) Comment by Nov 17th!

Rules and Regulations

Rules and guidelines are what help to keep a family happy and your household in order. What better way to remind your family of these things than to have a pretty reminder staring them in the face daily? We were inspired by the example posted here to make some of our own.

Jessica's is huge, made on a 27x22 sized canvas. She used Amy Butler paper and tore it into 2" strips, Modge Podged them on, used a Cricut cutter to cut out all the words and modge podged them on. Finally she covered the whole thing in a super amazing triple coat high gloss varnish, because everything looks better when it's shiny!

Monique used a smaller 12x24 inch canvas. Using paper all from the same collection, she cut hers instead of tearing. After gluing them down, she hand lettered each rule using a paint pen. Lastly she Modge Podged the whole thing.

French Onion Soup

I threw this together last night.It was very good. A little sweet. Very comforting.

some key secret ingredients: apple cider and potatoes (my kids love potatoes.) I served it over seasoned crutons and sprinkled with fresh grated parmesan and shredded swiss. mmmm

Stock up

If you have a Trader Joes near you stock up on some of their great mixes and gourmet frozen meals for the upcoming busy days. If you have friends and loved ones who live in an unfortunate Trader Joe-less area, grab some for their Christmas presents this year!

Ahhh November, Thank Goodness You're Here

Jess and I are ready to get back to this blog! After a couple months of the new school years, sick kiddos, and crazy lives we miss our little blog. This month you can look forward to recipes, craft ideas and patterns, and entertaining for the holidays.

I volunteered to host Thanksgiving this year at my house. I am so excited but knew I didnt have enough dishes for the 24+ people that will be here. I had been watching my favorite thrift store and thought I might collect different pieces of stoneware plates to mix and match. One afternoon I snuck away to find some Halloween costume bits, and saw a huge stack of Corelle stashed behind the other plates. At the register the cashier insisted she had the right price 4 for $1.49. I did argue that they were 4 for 2.99 but she showed me the price list. The lady behind me advised "Just take it honey, it's a deal."

So this year my guests will find all these beautiful vintage Corelle plates to eat from... I am thinking chocolate brown table cloth... but am still looking for centerpiece ideas... Any suggestions?

Jess Came for a Visit!

We accomplished so much! I did a photo shoot for her and for her kiddos. We peeled a HUGE bag of green chiles! We stopped at Trader Joes, went thrifting, and ate in Albuquerque's Old Town. By the time the day was over and all the kids in bed we were too tired to do anything crafty. Jess did write up a great list of things we will be working on and posting about in the next couple of months.

Right now she is running a couple of errands before she leaves town. Just trying to figure out how to get her to move back! ;)

Mini Vacation Idea Booklet

I made up a booklet for anybody to print out. It has creative ideas for taking mini vacations. More information on my blog here

Dawn's List

Dawn can be found here

Salt water taffy recipe

Sandcastle image courtesy of Sassy Arts. Shell from Because I said so 65. Boy with boat take a break

Amy's List

You can find Amy here.
More on Letterboxing here

Raesha's Summer List

Raesha can be found at her blog here

Dont forget to send us your list! (I can put the vintage photoshopped touch on it for you ;)

Summer Time Lists

Whether you or your littles have started your summer vacation or not, it's always a good idea to have a plan. I tend to think of things 2 seasons ahead... not sure why...but now I am craving pumpkin pie and crisp autumn nights??? Good thing I already made my summer list of things to do.

Read through ours (somewhat vintage inspired) and then make one of your own. Think about what you or your family really needs this summer. Is it more quality time? A great road trip? Or living more simply? We'd love to feature your list on this blog when you are done. Send your list, blog info, and a picture to cardigancakeblog at gmail dot com and we'll post them!

The tutorial for Jess's paper mache project can be found here: http://theredthreadblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/crafting-with-kids-tutorial.html

On a Line

For as long as I can remember, clotheslines have been an important part of the history of the women in my family. As a little girl and even now one of my favorite moments with my Grandma is hanging clothes on the line with her. When I was small it was my job to hand her the pins. I loved feeling the cool dampness of the clothes while she'd pin them up.

When I got my first house in New Mexico, my Grandpa made me my own clothesline and drove it all the way down from Idaho for me. I loved having it to hang the cloth diapers on. Especially living there, everything dried so fast in the heat. I was sick when we had to move and leave it behind.

It's been 4 years since I've lived somewhere that I'm able to finally dry clothes on the line again. Last weekend my sweet husband broke out the "Honey Do" list and made me my own in my backyard. I painted it blue and added the copper tops. As soon as the paint was dry I grabbed all the sheets in the house and washed them. The kids handed me the pins while I shook the sheets out and hung them up. Today it's towels and tomorrow it's shirts. Now if I can just get the garden to grow, that would be something!

Lazy Sunday

I love this time of year. Right when the weather is starting to warm up. Right before school gets out. When you still have some routine, but are about to lose it to summer and really you're ok with that. Dinners are more enjoyable and lingering thanks to the longer light. One thing we're going to try and do this summer is have a nightly game out on the front porch before bed. I can't wait to start the summer plans. We'll have to make new library tote bags for library day. Maybe the tote bags will also be used for swim gear on swimmming day. This summer we're also going to read Nancy Drew and watch Hailey Mills movies. Picnics at the park and clothesline tents in the backyard. A lot of nonscheduled free play will be a must. Thank goodness for lazy Sundays to sit back and be inspired!

How Does your garden grow?

8 bags of topsoil, 4 bags of sheep manure mixed with compost, one nicked sprinkler line, a bazillion tree roots and much rototilling here it is. I present to you.... my first garden! It's the great experiment of the summer. I originally had high hopes of planting all my little seeds indoors weeks ago. Then I was going to transplant them all carefully outside after the danger of frost. Funny what happens with high hopes. Instead I took all my seeds and gently planted them into the soil. My 2 year old came along behind and helped me cover them up. Hopefully they are all still in their rows. At some point this summer I want to get a couple of raspberry plants to plant in the middle of the 2 garden beds. I do have dreams of being able to send the kids out to pick salad for dinner. Drying out the gourds and turning them into birdhouses for all the robins who live in my trees. Watching the kids sit outside after running through the sprinklers eating watermelon and having seed spitting contests. I'll post updates frequently. Wish me luck!

Squash, birdhouse gourds, cantaloupe and watermelon.

tomatoes, pablono peppers, walla walla onions, lettuce, carrotts, beats, sweet peppers, and banana peppers.

Wiped Clean!

Oilcloth. A must have staple in my house. We have all the kids chairs, eating surfaces and the craft table covered in it. Great for lunch sacks, covering cookbooks and for making coasters.

Back in the days of our Grandmothers it was a heavy canvas type fabric made waterproof with a coating of linseed oil and paint. It was a basic, everyday cloth that was easy to clean and inexpensive to replace when it wore thin from use. I have memories of my great Grandmothers table covered in layers of it. When one layer grew too thin, she simply stapled another layer to the top. If you looked underneath the table you could see all the edges of the layers.

Made of plastic or vinyl woven with cotton, updated oilcloth is as long-lasting and as adaptable as the ones of our Grandmothers time. Use it anywhere you want a splash of color and a washable surface. When you wipe away those acrylic paint accidents, spilled tomato soup, smashed blueberry muffins, and tacky glue mistakes with ease, you will thank our ancestors for inventing it!

tied together ;)

Yay! Jess came for a visit. A very short, very fun, thrifting, crafting, antiquing, trip!

We arm wrestled for this typewriter at the thrift store... and as you know I am a mammoth of a woman so Jess had no chance! LOL!!!

We made mini thrifting wish list notebooks (while eating buckets full of junk food)

And super cute aprons from Target kitchen towels

We think we should do these whirlwind 36 hour visits more often ;)

What Time is It?

I have a hard time getting rid of things. Even if they are broken. Usually I'll stash them somewhere for future use. Cracked pottery and china want to be made into a mosaic table top. Stained sweaters want to be reconstructed. And broken watches, well they still want to be worn. For years I've been collecting discarded watches I find at yard sales and thrift stores. All of them have stopped working but are still beautiful or interesting. I have been wanting to link a group of them together to make a bracelet, I worried though that w/o proper link soldering, the heavy watches would come apart. So the watches sat in a box for years, forgotten. When I came across them this month, it struck me that I could thread them onto a piece of ribbon and tie them on my wrist with a huge bow. One watch does work, so I check that one for the time... the others stopped oh so long ago.

Have you looked at your broken and old pieces of jewelry and thought about how you could remake them into something wearable today?

Frosty Cold

10 years ago I was walking through an antique store in Lewiston, Idaho with my sister. Up in a corner behind a stack of books was a stash of aluminum drinking tumblers. There were 10 of them. The jewel tone colors stood out like a beacon of light among all the other vintage wares. The bright blue, purple, pink greens and golds were not even scratched. It was one of those moments where you pick them up quick and look around, like you're sure someone was racing you for them. I saw the price tag of 7$ and looked around again, stunned that indeed I was the only one going after these. I talked the owner down to 6$ and took them home immediately. I washed them in some hot soapy water and poured myself some ice cold root beer in them. The glass was almost too cold to touch. I have memories of Grandmas giving us kool-aid in these kinds of cups on bright sunny days. I remember how hot it was outside, but yet this glass was always so cold.

Now I love serving ice cold lemonade in the summer to my kids and their friends. I think it's funny to see some children drink out of them and whisper quietly to my children, "Why do you drink out of a can?" Those children have been deprived of frosty cold cups and now find new favorites in our home.

Charmed, I'm Sure

My mother has the most amazing charm bracelet that she started high school. A glass encased mustard seed, a typewriter, an air force strike for when my dad joined, empire state building, a yellowstone charm, mary and her little lamb, a moose from Alaska, Utah charm, a piano with a hinged top, a stage coach from a road trip, baby buggy with moving parts, a bowl, old time roller skate with moving wheels, a cob of corn (!?), and more.

When I was in high school, I received a charm bracelet of my own. My grandmother, a jewelry maker, had taken special consideration to select charms that really spoke about the young woman I was. A sleek cat because I was a cat owner, a clef because I was a musician, a peace symbol for my slightly hippie ways. 8 charms in all that told a story about who I was.

These days I feel my life just gets busier and busier. Littles to make meals for, a husband to adore, a career to coddle. I find that at the end of the day I have neglected so much and wish that I had something to remind during my busy life of the things that are important, a symbol. It came to mind that a piece of jewelry with a silhouette would help me to remember the important things. I also thought it would be nice if this piece of jewelry reminded me of how far I had come in my life and where I wanted to go as well. This was how I decided to give my old charm bracelet a makeover.

I removed her old cat charm, a comedy/tragedy mask and most of the others, leaving a pearl and a silver '93 (the year I graduated high school and met my husband.) I rummaged my jewelry box for unused bits (like my beloved single moonstone earring) and went through my beading supplies for any extras to assemble the beginnings of her new adornments.

One jewelry box find was a single Buffalo head nickel earring from a set I got as a child on a road trip. To make it into a charm I used pliers to make a loop from its post and attached it with a link.

Other ideas for a charm bracelet can be

• scrapbook embellishments
• game pieces
• small toy bits (like barbie acessories)
• charms from road trips
• beads or buttons

For further inspiration take a looksie at this flickr group

Clever Cleanliness

Ladies from the beginning of time have cared about the care and cleaning of their fingernails. Women have gone to great extremes to have polished manicured nails.

Imagine my horror when I realized 2 of my 3 children had been walking around for who know how long with too long, raggedy blackened fingernails! How this escaped my attention, I do not know! One thing was for certain, we had to remedy this.

While picking up the bath toys after the children's baths, I noticed we actually had a decent amount of nail brushes. The solution had presented itself. I scooped up all the brushes and stuck them in a small Pyrex dish. They now reside next to my kitchen sink. When coming to the dinner table now, all children are expected to "scrub up" and have clean finger tips.

Lunch Box

"What to make for dinner?" is a daily thought for most of us. We plan the menu and write out the list. Double check the pantry and do prepwork. We want our family to have a

good healthy dinner

So much effort for that valued family time. But how often do we slap some PB&J on sandwich bread and call it LUNCH? or do we grab the keys and hop over to that cute cafe (or even that quick drive thru?) My dear friend, Raesha and I were chatting about how lovely it is to go out to lunch. Who wants boring ol' PB&J when the options outside the home are almost endless and require less effort? One problem, this wanna be homemaker notices immediately when eating out is the HUGE BITE it takes out of the budget. And with little ones at home I also consider the example I am setting and the risk of catching a food borne illness.

Well, I'm here to tell you this is one homemaker taking things into her own hands. I think it's time for a

LUNCH REVOLUTION!!!

Here is what we need to do:

• find a lunch box or basket you love! My little miss B and I found our cute one at the thrift store. It once was a stationary container


• Spruce it up. For miss B's box we used a cute vintage inspired valentine rub on. I considered a lunch basket with a closing wooden lid that I would have re-lined with a coral gingham and adorned with a ribbon on the handle.


• Plan out the lunch menu. Include old favorites (yes like pb&j) and new recipes. Flip through your cookbooks for forgotten favorites. Consider your favorite lunch spots' menus for inspiration.


• Don't neglect that sweet tooth. Is there a new cookie recipe you'd like to try? A treasured candy that brings back childhood memories? put those on the list as well.


• Be green. Skip the baggies and foil if possible. Use small plastic ware or jelly jars. Wrap candies in scrap paper. And dont forget your napkin! Ours is a vintage inspired hankie print. Miss B loved the hearts!

Your Hostesses

Two best friends living 450 miles apart, both trying to live a good life, reducing their environmental footprint, raising children in a crazy world, crafting up a storm, and bringing a little vintage wisdom in to help it move along.

Jessica is about 50% hippie and 50% vintage housewife. She's been blogging at Me and My Storey for a year and a half. She has a love for antique stores, buttons, embroidery, teapots, farmer's markets, and baking bread for her family's daily lunches. She is inspired daily by Mothers and Grandmothers, seeking wisdom in their writings, secret recipes and knick knacks. She's married to a vintage car lover and they raise their 2 sons and 1 daughter in a cute house with a big back yard outside of Denver.

Monique has been all over the board as far as style goes but has always loved everything vintage. She currently blogs at The Good Neighbor and runs her photography business from home. She is a night owl that loves anything green, estate sales, California, and baking sweet treats every chance she gets. She comes from a long line of stylish women married to nostalgic pack rats and thinks shes a bit of both. Her husband is slightly obsessed with Disney so their 3 daughters and 1 son have loads of fun in their lives in the high desert of Albuquerque.

Monique and Jessica both share a love for the gospel of Jesus Christ and work hard every day to be better examples of His love and teachings to those around them.