It's Pinspired Friday! {My Very First Pin}

Good morning all! It's...

I thought today that I would showcase my very first "pin"! I was on Pinterest shortly after it started making it's rounds on the social media's and so I hopped on the bandwagon and never looked back! ;) I remember thinking... oh my word. This is crafts galore. And oh! That room is beautiful... and that outfit is stylish... pin pin pin... and suddenly found myself at over 1k pins. Yikes! As you've seen here on the blog, I do actually try to do or at least interpret the pins into something I would like to do and would actually do. I use it as a recipe book quite often now, pinning away foods I would like to make. I have a pin board for those pins I actually do - and I often write a little commentary so that if something I made was God awful, I'll remember it and maybe help someone out along the way as well. So without further ado... my first pin.

DIY Floral Pillows with Ultrasuede Petals

Is anyone surprised that it's a Martha Stewart tutorial? That wonderfully crafty (slightly crazytown) lady. I had no intention of making the pillows but I remember thinking the flower was neat. Where would I put it? I don't know. Would I buy ultrasuede to make these petals like our lovely Martha? That's a big nope. But, that's the beauty of Pinterest - you can see where you've come from, how your styles and tastes have evolved, and even release a little creative energy too.

SPEAKING of creative energy... You're probably wondering where all the tutorials are! I've been loaded with lots of different things going on this past week... and that's where my creative energy has gone. lol :)

First - Mr. LOC asked me if I would be willing to make him a bag for his tip ups, for ice fishing, and I said of course. How hard could it be?

Famous last words. ;) It actually was not TOO hard, it was a bit of trial and error as I had never made a duffel type bag, and the circles on the end were tricky. Since I wasn't following a pattern, I had to sort of...wing it when it came to measurements, and I made the bag a little long BUT, this way it actually can sling across his back vs. being carried on a shoulder, so it worked out. It was a neat experience and I had all of the materials, including that zipper (it was a super vintage one I picked up NIP at a garage sale), and he loves it so that's all that matters to me! :) And no, sorry, there will not be a tutorial since I didn't write anything down and was using scrap fabric, but I can tell you that those brown circles on the end were about 8" across.

My other BIG project of the week was a t-shirt quilt that I was commissioned to do for a friend from high school. I am THRILLLLLED (with that many L's, you know I'm pretty jazzed about it) with how well this came out as it was my first time doing a t-shirt quilt. I'll be writing a feature post next week on how this all came together. I'm very excited for my friend to receive it! :)

So tell me - what was your first pin? Why did you pin it? And do you think you would pin it again today? Thanks for stopping in!

P.S. I am not in any way affiliated with Pinterest or Martha Stewart either...! I realized about half way through that this looked like a giant plug for Pinterest. I just think it's a neat social media and a great creative outlet, that's all. :)

Ground Beef Pie

Whenever we have ground beef, I like to jazz it up a little, instead of just cheeseburgers or hamburger helper (don't get me wrong, I love myself some burgers and hamburger helper! Stroganoff hamburger helper anyone? Yummm) but sometimes I just want to try other things with ground beef. I have had this recipe in my dancing teddy bear recipe book for a while now, and have surprisingly never made it.

Just by first glance at the recipe, I knew it was going to need some... jazz. haha. Ground beef is generally sort of flavorless, so are eggs, and so is biscuit mix. Cheese was pretty much the only flavor redeemer here. So I added a few spices and I could have probably added even more.

Let's gather our ingredients:
• 1 lb ground beef
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1/2 tsp oregano
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1 cup of shredded cheddar cheese (I used sharp cheddar)
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 3/4 cup biscuit/baking mix
• (Optional) Frank's Red Hot sauce. We put it on before we ate the pie and it gave it a nice kick in the pants. :)

You'll also want:
• A glass pie plate
• A colander for draining the grease off the beef.
• Measuring utensils are a plus too. ;)
• Some Pam spray. I made it without, and let's just say that the pie plate is soaking now... :(

You might want:
• Some onions or onion powder
• Some chili powder cooked in with the beef

I say this as I could have probably added even more spice to the pie to kick the flavor up even more. Maybe a chili or taco packet added to the ground beef would be good.

First, brown your ground beef. Drain the fat. Spray your pie plate and press your ground beef into the bottom of the glass pie plate. Sprinkle the salt, pepper and oregano over the beef. I didn't mix the spices in, but rather did them as a layer. While you're at it, preheat your oven to 400.

Then, sprinkle your cheese over the beef.


In a separate bowl, mix your eggs, milk and biscuit/baking mix.

Try to get as much baking mix to mix in. I had a little ways to go when I took this picture.

Now, pour that goodness over the cheese/meat.

At this point, you have a plate full of liquid, meat and cheese and you'll think you added too much milk (that's what I thought at least!). Don't worry, it actually cooks in pretty well... just be careful when putting in the oven, it'll want to slosh all over. Before you go putting it in the oven though, take your garlic powder and sprinkle over the top, not mixing it in. This gives this crust a super yummy garlic bread type flavor when it's done. Your oven should be to 400 at this point, so go ahead and put it in for 35 minutes.

After 35 yummy smelling minutes... we've got a ground beef pie on our hands. Do let it cool a bit before gnawing into it - it'll help it set and you'll get better shaped pieces when you go to serve it.

It was pretty good, especially with a little Frank's Red Hot on top of it, and it tasted even better as it cooled. I think I'll be giving this recipe another go, but with sage pork sausage crumbled in the bottom, and maybe a sausage gravy on top! (That'll make it healthy, I'm sure.) ;)

Thanks for following along!

Ground Beef PieOriginal Recipe from Taste of Home

Ingredients
• 1 lb ground beef
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1/2 tsp oregano
• 1/2 tsp garlic powder
• 1 cup of shredded cheddar cheese
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 3/4 cup biscuit/baking mix
• (Optional) Frank's Red Hot sauce

Directions
1) In a skillet, cook beef over medium heat until no longer pink; drain. Press into an ungreased (or lightly greased, if you want an easier clean up) 9-in. pie plate. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, oregano and cheese.
2) In a separate bowl, combine the eggs, milk and biscuit mix just until combined. Pour over cheese.
3) Sprinkle garlic powder over the mixture.
4) Bake at 400° for 35 minutes. Let cool before serving and enjoy! Add a few dashes of hot sauce to kick up the flavor.

It's Pinspired Friday! {Fancy Pearl Earrings Tutorial}

Hi all! It's Pinspired Friday! Today I'm going to showcase these cute earrings:

Sorry about the quality of these pictures! My camera was just not cooperating that day.

and how easy they are to make!

It all started when I pinned these earrings about 2 months ago:

I thought they were very cute and would be great for any occasion, so I decided to make some of my own and share how to make them with you!

I picked out smaller pearls and made my posts a little longer. Looking back, I would probably make my posts a little shorter (I still like the dainty pearl size) as they are super long but they're still fun and I'll probably wear them anyway.

So let's gather our supplies. We'll need:

• 6 posts with flat bottoms
• 6 "pearls"
• two french hooks

You'll also need:
• a pair of wire cutters
• a pair of earring pliers. They have rounded prongs so we can get the circles just right (needle nose won't work.)
• Possibly another pair of pliers to open the circles.
• A ruler or other measuring device

 My measuring device was a piece of paper that was an inch long. Ha! I measured each post to be an inch long where I bent and made the loop. Not sure how to make earring loops? I don't want to beat a dead horse (there are so many great tutorials out there!), so I'll link to a tutorial on making a earring loop.

I made each beginning post.

And then I put my next pin through that loop.

And proceeded to make another loop, and then another pin through that loop. Then, I simply attached my french hooks to the three step earrings...

And it's as easy as that!

Cute, can be dressed up or dressed down earrings for cheap! I had all of the materials already, so I had no cost on these, but posts, pliers and "pearls" can be bought for very cheap at Joann's or even Walmart.

Thanks for following along!

P.S. Where was I last Friday?
I was out of town last Friday and I unfortunately missed last Friday's post! Usually I schedule something if I'm going to be OOT but I had nothing and time crept up on me. Sorry about that guys! 

Paper Heart Banner

Paper + Cricut + Sewing Machine = sweet and easy Valentine's Day banner!

I made this banner a few days ago so that I could add some color to my Valentine's Day vignette. I wanted to make something easy, cheap and cute - I already had all of the materials for this!

Want to make one? You'll need:

• Some fancy scrapbook paper in "Valentine's colors" - I think all of these came from one of those big paper "stacks" - I want to say it was stack #7.
• Cricut cutting machine, or a paper cutting machine of some sort (Silhouette, die cutter, etc) or a steady hand - if you're going to use a Cricut, I used the George and Basic Shapes cartridge, size 2 on "paper saver", and on my 6" Cricut.
• Thread and sewing machine

Get your paper ready to cut. I used three different colors, one is red with stripes, the other red with pink circles, and pink snake skin (ooo, fancy). Since they all came from the same stack, they matched pretty well.

Then, cut out four size 2/paper saver per piece of paper. If you're not using a Cricut, the hearts are about 2" wide.

Once you've got 12 hearts cut out, figure out the pattern you'd like them to hang in.

Before you start sewing, pull a fair amount of bobbin and top thread so you'll have a good tail to hang your banner from. I did not need to change my tension or anything when sewing the paper - I have a Singer Heavy Duty 4423 and my tension was set to "3" and thread width was "3" - which is a pretty normal tension, nothing high or low.

Then, just begin sewing and feeding the next heart as you go along! Simple! When you get to the last of your hearts, pull another fair amount of bobbin and thread to make another tail on this side of the banner.

That's it! Now you've got a super cute banner for Valentine's Day! You could use the same idea for other holidays too!

Add it to your holiday vignettes! :)

Hope you enjoyed this little tutorial!

I'm linking up to these linky parties!