Whats on the needles and the wheel!?

College girl broke out the sewing machine to sew an amazing costume for Anime Iowa (which is like a comi-con).  She worked on a Thor costume and needed very little help from me.  She is sure she would love to take the Bernina with her when she moves out.  I may need to buy myself a new one!

 

 Watching College girl work on the sewing maching gave me the sewing bug so I dug out a pattern I've been wanting to make for a long time.  The invisible zipper had me scared but I conquered my fear and got to it.

 

The zipper turned out pretty good, the skirt turned out cute and I think with a navy jacket I may be able to wear to work too!

I spun a when I could during Tour De Fleece, this ball of yarn is from 4oz that I spun.  It really is pretty yarn, I am thinking a cute hat?!

Play Ball

Well, it has been awhile since I last entered a blog post.  We have been very busy with Varsity baseball.  I have been at baseball games, mostly double headers, two or three times a week for the past two months.  It was a great season.

The team fell short of going to State by one game.  It was a heart breaker.  I actually can not yet really post or talk about it too much, it ended too quick.

The team had a really cool poster made and held a poster signing after the little league and senior night games.

 Dear son had a really good season, he played very well and will play next year in college.

Dear son's cutie girlfriend attended most of the games and I really enjoyed having her sit with me and getting to know her.  She is a doll.

The last game had to have held a record crowd. 

My favorite picture when dear son made the tying run for the last game of the year.  He pointed at the team mate that hit him in, our catcher.  To me, this is the picture that captures my son's sportsmanship, always quick to recognize the other guy.  I am very proud of my son.

4th of July Fun

A great 4th of July celebration for us.  We enjoyed a game at our local AA team stadium and they had the 2nd largest crowd in history.  It was really a lot of fun.

The team wore patriotic jerseys and a flag was painted behind home plate.

We enjoyed a 4 day weekend and took a pontoon out on Lake McBride with the kids and their dates.

I made a lunch of sandwiches and leftover salads from the 4th.

We enjoyed touring around and I window shopped for lake houses.

 

It was a fun way to spend a summer afternoon.

What's for dinner mom?

I enjoyed making several dishes to celebrate the 4th of July.  I made Trisha's Yearwood's recipes for ribs and crockpot candy.  You can get on food network for the recipes. 

This fruit salad is really yummy and so easy to make.  1 big can of pineapple with juice, 1 big can of peaches with juice, add other fruit you like, I used a banana, strawberries and blueberries.  Add 1 box of instant vanilla pudding, I used sugar free.  It was so good!  The fruit stayed nicely colored through a couple days too.

The ribs turned our really good, sweet daughter is picky and doesn't like sauce so you will see a few ribs do not have sauce on them.  If I were to make them again, I would skip the sauce she uses and just use bottled bbq sauce.  The thing I like about Trisha's recipe is she recommends using an over turkey bag which really kept them moist and juicy.  I made mine in the oven. 

Killer potato salad.  My Dad always made potato salad and you would never know how it would taste from time to time as he would throw crazy things in it like jalapeno peppers, cheese, macaroni and goodness knows what else.  It never feels like a summer holiday, to me, without homemade potato salad.  I have made many recipes and finally came upon one that I tweaked a little and seems to be perfect.  I even use a lot of 0% fat Greek yogurt in place of mayo to keep fat and calories down and guess what, no one noticed!

5 pounds red potatoes
6 eggs (save one to top the salad, use more if you love eggs)
1/2 small red onion (omit if you hate onion, use yellow if you would rather)

dressing
2 cups Greek yogurt, 1/2 cup light Hellman's
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup sugar (I use splenda)
1/4 t salt
2 T deli mustard
1/8 t pepper

cook potatoes, peel and chop, toss with eggs and onion.
stir dressing together, pour over and mix with potato mixture

I peel under cold water after cooling for a bit. 
add more salt if needed

Jello cake

bake one white cake mix according to box

cool for a bit, poke holes in it

make 1 box jello (I use sugar free)

pour over cake and cool

after cool, top with whip cream or cool whip(I use low sugar)

enjoy!  keep in refrigerator