Lil' Sprinkles of Joy: August 2013

Saturday, August 31, 2013

Kick Football Season Off in Style

I'm a little behind in having something ready for the first Saturday of college football as I am still trying to decide what new wreath or decoration to craft up for my front door. I've been on a search the last few nights and here are some possibilities I've discovered.

This yarn wreath over at A Step in the Journey would look great in blue & gold

Southern Color created this adorable burlap football door hanger. Wondering if I could create a house divided one?

This Preppy Boomer Sooner Wreath at Simply Living would make an adorable addition to any front porch

She's Kind of Crafty makes beautiful ribbon wreaths and this Florida Gators one is stunning.

Who doesn't love Burlap? This wreath would look great on any door.

Of course, no football post would be complete without a WV wreath! I'm loving this chevron style!

Have a great Saturday!

~Ila~

Thursday, August 29, 2013

Tailgate Time: Who doesn't love some good food?

As the summer begins to fade away and fall beckons, so does one of my favorite sporting times of year: Football Season! I love the tradition Saturdays in the fall brings and the hard hitting action that continues on Sunday. It's almost tailgate time and this definitely puts me in the mood for my favorite WV gameday tradition: pepperoni rolls. If you haven't had a pepperoni roll, you are missing out on this yummy creation. There are many varieties made but the basic principle is bread, pepperoni and cheese! So, lucky for me, I had all the ingredients on hand to bake up a batch today.

At times, these delicious treats call for homemade bread dough but tonight I used some frozen rolls I already had in my freezer. Ingredients you need:

Bread Dough (fresh or frozen)

Pepperoni: whatever kind you wish (I choose turkey)

Cheese: I used mozarella but have also used pepperjack

Directions: Allow bread dough to unthaw (if frozen) and rise up

Then roll out and fill with layers of pepperoni and cheese (the more the merrier)

Bake at 375 until golden brown on top, pat down with butter hot out of the oven and enjoy!

Recipe for Pepperoni Rolls

Ingredients:

Bread Dough

Pepperoni

Cheese

1. Thaw out bread dough and allow to rise

2. Roll out the dough and fill with pepperoni and cheese, then roll back up to seam together

3. Allow bread to rise back up

4. Preheat oven to 375 and once dough has risen to your liking, bake for 15-20 minutes or until tops are golden brown.

5. Remove from oven, pat with butter and allow to cool

6. Eat and enjoy!

I went on a little search and rounded up a few other tailgate recipes to kick off your football season in style. I can't wait to try out many of these recipes myself in the coming weeks. Enjoy the weekend kick off!

Pimiento Cheese Dip on Uncommon Designs

This looks super yummy and would be great with pita chips or my favorite Nut Thins.

These Pizza Puffs at Lick the Bowl Good are just what this busy mom needs and would make a great tailgate food.

If you love Mexican, these Mexican Tortilla Wrap Roll-Ups over at Six Sister's Stuff look to fulfill that craving.

The Girl Who Ate Everything has an awesome idea with these Individual Seven Layer Dips

Craving something sweet? These Ultimate Football Whoopie Pies from The Beantown Baker look

mouth watering.

I love these printables that go along with these yummy M&M cookies over at Thirty Handmade Days

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Yummy Crockpot BBQ Chicken

Our family is always on the go and often dinner is something I throw together quick and rarely planned. However, I decided that once school started, I was going to try to commit to trying out one or two new recipes each week via Pinterest or through fellow bloggers. Well, this recipe was perfect and easy for a quick weekday meal. I originally pinned this on pinterest and then rediscovered it after visiting the blog No 2. Pencil. I just love all the yumminess found on Melissa's blog.

The recipe I went off is found here but I substituted boneless skinless chicken breasts since that is what was resting in my freezer instead of the bone-in chicken breasts. I used 4 large ones which was about 3 lbs. I followed her method of resting them on the tin foil also and love this idea! The chicken did not fall apart and into the juices at all and still stayed moist and delicious.

Anytime I make anything involving BBQ sauce, I always use our absolute hands down favorite from Dinosaur-Bar-B-Que. My husband is from Syracuse, NY and this is definitely one of our favorite restaurants in the area. We even used their catering service last year for our son's christening celebration and everything was absolutely delicious. When we lived in Arizona, Texas and Ohio, I had to have my inlaws bring us bottles when they came to visit. However, here in Northern Virginia we are lucky enough to have Wegmans, which is hands down the best grocery store ever and being an upstate NY chain, they definitely carry it.

You can serve it up with your favorite side dish or shred it to make BBQ sandwhiches later. I used the leftovers this way today for lunch. It was definitely a hit and one recipe I will be trying again soon.

Enjoy!

~Ila~

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Football Subway Art Freebie

I love fall for many reasons: the cooler temperatures, amazing aromas, apple picking and of course the start of football season! We are a sports loving family and football is definitely high on our list! My allegiance is to my home state West Virginia Mountaineers and my husband will cheer for his Syracuse Orange every opportunity he gets. Our kids are usually decked out in gold & blue or orange & blue on Saturdays in the fall and then on Sundays our household becomes a NY Giants fanbase. To celebrate the season, I created a football subway art print that is free for all of you!

Don't worry, I have a number of different color combinations in case you aren't cheering for the gold & blue like me. Here are a few samples:

Want your own 8x10 print in your team's favorite colors? Go Here and download today and get ready for some tailgates and an action packed season ahead.

~Ila~

Linking up here:

Not JUST a Housewife

Skip to My Lou

Home Stories A to Z

A Bowl Full of Lemons

Reasons to Skip the Housework

Monday, August 26, 2013

1st Day of School!

It's the First Day of School!

Well, at least for one member of our clan it is: our oldest son begins 2nd grade and I can't figure out who was more excited. He was up and ready to go, dressed and eating breakfast by 7am. He is definitely our early bird child! Of course, mom had to have him come outside for the traditional first day of school photo. This year, I decided to add in what he currently says he wants to be when he grows up and I used the chalkboard style that I am currently loving and made his sign in photoshop.

Of course, no first day of school wouldn't be complete without a special treat waiting in the morning. However, he will have to wait until after school to enjoy although his brother is begging for one now.

Since I use to be an OT, I thought the idea of handwriting cupcakes was perfect! Granted, I whipped these up at 10pm last night and used my favorite Magnolia Bakery Buttercream recipe.

It's hard to believe the school year has started....where did summer go? I hope he had an awesome first day of 2nd grade!

~Ila~

Linking it up here:

DIY Show off

Sunday, August 25, 2013

Surfer Themed Birthday Party

Our oldest son turned 7 this summer, just a day after our youngest turned one! What a crazy weekend that was...two parties in two days = one worn out mama! It is hard for me to believe how quickly 7 years have passed. I still remember him being 4 days late and how anxious and excited I was to become a first time mom. We always joke that he was meant to be a firefighter as the fire alarm started going off in the hospital just as he came into this world. He's been along on all of our amazing adventures thus far including all of our moves and many of our travels. Our younger two boys are very lucky to have him as their big brother.

Since it's summer and hot, he wanted to have a water fun party filled with water balloon battles, splash blaster fights and water slide fun. He picked a surfer/shark theme for his party and with ten 7 year old boys along, we managed to have some fun and somehow my husband managed to keep them all under some sort of control.

Since I was busy with two parties, I didn't have a lot of extra time to make all my printables so I found this great surf party on etsy from ItsyBelle. She was so accomodating and I loved the color scheme.

I adapted my Subway art from the day before and changed the colors, then painted the 7. The banner was part of the party collection from ItsyBelle.

Another view of the Subway Art

I added some green fish netting I found at Party City over the white table cloth, and then used the printables from ItsyBelle. The cupcakes I made and cut out shark fins from cardstock and attached to toothpicks and placed in the blue wave frosting.

I bought the surfboard cookie cutter from Amazon.

The kids loved the water slide. We were fortunate to get the Blast Zone Hydro Rush Inflatable Water Park on sale at Amazon for $100 off. Thanks to Amazon Prime membership it arrived in two days too! Our kids have had a blast on this water slide all summer and I love the shallow splash area so our little one can splash around in there also. It is honestly the easiest water slide to set up and take down: only one minute to inflate!

Favor bags were filled with swedish fish and a shark water bottle from The Thoughtful Tulip

We also gave each child a mini aqua soaker to use during the party and take home.

I think the birthday boy definitely enjoyed turning 7!

1st Birthday Party Wishes!

The main reason I took a break from blogging was because of the addition of our 3rd baby boy. Besides the fact this poor little guy saw four different doctors before he was ever born due to our moving adventures, the adjustment to being outnumbered was a big one.

We moved to Virginia from Texas (via a few month in West Virginia at my parent's home) when he was only 2 weeks old. Plus, our oldest was starting school in a week and fall baseball was beginning. I am not sure if I actually recall half of what happened last fall due to all these crazy adjustments nevermind the sleepless nights with a newborn! So, now it has been a year and I'm back to blogging because it was something I promised myself I would do at the one year mark. Of course, turning one calls for a celebration! Two of my boys share the month of July as a birthday month, along with my husband too. This year, our July was packed solid with camps, birthday parties and two trips. Somehow I managed to squeeze in two birthday parties and decided on a whale theme for this little guy.

The cake was made by me, but the best surprise was the inside. All over pinterest I have seen the rainbow color cake, so I decided to do my version with different shades of blue. It was vanilla cake and I tweeked two boxed cake mixes with a a few add ins and of course, lots of blue gel dye.

I also added in a few chocolate cupcakes to satisfy all the chocolate lovers!

I redecorated our mantle for the party by adding a painted number one, some balloons, a Subway art party printable I designed and birthday banner comprised of pictures from each month of the past year.

a few more photos of the subway art

However, my favorite photo opp was the birthday sign I created with some inspiration I found online. I love etsy and I love designing printables so when I saw some chalkboard signs online, I knew that is the idea I wanted to create. My inspiration came from here and this is what I created:

It is 16x20 in size and I had it printed at Costco for $5.99 then used mounting tape and placed it on a foamboard that I picked up at Michaels. Our little guy had a ton of fun playing around with his sign that day and there are a lot of photos to show for it.