How to Cook a Spaghetti Squash

The top picture is what a properly cooked spaghetti squash will look like. I tend to serve it as I would spaghetti and so that I do not get too many complaints from my family I serve a meat sauce on top instead of a veggie sauce that I like on my pasta.

I find it is easier and quicker to cook if you slice it in half first and scoop out the seeds. Then place it in a baking dish upside down so the inside of the squash faces the inside of the pan.)

Bake: 375 degree for 45 minutes

Microwave: for approximately 10 minutes

If you bake it and it is not quite done just pop it in the microwave for 2 minutes at a time.

I Caught Santa & Rudolph

Is Christmas over for you? For many families, our included, it is not. We have one more weekend of Christmas (this weekend) and thought I would share with you the iCaughtSanta.com photo that we did this year that was courtesy of the review and giveaway I did earlier this month.

This year they added Rudolph to the options as well, so I thought that would be neat to take a picture of outside near the Reindeer Food we had sprinkled.

So, I am just sharing my picture with my readers. I would love for any of my winners to post their picture on the Save Green Being Green Facebook page.

Other Homemade Gifts

I just wanted to share some other Homemade Gifts I have made over the last couple months but didn't do tutorials on.

Winter Hats for Twin Baby Girls

Birthday present for book club member's 75th birthday

This is a wooden toy that my daughter painted for my son. I have the kids each make a gift for each other in addition to buying one. My son made a similar one for a friend of his for Christmas.

I made these Tile Coasters for a friend this Christmas (although I have made similar ones on other occasions). A tutorial will be coming soon.)

My daughter (with some assistance from me) made this Back Massage Shirt for daddy for a Christmas present. A tutorial will be coming for this soon as well.

Review: Natural Australian Soap

For the past couple weeks I have been using Australian Natural Soap daily to review it. I used it over my whole body and on my face. I usually find soap to be too drying (or sting too much if it gets near my eyes) to use regularly on my face and I did not find that to be the case in either instance with this soap.

I was sent the three soaps above to review in the scents of Lemon Myrtle, French Pear and Ocean Beach. They are all wonderful scents and my favorite is the French Pear. I split the Lemon Myrtle bar in half and put one in each of the Washcloth Travel Pouch I had made for my children for Christmas.

Their  French Milled soap is made using ingredients such as Sustainable Palm Oil, Certified Organic Shea Butter, Vegetable-based Glycerin and other wholesome and natural ingredients. Our soap bars are made from plant oils and contain no animal fats. There are no petro-chemical products detergents or Sodium Laurel Phosphates either.

One of the things I have really noticed is that is has not dissolved while it sits in the shower, like I have noticed with other soaps I have owned. I much prefer this so that I am not wasting any soap and not having to buy is as often.

Australian Natural Soap is an afforadable luxury soap at $3.95 a 100g bar. They sell them individually or in box sets in 100g, 200g, and guest soap sizes. They also sell them as wedding favors wrapped in gift bags. Now, that would be a wedding favor that would be useful and welcome to receive. I also like the idea that you can buy them in guest soap sizes.

All orders over $30 ship free and they offer a Rewards Program for repeat customers.

From Australian Natural Soap:

Did you know that a quality soap bar made from plant oils will not dry out your skin?  You will use less lotion because you will not need it.

Our Australian made soap bar is French-milled (long lasting), made from plant oils, has a creamy moisturizing lather, and a luscious fragrance. Our affordable bars are a real treat. More information on our soaps is available at www.australiansoap.com/our-soap.

If you would like more information about Australian Natural Soap you can check out their website or email david@australiansoap.com.

I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.

The Tooth Fairy Makes a Visit Again!

The tooth fairy has made another visit to our house. This time it was a brunette tooth fairy. The above picture was made at iCaughtTheToothFairy.com (which I previously did a post for, but this is NOT a review post.)

My daughter came to the understanding that there are many tooth fairies and they come in different colors. This was the fourth tooth she lost and the previous 4 she put the tooth in a glass of water so that the tooth fairy had to go in the water to get the tooth & the water would turn whatever color the fairy was. The water colors were purple with glitter, green, and red (in that order.) You can read about our First Tooth Fair Visit in this post.

After reading the Tooth Fairy Book that I reviewed, this time she wanted to put her tooth in the gold pouch and see if she put the tooth in a different container if she would get something different. This girl sure likes to perform her experiments; you should have seen the experiments she was coming up with with our Elf (named Skoob) as she was trying to make sense of why it didn't move one night (DOH!)

I have to say again, I really do like this book set. It is very applicable to most homes & whatever they believe about the tooth fairy. This is what I said about it before:

As for the story of the tooth fairy, I was impressed with how they covered all senarios of the tooth fairy that I heard but in a non-committal type of way that allows for parents to blend it with their own story and choose what the tooth fairy brings (money, treat, toy, etc.) I thought it was written in a way that would be appealing to everyone who tells the story of the tooth fairy and has the tooth fairy visit their home.

This time the tooth fairy did change it up and instead of bringing a gold coin with a pack of sugar free gum, she brought a basket made up from a dollar bill with 2 pennies inside & some glitter, as well as a little note  and a pack of sugar-free gum. It must have been the same tooth fairy that went to Filth Wizardy. :)

My daughter was very excited to see that I got another picture of a tooth fairy. When I showed her the picture and told her that I almost woke her up with the flash trying to get the picture of the tooth fairy she remembered there being a bright light that bothered her.

25 Days of Christmas with 52 Ideas!!!

Wondering what you missed this year for my 25 Days of Christmas? Well, here is a Re-Cap. This would be the perfect thing to PIN now (Follow me on Pinterest too!)  and do next year. I am giving you 52 CHRISTMAS IDEAS!!!!

5 Days of Christmas Trees

1. Felt and Button Christmas Tree Ornament
2. Felt Advent Christmas Tree Activity
3. Pipecleaner and Bead Christmas Tree
4. Decorated Sugar Cone Christmas Trees
5. Measurement and Counting Tree Activity

5 Days of Gingerbread

1. Gingerbread Latte Recipe
2. Gingerbread House
3. Gingerbread Boy and Girl Craft Kit
4. Gingerbread Game on Starfall.com
5. Gingerbread Reindeer Cookies
6. BONUS!!! Gingerbutton Cookies

12 Gifts of Christmas

1. Washcloth Travel Pouch
2. Fingerprint Ornament
3. Reinbeer
4. Tutu Dress
5. Caramel Corn
6. Homemade Sugar Scrub
7. Instant Hot Cocoa
8. Knitted Scarf (Loom Knitting)
9. Super Hero Cape
10. Super Hero Mask
11. Melted Flower Headband
12. Jewelry (made by myself and my daughter) 

3 Christmas Drink Ideas

1. Gingerbread Martini
2. Mulled Wine
3. Rum Butter Cider

5 Ideas for Inexpensive Gifts for Teachers and Coaches

1. Cleverly Decorated Sprite and Popcorn
2. Glitter Candle
3. DIY Stone Trivet
4. Stamped Stationary
5. Rosemary Salt

BONUS IDEAS!!!!!

1. Candy Cane Play Dough
2. Visit Santa and Reindeer
3. Popsicle Stick Ornament
4. Gifts in a Jar - Curly Soup
5. Homemade Hand Puppets
6. Christmas Lego Sculptures
7. Felted Soap
8. Felted Fairy Dolls
9. Felt Headband Crowns
10. Gingerbread Boy Dice Game
11. Hand and Foot Print Reindeer
12. Rudolph Noses Christmas Candy
13. Peanut Butter Balls
14. Bacon and Chocolate Sugar Cookies
15. Melted Snowman Cookies
16. Make a Decorated Plate for Serving/Giving
17. Chocolate Sprinkled Pretzel Rods
18. Magic Reindeer Food
19. 4 Handprint Crafts
20. Preschool Baby Jesus Craft
21. Christmas Pancakes

Wordless Wednesday: Children's Church Christmas Pageant

Merry Christmas From Our Family to Yours!

Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

from our Family to Yours!

Rum Butter Cider

Rum Butter Cider Recipe - makes 2
1 oz of Triple Sec
1 oz Butterscotch Schnapps
1 1/2 oz Spiced Rum
4 oz Hot Apple Juice

Bring apple juice to boiling. Combine liquors and split between 2 glasses. Pour apple juice in next, splitting between the 2 glasses. Enjoy!

Make It Monday: Christmas Pancakes

Here are just some ideas for some Christmas pancakes that I made my family. We had snowflake sprinkles so I added them to the plates for decoration. Also, I made whole wheat pancakes, so your may be lighter in color that mine if you do not make them whole wheat.

Other items I used to decorate our pancakes:

• M&M's
• Bacon
• Marachino Cherries
• Snowflake Sprinkles
• Chocolate Chips
• Whipped Cream
• Candy Corn

Mulled Wine or Cider

Mulled wine is one of those old fashioned holiday beverages that conjure up images of carolers in bonnets and top hats with that hands warming in muffs being greeted at a home with a cup of mulled wine or cider

For this tutorial, I made mulled wine, but these spices can be used to make mulled cider as well. You can  plan ahead and to dry or dehydrate, but if you are making it right away you can use fresh orange and lemon rind. 

I wasn't thinking about this until I starting writing this post, but preparing this dried spices in advance and putting then in a pretty jar would make a perfect gift with a bottle of wine. I have to remember that for next year.

To Make Mulling Spices - stir together all of the following ingredients.

Dried Mulling Spice (makes enough for 2 batches)
3 strips orange rind, dried
2 strips lemon rind, dried
2 tablespoons whole cloves
1 tbsp whole allspice, crushed
4 cinnamon sticks, crushed

To Make Mulled Wine or Cider - In a spice bag made from cheese cloth or in a large tea ball, put in 2 Tablespoons of dried mulling spice. In a pot, combine 1 Qt of burgundy wine/cider, 1/2 C sugar and 2T of mulling spices. Simmer for 20 minutes. Serve warm or hot.

To Make Dried Orange/Lemon Rind - Let sliced rinds dry on cookie sheet for 24 hours or until brittle.

This recipe will make enough to serve all your friends. :)

Jesus in a Stable Preschool Craft

Let us now forget the reason for the season!

Help your preschool child to understand by making this simple Baby Jesus in a Stable Craft. 

Supplies needed: 5 wide sticks, brown construction paper, yellow construction paper or craft foam, yarn (or straw if you have it), brown crayon, a marker, glue, and fabric strips.

I first had my son color four wide sticks brown (they look like tongue depresser sticks) while I cut the fifth stick in half. Next I had him glue in to place the brown sticks he colored to create a stable. Then he glued on a star on top (I cut it out) and yarn on the stable floor. I drew the face on the baby Jesus and applied glue to that stick and he wrapped around the fabric scraps and then that was glued in to place as well.

I thought this project turned out pretty nice.

Christmas Lego Ideas

Are you like us and already have a ton of Legos and want to use those to make new creations instead of buying more & more sets?

We made our own using our collection of legos and you can try to copy ours:

Or you can get all your ideas from the Lego website like we did. All you have to do is search under generic terms (like snowman, Christmas, Santa, reindeer, etc.) and they will give you Building Instructions for those types of items. You could do this for type of creation you want, or of course you can make your own creations without instructions, but some people like instructions.

Here are ones that I found on the Lego website that look inspiring:

Snowman (I based my snowman on this pattern using what legos we owned.)

Snowman, Girl, Boy & Tree

Santa

Santa, Reindeer and Sleigh

Reindeer with Elf

Here are close-up of the individual sculptures we made:

Our Snowman

Baby Jesus in the Manger with a Star Overhead

Christmas Present

Santa

Video Reveal of Master Bedroom Redecoration

It took long enough for me to do this....Jeesh!

As promised, here is a short video to show you the entire room. I will highlight all the features that we changed in the room in that video, but you can also read about some of the project tutorials from that room below.



4-Part Series on a Bedroom Re-Decorate

*Pottery Barn Inspired Headboard
*Natural Twig Art
*Family Handprint Art
*Video of the the Whole Reveal
**BONUS -- Review of Wrapped Canvas Picture Added to the Room

Candy Cane Playdough

 My son and I made two separate batches of play dough to make our candy cane play dough for our home and one to give as a gift to a friend of his.

The white playdough is made using a Basic Play Dough Recipe that we added 10 drops of mint essential oil (you could use mint extract instead). The red play dough was made using the Kool-Aid Play Dough Recipe (strawberry kool-aid) and we sprinkled in red glitter.

Basic Play-dough

1 C water

1/2 C salt

food coloring

2 T cooking oil

1/2 tsp. cream of tartar

1 1/2 C white flour

Boil water, stir in salt. Add food coloring & mix. Add cooking oil, cream of tartar & flour and stir with spoon until mixed. Knead dough to finish mixing dough to get a consistent color.

Kool-Aid Play-dough

1 C water

1/4 C salt

1 pkg of desired flavor/color of Kool-Aid

1 1/2 T canola oil

1 1/2 C flour

Boil water, stir in salt. Add kool-aid & mix. Add cooking oil & flour and stir with spoon until mixed. Knead dough to finish mixing dough to get a consistent color. This dough will have a pleasant scent.

Here my son is making worms. This is before he announced he was going to play worm farm and stuck his play worms in my plants. Doh!


Or you could try out some Cinnamon Scented Play Dough to get you in the holiday spirit! Or some Snow Play Dough to help you feel the season!

Gingerbread Martini Recipe

Gingerbread Martini Recipe
1 oz. Vodka
1 1/2 oz Butterscotch Schnaaps
1 tsp Torani Gingerbread Syrup
1 Tbsp Heavy Cream

Directions: Shake all ingredients over ice. Rim martini glass with cinnamon sugar and pour in martini. Add a dollop of whipped cream (optional).

4 Christmas Hand Print Crafts

 Hand Print Wreath with pom pom and bow decorations

Hand Print Reindeer 

 Hand Print Christmas Tree

Hand Print Santa Claus

Melted Snowman Cookies

Aren't these just the most adorable things you have ever seen? They are pretty simple to create as well. You start with your favorite sugar cookie recipe and make round sugar cookies. I made my sugar cookie dough into a log inside some freezer paper and placed the log of dough in the refrigerator to chill, then just cut circles. To make it even simpler, buy a pre-made log of sugar cookie dough.

Then bake as directed and cool completely. When cooled, make my The Best Royal Icing Recipe and place a dollop of icing in the center of the cookie and spread around. No need to spread it perfectly as it looks more like a melted snowman if you do not fill it in evenly.

Next, top it with 1/2 of a regular sized marshmallow that you drew on a face with decorating gels or edible markers prior to placing it on the icing. Finally using decorator icing, draw on some twig arms and buttons. Allow the icing to set and enjoy!

12 Gifts of Christmas: Handmade Jewelry

Designing jewelry can be so much fun. And there are so many bead choices and the combinations are endless. My daughter and I could spend hours in the bead section at Michaels picking out beads.

These are all pieces that I made for friends (well, except one pair I made for myself, but the other 5 pairs are gifts.)

And I made these for myself as well. I thought they looked nice with my new Christmas sweater.

This a whole collection of stuff that my daughter and I made. The blue set of bracelet & earrings are some beads she picked out  but didn't know I bought, so I will be surprising her with that set for Christmas and also made her the colored pearl one at the top which I made myself a matching one. 

The two pink sets are very similar are one my daughter helped me make for the grandmas (sorry grandmas if I have just ruined the surprise.)

The hoop earrings at the top are ones that my daughter made for her first grade teacher. Her friend (in a different first grade classroom) was here for a sleepover and I let her make her own pair for a Christmas present for her teacher.

These are some earrings that my daughter made for one of our babysitters. I let her have choice of my beads and she will put them on posts & hoops, I just do the finishing touches of twisting the metal. She  has made several pairs of earrings since her first pair last spring for gifts for her friends, teachers, babysitters, grandmas and herself.

I have to chuckle a little at one of these pairs. My daughter made both of them and the one with the pearls and gold beads is for our other babysitter. She made the earrings for our babysitters a week apart and didn't realize that they are very similar. The other pair of earrings she made for a friend for a Christmas present.

Would you want to win these?

And finally, these pair I made but didn't have anyone in mind. I am thinking about a giveaway, maybe pair these earrings with a melted flower headband (which I have to make yet). I think maybe a giveaway for Valentine's Day would be a good one for this combo.