Busy all day with snow and jewelry

So I was busy all day with shoveling snow, which took little more than an hour to clear the driveway and working on some jewelry.  I can get quite distracted by the jewelry making.  At the moment I'm making these minuscule little squares out of beads that I'm going to do something with.  I've yet to decide what.  Possibly link them with a herringbone stitched tube I started earlier this evening.  At the moment, there isn't a definite plan....

Here are some pics of the squares, with my ipod tossed in as a size reference.

smile.ly—Be Heard. Be Happy.

smile.ly—Be Heard. Be Happy.

If you've yet to join smile.ly, you should think again. It's a great word-of-mouth marketing program where they send you products to try. They ask that you promise to tell people you talk to that you got the product for free. Also that it came from smile.ly. That's not at all too much to ask. So far I've gotten a Zicam product (that didn't work for me), Twinings Tea {which my mom loved more than me, but hey can I help it if I like herbals :)} and a coupon for a carton of Florida's Natural Orange juice along with 10 coupons to give out to people.

I've only been a member for a few months and it couldn't be easier. After telling people about the product you just need to go to smile.ly and let them know what happened. This earns you smiles which ups your status and gets you invites to more campaigns.

So do check it out, smile.ly—Be Heard. Be Happy.

Free dog treats @ Meijers

At the Rolling Meadows Meijers, you can get free Purina dog treats.  Your dog loves free treats too.  Or at least mine does.  The Purina Cheweez Beef Sticks are marked $.99 thru Dec 12 or the 15th. 

There are coupons in the 9/12 RP (expiring Dec 12) and 11/14 R1.  The coupons are for $4 off of 4 Purina dog treats.  Since these are $.99 each it makes them totally free.  You may or may not get overage, depends on the register and the cashier.  I can say that we've gotten 2 bags full of treats over several trips to the store.

$.12 Pillsbury Easy Frost

So yesterday I was at the Jewel in Arlington Heights....on Golf and AH rd....and they had maybe 20 cans of Pillsbury Halloween Easy Frost for $1.12.  Now as Halloween is one of my favorite holidays, I of course picked one up.  Which meant I had to bake cupcakes last night so I could try it out. 

Pretty nice looking, huh?  So how am I going to get it for $.12 instead you might ask?  Well it seems every month there is an easy frost coupon for a $1 off 1 on here  So having a couple computers I printed some last night and went to pick up more frosting this morning. 

BTW the frosting was on the back half of the isle by the make up between the frozen foods. 

Mariano's Fresh Market 11/28-12/11

At Mariano's Fresh Market:

Every Wednesday and Saturday thru Jan 1, 2011 will double up to 5 manufacturer’s $1.00 coupons in a $25 transaction before tax and store coupons.  No expired coupons.

These are some of the coupon match-ups for the current ad:

• King Arthur Flour 5 lbs $2.99 11/7 SS .55 (which doubles to $1.10, $1.80 is really cheap for King Arthur Flour)
• Almond Breeze $2.49  $.49 for Almond breeze is a great price   $1 smartsource coupon 
• Skinny Cow Novelties $3.99  Skinny Cow on Facebook for a $1 coupon  "Like"
• Palermo Pizzas $4.49 (I know I've picked up $1 tear pad coupons for these somewhere but I don't remember where) $1/2 Palermos Pizzas 
• DiGiorno/California Pizza Kitchen Pizzas $4.99 DiGiorno 11/14 RP $1 coupon CPK 11/14 RP $1
• Lean cuisine 5/$10, there are $1 tear pad coupons floating around, 9/12 RP $1/2, Target
• Florida Natural Orange Juice $1 coupons from Smile.ly marketing promo.  You can join Smile.ly, it's a word of mouth marketing program similar to bzzagent.
• Stonyfield Yogurt 32 oz $3.19 Stonyfield Farms
• Chips ahoy $1.99 July All You $1
• Tide 50 oz $4.99 11/28 PG $1, Parents Magazine Sept. 10 $2
• Excedrin 24 ct $2.49 10/17 SS $1, $1 here too 
• Burt’s Bees Toothpaste $3.49 request coupon here $1 
• Chex cereal $2.49 smartsource.com, Target, ecentives.com, coupons.com $1/2
•  Hamburger Helper $.98  If you still have the $.35 off of one print coupon now would be a good time to use it.  11/7 SS $.75/3, 10/17 SS $1/5, Target
• International Delight creamer $1 11/7 SS $.55, International Delight $.55

Pom-a-Gram

The UPS man just dropped off a wonderful surprise package.  A couple of weeks ago, Pom Wonderful, sent out 5,000 pom-a-grams.  The site was majorly overwhelmed.  But my sister managed to send me one.  *THANK YOU*

Look at the gorgeous pomegranate that I got.

Lots of Wind

So today brought a ton of wind to the Chicago area.  Even the car rocked when I was out earlier.  The power went out at the Rolling Meadows Meijer while I was there.  I was there to see if they had anymore of that free Pompeian olive oil.  It was a fantastic deal with the Meijer Mealbox coupon and the one on the Pompeian site.  Unfortunately they were out....but I did get a rain check which is just fine with me.

Also picked up 32 ct finish tabs at Dominicks for $1 a pack.  Which was a great deal.  Picked up six of those.  And also got Betty Crocker fruit snacks for $.24 a box.  Which isn't bad.  My sister at college will eat them.

Also picked up 80 ct Splenda with fiber for $.99 a box at Walgreens.

All in all a very good shopping day.  Going to have to learn how to build shelves soon for the basement to put all these great deals on.

Hope everyone else is surviving the wind well.

Coffee cups

Coffee cups of all kinds are extremely popular at my house.  I missed snapping a pic when Rosie was running all over with it in her mouth.  Couldn't catch her till she plopped down to have a good chew.  And no it wasn't a mocha cup.  She loves all things coffee....you have to keep a close eye on your cups around here or they could end up like this one.

Starbucks just let Rosie know when you need some new ad shots....she'd be happy to help you out.

Who loves apple pie?

So everyone at my house loves apple pie.  That includes the pets.  Or at least they think they do.

So this is the huge apple pie that we normally make.  It's from The America's Test Kitchen Family Baking Book.  It makes a great pie which is well worth the extra step of cooking the apples first before putting them in the pie crust.  Cooking the apples first causes them not to shrink while baking and doesn't leave that hollow space in your pie.

See how great it looks?  Also since all the pets were hanging out in the kitchen....I asked if anyone wanted their picture taken.  This is what happened.

The evil cat ran right in front of the camera....and Rosie who's scared of him decided it wasn't worth fighting over being in the picture.  I got her later...when she was scoping out the pie being cut on the kitchen counter.

Hope the pie is as popular when you make it.  :)

Painting the Garage door

Apparently it needs to be repainted.  So yesterday, I spent several hours scraping and sanding the garage door over and over.  Luckily the neighbor had a hand held electric sander.  Otherwise I'd still be out there scraping and sanding. 

I have to go get paint this afternoon.  I'll add before pics to this post...and after pics in another one.  We're sticking to the same cream and dark red orange colors.  Which is blah boring....I think royal blue or bright green would be so much more eye-catching.  :)

Naturally Enhancing your hair color

So I read about this natural color enhancing in an email I'd gotten from Whole Living magazine.  I thought it might be nice for my mom to try as she colors her hair at least once a month.  Well it's not intended to use as a hair dye...but it does darken brunette hair quite considerably.  She had some left over after trying it and said I should give it a try.  Well it's goodbye summer highlights.  Leaving this on like you would a conditioner in the shower considerably darkened my already dark brunette hair.  Luckily it says it only lasts about a week.

But I can't imagine that it doesn't work just as well for blondes or redheads.  I was amazed that just a few minutes with cocoa powder, yogurt, honey and apple cider vinegar would make such a huge difference.  Whole Living says they got the information from this book; The Green Beauty Guide: Your Essential Resource to Organic and Natural Skin Care, Hair Care, Makeup, and Fragrances by Julie Gabriel.  I can't wait to check it out to see what else great things it has in it.

Need a pumpkin design?

I just found the neatest designs for pumpkins this year.  Betty Crocker has pumpkin templates on their site.  These pdf's can be printed out and you'll have an extra special pumpkin this year.  Or just save them to your computer to print later.

I definitely see some Betty Crocker pumpkins sitting on my porch this Halloween.  :)

Made from Scratch Cream of Mushroom Soup

So I got this new cookbook, Cook and Freeze by Dana Jacobi.  It has a fantastic recipe for Cream of mushroom soup. 

Which is great, cause I have this annoying allergy to soy protein and soy flour.  And you can't have tuna noodle casserole without cream of mushroom soup.  Every canned variety I've ever come across has soy in it....this is a great alternative. 

The recipe also has directions for use right away or if you want to freeze and use later.  Which I'll definitely be trying.  It doesn't take long to throw together and thickens up nicely even if you omit the cream and just use all skim milk.  A great alternative to canned ingredients and easy to make too!

Incredibly Cold In Chicago

It wasn't even forty out this morning in Arlington Heights.  Talk about fall showing up quickly. 

Well Rosie is all hunkered down in her kennel this morning with a blanket.  The cat was even following her around this morning wanting to cuddle with her.  But since he normally just walks up and attacks her, she wasn't quite interested in being cuddle buddies.  He'll have to sneak up on her later after she's already fallen asleep.

It's been a very uneventful few days.  Even though we did make cake pops, they didn't turn out as gorgeous as the ones from the cookbook.  Apparently you need to dip them a couple of times to make them seem more round.  That wasn't a helpful hint included in the book.  Would have been nice to know before we started.  But they do taste great.  And we'll probably make more of them.

Been spending every morning working on the mold we've found in the basement.  Apparently if you don't use a/c during the summer months in the Chicago area its way too humid down there.  And mold develops.  I still have to learn about dehumidifiers.  To suck all the humidity out of the basement.  It does look like the basement is closed off because of contamination.  Just like it would look in a horror movie.

Cake Pops

Today is going to be a busy day.  We have the new Cake Pops cookbook by Bakerella and we're going to try to make some.  That is after we get some lollipop sticks.  I have a feeling that Rosie is going to want to be quite helpful while we're making these. 

She really likes to help out in the kitchen at all times.  Even if you're making something simple like french pressing some coffee or choffy.  Rosie really loves all things coffee.  And since choffy sounds almost the same to her...she'd be willing to try some of that too.

Choffy is actually roasted organic cocoa beans ground up and brewed like coffee.  It tastes great (if you add a little sugar).  Doesn't have any calories and doesn't make you crash like coffee will.  I just wish it was more readily available.  The company is based out on the west coast.  So in Arlington Heights, it's something you have to send away for.  And wait and wait till it shows up. 

Pictures to come.

This is Miss Rosie Dickens.  She's originally from Seattle.  It's a little hard for her to live here in Arlington Heights because she's a little over-protective.  She's more a watch dog than a happy go lucky regular Labrador retriever.  She also has a large orange tabby cat named Seven.  Who she worries will eventually catch a squirrel which will leave him with more war wounds. 

As you can see she loves to dress up all the time.  With anything from a simple ribbon (Aerie ribbons are her favorite) to t-shirts or a costume.  She loves to discover everything from a new recipe to a great deal.  This blog is to help her share some of these great things with everyone else.