Giant Sub

Darn. Summer is almost over. It's been such a good one. And how about those Olympics?! I watched everyday and even shed tears from time to time. It was all so amazing. Did you guys watch?  

We started a little tradition of sorts this summer. On Saturdays, for lunch we make a giant sub from a loaf of french bread. It's goofy but we all look forward to it. I totally enjoy all of us gathering around the island and building Giant Sub. I think we even marched around and chanted GIANT SUB! GIANT SUB! one time.

You guys should make a Giant Sub yourselves and take it to a park for a little end of summer shindig. Or make it for family night. Or wouldn't it be fun with a group to do a Top Chef style competition to see who can make the best Giant Sub? Do I need to keep going?

Here are some tips on how to build your sub:

-Use a 99cent loaf of fresh french bread

-Any deli meat you prefer, about a pound. (we like roasted chicken) *You can add more meat if you prefer.

-SALAMI! Word to the wise, this MAKES the sub. *I like to use an uncured, nitrate free and natural salami.

-sliced cheese, we've used Swiss most times

-lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber, avocado, onions- any toppings you like on your sandwiches

-mayo, mustard and pepper. You could hit it with some balsamic too.

Slice the french bread, filet open. Layer toppings, starting with meats (fold deli slices in half) and cheese. Top with all your vegetables. Generously spread mayo and mustard or any other spreads you prefer on the other half of bread. Sprinkle with pepper and close. Slice with a serrated knife and enjoy!  

*One Giant Sub will feed 4-6 people.

images by Briana from my instagram

Kitchen Facelift

Hey, Bri here. Sorry I wasn't around yesterday. My kitchen's in shambles. Want to see a picture?

We are getting new cab doors! And the island is getting a little more pimped out. Pimped out sounds like it's going to be bedazzled. Haha. It isn't- it'll just have a little more mmph! They are coming to install either on Monday or Tuesday. I'm really excited! 

Hope your weekend is jammin'! See ya next week!

image from my instagram, you can follow me at breezy_may

First, let me apologize for the lack of recipe or diy in this post.  It's been hectic lately, but I will get on top of it!  Especially since Bri is currently "blowing me out of the water" with her creative ideas/write ups and amazing pictures!  I really need to STEP IT UP!  I hope you're all as glad as I am that the weekend is here.  I have a hot date tonight with my main squeeze, complete with scooter ride and dinner.  A great way to start the weekend if I do say so myself!  So, I shall shamelessly leave you with a few images of my little Q.  Who decided to speed through her first year of life, leaving a completely dumbfounded Mama in her wake!  I know I'm sentimental, but gosh dang, can she just slow down, like a teensy bit????

 

 

Have a great weekend!:)    

Cousin Day + Hand Mixed Ice Cream

Lily invited her cousin Grace up for a cousin day today. So far they've had a picnic, gone swimming, taken a bath, had a snack, watched a movie and eaten ice cream! When I told Randy all that they had been doing, he said: "I want to be four again." Haha. Being a kid is pretty great. And being a kid at the beginning of summer? Well, that is just about the best thing in the whole wide world.

I mentioned in another post that I hand mixed some ice cream Cold Stone style for dessert one night. It's right smack dab between hard pack ice cream and a shake. It's totally yummy. I made raspberries 'n' cream for the girls. I scooped vanilla ice cream out onto my cutting board and placed a few fresh raspberries on top, then just scooped and smashed the ice cream until it was mixed. 

Cute cuzzies.

And for me, I mixed in some lemon cookies. It was pretty naughty. 

I'm looking forward to trying some more kinds of hand mixed ice creams this summer. Here are some topping ideas dancing around my brain:

marshmallow creme

 caramel sauce

roasted/salted nuts

shredded coconut

any fresh or frozen fruit

peanut butter

oreos- mint, golden and regular (no brainer)

candy bars

lemon and lime zest (WORD TO YOUR MOM!)

Cookies

And the list goes on...

Hope your Wednesday is going swell, dudes. Thanks for popping in!

images by Briana

Oatmeal Moon Pies + Solar Eclipse Party

The last time there was a solar eclipse, my little brother Bryce and I thought we  were going to be blind. Someone (who?) had struck so much fear in us, that we were certain that if we looked upon the sun just once with our naked eyes we'd be blind by the next day. Our curious eyes could not help but dart a few quick glances up towards the sun that day. So by the end of it we thought we were goners. Dead serious.

18 years later and our vision is still intact and guess what?! we got another opp to burn our retinas....or is it corneas?

We had a little eclipse party yesterday with our little family of four and big brother Jason. It was a good ol' silly time. Jason had the totally brill idea to bring moon pies, but the night before I told him to skip a grocery run and I'd make homemade instead. And I'm so glad I did! These moon pies I'm about to share with you are legit. Like the kind of legit that makes you want to do a little dance and make yummy sounds all the while. But before I share the recipe, here are some pics of us Eclipsin':

Playing some Solar smash-ball. It's just like regular smash-ball if you are dying to play Solar smash-ball. (No children were harmed during this smashing session)

Special eyewear wearing.

Moon pie consuming.

And Eclipse viewing. That just about sums it up! Now, it's recipe time.

Oatmeal-Pecan Cookie Moon Pies (makes about 36ish cookies and 18ish sandwich cookies):

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

2 1/4 cups old-fashioned oats

1 cup finely chopped pecans

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temp.

1 1/2 cups (packed) brown sugar

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 7 ounce jars marshmallow creme

Chocolate drizzling sauce:

1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1/2 cup milk

Melt chocolate and milk over a double broiler or in your microwave. Stirring often to prevent burning and to promote the chocolate chips to melt. You can add a little honey in to thin out the chocolate as well.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a small-medium bowl.

Combine oats and pecans in another separate bowl. 

Using an electric mixer or stand mixer, beat butter and sugar until smooth. Add egg and vanilla and beat to blend. Scrap down bowl. While machine runs at low speed gradually add flour mixture. Beat until just blended. Stir in oat mixture with a wooden spoon until combined. 

Using a tablespoonful cookie scoop, roll dough into balls and place on a parchment lined cookie sheet. Flatten balls into 1/2 in thick discs. Bake for 12 minutes, or until cookies are golden brown. Do not over bake. Let cookies cool on baking sheets before removing to brown paper.

Drop 1 tablespoon of marshmallow creme onto cookie (use two spoons). Twist and push another cookie on top. Using a spoon, drizzle choclate over the top of moon pies with quick back and forth motions of the wrist. 

*Some of them I drizzled and some I left plain. I went back and forth all night as to which I liked more. They are equally delicious in my opinion- chewy and gooey. The chocolate drizzled ones were less messy which is good for kids.

So, did you see the Eclipse? How was your weekend in general? Thanks for letting me share our silly party!

images by Briana, bottom pic from my instagram, cookie recipe adapted from Bon Appetit

Hunger Games

A group of us hit up the midnight showing of The Hunger Games last night (or should I say this morning?). I was so happy to be there and I thoroughly enjoyed a night out with good pals, even though it was way past our bedtimes and even if we were surrounded on all sides by crazy teenagers. I'd do it again in a heartbeat! 

So, the movie! I thought it was so good. Totally dug it. The way I envisioned things to be from reading the book were totally how they portrayed them in the movie. District 12, the crazy fashions of the Capitol people, the arena...it was all really spot on, I thought. I'm no movie critic or expert on movies, but I thought the casting was really well done, too.

So, tell me. Are you into The Hunger Games? Have you read all the books (I'm only part way through the last book)? Did you go see the movie last night? 

Or do you have plans to see it this weekend? I hope you enjoy it as much as we did. See you all next week! Thanks for popping in!

image by Briana from my instagram feed

Three Things

Happy Presidents Day! Long weekends RULE, don't ya think? Today I'm sharing three RAD things that I've seen around zee blogs that I decided to make and and do: A DIY mirror, a yummy soup, and Apple Cider Vinegar as toner! 

1. After seeing this round-up of DIY (SHIM) sunburst mirrors on Little Green Notebook, I decided I'd give it a go since all the sunbursts I've admired over the years cost around three-hundy. The above picture is my finished mirror in all its gilded glory hanging above our bed. This project isn't difficult, but it does take time and patience. I mostly followed her instructions, but I did do a few things different (in case you decide to make one yourself): I used a 12 in round mirror from Michael's (not a 10 in), I painted the whole thing using Martha Stewarts Metallic Paint in Vintage Gold (from Home Depot, comes in a 10 oz container) as opposed to spray painting it and I used screws and wire as my hanging hardware instead of the teeth attachment. Click {{HERE}} for the tutorial.

2. Potato, Sausage and Kale Soup. I had this soup at a luncheon awhile back and really enjoyed it and then my friend had it brewing in her home one afternoon and her house smelled phenomenal and then Sophistimom posted a version of the soup on her blog. I decided it was high time I make a batch of my own! A double batch, athankyou. I followed Sophistimoms recipe to a T. It's delicious and I love that I found another purpose for kale. I even took some to my grandparents and they loved it! {{Click HERE for the recipe}}

3. Apple Cider Vinegar is my new toner! It has to be an Apple Cider Vinegar with the "mother" in it. I started doing this a couple weeks ago when I saw this post via A Blog About Love. My skin is softer, my T-zone doesn't produce as much oil and overall my skin just looks and feels cleaner. And it's all natural! I'm totally sold. All I do is pour a little Apple Cider Vinegar on a cotton disc (like you would with nail polish remover), then I just quickly run the vinegar soaked cotton under running water to dilute the vinegar a little. Then I swab it all over my face, starting with my T-zone first. The smell doesn't bother me and once it's dry and absorbed you won't be able to smell it. Give it a try! Read all about it {{HERE}}.

Thanks for letting me share these three things with you today and thanks to the awesome bloggers who inspired me to do them! Check ya later. xoxo

all images by Briana

Lily's Girly-Girl Party

When I asked Lily what kind of birthday party she wanted to have, she was all over the place like a four year old should be. Here's a sampling of what she would say exclaim when I would ask her what she'd like to do: Princess! Fairies! Whales! Radishes! (dead serious, you guys) Dance! Nail Polish! Fancy Nancy! Phew. I tried to prod her in certain directions, but we weren't getting anywhere. Then it hit me one night as I was laying in bed bouncing ideas around my brain. Why not throw a girly-girl party?! Bingo. A girly-girl party would surley fit most of Lily's desires under its umbrella.....all except maybe the whales. I pitched the idea to Lily and she loved it, so we ran with it! The party came together with ease and Lily and I had fun making it all happen. 

On a completely unrelated note (but somewhat related), I've decided that we're going to throw a friend party for our kids every other year, starting when they turn four. I know lots of other families do this and I think it's so smart. Gives us moms a nice break to let the creative juices fill back up and your bank account gets a break too! Here are some pictures from Lily's first official friend party, if you'd like to take a look.

This giant balloon (36 in diameter) greeted the guests when they arrived. Lily and I fell hard for this balloon when we walked in the party supply store. We had to have it!

I dug through my craft supplies to make these banners and they came together in about an hour. Lily helped me punch out the circles with our round punch for the happy birthday banner. I used a black sharpie to do the all caps lettering and then I strung it up with some pink ribbon. For the Lily banner I used black cardstock that I cut into the flag like shape, strung them on some hemp twine, then I used a piece of white chalk to do the girly cursive lettering. The Lily banner ended up being one of my favorite elements of the party. Black, when used right can have a cool impact.

We flanked the banners with some balloons from Zurchers (party supply store in Orem, UT if you're local). Nice and simple.

Randy grabbed a mediocre grocery store bouquet of flowers the morning of the party and it totally pulled the food table together. Flowers are the icing on the cake, so to speak....even if they are mediocre.

For the food I made some simple ham and cheese roll sandwiches (with a fancy toothpick, our subtle nod to the Fancy Nancy books), raspberry lemonade, and some kid friendly fruit and veg.

White cupcakes w/ strawberry buttercream frosting per Lily's request. I piped that icing on the cupcakes half-hazardly and that is just the way I like it. It took me all of 10 minutes.

I pulled out all my pink bowls and cake stands for the table. I rolled out a piece of black and white wrapping paper for a little interest and a foundation. Want to hear something weird? Pink is my least favorite color, but I LOVE and am always drawn to it on dishes and serving pieces.

The girls ate their food on a blanket picnic style. They all LOVED this. Scouts honor, not one of those glasses of raspberry lemonade got tipped over.

I adore this picture of Lily. So happy. So excited. 

The girls painted wooden jewelry box purses that you can find at Michael's. You don't see it, but I made each of the little girls wear a white garbage sack to protect their clothes. We let the boxes dry while we opened presents. After presents we came back and "bedazzled" (this was a stretch for me) the boxes with some sticky gems and some glitter.

In true Lily fashion, she chose sunglasses and lip gloss for the party favors. We got the lip gloss in a pack at Michael's and the sunglasses in a pack at Zurcher's. Both the lip gloss and the sunglass pack were super inexpensive. I think the lip gloss pack was around four dollars and the pack of 12 sunglasses was around 10 bucks. The striped bag is from Zurcher's as well. We sealed the bag with some pink washi tape from my own stash.

The end!

Thanks for letting me share this really long post about Lily's fourth birthday. It was a pleasure to put together and Lily had so much fun, which makes me the happiest mom in the world. However, I did learn a few things that I will do for parties to come, like being aware of where the products I'm buying are made. This is a hard feat since it seems as though everything is made in China. Next time I'll put more effort in to finding favors and supplies that are made in the states or local. I also loved having a helper at the party and I will definitely do this again. It was especially helpful when we painted the girls nails! Thanks to my girl, Abby, for helping me out the day of the party and making it that much more fun. If you have any questions about the party, leave a comment and I'll respond in the comments. Thanks for stopping by today!

all images by Briana, last image from my instagram, follow me at breezy_may

Happy Weekend!

My oldest of two turned four on Wednesday! Her grammy and grampy surprised us with a visit on Wednesday afternoon with some sweet treats they picked up from Tulie bakery! Have you been to {{Tulie}} <---- Click link? If you are local, it's in Salt Lake City and everything we tried was absolutely delicious. I especially loved the quiche, the graham crackers and the vanilla cake. The graham crackers taste like toffee, you guys! An added bonus is that the bakery is beautiful. You should go if you find yourself in Salt Lake and in the mood for a sweet treat.

Today I'm running errands and prepping for Lily's birthday party she is having with her friends tomorrow. It's going to be a Girly-Girl party. Hopefully it all goes well and I can keep 11 little girls entertained and happy. Luckily I have one of my sweet babysitters, Abby coming to help. Wish us luck! I'll see you next week with a post about the party! Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have a fun weekend in store! 

Image by Briana from my instagram account. Do you instagram? Well, you should! Follow me at breezy_may

Vintage Pyrex

Vintage, colorful, milk glass oh my!!!!Is anyone else as into vintage Pyrex as I am???  The colors and prints are just too cute to be ignored in any thrift or antique shop!  From the tiny little butter dishes to the large clear glass covered baking dishes, I wish I had an entire set... In every color!  I would love it if Pyrex brought back some of these styles!  But, come to think of it, maybe I'd rather have the 50 year old stuff.  Why?  Because each vintage dish tells a story.  A story of life less complicated.  Those dishes have me imagining whole families, sitting around the dinner table, on a week night no less, enjoying conversation about the days events.  No tv, iPods, nintendo ds or smartphones to distract from that precious time!  And although I love my tv, iPod and smartphone just as much as the next person, I think they should all be banned from the dinner table!  I need that precious time with Kimble and our kiddos!  Time to relax a little, laugh, obviously eat, and let our lil guys tell us all about their adventures during the day!  I wish I could tell you this is how dinner  is at our house 100% of the time!  But I'd be lying through my teeth if I did!  We are a "work in progress.":). It's amazing what a little vintage Pyrex will do for my perspective!  Pyrex collecting has been a fun little hobby for me!  I will occasionally get on ebay or ksl to see what I can find and so far, I've had pretty good luck!  Although my stomach lurched when my husband opened one box to find a bowl I had got on ebay, shattered into tiny little pieces!:( BUMMER!  So far I'm happy with the collection I've started!

Cinderella Nesting Bowls in Amish Butter print
and Wheat Print

Refrigerator Dish set in Amish Butter Print

  

Holiday Cards....

are the best, aren't they? I've loved getting the mail all month long. It's been such a treat to open up all the cards from loved ones and pour over them. And I must say, this year everyone brought there A-game; all the cards were so creative and lovely! Each year I like to find a fun way to display all the cards so we can enjoy them throughout the holidays and through January. We have a pillar in our main living area that I wrapped with the finger knitting I knitted and then I used mini clothespins to attach the cards. Finger knitting is new to me and I was really intrigued when I heard the term so I did some googling, watched a youtube video and I was off to the races. All you need is your fingers and any kind of yarn. It's really simple!

If you are interested in doing some finger knitting {{here}} is the link to the youtube video. You can also type in finger knitting in the search bar on the youtube site and learn more techniques and things. Happy finger knitting to you! 

Hope you have a fun and safe weekend celebrating the New Year! Thanks for stopping by today!

images by Briana

Christmas Movies

We finally got snow today here in Northern Utah! I'm so happy about this. Lily woke up and yelled from the top of the stairs, "It's snowing!". I hope it keeps up. All I want to do today is cuddle up and watch Christmas movies. I hope you're having a good week so far and that you find some time to kick back and watch a festive flick. Here are a few of my favorites:

A Christmas Story

Home Alone 1 AND 2

White Christmas

National Lampoons Christmas Vacation

The Holiday

Holiday Lights and Holiday Music

How was your Thanksgiving? I hope it was a memorable one. We've been eating leftovers non-stop since Thursday and I haven't gotten sick of it yet! My favorite way to eat leftovers at the moment is to toast a piece of french bread, then top with pieces of roast turkey, pour hot gravy over it and serve with cranberry sauce (you could even throw in a layer of stuffing too). It's a home-run. Give it a whirl. Another thing that has got me excited is the fact that I can finally turn on my holiday lights! I've been patiently waiting since they came and hung them in October (early bird discount). Here they are:

Nephi, our holiday light magician shared that the trick to doing colored lights and still make them look bright is to mix in a white light between each colored light. I never would have thought of that, but I thought it was good information to pass along......in case you are in the midst of trying to hang lights right now. It's pretty hard to beat an all white set up, though. Kara does all white at her place and it's classy as can be.


Lastly, we can all finally blast Christmas music w/o a second thought! Truth be told, we listened to Christmas tunes all throughout Thanksgiving and you probably did too. I think it keeps things fun and festive, especially when you are working your buns off in the kitchen. Here is some Christmas music that I'm excited about listening to:

Carpenters Christmas Portrait....a childhood favorite.

The Elf soundtrack always puts a smile on my face.

Nat King Cole's Christmas album is my man's favorite.

New out this year if you're looking for a hipper spin on Christmas tunage. 

And you can't go wrong here. Perfect when you are entertaining to play in the background.

All this tunage can be found on itunes or amazon! Hope you have a great day! I best be gettin' to trimmin' my tree. 

house image by Briana