Design Dilemma!

Now that fall is pretty much here, there are so many things to look forward to...... drinking baileys and hot chocolate on cool nights, eating root vegetables, and fowl suppers...just to name a few. Fall also marks the beginning of the craft show season! I already have 4 local craft/trade shows on my plate, and I am looking for more! Unfortunately, I have a little "design dilemma"..... This year I really want to make my booth look professional, pretty and functional. However, I have no clue how to display all my headbands and bows in a professional way! I have been googling for days and nothing has inspired me. So I thought that I would turn the problem over to all the crafty people who follow the blog.

So, If you have ever attended a craft/trade show would you be so kind as to tell me how you made your display and maybe even send me a pic? I need some great inspiration ideas that are girly, functional, and pretty!

CAKE!!!! That Is All.........

A few weeks ago my daughter hit a big milestone, she celebrated her first birthday! It's so hard to think of her as a toddler instead of a little baby, but she really has grown up from the sweetest little baby into an even sweeter little girl. Her party was amazing, with 15 family members making the trip to celebrate with her!

I thought that I would share the recipe for the cake that I made her......

Red Velvet Cake

3/4 C Butter

1 1/2 C Sugar

1/2 C Cocoa

1 tsp Baking Soda

2 Tbsp Red Coloring

2 1/2 C Cake Flour
1 tsp Salt

1 tsp Vanilla

2 Eggs

1C Buttermilk

2 tsp Vinegar

Beat butter, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, salt and vanilla in a large bowl for 2 mins until creamy. Beat in eggs 1 at a time until well blended. In a seperate bowl, stir milk, food color and vinegar until well blended. With mixer on low speed, beat in flour in 3 additions, alternating with buttermilk mixture in 2 additions, beating until just blended. Bake at 350 for 20 mins.

And of course and picture of the birthday girl enjoying it...............

A New Blogging Low

So today I was reading through the post archive at a friends blog and clicked on a link, that low and behold, took me to my blog! As I was thinking about how nice it was of her to link me up, I noticed something on my site's post archive. I realized that behind "August" there was only a "1".....1 post for the whole month! I really don't know what happened or where time went! But I do know that you guys deserve more of my thoughts, opinions and general knowhow! LOL.

So I knew that I had to post an apology (again) for being slack, but then I had to rack my brains about something else to talk about, because let's face it....listening to me bitch about how I have no time is not that interesting, and I'm pretty sure that alot of you would "unfollow" me! So I took the time to look back thru my past posts for inspiration.

Since the big move I have really fallen off the wagon in regards to my budgeting and meal planning. Now that I am back at work, it's so easy to just spend and not worry b/c now we have duel incomes. But we have recently decided that instead of doing the reno's on the new house ourselves, we are going to hire people to do it for us. My hubby would still prefer doing it himself (aka the CHEAP way) but I explained it to him like this.... Less Stress=Happy Wife, Happy Wife=Happy Life. But I digress....

As I mentioned before, I am back to work, so I dug out the old financial calculator that I downloaded off the Till Debt Do Us Part website and plugged in our new numbers. As of today we are officially BACK on the jar system, so our weekly household budget breaks down like this......

Transportation- $57.69

Food- $92.31

Entertainment- $23.08

Clothes/Gifts- $18.46

Everything Else- $25.38

Total Jar Money- $216.92

I think that it's definatly doable....The biggest stumbling block that we had the last time that we tried the jar system was when ever we had to buy formula, we only had $52.00 to eat with for the rest of the week.... but that problem is solved b/c our daughter is almost completely weaned onto cows milk. I am really refreshed about this new budget and I'm excited to get ahold of our finances again.

A big part of making that budget work tho is meal planning....something that I also let slide. I hate to admit it, but I think that we eat out almost 5 days a week.....what a waste of money and of health! So back on the meal planning bandwagon, here is my plan for the week......

Sunday- Chicken Ceaser Salad

Monday- Beef Stew

Tuesday- No supper b/c we are going on a trip!

Wednesday- Trip!

Thursday- Trip!

Friday- Perogies and Smokies

So enough of my novel! I will let your eyes rest now, so that you can read my incredibly interesting post tommorrow!