Delicious Eats!

Delicious.

That is the only way to describe my current cooking style! 

My goal has been to limit the amount of preservatives we eat, and they are just in everything! Salad dressing, frozen food, soup, lunch meat, ugh...the list goes on and on and on. I know in this world and with our busy schedules it will be almost impossible to completely cut them from our diets. But a girl can dream...

The delicious salad above it a combo of my farmers market finds from this week (except the olives). I even made the dressing!! It is so so so so yummy and was adapted from the recipe found Here.

Cilantro-Lime-Ginger Dressing 

4 large (6 small) Cloves of Garlic

2 T. Fresh Ginger (just estimate)

2 Bunches of Cilantro (trim the stocks off)

1/3 Red Onion

 Juice from 3-4 Large Limes

1/2 cup White Wine Vinegar

2 t. Crushed Red Pepper

1 t. Salt

3 T. Honey

1/2-3/4 cup Grated Parmesan Cheese

1/2 cup Canola Oil

1/4-1/2 cup Olive Oil

Put it all in a food processor (or a blender if you don't have a processor). You may need a bit more oil or vinegar if it seems to thick from the cilantro. 

It should keep for up to 2 weeks in the fridge.

These delicious pretzel dogs were so fun and delicious! The recipe was from Brown Eyed Baker who is an absolute genius.

My little version of a...

 ...Monte Cristo...

...from let over french toast.

2 slices of French Toast

1 slice of Thick Ham

1 slice of Thick Turkey

1-2 t. of Apricot Jam

1 slice of Provolone Cheese

Make a sandwich out of the above ingredients minus the jam. Wrap your sandwich in paper towel and microwave for 45 seconds. After you take it out of the microwave and put on the jam. 

Eat Up! Yum!

Falling in Love with Autum Dessert!

With all this eating healthy I have been doing I was completely craving a little piece of something sweet. But with cookies, pastries & chocolate off limits I was having a hard time thinking of something that would keep my healthy habits unbroken. 

Luckily, my rules said nothing about adult beverages (which would not be considered healthy at all)...and we have had our martini glasses for months and they had yet to be used. So a martini it was, now I just had to find a fun recipe with the little alcohol we have in our apartment. Actually, we only have Gin. So that would be considered very limited in the martini world. 

This recipe for an Apple Cider & Ginger Martini caught my eye and it was utterly delicious!! Watch out tho, this recipe will sneak up on ya if your not careful.

With that I was thinking that a baked apple would be great. I just love apples in the fall. A crisp apple has to be my favorite all time snack and the fall opens the doors to a fresh crop of apples, yum!

I searched and search the internet and could not find just the right recipe. Nothing felt right with trying to eat a healthy dessert. Well you know what to do then, make one! 

I can up with...

 Spiced Pastry Cream Baked Apples

Guest Bathroom Makeover

Calvin and I just do not do well with white walls, and the walls in our apartment were ever so white when we moved in! 

No amount of colorful wall hangings could help this place. It just felt cold and uninviting.

Farmers Market, Charlotte Style!

I just love farmers markets! The fresh vegies, happy people getting great deals, how could you not love it! The farmers market was a bit (ok, a lot) different then the farmers market that we went to in San Fran. For starters there were no nudists in sight lol. Otherwise, I just found it really interesting that this market has buildings and it open tuesday-saturday! Honestly, it was a bit smaller then I expected but the prices and produce were awesome!! The best prices I have seen at a farmers market yet!

Desk Organization

As much as I would love to show you the entire desk, because I LOVE our desk!! We got it off of craigslist (of course) for about $100 less then it retails for at Ikea. The whole picture is still "In Progress" (and a bit messy!). So we will just stay away from that for a bit. But while working on the whole picture we saw this awesome inspiration pic on Pinterest, Found Here.

We just loved the idea so we just had to put the pieces together! 

Pumpkin Time & Fun Fall Date Ideas!

Our "Modern" Pumpkins. Mine is the Owl and my hubby made the chevron!

I am not really sure that my husband or I really got the memo about being adults. We are all about fun during fall! We love apple picking, pumpkin carving, corn mazes and it seems the best time of the year for wine tasting! 

DIY sweater quilt!

This post has been long overdue!! I made these two blankets LAST Christmas! The red for my brother and the blue for my dad :) I think they turned out great! I found the how to on a tutorial Here!! I honestly think that her blanket turned out much better :) I would definately suggest using only wool sweaters. I used whatever I could find but I found that the 100% wool worked best. I will admit they are harder to find, but it is possible!

A Bit of Sparkle!!

I found this pretty craft on Pinterest of course!! All props go to the The Sweetest Occasion!! They are the creators of this awesome project :)

I think that my glitter was a bit larger then what they used in the above tutorial, but with two coats of ModPodge and glitter it worked just fine :) I plan on putting these away till Christmas, I think they will be just adorable with some candles glowing through the glitter! 

A Splash of Color (and a painting tip!!)

We decided our white walls were "blah." Just too much white for our vibrant personalities lol. 

Before...

DIY Tile Coasters

Another awesome pinterest project!! These coasters are so easy and can be great for a pop of color! You can find the complete tutorial HERE.

They are so cheap to make too and would make perfect gifts! I will say that the clear coat is very necessary! We did use it but I might even put an extra coat on it for extra covering. 

Craft Crate Coffee Table & Succulent Planter

Our awesome coffee table is done!!!

Let me just warn you that I swoon just a bit over this table. We ABSOLUTELY love it! Not only is it an awesome design by DIY-VIntage-Chic, but it was relatively easy to do! It is nice and big and has tons of storage for books and such :) Plus, with the empty square that is left in the middle you have so many options! Currently ours is a succulent planter, but our square dishes from crate and barrel fit perfectly in there as well! Which means a perfect place for appetizers or a plate of dessert when guests are over! Or you wan just remove the planter and such and have a table for board games! Awesome!  

DIY Antiqued/Distressed Dining Room Table

Drum roll please......

WE FINALLY FINISHED OUR TABLE!!! 

The table before the refinish...

...and After!!!

We are quite proud of this beauty, it came out just as we wanted :) While I am not going to give you an awesome tutorial (pretty much because we had no idea what we were doing and made mistakes) I will give you some tips and tricks that we learned.

Wine Bottle Sconce

This little beauty comes to you from an awesome project found on pinterest!! You can find the DIY instructions HERE. You will see that we made a few changes to the tutorial. Calvin added a piece of wood from a pallet, and the "Top plate connector/ceiling flanges" that we found at Home Depot were longer and flat unlike the ones featured in the tutorial. We found them by the ceiling rosettes.

Initialed Glasses

A birthday craft!

So the picture above is what I was originally going for... but lets just say I went through alot of trouble for the etching paste that I was using not to work...So I decided to but some window paint that said it was dishwasher safe...again a fail...apparently you need some special sealant for that to work....I digress... Finally I found the right stuff for the job! I will post a pic of it soon. But it looks like a pen, I found it in the stained glass section of Jo-anns. Its called DecoArt glass paint marker. Its a beauty! paint it on. put it in the oven. All set! But ill still describe how the little beauty works!

Bottle Cap Picture Magnets

Awesome Picture Magnets

I wanted to share an awesome craft that I did quite awhile ago with ya! I made my Aunt these great magnets for her birthday...she loved them :) They really turned out great! So here is the how-to-diy!