Happy Thanksgiving!!

We hosted Thanksgiving at our house this year. It was a blessed day getting to celebrate it with my Momala. The Lord has continued showing His Grace with us this year and providing these wonderful opportunities to spend time with our mom.

It was a little nerve wracking for me, cooking my first Turkey and all. I did a trial run in August when I roasted a chicken for Thomas and my anniversary. But alas, my studies of Martha Stewart have proven useful as I did great job with the turkey. My apologies - there are no pictures of the meal but you can at least see the table. In addition to the Turkey, I made green bean casserole, dressing, and pureed parsnips (from our garden) as well as the Gravy (with my sister's help). The rest of the family brought their favorites; corn bread stuffing, creamed brussel sprouts, jello salad, oyster stuffing, cranberry chutney, mashed pataters, and waldorf salad for some crunch, a pumpkin pie and a pecan pie. It was delish and so much fun having everyone enjoy the meal at our house.

My husband did an EXCELLENT job cleaning up the house as I prepared the food, he also cleaned up the kitchen and table while I was visiting with the fam! Thank you THOMAS!

The napkins I made for The Parsons Thanksgiving, and then got to use for mine today!

A lovely fire for this blessed day!

I am so Thankful for all the many blessings provided by my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!

♥ Ashley

1 Chronicles 16:34

Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever.

[recipe] Soup Sunday - Spaghetti Soup

Today I made Spaghetti Soup for dinner. It was pretty good. We would give it a rating of 7/10. I think the reason that it only got a 7 is because I really like pasta, and if I added too much pasta to this it would not have been soup - Just spaghetti.

Here is the recipe if you would like to try it.

Ingredients:

1 lb ground beef
1 onion, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
1 stalk celery, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 1/2 cups water
28 oz diced tomatoes (organic)
1 jar spaghetti sauce (organic) 13-15 oz or more I used a 28 oz.
1 Tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp Italian seasoning
salt and fresh ground pepper
Dash red pepper flakes
2 oz dried spaghetti, broken into 2 inch pieces

Directions:

1. In a Dutch oven, cook meat, onion, green pepper, celery, carrot, and garlic over medium heat. Stir until meat is browned, broken into pieces and vegetables are tender. Drain off fat.

2. Add water, undrained tomatoes, spaghetti sauce, sugar, salt, Italian seasoning, black pepper and red pepper flakes to meat mixture. Bring to a boiling and let boil for 10 minutes. Add broken spaghetti, return to boil and then reduce the heat. Boil gently, uncovered, for 12-15 minutes or until pasta is tender.

Serve with your choice of bread and/or salad. We used Garlic Bread. We also used Linguine instead of spaghetti -- and I added extra.

What are you cookin' for dinner? Any traditions?

♥ Ashley

A Parsons Thanksgiving

We are celebrating Thanksgiving with my husbands family tomorrow. I am so excited to get on the eating. I love Thanksgiving food. Its full of all that yummy, fatty, mushy stuff that is Ohh So Good but not so good for you. I love Stuffing, Green Bean Casserole, Stuffing, Mashed Potatoes, LOTS of Gravy, Stuffing, the desserts, and did I mention Stuffing? I didn't? Oh well then, yes the Stuffing with gravy is divine.

What are your plans for Thanksgiving?

What are you Thankful for?

♥ Ashley

Beautiful

Just wanted to share this beautiful dinning room with you as we are nearing the holidays. I love Christmastime!!

via

and this is what I would eventually like my kitchen/dinning room to look like. I just have a little work to do. (not a huge fan of this table or the fridge - but you get the idea)

And I simply adore this room. With the white and gray furniture.

♥ Ashley

[recipe] Soup Sunday - Cheeseburger Soup

As Fall is upon us so is Soup Sunday. I have decided that it is more of a seasonal thing than a year round thing...although I am not denying that I might have an occasional Soup Sunday in the Summer.

Today the MIL and FIL came over for Soup. I made Cheeseburger Soup. It was delish. I know that it sounds a little weird but it was very good. We gave it about a 8.5/10. It was super easy to make and I am anticipating to be able to make it again in the future!

Recipe courtesy of Better Homes and Gardens Special Interest Publications SOUPS Jan/Feb 2011.

The recipe is for a slow cooker but you can make it on the stove top like I did tonight.

Ingredients:
1 lb ground beef
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 russet potatoes, peeled and chopped into bite size pieces
1 or 2 carrots sliced
1/4 c ketchup
2 T yellow mustard
1 fresh serrano chile, chopped
salt
pepper
32 ounces of beef broth
1 can cheddar cheese condensed soup
shredded cheddar cheese for topping the servings

Directions:
1. In soup pot melt 1 tablespoon of butter and add onions. Stir and let cook for one minute. Add garlic. Stir and let cook for one minute. Add in the beef, stir and break up the beef and season with salt and pepper. Let meat brown.

2. Add in the potatoes, carrot, ketchup, mustard, chile. Stir to mix up. Then add the cheese soup and beef broth. Stir to combine the cheese soup until smooth. Bring to a simmer.

3. Let simmer on med-low for about 45-50 minutes or until potato and carrots are tender. It can simmer on low for 3 hours until ready to serve.

4. Ladle into soup bowls and top with shredded cheese.




♥ Ashley

[recipe] Pumpkin

Last weekend Deanna and I went to Watsons, it is a nursery down in Puyallup. We love this place, the displays are so inspiring a little expensive but it is just a fun place to visit. Anyways they were having a 50% off sale on all of their Halloween merchandise. So I picked me up some of these beauties:

Pie Pumpkins for $1 each. They even came with a recipe sticker on their bottoms. Since I got such a great deal, I thought I would make a few things:

Pumpkin Pie


by the sliceall beautiful and ready for my tummy



Some Pumpkin Loaf with a streusel topping

and Crust rolls with cinnamon sugar with the left over pie dough.

mmm....delish. I had myself a slice of Pumpkin Pie a la mode and a glass of Egg Nog. YUM

Here is the recipe for the Pie:

Ingredients:
1 1/3 cups Pumpkin Puree
1 1/3 cups sweet condensed milk
1 egg
1 1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp cloves
1 cup hot water

Directions:
1. Pre-Heat oven to 375. Roll out pie crust and place into a pie dish. Set in fridge to cool.
2. Beat egg, condensed milk and pumpkin with a whisk until combined. Then add remaining ingredients.
3. Pour pumpkin mixture into pie crust and bake 55-65 minutes. Cool and Enjoy.

NOTE:
1. If you are using a real pumpkin; cut it in half, scoop out seeds and strings, remove stem, place on a foiled baking sheet cut side down (cover with foil) and bake in a 350 oven until tender. Let cool, scoop out flesh and mash with a potato masher until smooth...drain any excess water/liquid.
2. It wasn't until I was writing down this recipe that I realized I did not add the water to the pumpkin...it still turned out great. I substituted the nutmeg for cardamom

If you try out either of these recipe's let me know how you liked them!

♥ Ashley

My Finds!!

Here are my finds from the Ruffles & Rust and the Junk Salvation shows.

I love this silver tray! Trays are great ways to display collections or "things" and to keep control of all of them.

I have been wanting one of these display towers for forever, and now I finally have one!

The tea-cart is new as are the great green clogs from the Junk Salvation show. The Owl is a great giant vase that I am planning on using for flowers, ice for drinks, and anything else that sparks my fancy. While I did not get the owl at a show I DID get it at Ruffles and Rust. [oh and that pumpkin...great deal and a fab story to go with -- just ask ;) ]

My new chandelier that will be going up in our master bedroom, after I paint it a gray color. (its lavender right now) I love the hobnail on it.

Hope all is well.

♥ Ashley

The Show in Puyallup!

WOW!! What a FANTASTIC show! I had such a great time seeing all the finds, getting inspiration and purchasing my favorite things at the Junk Salvation!! The vendors really went all out this time. There was a lot of Christmas themed stuff, plenty of vintage Santa's and ornaments.

Deanna and I were "V.I.P" since we pre-purchased our tix online. We got to go in an extra 30 minutes early. It is so fun to have someone to go junking with, to talk you into things AND out of things. I have to say that both of us ARE extremely satisfied with our finds.

Of course I am sharing my unedited pictures that I took at the show. Unfortunately I did not get a picture of our favorite vendor, but we got some great deals and buys from them (even if I did lose my boots to someone else!) Please enjoy!

what a cute name!!

The one thing I was looking for I did not find -- Nativity scene figures. If you happen to come across any please let me know!

Until the next show, just drool over the pics above :)

♥ Ashley