Therapy... Part 2

Contrary to last Thursday, Thursday this week was a pretty good day on all fronts... thank goodness.  I never want to repeat last Thursday... ever!  And this week my "therapy" was more of a treat rather than a stress release :)

My wonderful husband is a minor hockey coach and they had an unusual Thursday night game out of town last night.  I travel with him and the team for almost every game, but yesterday they were leaving before I got off work, so we decided that I'd just stay home this time.  So that meant that I had a whole evening home on my own... so of course I happily ignored pretty much everything that should have been done around the house and pulled out my sewing machine for a glorious evening... just me, my machine, a few stacks of fabric and of course my Thursday evening companions: Grey's and The Big Bang Theory (feel free to roll your eyes here lol!)

In my post last week I had just begun to piece this quilt.  Last night my machine just hummed along and the end result was pretty sweet!  This pattern has three long pieces of squares with a solid fabric in-between these strips.  The top left photo shows the top half of two of the three strips, and I just laid the solid fabric in-between to get a better idea of what the finished product will look like.

For now, I sew sitting on the couch with my machine on the coffee table (we do have plans for a craft room in our developing basement!) and even our pooch thought this was cozy enough to curl up beside for a little snooze :)

A New Find...

I love finding a great recipe online.  While I definitely have my "old faithfuls" in a few select cookbooks that are almost never fail, I love the nights when I feel adventurous enough to try something new!  And last night was one of those nights...

Not my picture lol!  I borrowed it from the recipe website!

I had the recipe for Crafty Crescent Lasagna delivered to my inbox yesterday afternoon and thought it looked like it might be worth trying!  I love lasagna but last night I was looking for something that required a little less work... and voila!

When it comes to cooking I tend to follow the recipe pretty closely, but this one was so easy to adapt to what I already had in the fridge.  My adaptations:
-I only used one can of crescent rolls and it was a little tight to wrap around the filling... maybe I should have gone a bit easier on the filling! :)

-Rather than make a whole new batch of meat sauce for the filling, I just used the left over meat sauce I already had in the fridge from our spaghetti dinner the night before.  It tasted awesome!  And it was a great way to use the left overs!

-I used ricotta cheese instead of cottage cheese only because that is what was already in my fridge :)  and didn't use quite as much as was called for here.  Unfortunately I discovered that while I love ricotta or cottage cheese in my lasagna,  my wonderful hubby doesn't so much... might make it half and half next time and make us both happy!

We both had a good sized piece and there is still enough for at least two more meals!  Would be great for a family!

(I'm including the recipe here for you, but if you'd like to jump over to the LifeMadeDelicious site, just click on the title and it will take you over there!)

Crafty Crescent Lasagna
Ingredients:

• 1 lb (500 g) lean ground beef
• 3/4 cup (175 mL) chopped onions
• 1 can (5.5 fl oz/156 mL) tomato paste
• 1 tbsp (15 mL) dried parsley flakes
• 1/2 tsp (2 mL) each dried basil and oregano leaves
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• dash pepper
• 1/4 cup (50 mL) grated Parmesan cheese
• 1 cup (250 mL) cottage cheese
• 1 egg
• 2 cans (each 235 g) Pillsbury* Crescents
• 1 cup (250 mL) shredded mozzarella cheese
• 1 tbsp (15 mL) milk
• 1 tbsp (15 mL) sesame seeds

Method:

• Heat oven to 375°F (190°C). In large  skillet, cook beef and onions until thoroughly cooked; drain.
• Stir in tomato paste, parsley, basil, oregano, garlic, and pepper. Cook 5 minutes or until heated through.
• Combine Parmesan cheese, cottage cheese and egg.
• Separate both cans of dough into 4 long rectangles. Place dough rectangles side by side on ungreased large baking sheet; seal perforations. Press to form 15x13-inch (38x33 cm) rectangle.
• Spoon half the meat filling in a 6-inch (15 cm) wide strip lengthwise down centre of dough to within 1-inch (2.5 cm) of short sides.
• Spoon cheese filling over meat filling; spoon remaining meat filling evenly over cheese filling.
• Sprinkle mozzarella cheese over top of meat filling. Fold short sides of dough 1-inch (2.5 cm) over filling
• Fold long sides of dough tightly over filling, overlapping edges in centre 1/4-inch (6 mm); firmly pinch centre seam and ends to seal. Brush with milk; sprinkle with sesame seeds.
• Bake 23 to 27 minutes or until deep golden brown.

Therapy...

After what I think was the single most rotten day of work in the past three years, I definitely needed an evening to just relax and do something that makes me smile.  So I pulled out my sewing machine and proceeded to indulge in some quilting therapy.

I'm very excited about this quilt for a few reasons:
1 - It's the first time I've used cotton for the front instead of flannel.  I absolutely love this fabric and so far so good!
2 - This is the first quilt that I've been commissioned to make!  It was fun to work through the process of finding patterns and colors that she liked and even more fun that it's actually coming together!  The option of selling my work is one I am looking forward to exploring!

This past Saturday, when I couldn't sleep late I left my hubby in dreamland and I began the mission of cutting all the pieces for this quilt.  And then last night I started actually putting it all together...  Here's a sneak peak of the fabric and the first square.  I can't wait to see the finished product! :)

Needless to say by the time I went to bed, me and my sewing machine had had a wonderful double date with Grey's Anatomy and The Big Bang Theory... and I went to bed with a smile!

A Record of the Journey...

There are many days when I feel I communicate so much more effectively through written means... when I write, I feel like I can communicate eloquently, I can go back and edit, "tweak" that sentence or that word to make it all flow... when I write, I have the time to process my thoughts and feelings instead of blurting out the first thing that comes to mind or being silent and saying nothing at all for fear of saying the wrong thing...

I have found that over the past many years journaling has been a great outlet for me.  My journals are full of more than just the details of the day, but rather the processing of my heart and mind, prayers, quotes, thoughts on what I've been reading, song lyrics that just grabbed my heart that day... Over the past year I have journaled very little.  It seemed like life just got in the way and I haven't made time for it the way I used to...

Add this to the list of things I want to be different in 2011...

Last Friday I spent the day home sick and when Justin left for a hockey game that evening I thought it best to just stay put rather than sit in a chilly rink for the evening.  I pulled out the "current" journal and read back through many of the entries. I started that particular book I think two and a half years ago and well a lot of life has happened since then!  I had an empty journal waiting on my bookshelf, so in an effort to start new and fresh, I grabbed that journal and decided to make it "me"... this is what I came up with :)  I love it!

 It was nice to be able to just use materials from my stash!

I really like the way the "Top Note" die cut and the cork worked great for this project!

 I thought the inside needed a little something too!

 A new monogram (well new for this journal lol!) and one of my favorite verses: "a season of singing has come..."

I believe that in this year especially, anything is possible...

A Deliberate Attempt...

Last week I stumbled on a blog that was incredibly inspiring... (elise joy) and I think if I lived in California we could be friends! lol!  She's very creative and her blog conveys an overwhelming feeling of joy just for every day living... I'd like to be like that...

In one of her older posts she announced that she was going to be closing her "card a day" blog.  For nearly a year, she took a playing card and created a fun and funky design on the front side of it... sort of a journey through a year of her life.  I admire the commitment it would take to do this every single day, and I'll admit that although that would be uber cool to do, the reality is that I would make myself crazy if I even tried.  But the "ah ha!" thought that came as I finished reading that blog entry was this: what if I tried to make a card a week?  Most weeks that would be totally doable for me...I'm gonna give it a try.  No pressure, just a little more of a deliberate effort to be intentionally creative... so here's the first - a card to send along with a baby gift... it's a little "simple" for my usual tastes but I think it's rather cute... and it matches the color scheme of the gift too (you are free to roll your eyes here!)

We Have Arrived...

...at the mailbox!  Finally, after way too long, we have our thank you cards in the mail.  Being someone who likes to stay on top of the "details", I fretted way much about how long they were taking me to finish...however I finally came to a point where I just accepted that I was delinquent on this project - and I moved on lol!  But it sure does feel great to know they are officially on their way and I can check this project of my list!

Last night when Justin and I were talking about this his comment was, "Well I sure hope we don't have to send out one year anniversary cards - if we do we're screwed, cause we're only 3 months away!"  Made me laugh... as he usually does :)

A Life Well "Created"...

In the past several months I have really been wrestling with the whole concept of being busy vs just being.  I remember my mentor in high school often reminding me, "Don't get so busy in the doing that you forget the being."  And I have really felt challenged to learn how to just "be".  In the past this was not an easy concept for me to wrap my brain around.  I lived to be busy, it felt like that was just who I was.  I was the girl who lived her life in her day planner cause otherwise all the tasks on the "to do" list might not get done, and if every single appointment, assignment, meeting etc was not written down, it would fall through the cracks.  I was so busy that I had to be over-organized (my nickname in college was OCD... lol let's just say I definitely came by it honestly!) otherwise I'd fall apart.  I rarely said no to anyone or anything, and taking care of myself was not high on the priority list.


Even in the past few years I have consistently found myself with several large projects on the go, which often left me feeling overwhelmed and wondering when I'd have some free time to do something other than a quick tidy of our house.  But I don't want to live like this.  I no longer want to have so much on the go that when a friend asks if I'd like to go for Starbucks that we have to plan for two weeks from now cause our calendar is too full.  I am determined to change and that this year is the beginning of a dramatic mind shift...


And I can honestly say the shift has begun...


The chapter of my life as a church bookkeeper has officially been closed.  Justin and I took all the boxes and files to the church office last week... while I'm still sad for the reason of why I'm done, it still feels like a huge weight has been lifted to know that I'm finished.


I know I feel much less overwhelmed when my surroundings are tidy and last week I deliberately puttered in our kitchen for while getting it back to how it should be... really tidying the counters, putting things properly away... let's just say I love a clean counter!


Our wedding thank you cards are so close to being done.  I have made a deliberate choice to quit beating myself up that they weren't out months ago... but life just kinda got in the way, and they got set on a shelf... My goal is to have them out this weekend...(one of those big projects I'll be very happy to check of the "to do" list!)


Last week I was fortunate to spend every night at home... I'm such a homebody so for me this is a serious treat!  Perhaps after the busyness of the holiday season, this is the reason I'm feeling like I have a better grasp on life...


I have had time to spend with friends this week, and I don't feel guilty that I should be working on something else... I am SO grateful for the very special women God has graciously given to me as friends... this week I will have been able to see each of them... and a few others too!


I have taken some time to quilt in the past week... I hadn't done any of that for over a month, it felt good to flip on the switch on my sewing machine...


I made two cards last night... I haven't actually made any cards since last spring - just after our wedding -  it was really nice to be creative and create!  


So in light of all of this, when I came across this quote this morning, I felt like it so encapsulated my heart at this very moment: 

If you want your life to be a magnificent story, 

then begin by realizing that you are the author 

and every day you have the opportunity to write a new page.

-Mark Houlahan

I want to write a magnificent story... but I don't want to just write it...I want to create it with photos, fabric, fun patterns, my computer, scrapbooking....


Here's to the beginning of a life well "created"!