Easy Ramen Noodle Stir Fry

Grrrrr!   Does Spring just not exist anymore?  It is literally snowing outside at my house right now!  Next week is when I planned to plant my garden. I hope Mother Nature will decide which season it is by then! 

Anyway this winter type day made me in the mood for something warm and comforting for dinner.  I saw a recipe a few days ago in one of my many cookbooks using Ramen Noodles in a stir fry.  I have had no luck finding it again.  I just have the image of the picture in my mind.  So I decided to try and figure it out myself using another recipe online as a guide that sort of helped, but it was not exactly what I was looking for so I tweaked it to my liking and it turned out really good :-)    If you are interested here is what I did. Oh and sorry no pictures :-(  My family devoured it before I thought to take a picture.

Ingredients:

2 packages of Ramen Noodles ( I used a combo of oriental flavor and beef flavor)
1 package of frozen stir fry veggies
Meat of your choice. chicken, beef, pork ( I used a lb of ground pork)
1/2 onion (chopped )
water
cornstarch ( 2 tsp)
season salt ( add for flavor)
soy sauce (about a tablespoon)
2 tablespoons oil
1/2 cup of peanuts

First I removed the noodles from the Ramen Noodle packages and boiled them in 2 cups water for 1 minute and took off the heat and drained the water off. 
Then I added 2 tablespoons oil to a saute pan and browned the meat with the chopped onion and sprinkled it with season salt  and about a tablespoon of soy sauce.  Once the meat was browned I added the stir fry veggies. When they started to soften up I sprinkled on the 2 season packets from the  Ramen Noodle packages.
Next I stirred 2 tsp of cornstarch in a cup of cold water and added it to the meat and veggies and seasoning and stirred until It thickened up.  Then I added the noodles to the meat and veggie mixture. I found that my sauce was too thick so I added water a little at a time until it was the nice saucy consistency that I wanted it to be.
 Last I stirred in the peanuts.  Our family also loves to sprinkle those crunchy chow mien noodles on top to give it some extra crunch :-) 

This meal was easy, cheap, and filling!  I will for sure be making it again!

Cute serving apron

So here is one of the finished  half aprons I have been making. 

I am making these aprons for a wedding reception. The serving girls are going to wear them, and they are also going to be their gift for helping serve at the reception. I love the simple black and white with just a touch of green :-)

Projects I want to try!

I have not been doing much crafting lately because I have been focusing on garden stuff, but I am starting to get back in the mood again! 
I found these two projects this morning that I want to try.   It is funny because they are both sewing projects and I always claim that I am not a very good sewing person, but I keep getting attracted to these cute projects!

First I love this coin purse at Paws and Thread.

She has a tutorial to show you how to make it.  I (as usual) am going to make some changes and cut some corners.  Instead of pleats I think I will gather the bottom half instead.

Next I love this ruffle purse!  It reminds me of my ruffle aprons.  Especially the little half aprons I am making right now for my friend.

You can find this purse here  If you want the pattern for this one I think you have to buy it, but I am going to try and figure it out myself.  I have this inner part of me that always yells out "I can do that!"  I rarely buy others craft items because I love the challenge of trying to make them myself.

I actually am posting this later then the first half of this post.  I found another tutorial that shows the gathering idea for the clutch purse that I was talking about.  You can find it at From an Igloo. 

Dotty and Daisy May went to the land down under!

My Etsy store lately has been sadly neglected :-(  I have not added any new stuff for a while.
 All my Nativity puzzles ( my most popular item at my store) are all sold out, and I need to make more.
I want to add more variety at my store, but I have been distracted by gardening and other projects lately.
I have however had  some of my little peg dolls on there for quite a while now.

  I had pretty much given up hope that anyone else thought my little Garden Girls were as special and worth buying as I thought they were, but a special someone finally did!  Daisy May and Dotty had a long journey  all the way to Australia :-)  I was sad to say good bye to them, but I am excited to think that these little peg dolls that I made all the way over here in Utah ended up having a home all the way to the land down under!  I also made this cute little box to package them in. I got the little box from the dollar store.  I modge podged scrapbook paper on it.  I think it turned out really cute :-)

Thanks Elyse  if you are reading this. for taking interest in my Peg Dolls and for your kind words :-) It has inspired me to make some more!  Right now though I am going to be busy making 8 serving aprons for my friend Donna, for her daughter's wedding reception.  These aprons will be like my like my  flour sack aprons with ruffles, but they will be half aprons instead of full.  Her fabric she picked out is really cute so I am excited to see how they turn out!

Happy Crafting!

kneaders Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies!

I love these cookies!  I have been craving them a lot lately!  And I rationalize with myself that they are healthy because they have pumpkin in them and I add oatmeal (fiber right?) to mine.  The recipe calls for 2 cups flour so I replace one of those cups of flour with oatmeal instead.  I also usually double the recipe.   So I made them yesterday and ate more then I should have :-(  but I guess there are worse treats I could eat right!  I got the recipe from Good Things Utah (A morning show here in Utah) a couple of years ago. Here is the link to the recipe.

Magnet Pin Dish

I found a  good solution for my sewing pins:-)

 I had the regular stuffed tomato that everyone has, but I really wanted one of those magnet pin dishes that the really serious people that sew have! 

I found two cute silver dessert dishes at the thrift store the other day.  I knew exactly what I wanted to do with them :-)  I put a strong magnet on the bottom  of each of them ( I did not even have to glue the magnet because it stuck onto the metal) and ta da! I had a Magnetic Pin Dish!

 It has been a huge help to me.  No more pins all over the place! I have one by my sewing machine and I have one at my cutting table.

"Put The Castle In First!"

I thought you all would like this wonderful analogy my friend Valerie made about  her daughter's Toy Castle.  I hope you enjoy her thoughts as much as I did.  Thanks Valerie for your wonderful insight as always :-)

Put The Castle In First

My daughter Kenzington has a darling little Disney play set. It has a tiny little version of many of the rides you would find at Disneyland (including teacups!) and lots of teeny tiny Disney Characters. The set also has an amazing castle. Kenz stores this set in a snap-top box that is just the right size. In fact, it is so perfectly sized for the set that if the pieces don't go in just right, the lid won't go on and close. She often attempts to put the set away and ends up very frustrated! Things just aren't working! She can't get it all in and get the lid on. Then I hear myself saying to her,
"Put the castle in first, the rest will fit in around it."

I'm guessing you already know what I'm getting at here; how this all relates to life, but perhaps, if only for myself, I need to clap it all out and finish drawing the analogy. Bear with me now!

We came to this earth for a number of reasons:

To get a body

To be tested

To have children

To fulfill a purpose

The overall goal of life is to live worthy to return to our Father in Heaven.
I think that SOMETIMES we get mixed up and mistake real life for a real life version of the GAME of LIFE. You know- the board game where the overall goal is:

to zip through school

to get the best job

to fill your car with family

to fill your bank account!

to sell the skunk farm!

to retire in Millionaire Estates or Countryside Acres.

REAL LIFE has to include many of those things, (hopefully not the skunk farm!) which is partly why it's easy to get mixed up about what REAL LIFE'S overall goal is. We spend so much time trying to make the journey through life better that we forget to move toward the REAL overall goal. In fact, many times we've forgotten what the REAL overall goal is and we're not going anywhere at all, just winding back and forth like on the board-game.

So here it comes- the secret to doing it right:

PUT THE CASTLE IN FIRST!

The Castle is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is attending ALL of our church meetings. It is repenting when we mess up. It is studying our scriptures and praying. It is having family home evening. It is attending the temple. It is serving other people. It is reminding others, some who might not even know about the castle, to put it in first.

And guess what?

When we put it in first, all the other little WORTH-WHILE things that are also a part of this experience we call LIFE fit in around it.