Pumpkin Spice Latte [at Home!]

Three magical words when said together: Pumpkin. Spice. Latte.
Don't you just feel more relaxed already?!?
It's getting cooler outside, and I'm getting cozier inside, and coziness requires warm drinks, knitted blankets, and good books (in my opinion).
I already have the last two, so I thought I'd work on one of the classic fall drinks for my indoor evenings.

I found a few recipes that I liked, and amalgamated slash adjusted them so that they were just the way I like it: tasty and easy :)

Ingredients: 

Fresh brewed coffee (of your choice - I used decaf!)

1 1/2 Tbsp. Pumpkin pie filling

1/2 cup Milk

1 Tsp. Brown sugar

Optional [in others' view] Topping: 

Whipped Cream

Cinnamon

Nutmeg

Directions: 

1. Brew coffee of your choice
2. Whisk together pumpkin pie filling, brown sugar, and milk
3. Warm up whisked product and froth the milk (if you have a frother)
4. Pour milk mixture into your favourite fall mug, and fill up the rest of the space with coffee
5. If you want topping (which you should!) add whipped cream on top and sprinkle with cinnamon and nutmeg

Everyone we've served this to so far has liked it :) 

If you're making it for more than one person, just double, triple, etc. the recipe!

Enjoy! 

{yumm}

Craft Organizing

I know it's far from spring, but my strange urge to cleanse led me to organizing my craft supplies. 

You can see some of my upcycling projects from this post and this post in the shelves below too!

Here are the ribbon holders I made. 

I originally only made one, but then I liked it so much, and I had a ton more ribbon, so I bought a second and painted it in a different shade of blue :)

More organized craft supplies: 

Notice the painted magazine holders in the background? Now storing scrapbook paper, sheets of sticker letters, & pretty odds and ends.

My upcycled storage tins have been put to good use too :)

Finally, I can scrapbook & craft in an organized, much more peaceful space :)

{xoxo}

Spaghetti Squash Pasta and Zucchini Salad

Remember these veggies?? 

Well we got more of them! 

I made some new meals and side dishes with them already, but this time wanted to try something new again. 

First stop: Zucchini Parmesan Salad.

Ingredients:

1 medium zucchini

zest and juice from 1/2 lemon

2 tablespoon olive oil

pinch salt and freshly cracked black pepper

a dash of basil (or a handful of fresh leaves if you have them!)

a block of parmesan cheese (And Don’t worry, I am not going to use the whole block)

 

Directions:

1. Make the lemon vinaigrette- in a mixing bowl, whisk together the lemon juice, lemon zest, and extra virgin olive oil. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside.

2. Using a vegetable peeler, shave the zucchini into ribbons. You should stop the peeling when you see the “core” and “seeds” of the zucchini. Place the zucchini ribbons in the mixing bowl; toss them with the lemon vinaigrette gently.

3. Add basil and mix them with the zucchini. Top with shaved Parmesan cheese and some more freshly cracked black pepper. Serve. Enjoy!!

Then came time for spaghetti squash pasta! 

Ingredients:

1 spaghetti squash

pasta sauce of your choice

parmesan cheese

Directions:

1. Bake the spaghetti squash. I have a weak wrist that doesn't enjoy cutting large uncooked veggies, so I poked holes all over the squash and put it on a baking sheet in the oven at 350F for approx. an hour.

2. Add pasta sauce. I usually make my own (the hour of baking would provide ample time for this!), but this time I just added a pre-made one.

3. When spaghetti squash is baked (should be soft to the touch with a fork), cut it in half. Scoop out the seeds and discard them. Then scoop up the delicious spaghetti squash noodles! Serve with sauce. Sprinkle parmesan on top. Enjoy!!

This made for another delicious fresh garden meal!
The spaghetti was actually SUPER filling too - I was surprised and definitely unable to eat my whole meal. 

I think everyone (except me) may have eaten this before, but if not, give it a try!

{yumm}

27 Years Young

This weekend flew by in a whirlwind!

So much birthday excitement :) 

I was overwhelmed by the number of people that called, texted, messaged, sent cards, etc. 

Although I love you all, the most special call came from my Opa and Oma. 

93 (almost 94) years young and he still remembers to call on my birthday! 

It's hard being so far from many family and friends on days like this where you want to celebrate with loved ones, but I felt the love all the way from Ontario anyway :)

Especially from my Dad who was actually able to make the trip here at the last minute! 

Here are some snippets from the birthday meals, games, and treats that we shared this weekend:

Bling that topped my homemade birthday cake!

Homemade ice cream cake from Mom!

Pretty sure Joop was just as happy to have Dad around as I was!

Wooden shoes!! Beautifully Dutch gift for baby V :)

Mr. A wrapped and labeled a beautiful gift. He even took pictures of it ahead of time! He knows me sooo well :)

Playing with my birthday gift! Not the game... the camera lens! New macro lens from my husband!

Carrot cake for another birthday dinner with Dad :) (also, more macro lens fun...)

Adorable baby gifts! Who doesn't want an owl rattle!

New boots from Dad :) Apparently I'm gonna need comfy slip on boots in the coming months!

Beautiful birthday weather.

All dressed up :) 

We actually got all spiffed up twice this weekend! Once to go out for a surprise dinner and play from Mr. A and then again for a friends' wedding.

Thanks for all the birthday love - I had an amazing weekend!
Feeling very blessed :) 

{xoxo}

My Weekend Via Instagram

This weekend went by in a flash! 

I haven't had a minute to soak it all in yet... 

My Dad came to GP for a quick visit, I started some fall crafts, I watched two good friends get married, I enjoyed the warm weather outside, I had delicious meals out, and I turned 27! 

Pretty sure 27's gonna be a good year :)

Thank you to everyone for your birthday wishes, messages, texts and cards! 

More birthday pics to come :) 

{xoxo}

Scrapbooking

I may have gone on a bit of a scrapbooking marathon lately...

I ordered a chunk of new supplies and papers and I was very anxious to get using them - so I did!

Here are a few of the pages I recently finished: 

This one is going to be the title page for my 2012-2013 scrapbook.

I love the "home" stamps and I hadn't gotten around to

And then there were wedding pages... 

I could probably say that I'm done my 13 of 13 goal to make a wedding scrapbook - but there are still a few moments I want to capture :)

I used my new artbooking cartridge on my cricut to design/make this page. I was quite happy with the end result!

This next layout uses CTMH huntington paper (so does the above one!).

It says "It's a good day to have a good day" along the side.

One more layout to show off some of the handy work that my husband and I did to decorate for the wedding. I used the artbooking cartridge to make these pages too :)

Thoughts??

{xoxo}

Taste of Autumn

I L-O-V-E the fall. 

It is easily my favourite season.

I love the temperatures, the colours, the leaves falling, pumpkins, apples, & cinnamon. 

What's not to love?!?

Our fall came with handfuls of fresh apples from mom's tree - perfect baking apples!

Clearly I put these apples to good use :) 

Apple pie was first on the agenda.

Then, since we had more crust, and more apples - mini individual apple pies were made too :)

We shared the goodness with neighbours and family. 

My mother-in-law told me the crust was as good as hers! Wow - that's a compliment!

Unfortunately I didn't snap any photos til after... but here are the leftovers!

Two slivers of pie, and one mini pie :)

Since we still had more apples to spare we also baked some quick apple cinnamon pancakes for breakfast!
I just used my normal pancake recipe and threw in the apples and probably a tsp of cinnamon.
Pancakes are the easiest breakfast because they are so quick to make, you can add virtually anything to liven them up, and they're made with simple ingredients that I always have lying around my kitchen! 

Even without whipped cream, these pancakes were delicious!

I'm sure there are more fall treats coming - I haven't even gotten the pumpkin out yet!

{yumm}