How to store nuts....so they keep longer

We just took a little trip to St George a few weeks ago, and when we go I always stop at a great little family ran pecan business.  The Thompson Family pecan farm- in Hurricane, UT. I don't know about you, but I love pecans-- and these are so fresh.  They have a larg bag 38 oz. of chopped pecans for $20.00 and that's the one I always buy. So today I thought I would share with you how to keep those nuts fresh longer-- at that price, you want to be able to enjoy all of them without any waste. 

All you have to do is store them in the freezer!!  It helps to preserve their nautral oils so they won't go rancid. It's a simple thing to do and they will keep a year in the freezer.  Well, maybe I should say mine never last a year.. we eat them faster than that, but they will stay good for up to a year.  When you're ready to use them just scoop them out- no need to thaw before using!!

Camping Printables

Here are the printables from our camping party!

If you download them, PLEASE follow our blog in return, thanks!
Banner Banner 2 Hunt Tags toppers.pdf Treat Toppers Welcome to Camp


These printable were made with the kit the great outdoors by gg digital designs. Be sure to go and pick up the kit!

Back Yard Campout!!

It was our Back Yard Campout this last week-end.  We did it for play day, only EVERYONE was envited.... and YES we had so much FUN!!

Welcome to Camp Hamblin....

The TREAT table

I filled tin buckets with frogs, bears, rocks, sticks, trail mix, popcorn, and licorice.  I picked the buckets up at Target, they have a chalk board square to write on- but I thought tags would be cuter and... you can print them off to use for your campout too



I wrapped the utinsels in camo napkins, covered mason jars with a paper label.. trees for the girls and camo for the boys. Put a fun jar lid & straw in them & you are good to go.



It wouldn't be a campout.... without s'mores and keep scrolling down to find a yummy new twist on the S'mores....

here are the jar drinking glasses... the little boys had a different colored strip of fabric tied around theirs.... the aduts had bigger jars with their inital on them. so they could keep track of their glass

the perfect topper for fishing....  we have the free printable for you too!  don't mind the colors, my printer had about had it & the color was fading-- but the little guys still loved them, they are more concerned about what's inside-- lol



I made a "Welcome to camp" board for the center piece on the table.. it says "Welcome to camp Hamblin"



Hobo sticks with a snack tied up in them for the scavenger hunt

I used to make these for my Boy's-- in fact I remember having them at one of MY Girls camps as a child!  They go way back--


close up of the labels on the cans... I had some other stickers and such in my stash... so I used them too!



trail mix... on these buckets I put a piece of paper behind the tag- it just adds a little bit more color to it!

scavenger hunt cans.  I wrapped a soup can with paper and glued the list onto the can- we left a couple of blank lines so you can fill in with other things you are hunting for!!

we played glow in the dark ring toss...  just put a couple of glowsticks into a bottle of water..it was a fun game, but they ended up carring the bottles around like a lantern all night.

we did cook s'mores on the fire, but these are my new favorite thing to roast.... rolo stuffed marshmallows  oh can you say yummmm?

Jars full of Fire flies, for them to put in the tent for a night light. Just use glow in the dark paint.... 

and hold them up to a flash light... and you have glowing fire flies. when I gave them to them in the tent, they were so excited & asked if they were real-- I said look they are glowing-- one of them replied- hey look they aren't moving!! I said they were tired & it was time for them to go to sleep with the fireflies--  Then I heard one of them whisper-- hey I think they're painted on!! LOL Yep they are getting smarter... but they still played along with Grandma!!

ready for the scavanger hunt... yes they were Happy Campers!!!

enjoying a piece of summer.... watermellon.  I will get the free Campout printables posted as soon as Jamie gets the files to me... she was making a couple of adjustments to them.. LOVE that I can tell her what I want and she does it !! Thanks Jamie.  Hopefully they will be ready for you today sometime!!  Until then get planning a campout at your house too!!  It was a lot of work-- but it was MORE fun!! They grow up too fast love them while you can!!

Getting ready for our Campout party

I am working on a few things for our campout party--- and as you can see I've got a BIG mess and a little helper too!!  We are having a family weekend... so you won't be hearing from me for a few days, but I promise you'll be in for a treat on Monday when I post how it all turned out.  So until then.. get outside enjoy the weather and so something good today!!  I don't know who is more excited about the party, me or the kids!!! 

Don't fry sausage... bake it!

I don't cook sausage very often, first because it's not a great food for you and second because it's a pain to fry.  The grease is always splattering all over & you really have to watch it.  So I decided to try baking it in the oven, and it worked perfect.  Just place the sausage on a cookie sheet and put it in the oven at 375 for 30 minutes.  I turned it once- and then put them on a paper towel to drain the grease off.  So much easier that frying them!!

I'm all about easy!  :)

Squash Bugs!!

Our garden has been doing so good-- the zucchini plants have produced a lot already, we love them!  But tonight when we went out to check on things....... we found SQUASH BUGS!!!

This is what our plant looked like yesterday

and this is what it looked like today, really it happens that fast.  Clair knew what was wrong with one look at this plant- it's happened before....

YEP!!! We've got squash bugs, and they can take out a plant in a couple of days.  If your plant looks like it is dying, turn the leaves over and look on the back side of them.  These are squash bug eggs, and we found them on A LOT of the leaves.  

 Instead of spraying the whole plant to kill them, we've found the best thing to do is cut the leaves off and dispose of them.  You don't want the eggs to hatch or you will have BIG trouble in your garden.  Clair found one adult bug, but by the time I went in to get the camera he smashed it.  What was he thinking? lol I wish I could show you what they look like because if you find them on your plants you want to get them off.  Anyway within a couple of days the plant will be as good as new- and the leaves grow back too.    

Here is a post update!!  We found one of the bugs tonight , this is what they look like.  Ugly- and they can take out a plant in a day!! So watch for them.

How to clean your coil stove

So I told you yesterday about the bar keepers friend! I couldn't stop just there! I had to try it on my cracked stained stove! Just look at the difference!

 Have I sold you yet on the product?

I pretty much used the same method as my tub!

1. I took out all of our coils.
2. Sprayed water on the stove in a spray bottle to get everything wet
3. Sprinkled a thin layer of the magic cleaner on the wet surfaces.
4. Lightly rubbed in the product with a dish scrubber.
5. Rinsed the product off
6. Amazing clean stove with no sweat and blood!

Seriously give it a try you'd be amazed by the price of the product and how well it cleans!

How to clean your bathtub!

I can't believe that I'm letting the blogging world see how nasty my bathtub was! But yeah it was pretty gross! I've heard about this magic cleaner a few times and was skeptical to give it a go! I mean I tried everything to get my grippers cleaned on the tub. Apparently I wasn't trying the right cleaner. Here is the before and after!

 This magical cleaner is the most amazing stuff ever! No deep scrubbing! Pretty much just pure amazing!

This is what I did to clean my tub...

1. I took out all of our shampoos and body washes.
2. Turned the shower on to get everything wet
3. Sprinkle a thin layer of the magic cleaner on the wet surfaces.
4. Lightly rubbed in the product with a dish scrubber.
5. Turned on the shower again to rinse
6. Amazing clean shower with no sweat and blood!

Seriously give it a try you'd be amazed by the price of the product and how well it cleans! Click here to get some delivered right to your door! Thank you amazon

UPDATE: They have recently come out with a wet version and I really really like this just as much!

S'mores on a stick

Here's another way to make S'mores!!!  Put them on a stick... these are really easy to do, we made them for Christmas last year too.

All you  need are Graham crackers- the flat marshmallows, sticks, chocolate and some sprinkles.
Break your graham cracker in 1/2 so you have 4 squares on each half. Place a flat marshmallow in between the two graham crackers- cook in the microwave a few seconds to melt the marshmallow, it will hold the stick better.  Insert a stick, the flat ones like popsicle sticks work better. Let them set-up a little before dipping them.  Take each one and dip into melted chocolate, lay on parchment paper & sprinkle with decorating sprinkles.  When dry wrap in clear bags & tie with a cute ribbon!! 

Fall Bridal Shower for Megan

I know it's only July, but I have been trying to get my house organized a little more- and I came across these pictures of the Bridal Shower I had for my youngest sons wife Megan-- 2 years ago!!! Oh how time flies by.

I made glitter pumpkins, oh how I LOVE them-- almost as much as I love JARS.  Really I think I made 30 of them, but they have been used over the last 3 years by MANY people for MANY parties... so it was justified. LOL :)

we just had a buffet style set-up with soups, breadsticks and treats!!

see these are the glitter pumpkins-- aren't lovely!!  I first started glittering REAL pumpkins for a service project while I was the Young Womens President in my ward.  The girls loved to make them & deliver them to people in rest homes. But I decided to use fake ones, and then I could re-use them .... you can use really cheap ugly ones, because you can't tell what they looked like when you're finished.   

for the favor, I just had 3 large jars full of: Muddy Buddys, chex mix, and a mix of peanuts & candy corn. (it tastes like a salted nut roll)  for the guest to fill up bags with to take home 

this was the tag we made up for the treat table.....

each jar had ribbon & a tag attached so they would know what was in each one

pumpkins were all over the house... I had them displayed really cute on my mantel-- but I must not have taken a picture of it.   They are very easy to make-- just add a bit of water to elmers glue- to thin it out a little, and brush it onto the pumpkin. It's best to just do 1/2 of the pumpkin at a time and then sprinkle glitter all over the glue,  paint the stem & embellish with ribbon and leaves.   I might have to do a tutorial one day next week..  Now is a good time to get planning for those fall parties or decorating!!

Bite Size S'mores

We have had the sick bug going around our whole family the last few days, so last night the two oldest Grandsons ( the only well ones in their family) spent the night at Grandma's -- and we decided to sleep out on the deck.  So Grandpa drug the mattress out and all 4 of us slept out under the stars!  It was a fun night-- but what is a sleep over without a TREAT?  I had seen these made at cookingclassy.blogspot.com and thought I would try them. I did a different version than she did-- Much easier than cutting the crackers into circles... and they taste just as good. 

I had the flat square marshmallows- so I just broke the graham crackers apart into squares place them on a cookie sheet, and put one of the marshmallows on each one.  You have to strech them a little to make them fit perfect. Then we put Hersheys kisses, and miniture candy bars on top.  Put them in the oven on broil until the marshmallows start to turn a golden brown.  Then watch them dissapear.  

How to clean a Front Loading HE Washer

Does your front loading washer ever start to smell musty or like mildew?  After I had mine for a few months I noticed this horrible smell in mine, and so I started searching to find where it was coming from.  This is what I found & what I do to prevent it from happening......

How to clean your Front Loading Washer....

first separate the rubber flap in the front like this-- yuck, see that gross gunk in the bottom of it?  It never dries out, so after awhile it starts to get moldy and smells really bad.

take a paper towel and wipe down inside of it-- do it a couple of times to get all the water out

and this is what you end up with--- after I have wiped it out really good, then I take a paper towel and spray it with pine-sol or another disinfectant and wipe it out again-- No more mildew! I try to do this after each load, but I hadn't done it for a couple of times, and it was pretty bad.  There's your tip for Tuesday-- it doesn't make laundry any more fun, but it does make breathing a little better! :)

Zucchini Bread

If you have all those yellow or green vegetables taking over the garden... here's a GREAT recipe to help you make something YUMMY with them.  Zucchini Bread!!  I have 100 different recipes, but I tried this one from Paula Deen on food network-- and it's a keeper.

the bread turned out very moist and yummy.  I added pecans to it, which made it extra good!!  Here's the recipe for you... Happy baking!!

leave me a comment with your email address if you would like the recipe card to print out on a 4x6 photo for your book.

Lemon Cream Cake

Are there any Lemon lovers out there??  Well, have I got a great recipe for you!!! I LOVE this cake, it is so moist & refreshing- I first tasted it at a Pampered Chief party, and oh my it is divine!  And did I say quick?  It's ready in 14 minutes!  You cook it in the microwave--  

Here's what you will need:

A cake mix, eggs and lemon pie filling-  to make the yummy glaze you use sugar, lemon juice and butter.......

14 minutes you have this! ENJOY

go here to grab recipe



Get Organized!!

A few months ago I did some organizing around the house-- a few simple things that have made a huge difference, here's what I did..... 

The first one is inside the cabinet next to my oven.  I have a drawer FULL of hot pads.... too many in one drawer, so I put a 3M hook on the inside of the cabinet door and hung a couple of them there.  I love this and use them a lot- they are very easy to grab. 

The next one is probably my FAVORITE!!! I have serveral sets of measuring spoons--  I am always trying to sort through them to find the one I need.  This is brillant... again I used very small 3M hooks- I think they were for keys.  They are perfect to hold a single measuring spoon on each one, you can tell at a glance which spoon you  need.  

 This one is a close second to my FAVORITE!!!   Are you always trying to fish out the tweezers in your make-up bag?  Well here is the answer.. hot glue a strong magnet onto the inside of your medicine cabinet & wah-lah you have tweezers right where you can find them every time!  Love this one!!   The Razor is held by a pencil holder-- they work great for tooth brushes too! 

And the last one is a very bright idea!!   I actually bought this flashlight and it had the magnets already on the back-- And it cost me a lot of money too!  Well, the store was closing so everything was at least 50% off-- but you can make your own out of any flashlight, for hardly anything.  Just glue a heavy duty magnet onto the back of any flash light & put it on your breaker box-- in case of an emergency you will always have a flashlight handy.
Well, there are a few ideas for you to be thinking about this week--- it's amazing how small changes can make the biggest difference!!  Makes life a bit easier!!   Good-Luck. :)