The best of 2010!

We've had such a good time this year!!

Thank you so much for keeping up with us, leaving us comments and featuring us on your own blogs! We truly appreciate you!! Because what fun would it be to do all of this and have no one read it??

So here's a recap of your favorite projects of 2010!

Colorful Bird Canvas

This was the the Pottery Barn look-alike that Tiffany decoupaged for her girls' room.

Lindsay's "New" House

Remember Lindsay's house transformation??

Absolutely beautiful!

Living Room Rearrange

With your help, we re-arranged Tiffany's living room!

Board & Batten

Lindsay taught us how to do board & batten. So impressive!

Fabulous shutters

And she turned these junk-yard shutters into a beautiful kitchen centerpiece!

You're favorite recipe was the Chocolate Chip Dip. Yum!

And your favorite Quick Change were the white pumpkins.

Then we wrapped up the year with some present topiaries!

Whew!! We've had fun!

Join us in 2011 for a whole new slew of projects and decorating ideas!! We can't wait!

Lindsay & Tiffany

(Recipe) Chocolate Cupcakes

Do you need a dessert for that New Year's Eve party that you're going to? Try these bite-size chocolate cupcakes! I've taken them to many events and they're always a crowd favorite!

Ingredients:

Devil's Food Chocolate cake mix + whatever it calls for (water, oil, eggs, etc)

8 oz creme cheese

2 cups chocolate morsels

1/3 cup of sugar

1 extra egg

Directions:

Mix cake mix by "back of the box" directions

-Separately- Mix creme cheese, sugar & egg and blend until smooth

Fold in morsels

Grease mini-muffin pan

Alternate cake mix and creme cheese mix until 3/4 full

Bake 15 minutes (or use toothpick test) at 350

Enjoy!!

My favorite Christmas gift!

What was your favorite Christmas gift this year??

Mine is this personalized flower pot! Don't you love it??

It was a gift from my mom & it was love at first sight.

She bought it from Christmas in Cowtown (a holiday market in Ft Worth). I'll definitely be making a trip to that show next year!

This picture just doesn't do it justice.

It's 12 inches tall and could probably hold anything from magaizines to firewood. I just haven't figured out what I want to put in it yet. Any suggestions??

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas from That Village House!

We pray that you're able to spend today with family, friends and loved ones. May God's blessings be yours this Christmas season.

Today, in the town of David, a Savior has been born to you:

He is Christ the Lord.

~Luke 2:11

{Recipe} Chicken Spaghetti

This chicken spaghetti is unlike most I've seen/cooked before. How many have you seen with the Rotel? I love those versions but I like that this is just as tasty and doesn't have a bit of rotel in it!

Gather your ingredients:
8 oz package of spaghetti
2 cups grated cheddar
4 TBSP parmesan cheese
2 cups cooked, diced chicken (I used 3 chicken breasts)
1 can of cream of chicken
1 can of cream of mushroom
1 can of chicken broth

Cook & Drain spaghetti. Combine 1 cup cheddar & 2 TBSP Parmesan with all other ingredients. Toss with spaghetti. Place in greased casserole & sprinkle with the remaining cheese. Cook covered 45 min @ 350*.

I hope you enjoy this alternative to the typical chicken spaghetti!!

(Recipe) Maw Maw's Pecan Pie

Do you need a pie recipe for this Saturday?

If you're like me, you cook pies about twice a year, Thanksgiving and Christmas...

So if you need something easy and delicious, try this pecan pie. It's a family recipe, passed down from my husband's great-grandmother and it's worth it's weight in gold! I set this pie out last weekend, ran to get my camera & this is what was left when I returned. It's that good!!

Ingredients:

4 eggs

1 cup sugar

1 cup white Karo syrup

1 cup pecans

2 Tbsp margarine (softened, not melted)

1 tsp vanilla

1 deep dish pie crust

Directions: Beat the eggs (not to foamy). Add sugar, syrup & butter and beat with a spoon until well mixed. It will still be a little lumpy. Add vanilla and the pecans. I use more pecans than it calls for because who doesn't love pecans?? Poke the pie crust with a fork and pour mix into the crust.

Bake at 400 for 5 minutes and then turn down the oven to 350 and bake for another 50-55 minutes. It's done when the top cracks. It may still be a little giggly.

Enjoy!!

Seriously, it's delicious! Your family will LOVE it!

Cookie Exchange Party

There's only 1 week left until Christmas!!

Have you made Christmas cookies yet??

Some girlfriends helped me throw a cookie exchange party, so I had to break from my annual slice & bake tradition. And I'm so glad I did!! The #1 rule of the party is that your cookies have to be homemade. So while my cookies weren't the prettiest or the tastiest, I had the wonderful benefit of sampling everyone else's!! Check out some of these cookies!! Yum!!

This was my first cookie exchange party, so I kept the rules simple.

#1 The cookies have to be homemade

#2 You need to bring 3 dozen cookies

#3 You need to provide your own platter to display them on.

It was a great success!

We had the ladies draw numbers and break up into groups of 5 so that there wasn't a mad rush to the cookie table. And we provided cookie boxes from Hobby Lobby for everyone to take home their goodies. It was a fun excuse for ladies to get together and required little to no effort to organize.

Have you thrown a cookie party?

Do you have other ideas for us to use next year??

{Recipe} Chewy Chocolate Cookies

These cookies are OH SO GOOD!! I made these on a whim a while back and my husband loved them. So, when I was getting ready for a cookie swap he told me I needed to make these! The only problem is they make a LOT so be prepared to gain a few pounds... or give them away!!

Gather your ingredients:
2 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cocoa
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 sticks of butter or margarine, softened
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
10 oz pkg peanut butter chips

1. Heat oven to 350*
2. Stir together flour, cocoa, baking soda & salt. Beat butter & sugar in a large bowl with mixer until fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well. Gradually add flour mixture, beating well. Stir in peanu butter chips.
3. Drop by rounded teaspoons onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 8-9 minutes. Do not overbake; cookies wil be soft. They will puff while baking and flatten while cooling. Cool slightly; remove from cookie sheet to wire rack. Cool completely. About 4 1/2 dozen cookies.

Enjoy with a big glass of milk! Yum yum!



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A Few of My Favorite Things

It's not too late!

Merry Christmas from my family! And a shameless plug for one of our sponsors which happens to be yours truly!


It's not too late to send out a cute, personalized family Christmas card. I started designing Christmas cards, invitations, and announcements last year as a hobby and decided that I'd give it a go as a real business. I LOVE LOVE LOVE it!!! It is my most favorite job that I've ever had. Here is a small sampling of some of this years families who were lovely enough to use me as their card creator!

If you are a procrasinator or just haven't found the perfect card for your family I'd love to help you out. You can often get the card image as SAME DAY SERVICE and if you choose to have the cards printed for you they ship next day! You have three options for purchase.

1. Buy the .jpg or .pdf image for $12

2. Order panel cards from me at $1.32 per card (including envelopes)

3. Order photo paper cards from me at $1.00 per card

Check out my new Etsy store to see some of my designs. Custom creations are always welcome! If you have birthday parties, birth announcements and other invitations coming up I would love to assist you with those as well.

Like I said... shameless plug for my own business. Thank you for flattering me by reading this post! You're the best.

Snowman Soup

Do you need a cute idea for neighbor gifts, teacher gifts, babysitters, etc? Kierste at Brown Paper Packages had this cute idea so I took it and ran with it. I'm so thankful for crafty people who share their ideas for people like me to copy!

I put two packages of hot cocoa mix, two thin mint candies, a handful of marshmallows and two candy canes in a treat bag. I attached these cute cards that I modeled after Kierste's with ribbon and VOILA! A cute and inexpensive gift for friends and neighbors.

These are the little tags I made to attach to the bags. If you're interested in downloading them, you can do that HERE.

Or you can click on the picture and save as a .jpg image.

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Someday Crafts
Trendy Treehouse

Christmas Home Tour #2

Tiffany showed you her beautiful Christmas tour yesterday... and I'll admit... I hate to follow that! :) But, so you can see how the other half of That Village House is doing Christmas... Here it goes.

I went VERY simple this year on the mantle. In fact if you take a look at my Fall mantle NOTHING moved! I just replaced the fall things with Christmas things.

I've already shown you my tree and the story it tells.

My coffee filter wreath has a new home for the holidays. I got this great wreath stand from our girls trip to Canton.



As I envisioned when I did these shutters my wreath works out great.

Our yearly frames find their home this year on our built in cabinets in the dining room. If you look closely it looks like I'm a year behind on printing a photo! This is me... love me or leave me. :)

Another Canton find I just added Poinsettias to for my front door.

So this tree was supposed to remain undecorated except the lights. My husband and the kids got a hold of it while I was inside decorating the other tree. Since the kids are 4 and almost 3 I couldn't stand to break their hearts by taking all the balls and garland down. They were so proud of what they'd done!


I was inspired by the beautiful wreaths in Pottery Barn last year so my mom and I created this one. I love it (and the price)!!


Our Santa pictures line the piano. We see the same Santa every year which makes it fun to display them all together.

So, my decor is a little on the plain side this year. Maybe I'll hit some after Christmas sales and do more next year. I made a decision to get rid of every piece of decor that I didn't either love or use. And I'm left with the bare minimum. The good news is that Goodwill will be getting a donation from me pretty soon!


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