Waffled Cheesesteaks

You've probably heard of Meatless Monday and Taco Tuesday, but have you heard of Waffled Wednesday?  I came up with the idea of Waffled Wednesday after I was looking for ideas for my meal plan and my husband asked "What haven't we waffled?" I thought maybe I was original with coming up with this idea, but it turns out I'm not the first. Oh well.  

For the First Waffled Wednesday in our house, I took my husband's suggestion and did waffled cheesesteaks.

Ingredients:

Pizza Dough (I used this recipe)

1 pound ground meat (I used turkey)

1 green pepper - diced

1 onion - diced

1 cup sliced mushrooms

1 cup beef broth

1 T flour

1 c mozzarella - shredded

ground black pepper

olive oil

flour

1. Brown the ground turkey with the onion, green pepper and mushrooms until meat is no longer pink.
2. Add the flour and stir then add the broth
3. Cook until thickened
4. Plug in your waffle iron to preheat
5. Dust the counter with flour and roll a portion of the dough out so that it is about twice the size of your waffle iron you want it to be about the thickness of a thin pizza crust.
6. Put some meat filling on half of the pizza crust
7. Top with cheese
8. Fold over the other half of the dough and roll up the edges (the "top" will be the side where the edges are rolled)
9. Brush the top with olive oil
10. Flip it on to a plate, pizza peel (or something similar) so that the oiled side is down.
11. Brush the bottom side with oil
12. Flip it onto your waffle iron so that the top is up again (by doing it this way, if anything cooks out of the edges it is less likely to stick to the waffle iron)
    
    
    
13. Close the waffle iron and cook it until the dough is done. If your waffle iron is like mine, you may need to flip it over so that the side near the hinge changes because that side cooks faster than the outer edge.  If you need to do that, wait until the dough is cooked enough to be crisp/firm.
14. Repeat with the rest of the dough and filling. 

Tip: Put the finished Cheesesteaks on a cookie sheet in a warm oven to keep warm while you make the rest.

All Good Things Must Come to an End

The final Iron Craft Challenge was announced a few weeks ago. I knew it would happen eventually, I was just hoping for another year though so that I could participate a little more.  Unfortunately, much like my blogging, my crafting has taken the back seat to other things in my life lately.

However, after doing so many of the Iron Craft Challenges, I couldn't let this last final one go uncompleted, especially given that it occurred over the holidays when I actually had a bit of time to craft!  So, even though I was out of town, I headed to Joann Fabrics and picked up some supplies to work on the challenge.

Originally I was going to do a bracelet to wear New Years Eve when I went out to dinner.  I was thinking something similar to this only crocheted.  So I found this lace pattern and set to work.

However, after I got it completed and blocked, I decided that I didn't really like it as a bracelet. I think it's actually better suited as a bookmark.

So, there you have it. My final Iron Craft Challenge project.  I'm sad to see the challenge end. I loved the idea of it and enjoyed seeing what everyone created.  It surprised me that I reached a point where I could recognize someone's crafts just from the picture without seeing their name attached to it.  So while I will miss the challenges, I understand that it's time for it to end and I thank the ladies at Just Crafty Enough for all their work.

Ear pins

A few weeks ago the ladies over at JustCraftyEnough.com had a green challenge for the IronCraft challenge.

I took this opportunity to make some ear pins after having seen some on pinterest.  They were actually quite quick to make.

I took two bead pins with flat heads, threaded my beads on and then bent them.

So you put them on like regular earrings and then turn them so the wire clips them against your ear to hold them in place.

Maybe some day, I'll be up to making some like these.

WFMW: Weekly Bible Verse

As part of my goals for the new year, I'm doing something each week to help bring my kids closer to God.  This week, we started a weekly Bible verse for them to memorize.  We've had them in the past, that they've brought home from church, but it often was just added to the stack of papers on the table.

So, I've decided to make it more visible for us by using a dry erase marker and writing on our sliding glass door. (Our blinds are in between the glass).

Is it the perfect solution? Not really, there's a lot of glare during dinner when we're reading it because of the light) but it's working for us until I find something better.  It is right next to the kitchen table where we can all see it though. The girls have almost memorized this verse and my husband has picked out next week's verse.

Do you display a weekly verse for your family? How do you do it?

For more great ideas, check out the Works for Me Wednesday link up at We are THAT Family.

To follow my new years' goals check out Five for the New Year.

New Blog!

I started a new blog a few weeks ago.  Come check it out.
Five For the New Year.

I'll still blog here too, this just provides a little separation between my new years resolutions/goals and everything else.

IC 2013 Challenge 2: Orange basket

This "week" the challenge was the color orange.  And for me, that truly is a challenge since, it's no where near my top favorite color.  But, I did happen to have some orange fabric in my stash and I also had some more organizing to do.

In our kitchen, there's a small counter next to the refrigerator that is for the phone.  But our phone mounts on the wall, so we use it to keep the girls brushes, etc right now since we still help with their hair some and usually do it right after breakfast.  The problem is it is always looking cluttered.

I took a box that I had, covered it in white fabric (I just hot glue it to the outside of the box) and then I sewed a liner for it out of the orange floral fabric I had.  Then, I put all the tall bottles and the hair brushes in the box.  Now, there is actually counter visible and we're not constantly knocking stuff off.

For more great Orange projects, check out the IronCraft Flickr pool.

IC1: Bean Bag Storage

Stuffed Animals, they're EVERYWHERE! They're in pretty much every room of our house (except the bathrooms, but don't think that my daughters haven't tried to change that!).  The problem is most of them have a story or some other sort of emotional attachment.  For example this guy:

His name is Bear Bear. For a while, he went everywhere with my oldest.  She gave him the name Bear Bear on a trip to the doctors office when she was about 2.

Then, there are the ones that my husband has won for them from those claw machines you see in some restaurants, the ones they got on vacation, a gift from Grandma, etc.  We've got a lot!

I don't want to get rid of them, but I would like to store them in a better way.  They've outgrown the boxes/bins that we're using currently. And it looks a bit cluttered.

Then, I saw this pattern for a bean bag chair and remembered somewhere seeing a "bean" bag chair that was "stuffed" with stuffed animals.  It seemed like a great solution and I have a lot of fabric already (plus it only takes 3 yards if you don't line it, which I didn't).  So when the first Iron Craft Challenge for 2013 was Cotton, I decided to give it a try!

I also used a zipper instead of velcro to keep it closed.  

Check out other great cotton projects in the IronCraft Flickr group.

This is definitely working for us.  For more great tips check out the Works for Me Wednesday post at WeAreThatFamily.com.