Pinterest Pick of the Week! Slow Cooked Chili

Ah ha!

After a week end of issues signing in, I'm finally back!  Wooo!  (Not sure what was up...)

Either way, it's that time of week again. Time for my latest Pinterest Pick!

"We want the room reveal!" my imaginary readers are shrieking.  I know you do... But I think I'm going to hold off for OOOOOONE more project. Just one. I promise.  It'll be worth it.

Instead, I'm going to explode with enthusiasm over the chili recipe that I found!  

Okay, so I'm a HUGE chili fan.  There are few things I find as satisfying as a bowl of chili.  Especially when it's slow cooked for.ev.er. So when I cam across this awesome base recipe on Pinterest, I knew I had to give it a go.

The recipe itself is simple. Throw the handful of basic ingredients into a crock pot for 8-10 hours on low and tada!!!! Chili.  But like i said.  It's a base recipe.  The beauty of this recipe is that you can add nearly anything you want and it's going to be amazing.  So I added corn, mushrooms, extra ground turkey, black beans and a can of Rotel.  You know... for an extra kick.

Wanna know what I got at the end of the day?

This amazingly amazing chili.  It was hearty enough to eat on it's own but we paired it with cornbread.  (Which, by the way, was too dry. Gotta work on that...)  Not only did it smell and taste amazing, it made enough for hubby and I to enjoy leftovers for DAYS. (I even gave some away!) All for next to nothing. 

Wanna try it too? Here's the base recipe, which started out on allrecipes.com before being pinned!

Ingredients

• 2 pounds ground beef
• 2 (16 ounce) cans kidney beans, rinsed and drained
• 2 (14.5 ounce) cans diced tomatoes, undrained
• 1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
• 2 medium onions, chopped
• 1 green pepper, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoons chili powder
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon pepper
• Shredded Cheddar cheese

Directions

1. In a skillet, cook beef over medium heat until no longer pink; drain. Transfer to a slow cooker. Add the next nine ingredients. Cover and cook on low for 8-10 hours or on high for 4 hours. Garnish individual servings with cheese if desired.

Holy wow! One step. That's awesome. 

If you make it (and you should!) leave me a comment and let me know what YOU added to it.  I've been reading all over the net the different things you can. Everything from beer to cocoa powder. Please, some one tell me they've tried the cocoa powder and it was amazing.  Cause for some reason, it sounded delicious to me. 

Ah, chili. You are a delicious dish indeed.

Baby Leg Warmers. A Tutorial for the Masses.

I came across a pic the other day of my oldest wearing a pair of baby leg warmers.  And I just squealed over how cute he was!

Then I squealed again because I remembered that in June, I'll have another to dress in baby leg warmers. Yay!  

In case you didn't know, baby leg warmers are NOT just for keeping legs warm.  These things are amazing. perfect for the gaps between pant legs and shoes... even better for those onesie clad cuties learning to crawl.  (Ever wonder if the babies mind the carpet rubbing on them when they start crawling?  I would...)

However, a pair of stylish baby leg warmers will run ya about $12.  Not bad, but my inner cheapskate crafter won't allow that.  Especially when I can make the same thing out of a pair of socks!

Wanna know how? Here goes!  Sugar Crumbs first tutorial!

DIY Baby LegWarmers

(That literally take 10 minutes to make!)

First, you're gonna need a pair of socks.  Any pair will do aside from the ankle length socks but I prefer knee highs. That gives some room to grow.

Cut off the feet.

Once you've cut off the feet, you're going to want to measure aboooout 2" in the center of the foot.  I've pinned off a 2 inch section to show. It doesn't have to be exact so if you don't want to measure, just eye ball it a little. (That's what I did. Shhhhh.)

Cut out that section and get rid of the toe and the heel. You don't need them! (Or hold onto them. Goodness knows when you make need a spare heel or toe.)

Take the 2" section and fold it in half. I find it easier to do this around my hand so that I can make sure it's even.

Once you've done that, you're going to take your little folded piece and put it around the cut edge of the sock. It should form a tube. Keep your raw edges facing outward (You should see nothing but raw edge if you look at the sock.)

Now for the hard part. Sew around the edges but DON'T sew the sock shut. You just want to connect the raw edge of the cuff to the raw edge of the sock.  You can do this by hand or machine. Machine definitely is quicker.

Done!

Seriously, that's it.  

Now go! Make a million!  But before you do, take a look at this sneak peak for the room reveal.

Pinterest Pick of the Week! DIY Chalkboard Paint

So I had a pick in mind for today but I decided to hold of on that one till the next post.  Because the next post is going to be the first room reveal of the Sugar Crumbs household!  

So today, to take it's place, I'm going to share a super cool, super easy tutorial that is pinned EVERYWHERE on Pinterest.  

DIY Chalkboard Paint. 

SO chalkboard paint is pretty self explanatory.  You use it on just about any surface and tada! You have a chalkboard.  The downside?  Not only is it pricey, it only comes in limited colors.  And by limited, I mean green and black.

Boring.

Thanks to the millions of motivated DIYers out there, there are now tons of recipes to make this awesome paint at home.  And all you need is latex or acrylic paint and non sanded tile grout.

And, of course, upon discovering this, I wanted to chalkboard paint... well, everything.  

I settled for a mirror.

I've had this mirror forever.  More because I like the frame than anything else. I'm not often using it as a mirror.  However, it's the perfect size for a memo board.

So I mixed 3 tbsp of acrylic paint with 1.5 tsp of white non sanded tile grout and painted the mirror.  

Muuuuuch better!  Now I have a place to write down those little things I need remember... Like appointments I quickly make. Or phone messages (Do people actually take those?)

This whole thing cost me a whopping 2 bucks.  And I still have paint to use! 

(Wonder if Jon would let me paint the fridge like this blogger did?)

Ahhh, I love it!  

Here's another great chalkboard paint recipe from adelynSTONE!

** Have a pin that you want me to review?  Leave me a comment or email me at yaysugarcrumbs@gmail.com!**

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Pinterest Pick of the Week!

Ah, Monday.  And not just any Monday.  It's the very first week of the Pinterest Pick of the week. Oh, do I have a gem for you!

So not long ago, I was doing what I do best and browsing pinterest.  Not really looking for anything in particular, I came across a pin for something called a "Mind Jar."

(Tada! A Mind Jar!)

The Mind Jar is literally a glittery fluid filled jar.  Almost snow globe like.  According to the blogger, she uses this as a replacement for time outs.  Whenever there's a tantrum or some upset, she shakes the jar and the child is to sit and watch the glitter fall to the bottom.  It should take about five minutes for it all to settle.  By the end of that time, the child is calm/distracted from the original issues.

Sounds pretty awesome, right?  I thought so too.  Luckily, the original blogger posted abit of a tutorial for this awesome idea.  Hot water, a tube of glitter glue and glitter combined in a jar will create the mind jar.

And there's no science behind it.  Seriously.  I just added without measuring anything.  

I added blue food coloring to my water because, well, I like blue. But feel free to add whatever color you want. Or don't. It's all up to you.  So this is my "Mind Jar" all non shaken like.

And here it is all shaken up!  

Beautiful.  And believe it or not, it works!  Anytime there's any anxiety in the house, the Mind Jar is shaken up and watched.  The kids tend to get impatient waiting for it to settle but they always end up calming right down. Maybe it should be a Calm Down Jar? 

It definitely should be... Even Jon and I use it just to recenter when we get over whelmed.

(We use it more than the children, honestly.)

I'm giving this Pinterest a 2 thumbs up.  Even if you DON'T have children, this is an amazing tool for calming. And it's way pretty to look at.

Want to make your own?  Head over to Herewearetogether.com for a basic tutorial.  And if you do, be sure to leave me a comment and let me know if I'm the only one entranced by the awesomely awesome Mind Jar.