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Snowflakes Ribbon Christmas Card

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Summer means Blackberries!

I think I may be addicted to picking blackberries from the gargantuous bramble bushes at the farm across the road from us.  These bushes have been there for years and are very overgrown which poses a challenge. But it's a simple summer pleasure!

Hi All! I'm still here ;)

I just wanted to take a minute to let everyone know that I am still planning to add all of my thrifty goodness to my blog when I can make time.  I have been so busy lately and I'll tell you why...
So, my husband and I were on a weekend trip in the cute little town of Smithfield, VA.  We visited The Ham Shoppe there (Smithfield hams come from here).  As I walked out of the store (with bacon popcorn, bacon chocolate, bacon this, bacon that, and ham), I said to my husband, "They have everything bacon, even bacon lip balm...but NO BACON SOAP!".  While walking around town, I came up with the name "Hog Wash Soaps" in "What's Shakin' Bacon" scent.  We were jokin' around with the idea and when I got home, I got to work on a soap label to put in my file of a million gajillion things to do "one day".  Well, I printed it out and showed it a little bit and people thought it was a great idea.  I figured out the packaging would be little muslin bags with red gingham wrapped around them and the hogs with bubbles image wrapped around that.  So, I decided to try it out and when I showed one of my good friends, she LOVED the idea.  We decided to be business partners and to really DO THIS THANG!  Well, it's been two months and here we are with 10 "farm fresh" scents... www.RuralRevolutionLLC.com  and we are also on Facebook , so PLEASE "like" us!

Metamorphasis Monday: Small Table

Here is a very simple paint project, but it shows what a difference paint can make.  

"What I Wore" Wednesday

 So these pics are from a quick jaunt to our 2 local thrift stores back in October...I have so much catching up to do! One of these stores, sadly, only lasted 6 months.  I'm not sure why because they had great stuff for a great price, but possibly it was that the other store is a couple hundred yards away and they are much bigger and even cheaper...I mean like yard sale prices.

I love this fleece, although I think it's a deep pink and everyone tells me it's actually red.

Fleece - Thrift Store - $1

I love this sweater, as well.  I was lucky to find the necklace in the same hue.

Sweater - Thrift Store - $1.50

Necklace - Goodwill - $3.00

Tank - Kohls - $2.00

I love the ruffles on this sweater.  This was from the store that closed :(

Sweater - Thrift Store - $3.00

Tank - Kohls - $2.00

I have tons of jeans (all from yard sales, thrift stores, and Goodwill) because they are what I prefer to wear whenever I can't wear my fleece pajama pants :)  Anybody buy any Pajama Jeans yet?  I'm SO not kidding when I say that I want some Pajama Jeans...only I'm not paying $48! 

I know, Christmas is SO over

but I just had to do a lil' braggin' about my Christmas deals. And btw, I apologize for being gone so long...for some reason, I had blogger's block for a coupla months!  

 Anyway, a few weeks after Christmas, I found all of the wrapping paper below for .80 total at CVS! Gotta love Christmas clearance!  And who doesn't need wrapping paper?

More goodies from CVS:  tissue paper, loads of labels, bags of bows, 2 cans of cranberry sauce, and the wrapping paper all for $4!!!!

Just take a look at all of these cute CWD clothes that I found at Goodwill!  My kiddos were able to wear all of these for Christmas this past year.  Every piece was brand spankin' new!  This lot was well worth $200 if bought at the boutique, but the total for all 10 pieces came to $20!!!  Now that's a deal!  When we were at Disney World for Christmas, they wore all of these outfits and received so many compliments!

Thanks for lettin' me brag a lil' bit!  

Bringin' Back the Jello Mold

 So, I started out making cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving and it turned into something more like jello, so I rolled with it.  It ended up being de-lish and I will definitely be making it again!

This pic looks like a picture from a 1970's cookbook, don't 'ya think?

I took out my thrifted Tupperware jello mold with the interchangeable tops that I bought 3 years ago and was scared to use...reminded me a lil' of "Chevy Chase's Christmas Vacation".

I ended up whipping up some sour cream and cream cheese to make a topping for it and it made for a nice dessert.

It's not picture-perfect by any means, but it was DE-LISH!
CRANBERRY JELLO MOLD
1 lb. fresh cranberries
2 packages black cherry Jello
1 can mandarin oranges
1 c. walnuts
1 c. sugar
Using a food processor, crush fresh cranberries until fine. Add 1 cup of sugar and mix well and set aside for 30 mins. Grind nuts and oranges in food processor and put in large bowl. Mix black cherry Jello using ONLY 1 cup of hot boiling water per package (no cold water).  Pour jello into nut and orange mixture. Add cranberries. Mix all ingredients together and pour into jello mold.  Refrigerate overnight.
If desired, whip cream cheese and sour cream together for topping when ready to serve.
Enjoy!