New (to me) Wheels!

For all the guys out there:
Hubby has been complaining about the alloy wheels on my car for a while. He wanted to make them look better since they were scuffed and chipped. He set out to do it using a method my cousin shared with us.

You were right babe.... Those were kind of bad.

I was driving around with wheels like this???? UGH!

Step 1: Remove tires from vehicle (duh).
Step 2: Using a can of primer spraypaint, spray the wheels. Allow to dry.
Step 3: Using the automotive premium spraypaint in the finish of your choice, spray the wheels. We used silver. It's just classic.
Step 4: Use the clearcoat spraypaint and spray them.
Step 5: In the process, some paint will have gotten on the tires (unless you took the time to tape and make sure the tape stuck- we were a little impatient). Use a steel wool pad (Brillo, SOS, etc) to scrub the tires and the paint will come off.
Now you have new wheels for less than $20! If only tires were that cheap! :)

Before the magic of spraypaint....

After.... SOOO Much better!

Meal Plan 8-28 through 9-3

Some good food this week. Stuff that's not really new to me, but that I've been craving! I hope I inspire you to make something yummy this week!

Sunday: Quesadillas (chicken with fresh from the garden pico de gallo, sour cream, and maybe some beans)
Monday: Beef enchiladas with green chiles (I'm on a Mexican kick right now).
Tuesday: Saute of chicken and broccoli (bumped from last week since I didn't get to make it)
Wednesday: bacon, onion swiss quiche with spinach salad
Thursday: Calzones
Friday: Out with Mom
Saturday: Beef burritos from Krista's Kitchen (I'll cook the meat in the crock pot during the day and assemble at dinner time) with spanish rice and refried beans.

I'm already planning my fall menus... can't wait to make homemade applesauce, apple dumplings, apple pie and apple butter! YUMMM!!! I want to go apple picking! Fall is my favorite season. I wish it lasted the 6 months that winter does!

Another deal...

I haven't posted any of our deals lately.  Back at the end of July, we went out garage saling- a usual Thursday, Friday, Saturday morning activity. We hit up this moving sale. There wasn't much there but a few piece of furniture and some odds and ends. The couple was moving from Ohio to California and were looking to get rid of everything (I love this kind of sale!).

Prior to hitting up this sale, hubby and I were talking about redoing the office. I hate the big bulky desk that is in there (from when we were first married - almost 11 years ago). I also am hoping to make the room a walk-in closet with a small office in the future. A smaller desk would be perfect and I had a great idea planned in my head. I could almost envision everything so quaint and beautiful yet functional. Ah the things in my head always seem like they won't take much work. :) Isn't that always the case?

Back to the desk. We hit up the sale and my husband actually saw the beauty before I did. He pointed it out to me. Was it really truly beautiful? No, but it could be. I loved the structure and all the drawers. This desk had tons of potential. I had a total of $27 in cash, plus a little change (maybe about 50 cents). We stood there while the seller was talking with someone else. The desk was marked $10- a total steal at that price. When it was our turn, we talked about having them hold it until we got a truck/SUV to pick it up and learned the history of the piece. Apparently, it was her parents' desk, they passed it to her and she passed it to her son who didn't want it. This thing is OLD, but I think it's beautiful. Since I didn't have a $10 and most sales need ones, I threw it out there- Could I buy it for $7? She said "YES!" 
Hubby and I were so happy with the purchase and couldn't believe we just stole something from someone for that's what it truly felt like. It's our greatest find yet.

Stupid wires. If it wasn't sooo late, I would have hidden them and the chair for the big desk better.

   I have many things I could do with this... cute for a little laptop, small printer some pics and such in our little office/walk-in closet as it's the perfect size. OR Use it as a vanity! Lots of storage for my stockpile of make-up and so cute with a little stool under it and pretty mirror....
   Right now, it's sitting in the office waiting to be painted or refinished with new hardware and has one of our desktops on it. Not the best situation, but it works.

Meal Plan 8-21 through 8-27- Dairy Free week challenge

I'm new to blogging and reading blogs. I can tell you, it's addicting. I came across a blog that is becoming one of my favorites quickly- john's journal. Her challenges with finding dairy free recipes, as well as our limitations with Everett and his allergies, led me to this week's meal plan. I wanted to a do a week with NO Dairy. It's not easy, but can be done! I'm thinking it will be tasty.

Sunday: Rotisserie chicken with parsley potatoes (made with olive oil and garlic salt instead of butter) and spinach salad. I'm cheating since I have to do shopping and class prep on Sundays.
Monday: Wild rice and mushroom chicken from Taste Of Home 5 Ingredient recipe book.
Tuesday: Pot roast in the crock pot (potatoes, carrots, celery, onion, soup mix)
Wednesday: Easy Pork Chop Suey from Pillsbury Best Family Supper 2007 cookbook
Thursday: Saute of chicken and Broccoli from Food Network. (One of my favorites and very healthy!)
Friday: out to eat with my folks
Saturday: BLTs and a birthday party
Sunday: Honey grilled chicken with baked sweet potatoes

The new recipes for the week fall on Monday and Wednesday. I'll do the review of course and let you know how it goes.
An upcoming blog to look forward to (and share with your hubby): How to get new "wheels" on your car for less than $30. I'm working on the write up and sifting through the pics. Soooo cool how great my car now looks!

Chicken a la King Recipe Review

The one recipe I made "new" this week was Chicken a la King. I have made this meal before, but this time I chose a recipe from the Nestle cookbook I received as a gift (one of my favorites!).

Here's the recipe:
3 Tbsp butter or margarine
1 c. sliced fresh mushrooms
1/4 c. chopped green bell pepper
1/4 c. chopped onio
2 Tbsp. all -purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp paprika
2 cans Nestle Carnation Evaporated Milk
3 large egg yolks, beaten
2 c. cooked, chopped chicken breast
2 Tbsp diced pimento (optional)
2 Tbsp dry sherry (optional)
8 biscuits, 2 c cooked rice, toast other medium to serve with it (mashed potatoes may be really really good, but not good for you- not that this recipe is!)

Directions:  Melt butter in large skillet over medium heat. Add mushrooms, bell pepper and onion. Cook, stirring occasionally for 1 - 2 minutes or until tender (not brown). Stir in flour, salt, paprika. Gradually add evaporated milk. Cook stirring constantly, until mixture comes to a boil.

Whick 1 c. thickened sauce into egg yolks, pour into saucepan. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture comes to a boil.  Stir in chicken, pimento and sherry. Heat through. Serve with rice, toast, potatoes, biscuits, etc.

Review: Sorry... that took a while! This was a good recipe. I didn't have fresh mushrooms or the last 3 optional ingredients. It ended up taking longer than I anticipated in making it, but with a toddler, this happens! According to the recipe it should take 20 min prep and 15 min cook. Well, I guess the fact that I needed to cook the chicken didn't help matters!  We did need a little more salt than called for, but we love salt (I know- it's a terrible habit!) so you may not need to add that extra pinch.

If I had pre-cooked chicken, this recipe would have come together in a jiff, but that wasn't the case for me. I added carrots to it (not normal, I know). It was very tasty and scrumptious. It tasted almost exactly like Stouffer's CAK. Good stuff.
Would I make it again? YEP! Now, if I could lower the fat... maybe change out evaporated milk for half and half.

Quick meal plan post- Gotta get ready for work! YIKES!

It's been a little crazy trying to get the classroom together and spend as much time as possible with the little guy, who ended up sick. That stinking virus foiled our plans for Waterworks and Cleveland zoo and hiking. Oh well. Healthy is better than fun.
 
I threw together this meal plan yesterday in just a few quick minutes. The only "new" recipe I tried was Chicken a la King. I found it in an old recipe book and have made a la kind before- but not this recipe.
Here it is:

Sunday: brinner (breakfast for dinner - for those of you unfamiliar with the term)
Monday: Chicken A La King (courtesy of the Nestle cookbook)
Tuesday: Meatloaf, mashed potatoes and green beans
Wednesday: Honey Grilled Chicken, sweet potatoes and asparagus
Thursday: Tuna noodle casserole (hubby's favorite)
Friday: Out
Saturday: sloppy joes (Mommy's really busy with important paperwork this day! I even had to cancel on the shower for dear friends. I really wanted to go, but time crunch is on!)

Mirror, mirror on the wall....

I'm' working on redoing one of our rooms, a kind of catch all known as "Cheri's room". Our house is 93 years old. That being said, it has very small closets. My hubby has the closet in our room, the kid has the closet in his room. That leaves a closet in the attic (bigger- actually biggest in the house) and "my room". Currently this room is for my clothing/dressers, crafts and gift stockpile storage area (that's a little awkward- essentially where I store gifts for kids and people when I get super good deals on them).

UGH! I hate dislike don't know what to do with this room. It has no order and an awkward layout, but a super cool balcony off of it (pending we fix it since it's kind of not-in-the-best-shape). There is no bed as it's a craft/storage room. The paint was light green which is fine and I loved the color, however, since it used to be our bedroom and the bed was up against the window and blocked the closet (that's how small it it), there were things all over the wall (juice from kids, spilled pop, holes from previous hangings, etc.). I really didn't like this room at all.

Anyway, I'm redoing it on a frayed shoestring budget (yes, my budget is that tight). I told my husband I really wanted to move the beautiful big mirror we have in the dining room into this room right above my old dresser (that is scarred and needs painted or redone in some fashion). He said "no". Poo! No mirror- unless I find a super cheap one at a garage sale.

Imagine my surprise when I hit this garage sale that had a mirror very similar to the one we have in the dining room but in a cream painted frame for $5. When I was loading it in the car, the sun hit it just right and I noticed 2 scratches in the mirror. Boo! I had already bought it. Is there a return policy for garage sales?? I didn't want to find out and decided to keep it and see what I could do with it.

I hung it and left it in the room. The scratches were in the way when I first hung it, but I left it as I wasn't sure if I was going to keep it/fix it or paint it or whatever (chalkboard paint the mirror surface).

Not bad for $5. I should have haggled a little, but I was in a moment.

 After about 1 1/2 weeks, I decided I wanted to paint the frame and go from there. I had left over Oil Rubbed Bronze spray paint from my shelf project so that wasn't going to cost anything. I loved the result!

I know, the window needs curtains. I'm working on it... it's all a process when you're low on cash!

 I re-hung it, but upside down from how it was initially. Amazingly, the scratches are in a lower corner and aren't too bad. I can totally live with it for the time being (until I determine if I'll replace the mirror or get it resilvered). Honest, it's in a room that isn't used by anyone other than me, so I think I'm okay until I get up the nerve to try the home remedies for fixing mirror scratches or get enough cash for a new mirror. For the time being, I love the mirror and it beats the old, small fogged/film covered mirror it replaced!

See, my sewing machine, ironing board, with newly cut fabric strips, fave book and other misc stuff. I think I have too much stuff..... hmm...