This Book...!!

First off, let me just state that I am a huge nerd. I have a passion for reading so great that it almost outshines my love for crafting. I mean, if you want to transport yourself to a different place, lose hours of time in what feels like minutes, and make up the appearances of fictional people, I suggest picking up a book (just don't watch the movie 97% of the time).

Now, I enjoy reading big girl books, such as "50 Shades of Gray," romance trilogies by Nora Roberts, and just about anything with Nicholas Sparks's name on it. However, I love reading the teen/young adult books even more. It's not the same story with different names over and over again, which is nice. Recently, I finished the Shatter Me series/trilogy by Tahereh Mafi. A M A Z I N G!!!!

I am not one to often tell other people that they have to read a certain book, but if you enjoy books like "Divergent," "Uglies," "The Host," and "Hunger Games," then this book is for you. It's a story about a girl who can't touch anybody without pretty much killing them. She has never been able to be loved because she's a monster and nobody wants to be around her. Except now the leader of The Revolution wants to use her as his own personal torturing device/killing machine against the rebels. Can you imagine?!

I accidentally found this book through Amazon suggestions (Yeah, they pretty much got their shit together there) and I am so glad I did! I started reading the first book about a month before the last book was released, so I got really lucky with very little lag time. How often does that happen, right? It took me less than two days to read the first two books and the two in-between books. I already knew who I wanted the main character, Juliette, to be with and I foresaw the ending; or so I thought. I started the last book around 11pm on the 5th and planned to read until I got tired. By 2am I had it finished and was laying in bed replaying the whole book over and over in my head.

I seriously ordered the book for someone else as a birthday gift just so that I could talk to another person about it. Yeah. It's that amazing to me. Hell, the third currently has a 5.0/5 rating on Amazon.com. Pretty unheard of these days.

Mafi is an amazing author with a unique style. That's what I like about her. She has several leads and twists and the emotions are written out so well that I felt myself becoming depressed in the first, angry in the second, and so sad I actually cried in the third. Crazy thing is that these are her first books! I can honestly say that I am looking forward to more books by Mafi and will even preorder the next ones.

I need to stop here before I bore you or before I start giving the plot away. Have any of you read it? Anybody have any good book suggestions? I just downloaded "Alienated" and "Cruel Beauty." Can't wait to see how they turn out. I am open to suggestions and will read anything except scary or disgusting gory genres. I'm a nighttime reader and the two just don't mix well.

Let me just reiterate what a huge nerd I am: the first time I heard  "Counting Stars" by OneRepublic, I thought of this book. Read the book and you'll understand.

Why I Hate The News

I hate to read or watch the news. We live in a very small town in a relatively small area known as "The Tri-States." So, I try to not think of this area being "bad" or "dangerous" but lately bad things are all I hear about. I'm not saying that nothing good ever happens in this area, but I'm not entirely sure when the last time a "good" thing made the front page in print or online. That could be because I rarely watch the news channel or pick up the  newspaper any more. However, I bet it has more to do with the fact that we are shining spotlights on the negative occurrences around us, allowing the positive ones to fall behind stage in small articles in the backs of papers and small prints online. Which, if I might add, is pathetic of us as a nation. I know it isn't just my small community, either - it's happening all over the country. I just don't understand why.

My Thoughts on Recent Headlines:
I'm very sad to hear about the school shootings, I truly am. But let's quit making the MURDERER the headlines and worry about those who lost their lives. In interviews, reporters ask about the person who went off the deep end, not those who were taken with him/her. They will already always be remembered because of their decisions and actions, but let's not allow their name to be the only one remembered from these horrible events.
And about Justin Bieber?!?! C'mon people! He's a teenager that's going to make stupid decisions. Why do we think that making him the center of attention is a good consequence? It's seriously not! Let him get real consequences instead of a publicized slap on the wrist and forcing him to make some BS apology he doesn't even mean. He's lucky he's not my child - famous or not there would be serious punishment. But maybe that's because I lost somebody very close to me from a drunk driver's recklessness.
"14 Arrested On Drug Related Charges" is a local headline. The entire article talks about each  individual and priors and trying to run from the police and blah blah blah. Where are the officer interviews? Where are the congratulations' and pats on the backs or stories of how they uncovered it all? Why give glory to those who don't deserve it?

I had somewhere I was going with all of this when I started the post, but that direction is long gone due to rambling thoughts. So, I'll leave with this:
Let us focus on the good deeds and positive events in our communities for once. Let us not ignore the bad, but not spotlight it, either. Heck - give criminals a section of their own titled "People Who Don't Make Their Mamas Proud" or "Reasons to Raise Your Children the Right Way." Make it embarrassing to be in that section, not faming to be front and center for putting a gun in a young mother's face to steal the money she selflessly earned for her family. The reporters of America are pretty much accomplices at this point, and are turning to no more than scum to me. Therefore, I have no interest in watching the news channel or wasting my money on a paper any time soon.

Anybody else have any thoughts on this? Agree? Disagree? Both? Let me know!

Giveaway

I'm finally hosting a giveaway, guys! Mainly for selfish reasons, like promoting my Facebook page to get more likes (hey, a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do!). I currently have only 33 fans (love every one of you), but want to make my 100 mark. So, when I make it to 100 likes on Facebook, there will be a giveaway of one item from my Shop - winner's choice. Yes, the winner of the giveaway will be able to choose ANY one item from my Shop.

So, if you haven't liked my page yet (link at bottom), then get to it already! If you have, help me promote by sharing, liking, commenting, inviting, etc.! Whatever it takes {in my best Drill Sargent voice}!!!

Thanks. :-)
And, to get your attention and show off what The Diva and I made, look at this pretty soap:

Facebook.com/MommysSew.Clever

Etsy.com/MommysSewClever

DIY Puppy Treats, Part 1

 How much would your spoiled pooch absolutely love you if you made him/her some delicious, peanut butter puppy treats? Don’t laugh! They are so easy to make and even my picky doggies enjoy eating them! And… just think of the money you’ll save by making your own versus buying them AND you know exactly what your dog is eating. Sounds like good enough reasons to me!

  Materials Needed (makes appx several dozen 1.5” treats - seriously it makes a ton):
- 2 cups whole wheat flour (you can use bleached, but it’s not as healthy and may be harder for dogs to digest)
- 1 cup graham cracker crumbs
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¾ cup broth (beef for my dogs)
- ¼ cup creamy peanut butter
- 1 egg
- 2 tablespoons canola or vegetable oil

 I put mine in my KitchenAid mixer bowl because 1) it’s easier on me, 2) I’m lazy, 3) I could do other things while it mixed, and 4) something slightly more heavy duty works better for this recipe because it gets pretty thick (but I used my hand held mixer every time I’ve made these treats up until now).
 

 

 Combine all of your dry ingredients first. Mix well so that the cinnamon is distributed evenly through the crumbs and flour.

 Next, add in all of the other ingredients and mix for 3-4 minutes on Speed 2. Make sure that the dough is in a ball on your mixer and is no longer sticking to the sides.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough until ¼ inch thickness.
 

 

 Cut with cookie cutter.

Place your millions of little treats on an ungreased baking sheet and bake at 300 degrees for 35-40 minutes, or until lightly browned.

 

Store in an airtight container. Put some in freezer to ensure that they last even longer!


And, if I may note, these dang things smell very appetizing while they are in the oven. Not fair! I, of course silly me, hadn’t eaten almost all day and then had to smell these things for hours while I was cooking them. Although all of the ingredients are edible, I’m just not sure about the whole cinnamon-with-peanut-butter-with-beef-broth-thing would actually taste. Unless you are a dog, in which case they taste scrumptious.

Look forward to a Part 2: DIY Yogurt Topping for Puppy Treats recipe!

If you decide your dog should definitely be allowed to have these healthy and yummy puppy treats, but don’t want to take the time to cook them yourself (Hey, I won’t judge!), they will soon be available for purchase in my Etsy shop: Etsy.com/shop/MommysSewClever

Trash the Dress

A few months back (right before my beloved laptop crashed) I did a "Trash the Dress" photo shoot of two girls. I love taking photos and am currently working on a children's calendar for Christmas gifts this year and about to start a photo series titled "Beauty In..." I've wanted to do a "Trash the Dress" shoot for years and was really excited when L and A agreed to get down and dirty, ruining beautiful dresses, just for my picture  bucket list.

I was finally able to recover my original, unedited photos from the shoot thanks to my SD card. Yay! So, using an online program (I miss my Photoshop), I edited a couple to see how they would turn out. I think they look pretty good! Needless to say this weekend I am going to pay for the upgraded version and spend all weekend next door at my parents editing pictures. Then, Monday, I'm going to show them off.

For now, though, here's a sneak peak of one of the pretty ladies:

Breast Milk Storage System

This post should really go as a Thief Thursday post, but I'm really not sure who originally came up with it and the person I got the idea from doesn't blog. But, I'm just letting everybody know that I didn't come up with this personally, I just love the ease of use and wanted to share.

So, one of the reasons I was so excited to breast feed was because of this breast milk bag storage idea I saw at my sister-in-laws house. Don't get me wrong-there were no doubts in my mind that I would (try to) breastfeed Little Man, but the storage system just gave me an extra reason to look forward to doing it. Besides, it's so simple and - one of my favorite words ever - CHEAP! How could I possibly say no? I couldn't!

 

Materials needed:
-gift bag the size of your storage bags laying down (use a thick one so it'll last longer!)
-scissors
-tape (just in case)

Cut along the dotted lines on your own gift bag (mine was left over from The Divas birthday party last year). I cut mine and then it ripped a little, so I had to tape the sides. Done. So easy, right?!?! Just pull the bottom bag out through the hole! I spent $0.00 on this project.

It allows you to keep all of your bags in one place, freezes them flat, takes up very little space, and you can put them in order by date so the oldest is used first by being pulled from the bottom. Genius. My SIL had several of these bags full on her deep freeze. I can only hope to grow my stash that big!

(Here's how cheap I am - I rewash and rinse/sanitize the bags when I'm done with them so they can be reused. I put a red dot in the left corner so I know it's on the second time through; after the second time I toss them, though. But... $12 for 25 bags is CRAZAY!)

Trying to Clean With The Diva

Finally, school is back in session! We had a small blizzard and so school has been canceled for the last week, which just happened to be directly after Christmas break. I love my daughter to death, but I am so glad to have her out of the house for a few hours and have it basically to myself. Do you have any idea how cleaning with a 5 year old under foot goes? Yeah... It doesn't. Everything took at the least 3 times as long as it normally does, and you couldn't even tell I had done anything within 2 hours. This morning I did all of the dishes, cleaned my stove, set out dinner, AND wiped down all of my counters - it took me about thirty minutes total. And 5 hours later it's still clean. Now, I just need the motivation to clean the rest of my house.

Surely, I can't be the only parent ever happy just to see their child go to school? I miss her right now, but it's nice to not have The Diva here talking my ear off about a million things per second and going through all of the things I just put away. I thought so many things would change from when she was a nosey two year old to now. Hahaha! The only thing that's really changed is the amount of things she can reach now. She still tries to " help clean" and ends up making a bigger mess for me. She still asks a hundred questions. She still follows behind me and goes through or takes out the stuff I put away. She's still easily distracted. She still can't sit still long enough to watch a whole movie so I can clean in 'peace'.

However, she's also still my baby girl and one of the loves of my life. She'll only be 5 for a little while longer. One day I'll wake up and she'll be graduating high school. Or getting married. Or have moved far away to chase her dreams. So, for now, I'll enjoy her messing up the house and annoying me to death on some days. She has to learn new things somehow, right? I only have a certain amount of unknown time with her, so I may as well make the most of it.