Cinnamon Roll Waffles

I was on Pinterest the other day and saw this great idea.  Pinterest; great idea; shocking isn't it?  While genius, the idea wasn't too brain busting, so I filed it away upstairs.  This morning, I put it to work for breakfast.  

First, get out your waffle maker and plug it in.   

Next, you open a can of Pillsbury Cinnamon Rolls.  

Wheew, that was pretty difficult.    If necessary, take a moment to wipe the sweat from your brow.  

Now, you stick one cinnamon roll in the hot waffle maker.  I turned mine a little lower than I do for waffles.  If your waffle maker is larger, go for multiples!  

Close that lid and about 60 seconds later, you have a cooked cinnamon roll waffle.  Let your kids add the frosting and it looks like this.....

The waffles get a little crisp on the outside, but still have the soft cinnamon roll feel on the inside.  It did make my waffle iron a little messy, it was not difficult to clean.  

This is a little more sweet than our usual school day breakfast, but we added some cantaloupe and sausage and everyone loved it.  

If you will excuse me now, I need to spend some time pondering some of life's big questions.  First and foremost, what else can I make into an adorable little waffle?

Quest for Order

As I have already mentioned, I am very good at making messes and not so good at cleaning them up.   They say that creative minds are seldom tidy.  I am not sure if they are talking about the mind or the spaces around the creative person, but either way, I tend to create clutter.  The problem with this is that I am not someone who can live in complete chaos and be fine with it.  As an ambidextrous Gemini, I live with a war inside me.  I am a living, breathing contradiction to myself.   Clutter vs. Order.  Reason vs. Emotion.  It goes on and on.   But the complete absence of order starts to weigh on me.  As the piles grow, so does my anxiousness about them.  But rather than feel more motivated to get rid of them, I become more overwhelmed with their presence.   I don’t know where to start

. 

Well, a couple of weeks ago, I had purchased a Living Social deal for 3 hours of house cleaning.  I wanted to start off the year with a clean house and maybe then I could maintain it.  Maybe. The purchase forced me to pick things up and create some order so that when the angels from the cleaning service knocked on my door, they could do their thing.   So what did I do?  I piled it all in my closet, of course.  Oh, the shame.  The house was looking good, but I could not get to my pants. 

I had to call in reinforcements.   This time it was my friend Barbara.  She is no nonsense about the house purge.  She grew up in a military family that moved often and because of that, she does not hang on to stuff like I do.  They say a true friend is the one who holds your hair when you've had one too many margaritas.  This is true, but the very best kind of friend will hold the trash bag while you clean out your closet, and here’s the kicker, without judging.  (Or at least being kind enough to keep her judgment to herself!)  So on Friday, we went to work on my side of the closet.  Doug got really defensive when he knew what we were up to.  I swore I would not touch his extensive collection of beer shirts.  I also wouldn't touch the boxes of paper work collected over the years.  With these boundaries in place, I went into battle. 

   

I took everything out of the closet.  Truth be told, I really badly wanted to yank all of his stuff out, paint it a pretty color, install a closet system, and build some more shelves, but this day was more about just getting things in order.   It took about 3 hours, 3 Dr. Peppers,  6 trash bags to the local Community Outreach, 1 bag of garbage, and assorted recycling, but I, scratch that,  WE, did it. And here is the real indicator of friendship--when we do these things, Barbara hauls my stuff away!  It prevents the rest of the family from making a "dumpster dive" to rescue long forgotten or broken "treasures".  It also ensures that the stuff gets out of the house or I would find myself stepping over and around my trash bags for another month.   

If it weren’t for having Barbara there, I would have probably pulled all of the junk out and then decided I needed a nap.  I suffer from chore induced narcolepsy.  It is another medical condition.  I swear that nothing makes me more tired, more suddenly than a large chore at hand.  This medical condition explains the reason that I can fall asleep, Gasp!  The Horror!, with dishes in the sink!  I will never need Ambien.  I can just make a huge mess and by the time the mess is good and made, I am ready to sleep like a baby.  I think it is also a genetic disorder, because the words "Clean your room" are the only ones that ever, ever, make my daughter say, "I need a nap".    

For the first ever in the almost 7 years in my house, I have floor space in my half of the closet!  I have all my pretty colored Vera Bradley bags hung up. 

 I have the extra pillows piled up in the top of the closet, rather than in my rocking chair in my bedroom.  I can now sit there and read.  I put my small purses and hats in a hanging shoe organizer.  Ugly, but quite functional.  

All my pottery paint is on a shelf separate from my clothes and shoes.  And most importantly, my t-shirts have been greatly purged and segregated from my husband’s shirts.    It feels so good.   To celebrate,  I rewarded myself with a trip to the quilt store so I can start cutting out my next projects and making a big, huge mess!  The battle rages on......

Magic Glasses

A few years back, I had PRK surgery done on my eyes so I would not have to wear glasses or contacts any more.  BEST. MONEY. SPENT. EVER!  When I did that, they suggested I get a pair of quality sunglasses.  I have always worn sunglasses because glares and brightness tend to give me headaches.  This is just one of many reasons why I cannot watch Jersey Shore.  It is a medical condition.  The glow of fake tan brings on a migraine.
So after the surgery, I went and bought some Maui Jim sunglasses.  They cost a lot of money.  It hurt me to buy them.  I dreaded telling my husband what they cost.  He had a minor stroke when I did.  I have now had them for almost 4 years.  I love them.  And seeing as how they still make them, I guess that they are not completely out of style---not that I really care.  They have been worth every penny and more.  The nose pieces are small and plastic so I can put them on my head for storage without wrecking my standard issue ponytail.  This was the only feature I was really looking for in choosing sunglasses.  The nose pieces on my old glasses ripped out my hair because they were not integrated into the frame.  Annoying!   These glasses are extremely durable having been repeatedly dropped and haphazardly tossed into the bottom of my purse.  They cut the glare so well that I sometimes even wear them when it is cloudy.  It keeps me from squinting and I hope slows the progression of the crow's feet around my eyes.
I have noticed too that they make some white cars look a lovely shade of pink. The Mary Kay cars turn from their soft pink to a much more vibrant shade.  They are truly a pair of rose colored glasses. Today, they showed me what else they can do.
I was driving my son to preschool and the sun was at our backs.  It was kind of sprinkling rain, but I had on the glasses anyway.  Looking ahead, I saw a rainbow.  I lifted the glasses to check it out and the rainbow pretty much disappeared.  I put them back on and like magic, rainbow!  I welcomed the red light so I could spend the idle time lifting the glasses up and down marveling at what they were doing.  I know it isn't really magic. I took physics.  I learned about light rays, spectrum,  polarization, and prisms. We arrived at school and I hustled my son out of the car and put the glasses on him.  Seeing the look on his face was NOTHING short of magical.

Miracle

After many trials and errors, I do believe I got my new fancy template on! Isn't it fun?!? Really, it wasn't that hard, but since I can cause my Internet to go crashing by simply searching "organization" on Pinterest, I am surprised that I did this "so simple a caveman can do it" task without 1) causing the entire Internet to be striped and polka dotted or 2) Causing some War Games scenario to play out because I accidentally hit paste in the wrong place.  I like to think I wield that kind of power.  I don't.
For those of you who don't know me, you just got a great introduction to all the things that I love.  I will take you on a tour now.  First up, polka dots.  If you are no friend of polka dots, you are no friend of mine.  Just kidding...maybe.  They will always, always be my favorite.  


Next, scallops! Check them out! When she was 4, I painted a scallop border on my daughter's wall.  She is now 8 and pondering a big girl room but said she would like to keep that.  Wheeeeew.  I was going to be really sad if she wanted to ditch sweet feminine scallops for animal print or something.   If I weren't terrified of waking her up, I would snap a picture this moment and show you.  But, I have a feeling that you will see it at some time or another.   


I also hope that you enjoy the bold bias stripes!  Bias is a fancy sewing word for diagonal.    When I was learning to sew, my mom would say, "You need to cut that on the bias." I had no clue what she was talking about, though I pretended.   When I figured it out, I wondered why in the world she just did not say diagonal.  Come to think of it, why didn't I just say diagonal?  I guess the B word is not that scary after all.  


Last, but not least, the rainbow writing.  You may think it is rainbow writing is juvenile, but in college I made these CRAZY colored study sheets when I had tests.  For some reason, I could remember what color I had written information in on my study sheet and therefore, remember the answers at test time.  Rainbow study sheets are how I got an A in genetics.  My brother sat next to me and got a B.  I have no doubt it is because he was too manly to rainbow write. 


I want to thank Alicia at Dreamlike Magic for doing this. Less than 12 hours after I placed my order, sha-zam! It is here and you are looking at it.  I think that is the Magic part.  In addition to her warp speed, she gave excellent installation instructions preventing any polka dotted doomsday scenarios from playing out.  Another amazing ETSY experience.  


The following is a dramatization:  And again, she exclaimed "Oh, how I love ETSY."  Dreamily adding, "I think I will have to open my own little shop one of these days." Then she tucked herself in bed to imagine what she could make and how Ryan Gosling would be so very helpful to her.  

Color Me Happy

Ok, so last night, I spent some time looking for sassy pretty templates for my blog. I looked at the free sites and I looked at custom sites and I went to bed frustrated because I want to see something pretty and happy and adorable. I cannot help it. I am superficial like that. Sometimes, prepare yourselves, I judge books by their covers. It is true. This morning, it is cold, rainy, and gray outside. For a rainbow kind of girl, you'd think I would be sad, but considering the drought we are having in Texas, the rain is a glorious thing. In fact, I almost always like a rainy day. Maybe it is because we just don't have that many around here. But I digress. This morning, I decided to revisit my drab blog. I looked at all the places again and I decided on a cute, but not me template. Overwhelmed by the installation instructions, I gave up. No hablo HTML. Then I had a lightbulb moment. What is my favorite site for tapping into the talents of others? That's right, ETSY. Within 5 minutes I found exactly what I wanted. Within 10, it was paid for. All accomplished in the comfort of my slippers! I am so excited! So so so excited. Almost as excited as the boy kicking the beach ball in the house creating his own soccer game and begging me to play. So, I shall go and join the game in the arena that is my living room and enjoy the excitement of something new and fancy on the way! KMc

In The Beginning.....

Hello there! My name is Katy and this is my 3rd attempt at blogging. I am hoping that this goes much better than the last 2 attempts. First, I tried a family blog. I love them, I am passionate about them, but I don't want to write about them. Too personal! Then I tried a running blog. Well, lets back that up. I tried running. I learned that the only thing I hated more than running was blogging about running. I tried hard man, and it just didn't work. Then, I got invited to the wonderful world that is Pinterest. I began pinning things and I noticed that the boards that had the most color made me the most happy. I found a website all about color. Go to it, when you finish reading this riveting post, of course. I can spend (waste) hours looking at the pretty colors and daydreaming of ways to use them. I am a very good day dreamer. I am also a very good mess maker and only a marginally good cleaner-upper. I like to try new things even if I fail miserably at them. A fantastic example is running. My aspirations are usually far more grand than my actual skills. Some people call it under qualified. Here, we will call it ambitious. I hope that this blog about everything and nothing at all will bring a little bit of color to our lives and be a bright spot in our day. Be patient with the ugly lay-out. I am going to try to learn a wee-bit more about blogging and make this a happy, colorful, lovely looking blog. In the mean time, go now to Design Seeds and let me know your favorite palettes! Here are a few of mine....
Blossom Hues
Cherry Tones
Single Blossom
Have a colorful day!
KMc