Kielbasa and Cabbage Skillet

Kielbasa and Cabbage Skillet
Serves 4-6
Prep time: 10 minutes
Cook time: 13-14 minutes

Ingredients

• Olive Oil
• 2 pounds polska kielbasa, cut into pieces
• 1 head cabbage, chopped
• 1 large onion cut into pieces
• Garlic
• Sugar
• Salt
• Pepper
• Old Bay Seasoning
• Mustard

Directions
Spray or coat a large nonstick pan with olive oil and set at medium-high heat. Add kielbasa slices. Cook for about 3-4 minutes. Remove from pan and set aside

In the same pan (do not rinse or drain)  add the cabbage and onion. Season to taste with garlic (about 1 1/2 tbs), sugar (just a pinch), old bay seasoning, salt, and pepper (a few shakes each). Stir to combine and cook for  10 minutes. Add a squirt or two of mustard (any flavor) and add the sausage back to the pan and cook for another 2 minutes to heat through.

This dish is great served over wide egg noodles or mashed potatoes. My honey likes it by itself too!

How To Make Free Computer Art

How To make this print for FREE on Google Drive

1. Open 'Drawing' (program) in Google Drive- If you don't have a Google account, I highly recommend getting one. You can use so many of their features and programs all free!

2. Find Your State- go to google.com and search for your states. Below you can see how to search for transparent only images. This will help make sure there is no background in the way. I use this search feature all the time when searching for embellishments for photos. 

3. Insert Your States- Add your states to your page by uploading and inserting a photo. (You can also just copy and paste from the web if that's easier)

4. Add Hearts- Add hearts to where the city/cities you lived (This will be our starting point for our scribble dotted lines!)

5. Draw Dotted Lines- In order to make these lines, use the scribble line feature (don't worry about making your scribbles perfect, they automatically smooth them out for you!) Make the line then make the lines dotted by using the line dash drop down menu. 

6. Add Text- You can make this say anything you want, just add a text box and edit the text, size and font!

If you have any questions or need help creating your own, send me an email! I would love to hear from you and I'd be more than happy to help!

Thanks,

Katie Lynn

Ps! Don't forget to follow my blog for more ideas, tips and tricks!

Another example:

Coleus Care (Tips and Tricks)

Colorful Coleus

Coleus plants are by far one of the easiest plants I've worked with. They are so beautiful and come in many different colors. They can grow in full sun, shade, anything works well. You just have to adjust your watering schedule accordingly.

Tips and Tricks:
(From a new-found green thumb---you can have one too!)

1. Water, water, water. Coleus love water, so make sure they get plenty. A little miracle grow in the water will help, too. (But that really goes for any plant you're growing.)

2. Pinch the leaves. When coleus starts to grow larger, two tiny baby leaves with pop up at the top. Pinch them both off and four will grow in its place! (This helps your coleus grow nice and large and bushy!)

3. Start new seedlings. You can trim off stems of your coleus (about 4-6 inches worth) and place it in a small glass of water that's near bright, but indirect sun. Once you see roots growing off your clipping you can transplant them into some moist, damp soil.

Enjoy!

Twine Pears Tutorial

I love a good three step anything! Recipe, craft, you name it. This is pretty self explanatory, and you can't really go wrong with it. As you can see my twine was not wrapped perfectly around my light bulbs, but that's okay! Pears don't have a perfect shape anyway. It helps them look less like a light bulb wrapped in twine!

Try something new! Let me know how it goes! I would love to hear from you! I'm always looking for new tips and tricks for decorating on a budget.

Enjoy!

Thanks for viewing and don't forget to follow my blog for more tips and tutorials!

Loss of a Furry Family Member

When a furry family member passes away...

Here's how I'm trying to make it a little less hard. (I know how hard it is, and my thoughts are with you if you're going through this.)

Make it Special

Even though it's hard and you're sad, try to remember the best things. The great times you got to share with your pet. Use photos to create a collage or scrapbook page or even print some photos to hang in frames as a reminder of the love you shared. If you have other pets in the home or children, you can use this time to include photos of the rest of the family too, create these projects and new memories together. Having a creative outlet can take your mind off the giant gallon bucket of ice cream you'd like to dive right into. (Trust me, I know the feeling.) It can also bring a family closer together by spending time enjoying each other's company.

--- The collage today was on Fotor. Check out my blog review here.

And don't forget to follow my blog!

Best Photo Free Editing Software (And Review)

Fotor - Photo Editor

So I've been trying to find the best photo editing software out there that is (of course) free.  Fotor.com is the best one I've found thus far. It has all the great features that I look for, basic editing like croping, fine-tuning, and it has advanced options (that are still free) like blemish fixes, red-eye remover, [it even has lip tinting  mascara, eye shadow, wrinkle remover, smoothing, reshaping, and so much more, still free] all while having an easy to use, clean cut interface.

What really caught my attention was the "try it first" demo/thing. When I first went to the page it didn't bombard me with popups making me sign up or anything like that, I could just go and try the website and see how I liked it (which made it helpful because this wasn't the first website I went to) It gave me some of their pictures in the 'basket' for me to try out on the canvas. It didn't take me long to scan all the features before I stopped my search. This was the one. Plus, you can upload photos from your computer, dropbox, facebook, picassa, flickr, webcam or the web. 

The program also has a free app for your smartphone that you can download and edit from there as well! They still have some great features available (all free) [not as many on the web, but that can be expected]

Here is a photo I edited from the smartphone app!

(After)

(Before)

Enjoy!

Try something new, you'll like it! Don't forget to follow my blog for more tips, tricks and ideas! :)

Weekend Beach Date!

Our Day at the Beach!

 We had such an amazing day at the beach yesterday! It was great to have a day all to ourselves and enjoy some relaxation by the ocean.

Breakfast

They day started off by making some fresh banana muffins for breakfast. They were just too good! Along with our muffins we made some eggs and sausage. 

(Click the photo to see how we made these muffins!)

Ready to Jump in!

I had everything all packed (Towels, blanket, dry clothes, a zipper pouch to hold sunscreen, lip balm, etc, and a bag for wet suits all in one big bag [a Thirty-One Large Utility Tote- I highly recommend]). My honey likes to say the women in my family like their bags, totes and 'containers for containers'.  I like it. Organization is a good time! We also packed a thermal tote with some fresh fruit, veggies and sandwiches and made sure it would stay cool with frozen water bottles (Those came in handy with the warm weather!)
Once we got to the beach we laid out our blanket and headed right for the water. We had an excellent time swimming (even though my bathing suit bottoms kept falling off me!) [Oh well- gives me an excuse to buy a new one with the Real Women Lane Bryant Dollars I earned last shopping trip! Oh and I can't wait for more of the T3 Capris!- I'll make sure to post my curvy girl shopping experience with you all! I know sometimes shopping can be a bit of a pain..]
After we were done swimming we went back to our blanket and enjoyed some nice cold fresh fruit and laid out in the sun for a bit. We even had some time for my honey to fly her kite! It was such a beautiful day!

Can't wait for our next Weekend Beach Date!

Try something new, you'll like it! Don't forget to follow my blog for more tips, tricks and ideas! :)