Glorious Spring!

I don't know about you, but I love spring.  The weather here in Virginia has been wacky to say the least.  Today is a high of 85.  Can you believe it?!  My perfect temp.  I would love for it to be this temperature all year long.  A girl can dream.  :-)  I am loving that I can see signs of spring even tho they may be early.  But, I always say nature knows more than we do at times.  Some of my fruit trees are budding out and my peach tree even has glorious blooms and I wanted to share the beauty with you. 

Fantastic Fish Tacos

Ingredients For Taco
Tilapia Fish - Not the breaded kind - Cook enough - I usually cook 2lbs
Corn tortillas - not the crunchy kind
Flour Tortillas
Cabbage - Use instead of lettuce - shredded
Mayo - 1/2 cup
Chipotle Tabasco Hot Sauce
Chile Powder
Garlic Powder

Ingredients for Pico De Gio
Chop all these ingredients by hand - makes for a better Pico than doing in a blender or chopper.
Roma Tomatoes - about 8 to 10 of them
Red Onion - bout 1/2 of it
Jalapeno - 3 of them deseeded
Banana Pepper - 1 deseeded
Cilantro - a good handful
Garlic - the kind in a jar or you can chop fresh.  I like it garlicky so I put a lot
Apple Cider Vinegar - about 1/4 cup
Salt and Pepper - to taste


Sprinkle Chile and garlic powder on top of tilapia and place on grill that has been lined with foil.  Be sure to spray foil with cooking spray 1st.  Cook till fish is done.  Don't over cook or else it will be hard to remove from the foil (yep I've done this).

Mix mayo and chipotle hot sauce together.  Mix enough hot sauce in until it turns almost a salmon color.  This will be somewhat thin.  Think I may try sour cream next go around.

Heat the flour and corn tortillas in a frying pan (I use cooking oil spray on them, but do what you like) and place in a tortilla warmer until you get the amount you want.    You will use two shells per taco.  The flour on the outside and then the corn one then spread some of the mayo sauce on top and then top with fish.  Add shredded cabbage then top with Pico.

Cheese is always an added plus.  I like Seriously Sharp Cheddar by Cabot.  

Well, I hope you enjoy!

Bacon Wrapped Water Chestnuts

Bacon Wrapped Water Chestnuts

2 cans whole water chestnuts
1 lb raw bacon
½ cup brown sugar
¼ cup chile sauce (in a ketchup-like bottle).  I use Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce
¼ cup mayo

1. Wrap each water chestnut in a single layer of bacon and secure with toothpick. Each piece of bacon wraps 2 chestnuts
2. Place on bar cookie sheet and bake for 30 minutes at 350 (until bacon is done).
3. Scoop fat out of pan and discard.
4. Mix remaining ingredients and pour over water chestnuts.
5. Bake an additional 10 minutes.
6. Try not to eat them all in one sitting all by yourself.

I added some extra Chili Garlic Sauce to the mixture to give it a little bite, cause I like things HOT!

YUMMY!!!

Vanlentine Movie Night For My Grand Girls

I made up these neat Valentine Movie Gift Baskets for my two Grand Daughters, I like to call them my Grand Girls.  I bought those 2 for $2 Dollar Popcorn Tubs and filled it Lots of Goodies.  They each got a movie to share and enjoy along with some movie candy favorites (M&M's, Milk Duds, and Gummies).  Also for the fun of it I placed in the tub a Valentine Themed Melamine Plate and Cup.  I filled the cup with fun pencils and erasers. 

My One Hour Valentine Gift.

Front "You Light up My Life"

Back Side of Glass Block

Wow, today is already Valentine's Day.  The year is going by so quickly.  I haven't been feeling all that great and I didn't have anything ready for my sweetie, Thomas.  I have one of those glass blocks just waiting for me to do something with, so hence my project for him began.  I made a simple cut out of the phrase "You Light up My Life" and stuck it to the front of the glass.  Punched out a Butterfly in the corner and glued it back in without gluing down the wings for that 3D effect.  Then just placed a heart  in the other corner.  Easy Peasy and Fast with my Silhouette Cameo.  Have I told you how many times I love this machine.  Any who, I then stuffed the block with lights and grass like filler.  The backside of the block I just covered with some pretty pink Vellum Paper and stuck a couple of Hearts on there.  Again Easy Peasy!  Then wrapped it all up pretty with some Valentine Ribbon.  Wonder what Thomas will think of the girly colors?  Also the lights are not in there just so, but I can work on that another day.   Thanks for visiting and hope you enjoyed my one hour Valentine Project.