Super Cute Little Girl Hairstyle

For those of you who don't know me, I have a 3 year-old daughter who has a lot of hair. No, seriously, the child has enough hair for three kids...but it's a blessing, because it's beautiful, thick & has those gorgeous loose, bouncy curls that we ladies would all love to have.

Luckily, I have ALWAYS loved styling hair, and I have a bit of a knack for it, so my Little Lass & I are a great match! I'm always looking for cute new styles to try on her, and my sister sent me this picture tutorial, so today we gave it a whirl!

It's not nearly as hard as it looks, but it does require that you know how to do a French braid. I have my own technique for French braiding that I taught myself on a doll when I was in fifth grade, and I've done it that way ever since. Someday soon, I'll post a tutorial on that...

Here's the tutorial pic on today's style. I have no idea who the original poster was, or I'd give them credit.

And here is our finished product...love it! As you can see above, she finishes out the whole braid at the end, which I never do. I like to finish it at the base of her neck, put in a tight elastic pony & a bow, then let her curls hang down loose.

Portable Enchiladas, You Say?

One of my current obsessions is food, other than muffins, made in a muffin tin. Sometimes it really is the little things! First of all, let's face it...mini-meals are cute. Secondly, kids like them because they're easy to eat & less messy, which we moms love too! Finally, you can make a lot of them, freeze what you don't eat, then reheat them as needed, so leftovers & snacks are a breeze! There really is no down side to making meals this way, in fact, check out this awesome blog with an entire section devoted to muffin tin meals. I used three of the recipes last week & they were all great!

So....on to tonight's dinner! I've made muffin tin tacos before, and they're great, but this week I started wondering if I could do muffin tin chicken enchiladas...why not? They actually turned out really good & I've got plenty left over to put in the freezer. This recipe makes 24 mini-enchiladas, and they would also make great party appetizers or game day snacks!

INGREDIENTS:
2 lbs. boneless, skinless chicken breasts
6 C water
3 packages taco seasoning
24 flour tortillas (soft taco size)
1 can red enchilada sauce
1 package queso fresco, crumbled (in the Mexican food section of grocery store)

DIRECTIONS:
The chicken breasts can either be cooked for several hours in the crock pot, or you can boil them on the stove, whichever you prefer. I used the stove this time.
Put 6 C of water in a large pot, mix in all 3 packages of taco seasoning & the 2 lbs. of chicken breasts, then bring to a boil. Turn down to medium-low & let simmer for 1 1/2 hours. This lets the chicken get really tender so it just falls apart. *FYI, this shredded chicken is AWESOME for chicken tacos, taquitos & quesadillas...I use it all the time & it's a no-fail!

While the chicken is cooking, get your tortillas ready! They'll need to be cut down a little to fit into the muffin tin, roughly a 5" diameter circle works fine. I just use a bowl that's roughly 5" across, then cut around it (you can do 4-5 tortillas at a time with a decent knife).

After you get all 24 circles cut, you'll need to soften them in the microwave. Get a clean dishtowel wet, wring it out, then you can wrap 4 circles at a time in it & microwave for 1 minute. After nuking each batch of 4, put them in the muffin tin as shown.

When the chicken is done, use a couple of forks to shred it into a bowl, then discard most of the leftover juice (you can use a few TBS of the juice to keep the chicken moist, but not too much, or your tortillas will get mushy). Distribute shredded chicken evenly among the 24 tortilla cups, then top each one with a spoonful of enchilada sauce & some crumbled queso fresco.

Bake in a preheated 350-degree oven for 20 minutes. Leftover enchiladas can be wrapped & put in a plastic bag in the freezer for reheating later- the microwave works great for that:)

Enjoy!

Best Cookie Recipe Ever...

I'm a sucker for a great cookie recipe, especially chocolate chip! This is one that I've made over and over again & it never disappoints! I originally found it a few years ago on one of the recipe sites, but I tweaked some of the ingredient amounts & added the toffee chips. Occasionally, I'll even double the recipe & freeze half the dough to bake later. I'm not sure if it's the vanilla pudding or what, but these always turn out soft, dense & absolutely delicious! 

SOFT CHOCOLATE CHIP TOFFEE COOKIES

2-1/4 cups all-purpose flour

 1 teaspoon baking soda

 1 cup butter, softened

 3/4 cup packed brown sugar

 1/4 cup white sugar

 1 (3.4 ounce) package instant vanilla pudding mix

 2 eggs

 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips*

1 package Heath Toffee Bits

*I'm a chocolate snob, and I use Ghirardelli 60% cacao chocolate chips:)

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Sift together the flour and baking soda.

In separate bowl, cream together the butter, brown sugar & white sugar. 

Beat instant pudding mix until blended. 

Stir in eggs and vanilla. 

Blend in the flour mixture. 

Finally, stir in the chocolate chips & toffee bits. 

Drop cookies by rounded spoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake for 10 to 12 minutes.

Edges should be golden brown- do not overbake!

Enjoy:)

You want HOW much for that???

I recently saw a post on Pinterest for a DIY wine rack made out of a pallet, and I LOVED it! After all, you can get pallets for free (as in $0) from most home improvement or warehouse-type stores, and as much as I crave a good bargain, getting something for free makes me absolutely giddy! The guy at Lowe's even loaded 4 of them into my van for me a few months ago for a table project I was doing.

As I coveted the aforementioned wine rack, I remembered that I still had an extra pallet out in my garage. The project sounded easy enough, so I decided to tackle it for my husband's Valentine's Day present. We're bursting at the seams in our small house, so I'm a big believer in practical, stylish space-savers, and our existing wine rack just took up a lot of unnecessary space.

This turned out to be one of the easiest projects I've ever done, and it looks great! Including staining & mounting it to the wall, it took me about 2 hours from start to finish. And as I already had all of the materials, it cost me nothing to make. Zip, zero, nada....

Oh, and someone is selling these "made to order" wine racks on Etsy. They look EXACTLY the same as the one I made. See the post here.

Wait for it...

Wait for it...

And they are charging $80 plus shipping. SAY WHAT???

Ok. Here are the directions for your free (or extremely cheap, if you don't already have all the materials) wine rack.

WHAT YOU'LL NEED:
1 wood pallet
Screws
Stain or paint
Sanding block
Hammer
Drill
Saw (my corded, hand-held reciprocating saw worked great!)
Wine bottles to put in your new wine rack!

DIRECTIONS:
Make sure your wood is dry & free from bugs, and saw across about the top 1/3 of the pallet (it's easy to see what I mean from the picture)
You'll also need to remove two boards from the remaining pallet, using your hammer to pry them off. One board is to attach to the bottom of your wine rack & one will attach to the back (behind where the bottoms of the wine bottles would go).
Use your drill & screws to attach the two extra boards.
Now, sand your wine rack. If you want it completely smooth, go for it, but I just focused on the sides & corners because I like the "rough wood" look for stuff like this.
Stain or paint whatever color you like & let it dry.
Now hang it on the wall- you can use whatever method you like to mount it. I used extra-long drywall screws to drill right through it into the studs, so that puppy isn't coming down for anything!
Load up your wine bottles & you're good to go:)

Out With the Old, In With the...Well, You Get It

So...what used to be my "Kiss My Wits" blog, has now been revamped, plucked, moisturized & Botoxed to become "Thrifts, Wits & Kitchen Bits". Hopefully, unlike my abs & my kids and husband during my finals week, it won't be completely neglected. Enjoy, comment, share, eat, create & laugh!

Coming up, I'll be posting a few of my favorite DIY projects!