Quick & Easy Garlic Bread

I know I said that the next recipe coming from The Farmhouse Skillet was going to be fried chicken, and it still is coming up soon.  I took the pictures yesterday and hope to have it posted next week. BUT...in the mean time I just wanted to share this quick and easy idea with you.

A New Addition to the Kitchen

Something new has been added to the kitchen. 

 Can you spot it?

Remember, below is what it looked like before. 

 (This is on top of the fridge by the way.)

Repurposed Ribbon Spool

Sometime in the weeks before Christmas I saw a picture in one magazine or another that inspired this project.  In one of the scenes there were little decorative boxes in a vignette that looked like they used to be ribbon spools.  I wondered if I could use a similar idea only turn them into gift boxes.

Well, I never got around to trying it out at Christmas, so instead I gave them a Valentine's twist.

Boneless Skinless Chicken Breast for .99/lb

This is the first of many planned cooking posts in the newest section of my blog, "The Farmhouse Skillet."  Thank you to Jodi M. for coming up with the name, and to all the other Facebook fans for the creative suggestions you gave me.  I liked several of them, but in the end chose this one for more reasons than you probably care about so I'll spare ya the details and get straight to today's post.

Now, this isn't a recipe or even an actual "cooking" post, but we use a lot of chicken around The Farmhouse and I'll be sharing lots of chicken recipes.  So, I thought I'd share with you the cheapest, most frugal way to buy chicken and then what to do with it.

Boneless skinless chicken breast (will refer to this as BLSL chicken from here on out) is great for SO many recipes, but let's face it, convenience can be down right expensive.  The cheapest I've ever found BLSL chicken is on a mark down at Walmart for 1.38/lb.  That's a pretty good price and when I find it that low I stock up.  Otherwise, the absolute cheapest way to get BLSL chicken breast is to wait for split breasts to go on sale for .99/lb. (I price matched mine at Walmart.)  It requires a little more work from you, but in the end you'll have meat for at least 3 different kinds of meals.  It really is worth it.  So, watch your sale papers and when you find it for .99/lb, stock up.  Not just with what you'll need for that week, but if you have the freezer space stock up on what you think your family will eat over the next 4-6 weeks.  That's usually about the length of the sales cycles and you'll have plenty on hand until the next time it goes on sale again.

An Unexpected Adventure

Earlier in the week I told you about an unexpected junkin' adventure I had.  Last weekend we had some business/errands to do about an hour away from where we live, so we packed the family in the car and made a day trip of it.  I knew there was a large Goodwill retail store there and I was secretly hoping I could sweet talk Hubby into letting me stop in.

Well...our errands took us to a part of town we had never been to and before I could even make my wishes known, what did we just happen to drive past?  A Goodwill OUTLET store!!  Thankfully my sweet Hubs was willing to keep the kiddos in the car and let me run in.  I had heard of these outlet stores before, on other people's blogs and also from my junkin' buddy.  She had actually been to this one and told me all about it, but I had completely forgotten it was there.  So, I had heard the "tales" and just had to experience this for myself.

I took these pictures with my phone while I was on the go, so they're a bit blurry.

It was HUGE in there and everywhere you looked were these large rolling bins that were just piled with stuff.  I did a quick survey around the store to assess the layout.  Clothes in the left corner (no interest there at the time), shoes and purses in the back left (no interest there either), large furniture in the back right.  Everything else was lumped together smack dab in the middle.  I grabbed a cart and headed in.

Winter Coffee Table Vignette

Over the weekend I had an unexpected junkin' adventure that I can't wait to share you with you.  I found some great treasures and I'm excited to give you the full scoop.  My Facebook fans got a little taste of it when I shared snippets of it with them.  If you haven't already, be sure to stop by and "like" the page.  You're missing out on half the fun if you don't!   So stayed tuned for that adventure later in the week.

But for today, I'm sharing my winter coffee table vignette.

Last week I shared the winter mantel with you, and promised some more to go with it. 

 I hope you enjoy what I came up with.

Keeping with the white and silver palette I had going on with the mantel, I shopped my house for some more items to create this gathering.

And the Winner Is.....

The winner of the $25 Hobby Lobby gift card has been picked by Rafflecopter.com.

Congratulations to

a Rafflecopter giveaway

An email has already been sent, so if you're the winner check your inbox and get back to me right away with your mailing info!

Thank you SO very much to everyone who joined in the fun and for following along on my thrifty adventures!

                                                           
                                                              

Farmhouse Winter Mantel

I've been having so much fun shopping my house and coming up with some new arrangements for a January "winter" theme.

The shelf (or "mantel") in the above picture is how I had it last year.  It was cute and very "wintery," but this year I wanted something a bit more "junk-i-fied."

Here's this year's winter "mantel."  Only 2 things (besides the greenery) are not 2nd hand treasures.  The rest has been either thrifted or a yard sale find.

A Winter Ice Wreath {with Tutorial}

Good morning everyone!  Today I'm bringing you a little project that I've been working on for the past couple of days and finally got finished up -

 A Winter Ice Wreath.  

It's Giveaway Time Again!!

Ok, so if you're not a Facebook fan yet, or if you are but you were hiding under a rock this past weekend, then you missed a HUGE and exciting event.  The Facebook page gained over 1,200 new fans over the weekend, 1,000 of them in less than 24 hours!  Can you believe that?!?  To say I was in complete and total shock is an understatement since it had taken 4 months just to climb up to 300, and almost over night we're over 1,500!

Here's how it went down.  Earlier that day I posted a question asking what the interest would be in me doing a few good ol' country cookin' posts.  I had been checking in on my phone periodically to see what the response was.  We put the kiddos to bed at 8pm, I checked in, nothing out of the ordinary, I went and took my shower and literally, 30 minutes later I checked in again and had 253 new followers and 23 new notifications!  I almost fell over.  I thought for sure I had been hacked, but the numbers just kept climbing right before my eyes!  Finally, I posted a question to find out where in the world all this new traffic was coming from.  Turns out, another Facebook page, Two Women and a Hoe, posted a picture of the watering can shower head from our cabin visit back in June.  They have over 87,000 followers and a nice big chunk of 'em came over to visit and decided to stay awhile!  So a HUGE thank you to them for posting my picture!

So....we are celebrating this humongo influx of new fans with a

$25 gift card for Hobby Lobby.

(Please do NOT leave me comments voicing your opinion against Hobby Lobby or against me for supporting them.  I've had enough hatred spewed at me on the Facebook page over this issue and I will not tolerate it nor will I debate it.  This is not a political blog and we will not argue.  Any political/hateful/argumentative comments will be immediately deleted just like they were on Facebook.  If you don't agree with me or with Hobby Lobby then don't enter the giveaway.  I choose to support them.  It's my blog and my Facebook page, and I have the right to run it the way I see fit.  If you don't like it, you know where the "unlike" button is.)

Ok, now that a little housekeeping has been done, here are the "rules."  If you are not already, you must become either a follower of the blog and/or a fan of the Facebook page to enter.  You can gain more entries by doing the other things, but they are not required.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

It will end on Saturday at midnight.

Thank you so very much to all of my followers and fans who were already along with me, and thank you and welcome to all the new fans!

Good luck everyone!

                                                              

Happy New Year!

Just a quick post to wish you and yours a very happy new year, and share some snowy photos.  

The day after Christmas it started snowing and it feels like it hasn't stopped since.  I threw on my boots, tucked my camera in my coat and trudged out to snap a few pictures.

I had added a touch of fake snow when I made this porch display, but now it has bunches of the real stuff!  

Doesn't it look beautiful?

Hubs and I were able to take the kiddos to a local park this past weekend to go sledding.  

The pond was frozen, everything was covered in white and it looked absolutely gorgeous!

Thank you for a great year here on the blog, I'm looking forward to another fun filled year!