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Teriyaki Chicken & Rice Bowls: a Recipe

Let me just tell you, these were amazing!! I could eat this every night and be perfectly happy about it.

Okay so here is what you will need:

2 green peppers, a yellow onion, a can of pineapple chunks with the juice, a package of boneless, skinless chicken thighs, oregano, salt & pepper, olive oil, teriyaki sauce, butter, and rice.

I picked up this Kikkoman teriyaki sauce and it's delicious but you can of course use your favorite.

It is pretty simple to make. I typically prepare the chicken the morning of so it has a few hours to marinate but you could also do it the night before if you've got the time and plan ahead that far. Cut chicken into bite sized cubes. Place cut chicken in a gallon Ziploc bag. Add Oregano, Salt, Pepper and a bit of teriyaki sauce, enough to evenly coat chicken. Leaving some air, close the bag and mix. Once completely combined remove as much air as possible and let marinate in the refrigerator for as long as desired.

In a large saucepan or pot on medium high heat add chopped green peppers and about a 1tbs. olive oil. Cook until almost soft then add the onions and more olive oil if necessary, you could even throw in a tablespoon of brown sugar to help caramelize the onions. Once onions are caramelized move veggies to a serving bowl. There may be bits left on the bottom of the pan, this is perfect we will use this to cook the chicken.

But let’s start the rice first. In a 1 quart pot add 1 cup of uncooked rice, 2 cups of water, a tsp. salt and a tbs. butter. Cook on high uncovered until it starts to boil. Once it is boiling cover and turn down to simmer for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes remove from heat leaving the lid on for 5 minutes. Remove lid and fluff before serving.

While the rice is going let’s deglaze our veggie pan by pouring in the juice from the can of pineapple chunks. Keeping the heat at medium high add in your marinated chicken chunks and cook in the pineapple juice. You may want to add more teriyaki sauce at this point, about a tbs. at a time depending on your desired taste. I added about 2 more tbs. Once chicken is cooked through and rice is ready, let’s eat!!

To build your rice bowl start with a couple spoonfuls of rice, then add veggies, pineapple chunks and chicken. Make sure you include a few extra spoonfuls of the juice from the chicken, it is amazing! I also added more teriyaki sauce because I love the flavor but you don’t have to, it will be amazing either way. Eat up and enjoy! This is a new favorite in our house.

For printable recipe click here.

I hope you like it! What is your favorite meal? I'd love to hear!

The Evolution of a Room: Part 3

A few weeks ago I Instagramed this photo:

I was so excited when I brought my new bike home I had to put it up and show it to the world!
I love having pictures and art hanging on the walls in our home, it makes it feel so much more homey and ours. I have a hard time with plain blank walls...

I have plans to make a washi tape frame around the bike but until I find a tape that I like or actually start looking for tape, I just used regular old masking tape on the back side and taped it in several different spots to make sure it stayed up.
I have plans to hang more things in here (that means you characacher!) but so far this is what I've got and there are also plans in my head for lighting but that will have to wait a little bit as well.

I am very happy with the makeover my bed received. Thanks to Christmas and my hubby for getting me the duvet I wanted. I was happy to see this duvet cover on my way out of JCP while Christmas shopping one night. I love the colors and pattern and the price was too good to pass up, I didn't know I would get the duvet for Christmas so that was a very happy surprise and a wonderful Christmas morning!

For those of you that are interested here is my source list for bedding and bike:
I have a really hard time spending a lot of money on anything so this whole room makeover was super duper inexpensive, like less then 100 bucks!

Art:

Bike print from CaravanShoppe
Printed at Staples with a 40% off code.

Bedding:

Sheets at JCPenny similar here (and on sale)
Duvet Cover at JCPenny clearance (no longer available)
Duvet at Overstock.com here 

I love the new colors going on in here now and I can't wait to add more stuff to make this room feel even more ours. It is evolving into a space that I love!

Valentines

I love giving and receiving Valentines, it is my favorite thing about this holiday! So I wanted to share with you what I did last year for my Valentines.

There is one of the cutest little Etsy shops called Paper + Pip and they create some of the cutest little printables. I was able to get these when they were running a deal on GroupDealz last year.

I just fell in love with all the different designs and the cute little pictures. They are too sweet!

These went together pretty quick.

I whipped up a batch of cookies using Valentine's M&M's instead of chocolate chips.

Purchased these paper CD sleeves and put a little red napkin in each one and then put a cookie inside.

I wrapped the Valentine's I printed out around the cookie sleeve and tied it up with twine.

They are so darling and yummy! I couldn't wait to give them out!

I hope this helps you if you are searching for a cute Valentine idea!

Valentine Mantle

I love decorating for Valentine's Day! It's the perfect excuse to have a little extra foof and glitter everywhere. Last week I showed you my two heart shaped wreaths and how to make them HERE & HERE. This week I'm going to show you how I decorate my mantle for Valentine's Day.

I love this year's mantle! I made the banner a few years ago and it's supper cute hanging up there; I just love it! It was very simple to make and there is a great toot HERE. I just used 3 different fabrics that I thought looked good together. I had a few extra triangles so I wrapped them around the 2 candles. The red rose thing is just a ball covered in extra pizza squares from my heart wreath. And the love story print is from the girls over at Eighteen25 and is one of my favorites. Everything else pretty much stays up there all year.
Anyway, I hope you like it; I know I sure do!
I'm not sure what happened to last years photo but here is a picture of the year before right after I finished my banner. 

2011 Valentine's Day Mantle

I'd love to see your homes decorated for the holiday, post me a link.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!

Feather Heart Wreath: a Tutorial

Okay, if you follow me on Instagram you have already seen this one. I first saw this boa heart idea last year when a friend of mine made one for a secret gift exchange we had at work. At the time I had never seen anything like it. It is so fun and fluffy and girly, just perfect for Valentine's Day. I asked her how she made it and it seemed pretty easy so a few weeks ago I thought I would finally give it a try. Seriously people, this will take no more than 30 minutes!

Supplies:
Cardboard
Utility knife
Feather boa - use a coopin if you can, this was way more expensive then I thought it would be.
Hot glue gun - with plenty of glue sticks
Ribbon
Scissors

Directions: 
1. Draw a heart on your cardboard and then draw another one about 1 1/2 inches bigger around the first one. I used a shoe box I had from a pair of boots I bought a couple months back but you can really use anything.

2. Cut out the heart shape. The thinner the cardboard is, like my shoe box or a cereal box, the easier it will be to cut out.

3. Glue the feather boa down to the cardboard heart using your hot glue gun. My heart was small enough for my boa to go around twice so it's nice and full. Depending on the size of your heart you may need more then one boa. I purchased 2 just in case.

4. Cut ribbon to length & hang. You can hot glue the ribbon to the back but because I wasn't hanging my wreath on a door hanger I wrapped my ribbon around the top of the heart, tied a knot at the end and taped it to my back door.

So what do you think? Do you want to make a Big Bird heart too? I giggle every time I see it.
Leave a comment if you do!

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Valentine's Day Wreath: a Tutorial

I love Valentine's decorations they are so pretty! I have 2 heart wreaths and I love them both, they make me happy and my home looks so much more cheerful for Valentine's Day!

The first wreath I will show you how to make is a beautiful felt heart wreath, I absolutely LOVE it! I would keep it up all year round I love it so much! I had wanted to make this ever sense I saw it on eighteen25 in 2011. I tried to make one then but I couldn't for the life of me get a hold of a heart wreath form, they had been sold out the entire month of January and February at my local craft store and online. So I put it on the back burner until the summer when I knew there would be plenty of heart wreath forms to purchase. The Idea Room has a great tutorial that I followed to make my wreath. So I will just give you a quick run down of how I made mine.

Supplies:
Styrofoam heart wreath form
1 yard red felt
2 inch paper circle pattern
Fabric scissors - to cut felt
Package of straight pins
Ribbon - for hanging

Directions: 
1. Cut out a 2 inch circle. I traced a mason jar lid onto a piece of scrap paper and cut it out to use as my pattern. I figured it would be about the correct size I needed.
2. Then cut out a bajillion circles from the red felt using the pattern you just made. Do whatever is easiest for you. I traced a bunch of circles with a pen on the felt and then cut them all out, it went pretty fast after they were all traced. We called these pizza squares at my house.

3. Fold a pizza square in half and then in half again to create a point an the end.

4. Insert pin into the point of the folded pizza square and push into wreath form.
Repeat steps 3 & 4 until your entire heart is covered in pizza squares on 3 sides. Leave the back empty so it will hang flat.
5. Cut ribbon to length and pin to the back. You could also hot glue it if you wish.

6. Hang and admire your beautiful work!! I love how velvety and rich it is.

If you make this or have made a wreath like this I would love to see it,  post a link in the comments!

I'll be back a little later today to show you how I made my feather heart wreath! It's super easy and can be done in less then a 1/2 hour. I hope you join me!