Idea Queen Tips & News

Here it is, almost Easter and we still don’t have our Easter eggs done yet. Gasp! No worries, we plan to tackle this project on Saturday right before Easter.

Today I found an articled about painting eggs instead of dyeing, which I thought was rather interesting. The thought never crossed my mind that we could actually use paint instead of those messy dyes. Not a bad idea at all! The article goes on to give ideas for different ways to paint, which I also thought was very useful.

This got me thinking - exactly what do we want to do this year? Do we want to paint them or dye them like we always do? Well I think we are doing a little bit of both.

Usually we get the kind of dye kits that come with little sponges which allow you to “paint” the dye onto the eggs. This has always worked pretty well and kept the mess to a minimum (thank goodness for black counter tops that don’t show stains!).

Regardless, there’s some pretty good ideas for painting on that page that I believe we can use with the dye. I especially like the Tie-Dye idea with the paper towel. We might give that a shot with the regular dye instead of the paint and see how it works.

Have fun!

This winter has been absolutely horrible, and there’s still no end in site. If it’s not near zero or below, it’s snowing. Well, I’ve had enough. Any mention of cold weather or snow is starting to set me off, so I had to do something.

The first thing I did was changed the template here at the blog. The last one was for Valentine’s day, so we needed something a little more like spring. It wasn’t my first pick, but it was the first one not to give me major problems with the design. If you dropped in during the revamp yesterday, I apologize.

While working on the template I pulled out some specific candles. One was in the scent floral bouquet which is burning in the front room, and the other was lily of the valley. Nothing like the scent of fresh flowers to trick your mind into thinking it was warm.

Everything worked fine until I had to go outside. Is winter ever going to be over?*Sigh*

Valentine’s day is only a little over a week away, do you have plans?

Unfortunately being single, I have none. While it’s a romantic day for most, it can be a little depressing to me. No big deal though, I just do my best to ignore it all together. It’s just another day, right?

I kicked around the idea of maybe hosting a chat for all us single fokes (moms in particular), but not sure how much interest there would be. It would of course be a controlled chat, unlike so many chat rooms are now.

What do you think? Would join in if you knew of a friendly chat designed to distract us single fokes from the day of depression? I do have a chat room in mind, so let me know!

Need some cute eCards for Valentine’s Day? American Greetings has lots to choose from! Plus you don’t have to worry about spyware or other computer problems by visiting this site.

With their free trial, you can send out all your Valentine’s day cards for free before you decide to use them for other holidays. I was especially impressed with the number of different holiday cards they have available. Just about everything you can think of is listed here, including the major holidays like Valentine’s Day, Halloween, and Christmas.

For those that send out a lot of ecards or print cards at home, they’ve got a whole lot of options for a pretty good price. Worth trying out free for 30 days!

Here we are officially one full week into the new year. A good chunk of you probably had resolutions and goals you wanted to meet this year. So how are they holding up?

Yes I know it’s only a week in and your probably doing alright. But as the year wears on, it gets harder and harder to keep up with those resolutions. I know because I’ve let mine slide year after year. Unfortunately they are the usual type of goals - make more money, lose weight, or keep myself more organized. Those empty goals sound good in theory, but really have no real solid plan behind them.

I think I’ve come up with my own personal solution to the failing resolution problem though.

For one, I don’t care what time of year it is. I don’t wait until January 1st to start a new diet or start cleaning my house. I don’t even care if it’s a Monday when I start. I just start, period.

For two, I plan. I sit down and make a very detailed plan to map out how I plan to get to my goal. For example, if I decide I really need to lose a few pounds, I translate that into how many calories I need to burn over how much time. I keep a log of calories taken in and burned every day. If I want to get organized, I schedule in a time to do that every day. I make new habits that stick (like doing laundry first thing in the morning as I’m getting the kids ready for school, or doing dishes while I’m making supper).

If you are traveling somewhere new, you need to have a map. The same goes for plans for goals - you need to take the time to figure out how you are going to get there before you even leave.

With New Year’s almost here, many of you are surely thinking of what your New Year’s resolution will be. While I tend to set goals all year round, I know many take the new year to make a new start.

A few weeks ago we put up a brand new page specifically for help with setting goals. We hope this will get you started on your new years resolution!

As always, if you have something to add, please be sure to use the form on the page. We’re always looking for additional ideas to feature on the site.

Did you forget someone on your Christmas card list? I know it’s easy to do sometimes. Especially when you are trying to remember all your family, friends, and neighbors.

If you are in need of one more quick Christmas card and don’t have time to send it, why not send an eCard? They can be just as personal and perfect for last minute (and we mean at the VERY last minute!). You can even wait until the day before Christmas to send an ecard and know it will get there in time.

Blue Moutain is a site we highly recommend. You can get unlimited ecards and printed cards for a very low price. Best of all, they have a free trial. So if you need to send out a few more Christmas cards via email, give them a shot. Hey why not? It’s free! Just click on the button below to get started.

A friend and I spend the entire day baking over the weekend, making cookie and candy dessert trays for our family, friends, and neighbors. While it was a lot of work, we made some pretty fantastic dessert trays.

Here’s our list all the desserts that went on our plates:

- Chocolate Covered Pretzels
- Peanut Butter Fudge
- Caramel Filled Chocolate Bars
- Sugar Cookies
- Cookies & Cream Truffles
- Pumpkin Bars
- Peanut Brittle

Several of these recipes my friend brought over, while a few of the others I had on hand. I think just about everyone has a basic sugar cookie recipe, but the others you might have to look for.

One of the recipes I pulled from the Chocolate Lover’s ebook was the carmel filled chocolate bars. The recipe for those are below, but I do have to warn you. I had my doubts it was going to come out good just from the looks, but after it baked it was fine. Then again my pan was bigger than what is recommended (our fudge was in the pan these were suppose to be in!).

Caramel Filled Chocolate Bars
1 German Chocolate cake mix
3/4 c Margarine, melted
14oz Bag Caramels
2/3 c Evaporated milk, divided
1 c Chocolate chips
1 c Walnuts, chopped

Melt caramels and 1/3 cup evaporated milk over hot water or in microwave, stirring every thirty seconds. Keep warm.

In a separate bowl, mix the cake mix, margarine, and 1/3 cup evaporated milk and beat well.  Spread 1/2 the batter in a greased 9×13 inch pan. Bake for 6 minutes at 350 degrees. Cool about 2 minutes. Spread caramel mixture over baked layer and sprinkle with chocolate chips. Stir 1/2 cup nuts into remaining 1/2 of batter and drop by half teaspoons over top. Sprinkle with remaining 1/2 cup nuts. Return to over and bake for 18 mins at 350 degrees. Cool, cut into 1 1/2 inc squares.

Somehow I managed to get all my Christmas shopping done…..except for stocking stuffers for the kids. I figured I’d make a quick trip to the dollar store, and spend $20 or less on both the kids. Easy right?

Well I started looking at a few things on Amazon.com, and wondered if that might be a better idea. There are quite a few items that would make awesome Christmas stocking stuffers for kids, and quite a few are under a $1. Doesn’t get much better than that!

They’ve got some really cute stuff, including holiday specific items like mini coloring books, pens, mini holiday cards, and lots more. You know, the stuff that’s small enough to fit in a stocking with other items.

Usually in addition to the small dollar store items, I usually stuff candy in there as well. At a craft show I had found little chocolates wrapped in adorable candy wrappers that I was going to put in their stockings. Unfortunately I didn’t get them put up fast enough and they were found. I may end up doing something similar if time permits.

S&S Worldwide also has some great inexpensive options for stocking stuffers. This site is great for crafty kids that like craft supplies and craft kits. They also feature games (like card games) which would make nice stocking stuffers.

Whatever you chose for Christmas stocking stuffers for kids, just remember Christmas is only a week away! If you plan to shop online, time is running out quickly.

This is my absolute favorite thing to do this time of year. I’m not real big on Christmas, but every year the kids and I make our own Christmas ornaments. It’s become a family tradition that we never miss.

What’s great about this craft is you probably have all you need in the house, which makes this a perfect craft to do when your snowed in (like we are today!).

First you’ll need cookie cutters and the dough recipe. That can be found on our Christmas ornament craft page at Idea Queen.  Just make the dough and cut out your ornaments, then bake. We let them sit over night, and paint the next day.

Since this has become a tradition, we also make sure we leave enough dough for each of the kids to make their own hand print. Then each year as we decorate the tree, we look at the hand prints from the previous years to see how much they’ve grown.

Take care when you put these decorations away, as they are very breakable. Over the past few years, we’ve had a few here and there break, but not many.

Have fun!