DIY Turkey Thanksgiving Fall Decor Ideas

DIY Turkey Thanksgiving Fall Decor

I'm pretty frugal about buying things for the house, I just have a hard time deciding on something if it's more than like $12 and I get so much more enjoyment from making something anyways, especially if I can make it from scraps and things I find in my stash for free!  Here are some thanksgiving turkey themed things I made with scraps from my craft/sewing/art closet.

DIY Turkey Thanksgiving Applique Throw Pillow

I drew a simple turkey design, cut out all the pieces and then traced it onto fusible webbing, stuck it on scraps of fabric, cut them out and ironed onto a piece of unbleached cotton.  Cut that all out with a slight edge and then centered over a 22 inch square of the unbleached linen for the pillow and then sewed around all the edges with the yellow thread as you can see in the pictures.  I didn't take pics of the process so I couldn't make a tutorial..darn!  At the end I stitched a bead on for the turkey's eye. (sorry I don't really know what I'm doing. I just figure out how to make it work so I hope that made enough sense for anyone who wanted to try this..that's why I love step by step picture tutorials...because you don't have to know proper sewing terms and techniques lol)

 I used some yellow ribbon trim for the legs and feet.

 The back is an envelope style so I can easily remove this thanksgiving turkey pillow cover as the season changes.

Handprint Turkey Applique Canvas Keepsake

I made this one last year as the kids were obsessed with making handprint turkeys, I decided to make some thanksgiving fall decor out of it that would keep forever.  stuck some fusible webbing on the fabric and then traced each child's hand on the webbing and cut it out.  Then ironed it on to the strip of unbleached linen and stiched it down around the edges and used the sewing maching to make the legs, eyes and gobblers.  Then wrapped the canvas with the yellow chevron fabric and added the strip of unbleached linen and just used pushpins on the back to hold it all together.  I just whipped it up really quickly with scraps on hand, another free DIY project!

Leftover Turkey?

Have any Leftover Turkey from the holidays?  We got a free turkey from my husband's office that was like 25 pounds and between the two of us and 2 little ones (one who won't even touch it), and being that our turkey was pretty well cooked (if you saw my last post, we slacked on Christmas, took naps all afternoon and got a dry turkey).  Anyways, so what to do with those rather dry turkey leftovers?

Yesterday I made Turkey Tetrazinni for my husband.  I found some recipes on AllRecipes and ended up doing a mix of the Turkey Tetrazzini II and Chicken or Turkey Tetrazzini.


For my daughter and I, I needed something gluten free and dairy free (I doubt she would have eaten the tetrazinni even if it was gluten free anyways) so we made turkey noodle soup with gluten free animal noodles.  It's Super simple, just poured gluten free chicken broth in the pot, added some mixed frozen vegetables, a bunch of turkey chopped up small and lastly, the gluten free farm animal noodles.

These noodles are great by the way, it's not always easy to find good gluten free noodles that the kids will enjoy and these are good, made with vegetables, are fun and my daughter always is excited to have them.  My 20 month old on the other hand....I have YET to get a noodle in his mouth of any kind!  No matter how we try it, he is determined to never touch one....He is a picky eater visually AND he refuses to eat anything we give him...we have to put food we think he might eat somewhere in his line of sight, casually without actually giving it to him or saying anything about it and wait for him to notice it, then we can say "Oh you want this? you sure?' then we can give it to him without him freaking out and acting like we are trying to force it down his throat! lol!  (they say payback is a b!@#$...I was a super picky eater the same way growing up and drove my parents crazy).

Anyways, next on the menu that we can all eat will be Turkey and Rice Soup.  Other years I have made Turkey Enchiladas with a cream sauce.  Another option to use up small amounts of leftover turkey or taco meat is to make quesadillas.  I like to put a little oil in the frying pan then use corn tortillas, add shredded cheese, leftover meat and top with another corn tortilla, fry about 2 minutes on both sides, then place on a paper towel and serve with franks hot sauce.  

After the Turkey and Rice soup, if there is anything else left...too bad....we will be turkey-ed out and I have sliders and fries on the menu!!!

PS- Thanks everyone who voted for my embarrassing stories over at Wanna Be Balanced!  Crystal just told me I won the personal microderm system!!!! YAY I AM SOOO EXCITED! THANK YOU!!!  I'll be sure to let you all know how it works and if it helps!  I've recently started getting the worst acne of my life!  I didn't break out this much in high school! UGH!  Crystal, I really appreciate you doing this awesome contest/giveaway!  I love your blog it's always so fun, interesting, inspiring and educational!!! :)

Thanksgiving Recap

Hello out there....if anyone is still there!  We are alive over here, however we had family come visit, then went and visited family...pretty much the time between Halloween and Thanksgiving just happened at warp speed.  But we are back and Scrappy Saturdays will be back on this weekend too.
After not posting in so long it's almost hard to know where to start so I thought I'd start with a recap of our Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving day started with these

Gluten-Free Sticky Cinnamon Swirl Pancakes with Maple Frosting

 by Silvana Nardone

 For her other great thanksgiving breakfast menu recipes including this one, visit Silvana's Kitchen!


And our Day Ended with this

Toasted Marshmallow topped Pumpkin Ice Cream Pie with Ginger Snap Cookie Crust from 

 from Silvana's Book Cooking for Isaiah 

(I LOVE LOVE LOVE this gluten free dairy free cookbook!)

Both were super yummy and delicious, along with everything else we had in-between.  My husband cooked the actual meal and did a great job on everything.  I sure am Thankful for such an awesome hubby!!!  And I'm thankful for all the great resources, including Silvana's recipes that make eating gluten and dairy free easy and delicious!  We had company over for Thanksgiving and they said they would have never guessed everything was gluten and dairy free.

I did make ONE thing for the actual meal from a recipe my sister gave me. I made this the night before and I  want to make this everyday, just to make my house smell like this.  Now I'm desperate to find the perfect candle that smells like this...cranberries, apples, vanilla, cinnamon and clove! *I left out the raisins.

homemade cranberry relish

2 cups fresh apple juice

1/2 cup sugar

24 ounces cranberries

2 slightly sweet apples, peeled and diced

1/2 vanilla bean, slit open

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 -2 cloves depending on preference

1/4 cup golden raisins

Combine all the ingredients in a large saucepan. Cook, stirring occasionally, on medium-high heat until the cranberries have popped and everything has begun to gel. Spoon into a casserole dish. Let cool.

This is beautiful and super Yummy!!

Gluten Free Corn Bread Stuffing (also got this recipe from my sister)

Use your favorite GF cornbread mix - (Bobs Red Mill is awesome) or substitute gluten free all purpose baking mix for the flour in any basic corn bread recipe. Mix dough then stir in 1/2 Tbs of dried thyme. Bake according to recipe directions.

Once the cornbread has cooled, cut into cubes and arrange on a baking sheet. Let this sit overnight to dry out and create cornbread crumbs.

Stuffing ingredients:

2 Tbs Olive oil

1/2 onion - chopped

4 cloves garlic - finely chopped or pressed

1-2 stalks celery - chopped

1 apple - peeled and chopped

.75 oz of fresh Rosemary, Thyme and Sage

Vegetable or Chicken stock as needed

Salt and Pepper to taste

In a large pot, saute onion, garlic and celery. Add apple, salt and pepper and herbs, cook stirring frequently over medium heat for 3-4 mins. Lower to med/low heat and add cornbread crumbs, toss to coat with herb mixture. Add vegetable stock to moisten cornbread to desired consistency/texture. Serve warm.

Turkey Enchiladas!

So, after a lot of Thanksgiving leftover dinners and turkey sandwhiches, we used up the remaining dark meat (which we don't really enjoy) and made Turkey Enchiladas.  This is one of our favorite recipes, I always get positive feedback when I make it (normally with chicken).  It's from my trustee Better Homes and Garden Cookbook, a staple for every kitchen!

Turkey Enchiladas

• 1/4  cup  slivered almonds
• 1/4  cup  chopped onion
• 2  tablespoons  butter or margarine
• 1  4-ounce can  diced green chile peppers, drained
• 1  3-ounce package  cream cheese, softened
• 1  tablespoon  milk
• 1/4  teaspoon  ground cumin
• 2  cups  chopped cooked chicken or turkey
• 12  7-inch  flour tortillas or 6-inch corn tortillas
• 1  10.75-ounce can  reduced-fat condensed cream of chicken or cream of mushroom soup
• 1  8-ounce carton  light dairy sour cream
• 1  cup  milk
• 3/4  cup  shredded Monterey Jack or cheddar cheese (3 ounces)
• 2  tablespoons  slivered almonds

Directions

1. In a medium skillet cook the 1/4 cup almonds and the onion in hot butter over medium heat until onion is tender and nuts are lightly toasted. Remove from heat. Stir in 1 tablespoon of the canned green chile peppers; reserve remaining peppers for sauce.
2. In a medium bowl stir together cream cheese, the 1 tablespoon milk, and the cumin; add nut mixture and chicken. Stir until combined. Spoon about 3 tablespoons of the chicken mixture onto each tortilla near an edge; roll up. Place filled tortillas, seam side down, in a greased 3-quart rectangular baking dish. Set aside.
3. For sauce, in a medium bowl combine the reserved chile peppers, the soup, sour cream, and the 1 cup milk. Pour evenly over the tortillas in the baking dish. Cover with foil. Bake, uncovered, in a 350 degree oven about 35 minutes or until heated through. Remove foil. Sprinkle enchiladas with cheese and the 2 tablespoons almonds. Return to oven; bake about 5 minutes more or until cheese melts. Makes 6 servings.

Picture from Wanna Be Balanced

AND I forgot to tell you guys, because I was so busy with sick kids and company at the time, but I won a giveaway over at Wanna Be Balanced Mom, and received my lace shirt today and LOVE it!  Thank you Crystal!  She always has great giveaways, and has another sweet giveaway going on right now that ends tomorrow so CHECK IT OUT!

Dairy Free Pecan Pie

Dairy Free Pecan Pie

Well, I had no desire for pumpkin pie this year and decided to go for pecan pie.  I've always shied away from pie making...maybe because the one early attempt I made at a Lemon Merengue pie was a huge FLOP!  But I was like 14 or something when I did that and ever since, I always thought a pie was a lot of work and just not my thing.  Anyways....

I wanted to make a pie that was milk free since I can't have any milk products.  I remembered a pie crust recipe my mother in law gave me that is really simple and uses oil rather than butter.  Here is the dairy free pie crust recipe.

Pie Crust

1 cup + 2 TBSP flour

1/2 tsp salt

1/3 cup oil

2 TBSP cold water

Mix the flour and salt together in a medium bowl with a fork.  then add the oil and water and mix until you can form a soft ball with the pastry.  

Place the ball on the center of some parchment paper.  Press down with your hand and then roll out into a circle that is slightly larger than your pie plate.  

Flip parchment paper over with rolled out pastry over your pie dish and transfer it to the pie plate.  

Pecan Pie

Found on AllRecipes.com

1 3/4 cups white sugar

1/4 cup dark corn syrup

1/4 cup butter (I used Earth Balance Vegan Buttery Sticks)

1 tablespoon cold water

2 teaspoons cornstarch

3 eggs

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 1/4 cups chopped pecans

1 (9 inch) unbaked pie shell

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F

in a medium saucepan, combine the sugar, corn syrup, butter, water, and cornstarch. Bring to a full boil, and remove from heat.

in a large bowl, beat eggs until frothy. Gradually beat in cooked syrup mixture. Stir in salt, vanilla, and pecans. Pour into pie shell.

  Bake in preheated oven for 45 to 50 minutes, or until filling is set

Well I guess this isn't technically 100% "dairy free" because there are eggs in the pie, but I can have eggs, it's just the milk/butter products I need to avoid.   I also added an extra 1/4 cup chopped pecans because it seemed like it could use a little more.  And of course just substituted the butter for the Earth Balance Vegan Buttery Sticks.  Now my holiday cooking is DONE!  My sexy hubby will be taking care of the rest....oh yea! 

Easy Thanksgiving Centerpiece - Pumpkin Turkey

I have missed blogville lately!  I have been super busy and super sad that I haven't kept up with Art Every Day Month!  We've been pretty sick around here and just busy in general.  I kind of panicked today when I realized we didn't really have any Thanksgiving decor and Thanksgiving is TOMORROW!  How lame is that???
So J and I recycled her Halloween pumpkin and turned it into a turkey pumpkin for an easy, last minute thanksgiving centerpiece! 

We went out to the hot tub and it was warm and windy, so the hot tub was swirling with fall leaves (FINALLY seeing pretty fall colors!)  As J, Baby B and I sat on the edge soaking our feet, we collected some of the leaves that were floating around in the hot tub.  Then J got a few drops of water on her pants which was of course unacceptable and she could no longer keep her clothes on so before I know it, there's my 3.5 year old running around in her undies (at least we were the only ones in the pool area!)  Then she went to put her feet on the steps of the swimming pool to see how cold it was and before I know it, for some reason, she took her undies off too and was standing there trying to pee like a boy into the pool...Anyways....diverted her attention, got the undies back on, gathered up our leaves and went back home to make our easy thanksgiving centerpiece.

 

Here is J pulling of the glow in the dark jack o lantern stickers and then she wiped off all the marker (but the pen marks stayed...oh well)

Then we just used leaves and arranged them to make tail feathers, pressing a tack or small nail through to hold to pumpkin.  We used a round red leaf for the "gobbler" and stuck on some googly eyes.  Very basic easy Thanksgiving centerpiece, but better than nothing!!!  I just didn't even think about it, I'm not used to doing all that stuff because I'm still used to going over to our parents house where OUR moms do everything! lol.  I also made my first pecan pie today.  It's a dairy free pecan pie, I figured I would get it done and out of the way so I can leave the kitchen to my hubby tomorrow...he will be the one slaving away over the feast! :)  (I'm a lucky girl!)