The Sewing Mom

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Hormel Foods. All opinions are 100% mine.

Wow! I just found out that Hormel® chili and Dinty Moore® are celebrating 75 years! That’s incredilble! I truly had no idea that either of those products had been around so long, no wonder just about everyone I know has memories of eating one or the other sometime in their life. Personally, every single time I see a can of Dinty Moore® I instantly go back in time to when I was a kid. My parents would take us camping in a small travel trailer and I always remember my mom opening up a can of thick, hearty stew, heated over the propane stove and served in paper bowls, usually while we were pulled over at a rest stop on our way to whatever destination we were heading to. It was always, delicious, warm and filling. To this day I don’t think a camping trip is complete without eating a can of Dinty Moore® stew!

After getting married, I discovered that my husband enjoys a can of hormel chili now and then. I’ve even been know to add a can to my crockpot taco soup once in a while. Here’s the recipe:

1 pound browned ground beef
1 can Hormel® chili
1 can pinto beans (drained)
1 can beef broth
1 package of taco seasoning
1 can diced tomatoes
Combine all ingredients in a crockpot and cook on low for 6 hours. Place in serving bowls and top with grated cheese and sour cream.

For more recipes you can check out www.hormelrecipes.com. Be sure to share your favorite memory or recipe with me!

It’s been so dark, gray and gloomy here lately, I decided to look through some photos for some brighter colors to cheer me up! I found this, one of my very favorite purses I’ve ever made.

This purse has a unique spring hinged closure and is such a great size for carrying everything we women need without getting too heavy. Aren’t the colors fabulous?!

Dear Mother Nature,

Please make up your mind.  It seems of late you have many rather wishy washy and can’t seem to decide if it is Winter or, as the calendar states, Spring.  I don’t mind one way or the other, but I really am not enjoying the current pattern of radical changes on a day to day basis.  So please, I am begging you, make up your mind.

Thank you,

The Sewing Mom

Why am a complaining to Mother Nature?  Well, let’s see.  Last Friday, here in Dallas, we were enjoying beautiful sunshine with nice temperatures hovering around 70 F.  Of course, my daughter’s softball team was scheduled for a tournament Saturday and Sunday, so WHAM!  Mother Nature decided to show her fury and hit us first with very cold rain and temperatures in the low 40’s, combined with high sustained winds making it feel like it was in the 30’s.  Tournament canceled.  Then, as if that wasn’t bad enough, we got ready to go to bed on Saturday night and looked out the window to see this:

I thought for sure it would be gone by the time we woke up on Sunday, but instead, this is what we woke up to and it stuck around until late on Monday.

Now today it’s 75! Make up your mind!

Yep, old man weather struck again. My daughter’s softball tournament was rained out. It’s really getting to be quite the joke. Just schedule her team to play in a tournament and we are all but guaranteed rain!

I made good use of the day though. First, my husband amazingly agreed to go to Sam’s Club. I had recently joined through work and we needed to have our photos taken for our permanent i.d.’s. We haven’t been a member of any warehouse club store in so long, it was interesting to see some of the items they’re selling. We managed to spend less than $100 (amazing huh!) and got 2 new folding chairs to take with us to softball tournaments (if we ever actually get to go to one), some bagged frozen veggies, the New Moon dvd for my daughter and a case of Kraft macaroni and cheese (the blue box), also for my daughter and all her friends who’ve been eating me out of house and home all week since they didn’t have school.

I didn’t just shop today either. I came home and sewed! That’s right, for the first time in 2 months, I turned on my sewing machine, and created something new! Here it is, in all it’s glory…

a new Softball purse!

Now I have to admit, this isn’t completely finished. I want to find a decorative button to attach to the front pocket, and maybe even a charm to hang from the zipper pull, although, I may just use ribbon for that. I thought I might go to Joann’s Fabrics tomorrow and see what I can find for the finishing touches.

This bag is approximately 8″ wide and 10″ long with a zipper on the top for security. The front pocket is perfect for holding a cell phone and there are 2 additional interior pockets for chapstick and whatever else a person might be carrying. This bag is fully lined and I used fleece for sturdiness in between the top and lining fabrics. The strap is around 45″ long and is perfect for carrying cross shoulder.

This bag takes a quite a bit more time to make than the one show in my previous post so I’m going to have to ask a higher price for it. I sell the other style for $15, so I’m going to ask $20 for this one. I think they are both fantastic bags for carrying to games and use one myself!