Ribbon Bookmarks

This a great quick, easy project! It would make a great little Christmas gift or hostess gift (for a hostess who likes to  read, at least.) if you bought a journal and made a ribbon bookmark to match. I spotted this on Pinterest in the  DIY/crafts section (and quickly repinned it J).  I won’t go into too much detail with the how-to because Percolating Projects has a reallynice tutorial, so click on the link for the step by step! 

All you need are buttons, ribbons, and hair elastics (which I usually just call "hair things" but let us be fancy for the blog).  The only thing I did differently was use my hot glue gun for everything except sewing on the button, which I did by hand.  I just didn’t feel like getting out my machine for a few bookmarks (Crafter’s Lethargy takes another victim!) I made one for my journal, my Bible, and my slightly smaller Bible.

So Easy

So Cute

Of course, now that I have my beloved Kindle I don’t have as much need for bookmarks…but I’m not completely electronic yet, and probably never will be.

Happy Crafting!

A Student Staple Revisited: Ramen Shrimp Pouches

I wish some of the pretty scallions had made it into this shot.

Last week I made Ramen Shrimp Pouches for dinner (That is a weird name. I don’t relish having the word “pouch” on my menu).  It’s Alton Brown’s recipe, and you know how I feel about Alton Brown. 

Oh? You don’t? 

I think Alton Brown is great.  Really great.  He is hilarious, snarky, and science-loving. When ridiculous stuff happens on Food Network, he calls it like it is.  He was the speaker at my college graduation (a darn good speaker, ask anyone).  He’s from Georgia.  He went to UGA…..and apparently he’s friends with a friend of my Dad, which means I am 3 degrees away from Alton Brown (I don’t know what my Kevin Bacon Number is, though, and I don’t really care. Unless Alton Brown knows Kevin Bacon, and then my Kevin Bacon Number is 4.)

Back to the important part! The food. 

The recipe tells you to make pouches with foil and then you stack up all the delish ingredients in there, add the broth and seasonings, and then cook them in the oven for a little while. 

I didn’t follow the good Mr. Brown’s recipe exactly, because I was shopping at Kroger and they just didn’t have all the ingredients.  It still tasted pretty good, though, so…high five!

I didn’t have mirin, which is a kind of rice wine, so…I just added a shake of rice vinegar.  I fully understand this is not the same thing.  But it was something I had, and it had the word rice in it, and you can make vinegar out of wine so….I know. Still not the same thing.  Also, there were no dried mushrooms at Kroger, so I used non-dried ones.  There. That’s all.  Not so bad, huh? Everything else was by the book.

Here’s a link to the recipe!

My roomies seemed to enjoy it, even though Jessica is not a shrimp fan. (Which is fine, because Sammy and I just ate her shrimp for her)

I give it an A plus, but not for folks on a low-salt diet. It’s quite salty.  Stay away, my hypertensive friends! Or at least use low sodium soy sauce and broth…and maybe less soy sauce.

PS- I just joined Pinterest and Twitter.  What?! I’m having a pretty good time on there.  Join me. Or follow me. Or pin with me. I haven’t quite figured out the proper verbs to use.