Mountain Mama: 2013

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Martha Stewart American Made 2013 Nominee Adirondack Patterns and Handmade Babies

We are happy to announce that we are a nominee for the amazing Martha Stewart American Made 2013 Contest!

Here is the link to our Nominee Page:

Please mark your calendars and vote for us on August 26th 2013!

We appreciate the love~Sincerely, Laura and Julia

Saturday, May 25, 2013

Easy Oven Baked Chicken Parmesan

Laura Hooker

Ingredients:

1 box Barilla Pasta of your choice (I used rigatoni)

1 small jar Ragu Garden Combination Sauce

1 small jar Newmans Own Alfredo Sauce

1 package Tyson Chicken breast tenders

1 small package shredded cheese

Directions:

Cook the noodles and drain. Then using a medium sized bowl mix the two sauces together. Spray your baking dish with vegetable cooking spray and place a thin layer of the sauce mixture on the bottom. Then pour your noddles over the top of the sauce and then pour the remainder of the sauce over the noodles evenly. Place a single layer of the chicken over the sauce covering the whole dish. Sprinkle with cheese and bake at 425F for 35 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked. Allow to rest for 5-10 minutes and then enjoy.

Healthy Baked Chicken Cordon Bleu Recipe

Laura Hooker

Ingredients:

3 boneless and skinless chicken breasts

12 slices Hillshire Farms Honey Ham sliced meat

3 slices of American Cheese

Panko 4C Seasoned Bread Crumbs

Salt and Pepper

Directions:

Pound each breast flat with a mallet. Then sprinkle the breast with salt and pepper lightly. Layer 4 pieces of ham over the chicken to cover the whole breast. Then take one slice of cheese per breast and cut it in half. Place each half next to each other on one end of the chicken. Roll the chicken starting at the cheese end until it makes a finished roll. Then roll the chicken roll in the panko bread crumbs and place on a greased tin foil lined pan. Then spray the rolls with vegetable cooking oil. Bake for 30-35 minutes at 425F. Allow to rest for 10 minutes before cutting. Enjoy

Simple Healthy Imitation Crab Cake Recipe

Simple Healthy Crab Cake Recipe

Laura Hooker

Ingredients:

1 pound Imitation Crab Meat by TransOcean Brand

1 C. Panko Unseasoned 4C Brand Bread Crumbs

1 Red Pepper diced

1 C. Light Hellman's Mayonnaise

1 Tbsp. Worchestershire Sauce

1 dash of black pepper

Directions:

Dice the crab into 1/2 inch chunks. Mix all of the ingredients together in a large bowl. The mixture should be able to come together into a loose ball. If it does not lightly stick together you can add a bit more mayonnaise, also if it is a bit moist you can add a bit more panko. Make into 2-3 inch wide X 3/4 inch thick cakes and then gently toss in panko again to coat the cakes. Heat a 1/2 inch of vegetable oil in a fry pan at a medium heat. Place the cakes 2 at a time in the pan and cook on each side for 5 minutes. They should be golden brown on both sides. After cooking place on a paper towel lined plate and let rest. Serve with tartar sauce and enjoy!

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Easy Veggie Planting From Seed...first time ever!

Today I planted Peas, Lettuce, Tomatoes, Peppers, and Broccoli from seed. I have always planted bulbs, and plants. Never have I started from seed or veggies so this should be fun! Here is a picture montage of our journey:

I heard Burpee Seeds are the Best...so I bought these ones to start.

I put the seeds in super cute little Dixie Cups and Solo Cups

I used MiracleGro Potting Mix in hopes that by some Miracle they will grow ;)

I then took pictures of the front and backs of all of the seed packets to keep on file in case I lose them.

Hayden had a blast watching!

See, big helper:

All set for labeling!

Easy clean up. Take the table cloth, ball it up, and flick it outside. Easy breezy!

Placed in a sunny windowsill box!

Hoping the veggies grow! Can't wait

Friday, March 29, 2013

Home Made Play Dough Fun! (With EASY Recipe)

I realize I am not inventing the wheel here people, and I also realize that there are about give or take 1.5 Million other handmade play dough recipes out there in blog land. This is my version, and pictures of the fun my boys had with it! This dough is incredibly soft and smooth dough, not very greasy either!

Ingredients:

1/2 C. Salt

2 1/4 C. Flour

4 Tsp. Vegetable Oil

2 C. Warm Water

Step 1:

Place all ingredients in a large sauce pan, and blend with an electric mixer until well combined.

Step 2:

Place on the stove top on medium heat for approximately 2-4 minutes blending with the electric mixer while it is on the stove (BE CAREFUL)

Step 3:

Allow to cool for a few minutes, then divide evenly amongst 4 (or how ever many colors you want ot make) bowls

Step 4:

Add a little food coloring to each mound of dough

I used Betty Crocker Classic Gel Food Colors. Love the gel consistency!

Knead the color into the dough, using your fingers. I recommend using a glove for this part if you don't want to dye four skin temporarily.

Hayden loved watching me get everything mixed.

All ready to go!

Sam's first choice, a sad snowman...SICK OF WINTER HERE!

Eben tried his hand too!

See, dyed hands are lovely ;)

Fun for all!

Can't have play dough fun without farting noises... TOOT TOOT!

Getting the hang of it.

Hayden wanted the box more than the tools. He chased it around the table.

After the fun has been had, put each color separately in tupperwares or plastic bags and save for the next time!

Enjoy!

Friday, March 22, 2013

Adirondack Patterns:The Growth of A Handmade Business

This week we reached 2 HUGE milestones as business owners. We celebrated our Third Year in Business, and passed our 2000 sales mark! So exciting.

It is amazing how far we have come, and how much our business has grown.

Here are the sales for our first month in business March-April 2010 a whopping 12!

Slowly but surely we sold 198 orders for that year, and added a few more patterns to the shop. In total we had approximately 30 patterns in the shop by our first year anniversary.

Exciting right?

2011 was a landmark year! I had a new baby, and therefore we had a new muse! We inundated our fledgling shop with new patterns, inspired by that babe.

Julia's Waldorf doll patterns became more coveted and perfected, and we started advertising a bit with various blogs who emulated what we liked, or thought we would be a good fit with them.

Here are some of the patterns born that year!

Waldorf Doll Patterns

Baby Knit Booties Pattern

Cloth Diaper Cover Pattern

Crochet Cocoon Pattern

Newborn Crochet Dress Pattern

The advertising worked, and the views of our shop for 2011-2012 year were over 57,000! Sales totaled 652 for that year alone~and business was as they say...booming!

More exciting, right?

Well, little did we know, 2012-2013 would be the biggest year yet!

Our traffic increased to over 90,000 hits, and our sales were over 800 orders!

Advertising continued to be our major source of traffic for 2012-2013 with a majority of the traffic coming from buttons we had on lovely blogs like Rhythm of The Home, Small Things, French Press Knits, and Smashed Peas and Carrots. Julia's Waldorf Doll Patterns seemed to be the "it" pattern for simple Waldorf Dolls, and word of mouth spread in the Waldorf World! Ravelry turned out to be a huge traffic source for our crochet patterns as well. We were selling internationally, with one of our biggest countries of sales being Australia!

We started a Facebook Page to help obtain more fans, and spread the word of mouth in the social media forum.

Now we have over 600 fans!!!

The feedback we received over the years was crucial to the success of our shop, we love to hear what people have to say about our patterns!

After much research, and soul searching we decided to put handmade swaddle and baby dolls in the shop this year!

Here are a few of the newest additions!

Cane

Isobel

Ethan

A custom order

We are very excited for what this year has to bring! More creativity, a little more love, and many more little babies to craft, and of course meeting more new customers!

Thanks for liking us, and for reading this. Your support is so encouraging!

As a thank you, please use our 20% discount coupon code on any orders from our shop through the weekend!

Enter code THREE20 at checkout.

Sincerly, Laura and Julia