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Dose of Sunshine Monday — Trust the path will Illuminate

Happy Monday. I was inspired this weekend! And it caused me to remember a coach who would tell me to take a leap of faith. He says you don’t need to see all the steps in front of you, you only have to take the FIRST step and the step stones will appear. That takes trust and faith. Even if you don’t know WHERE you are going right now.

Take a deep breath, and take a first step.

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Have a GREAT week filled with trust that your path WILL illuminate! Happy day. 🙂

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Thank you Berry Much card

It’s the first day of summer. (Although it has felt like summer for weeks now, here in Arizona!) And to celebrate, I put together a little summer fruit berry card with a few scraps of paper, a few scraps of felt and a thanks banner.

I love strawberries in the summer, and how cute are they as the star of this card? Enjoy:

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Inside:

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I love felt as a medium for cards and tags. {See my orange felt slice here.}

Linking up to the Summer Fruit Card Challenge.

 

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Ginger-Lime Grilled Beef Salad

Today is my wedding anniversary and what better way to celebrate and praise 14 years of wedded bliss than with a perfect and delicious recipe?! This is special tribute to my husband who is a grill master (you are awesome, Honey!) and he will grill anything I ask him to!! I love that we are such a perfect couple for this: I love to cook and deliver up great recipes, he loves to grill them…:)

Summer is perfect for grilling and for salads…and when you have a recipe that combines the two, you have the perfect summertime dinner!

We love this recipe at our house. In fact, whenever my son comes home from college, he requests it! It is easy to make and nice and light for summer. It’s a fast recipe too…just marinate the meat in the morning, then grill it up for dinner! I can’t even begin to tell you how flavorful and delicious this recipe is, you’re just going to have to try it yourself. 🙂

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To make the marinade, use some simple ingredients. I always keep these ingredients on hand so I can whip this up at (almost) any time!

the-ingredients

Less Sodium Soy Sauce, Chili-Garlic sauce, ginger root, lime juice, and a little brown sugar (not pictured). Those ice cubes in front are actually frozen lime juice…if I can’t use my limes up in time, I just squeeze them and freeze the juice. And did you know that you can freeze ginger root?! It’s true…I’ve had this ginger root in my freezer for a few months and it’s still delicious and fresh tasting in this marinade! (see the full recipe below)

Just mix together all these ingredients, then reserve some aside to use later as your salad dressing. Pour the rest into a resealable bag with the meat and add a little extra lime juice. Then make sure to coat all your meat and store it in the refrigerator until ready to grill. I found that if you marinate for four hours or longer, the taste is SO much better. So make sure to stir this up for marinating earlier in the day.

You can use either Flank Steak or London Broil for this recipe. I’ve tried both and we all seem to like the Flank Steak the best. I will be experimenting with other cuts of meat, I’m sure and I’ll report back. 🙂 Now just grill up the meat:

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(Here’s the picture to prove it: My husband is the best at grilling…Happy Anniversary, Honey!)
And while that is on the grill, get your salad ready:

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I like to use the organic salad mix from Costco. It has spinach and arugula, but sometimes I just make a simple romaine bed of lettuce for this recipe. It’s always just delicious! I will add tomatoes or green pepper from the garden, and sometimes I shred up a carrot to add, too. Mmmmm….

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Let the meat rest for a few minutes before you slice it thinly. This allows the meat to retain more of it’s juiciness! Since everyone at my house likes their salad different, I will put the additions on the side so it’s more like a salad bar…then you can build your own salad and top it off with a bit of the grilled meat. Add a little (believe me, this is flavorful stuff so you only need a little!) of the reserved dressing and enjoy!

{The recipe suggests that you add all the ingredients together and combine with the reserved salad dressing, but at my house everyone likes different amounts of the dressing (or none at all) and so I just let everyone make their own plate.}

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See, it’s a hit! No leftovers!

*Recipe here

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Try this recipe and until next time, have a delicious summer!

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Sending Happy Thoughts

It’s time to send a card to someone very special. (Hey, Sis, if you are reading this..don’t look! It’s on its way up to you)!
And I had a great time figuring out how to “Send Happy Thoughts” with my card.

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I love this glitter paper that I used for the backing, and it just happened to match my embossing powder I used on the word “Happy” almost perfectly! I cut circles out to serve as balloons and drew on the string…”attaching” it to HAPPY. So THIS is how you transport a little bit of happy. 🙂  After I finished this card, I decided to add a little shine to the balloons with Glossy Accents.

Sending a few Happy Thoughts your way, too!

{Linking up to Simon Says Stamp Transport challenge!}

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Dose of Sunshine Monday – We are here for each other

Hello to a fresh new Monday! This week is going to be a great one.

I’d like to share gratitude for people in my life who have been there for me. I really believe that we are here to help each other. To mourn with those who mourn, and comfort those who need comforting; to help through hard times, and encourage and motivate. Sometimes the work of God is done through people here on Earth (for that I am grateful).

I sometimes start my week off by asking, who can I help this week? What can I do? Who needs a little sunshine or a smile? And usually I just know. One of my favorite things to do is help someone to smile.

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So dear reader, thank you for your encouragement, your kind comments, your support in my efforts to bring sunshine to you in my little space of the blog-o-sphere.

What can you do this week to inspire a smile? This week, be kind to others and to yourself. 🙂

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