Chickpea Olive and Tomato Salad #WinWithTonysPizza #ad #CollectiveBias

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #WinWithTonysPizza #CollectiveBias

It's important for our family to feel a close connection to our community and we are feeling it strongly this fall as we've just moved into our beautiful new home! The kids love to invite friends over and are super excited to be able to host parties again now that we're unpacked and settled. Several of them really love themed parties and what better theme for this football season than a pre-game pizza party!

Our local high school is small with lots of family-oriented activities available to pull the community together in support of our kids. Even though our teens are homeschooled, we have several friends involved in high school football and we love to be supportive of the local teams.

Last night I put together a quick and fun party dinner combining Tony's Pizza and a zesty Chickpea Olive and Tomato Salad. I was surprised that everyone in the family loved it! Usually the olders will eat anything, but the littles are pretty picky. Everyone gobbled it up so I call it a win!

Tony's has been serving up delicious, pizzeria-style pizza since the 1960's. In fact, they started business nearby at a local restaurant in Salina, Kansas.

#WinWithTonysPizza #Sweepstakes - AWG (9/19 to 10/17)

Be sure to take a minute to visit this sweepstakes site as you could win some pretty great prizes like Walmart gift cards or $3,000 for a high school team!

We purchased Tony's Pizza at our local Harp's store. I love the friendly, hometown atmosphere at Harp's and I was able to find many varieties of Tony's Pizza there.

We wanted to try every option so we got one of each. Ha! My favorite is Tony's® Pizzeria Style Supreme Pizza because I love the peppers and onions, but most of the family enjoys the meat varieties the best. With 100% real mozzarella cheese and sauce made from real tomatoes, Tony's prides themselves on offering an authentic taste.

I hope you'll give this salad recipe a try. It's so quick and easy, you can put it together while the pizza is baking.

I like to begin with the chickpeas, red wine vinegar, and lemon juice so I can let the beans marinate a little bit. I combined these three and then set the bowl aside to await the other ingredients.

Next, I sliced some grape tomatoes and black olives and added them to the marinade bowl.

Then I diced half a red onion and snipped off the remaining good leaves on my basil plant, adding both to the other ingredients. I hope I get some more leaves this year but I'm not holding my breath. A cold front moves in tonight!

Finally, I mixed up the oil and vinegar dressing and stirred it into the mixture, along with some dried parsley, salt, and pepper.

I just left the salad out on the counter while the pizzas finished up. It was lovely at room temperature as the flavors had the opportunity to really mix.

Chickpea Olive and Tomato Salad

Salad Ingredients:

1 can chickpeas, drained

1 TB red wine vinegar

1 TB lemon juice

9 oz. grape tomatoes, sliced

1 can olives, sliced

1/2 red onion, diced

3-4 TB snipped fresh basil 

2 TB dried parsley

salt and pepper to taste

Dressing Ingredients:

4 TB olive oil

4 TB red wine vinegar

1 tsp. lemon juice

salt and pepper to taste

Begin by mixing the chickpeas, vinegar, and lemon juice in a bowl to begin the marinade. Add remaining salad ingredients and stir. Mix dressing ingredients in a separate bowl and stir into mix. Let sit at room temperature for up to 90 minutes before serving. Refrigerate leftovers.

I love it that our teens have adopted our town as their hometown and see the value in supporting our friends. Whether it be football goals or any other dreams, celebrating successes is something to be proud of!

I'd love to hear what your family is celebrating this season. Let me know in the comments below and be sure to check out the Tony's Pizza Social Hub for more recipes to pair with Tony's Pizza.

Autumn In the Sitting Room

Welcome to the Homemaking Party! I'm still unpacking!! Today I finished all the upstairs sitting room boxes and a few bedroom boxes. I also organized our closet and did some more work in my library. Whew! I'm exhausted!

Even though it's still in the high 70s and extremely humid, I figured it was time to get my Autumn on so I went ahead and put out the rest of the Fall decor. Liam (7) was concerned these things would be ruined when we fire up the woodstove. I'll be sure to move them if we need it this year!

These little buddies are occupying the window seat that looks out on our front yard.

Well, and look who's appeared! Lynzie Mae (17) and Mr. Darcy!

This is the coat closet and decor at my entry way. No need for coats yet!

Here's a little vignette I set out on the cabinet between the sitting room and the library. I think it may be time to take another pumpkin patch photo!

My hutch with Fall decor. I used to have a bunch of neat plates to display but I broke them all at once last year! Yikes!

My mom gave me these two owls and I've displayed them atop the hutch. I have several owl things that I set out at Autumn. Selah (11) asked me what do owls have to do with Fall? I suppose not much more than any other season, but they've got the right coloring!

This was supposed to be a nice photo of my Autumn centerpiece but apparently the camera wanted to focus on my porch chair instead. Ha!

Here is another hutch near our back porch. The red books are a collection of Shakespeare's works published in the early 1900s. Jamie gave them to me last year. The Steampunk owl atop the hutch was my sweet find from Hobby Lobby a few weeks ago.

Here is our screened back porch. It's a lovely place to sit when it's cooler outside---which is not often...but I'm holding out hope. Ha!

...and here's the final shelf in my sitting room where I'm arranging my homemaking, homeschooling, and this season's read-alouds. 

Hope you've enjoyed a mini-tour of my home. It's all coming together nicely! Have a lovely week, friends!

Fall Baking Recipe Round Up

It's Fall---my favorite time of year, and I'm already planning on baking up some delicious things for my family! Here are a few ideas to inspire you, as well!

Candy Bar Apple Crisp

Apple Quick Bread

Pumpkin Pie Fudge

Pumpkin Spice Chocolate Chip Scones

Autumn Spiced Cornbread

Apple Doodle Cookies

Pumpkin Banana Bread

Apple Cinnamon Rolls

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cinnamon Sprinkle

Autumn Pumpkin Bread

Caramel Apple-Pecan Bread

Autumn breakfast made easy with this gorgeously sweet Caramel Apple-Pecan Bread baked in oven-proof paper baking pans.

Fall is in the air and I'm determined to make the most of it! It's my favorite season, but it lasts for such a short time. Soon, most of our colorful trees will have turned bare and the ground will be covered with soggy leaves and munched-on acorns. The squirrels and chipmunks will be out in full force, gathering their winter meals. 

Have you seen these adorable paper baking pans? You just fill them and bake the same as you would for metal or glass. The bread comes out beautiful! I think they're super cute for gifting. 

I made this Caramel Apple-Pecan Bread for the kids recently. It's almost to pretty to eat. Almost. The caramel glaze on top reminds me of the Cracker Jack popcorn my Dad used to make us on a family night at home.

Here's the recipe--let me know what you think!

Caramel Apple-Pecan Bread
1 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. sour cream or milk
1/2 c. oil
4 eggs
1 baking apple, grated 
3 c. flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 c. chopped pecans (plus extra for topping)

Glaze
2 TB. butter
1/2 c. powdered sugar
1/4 c. brown sugar
1 TB. water

Heat oven to 350º. Grease two 8 in. loaf pans or four mini loaf pans. Mix brown sugar, sour cream, oil, and eggs together until well blended. Stir in grated apple. In a separate bowl, stir together dry ingredients, then add to wet mixture. Stir together and spread into pans. Bake for 40-45 minutes for standard loaves or 20-30 minutes for mini loaves. For glaze, melt butter in a sauce pan and stir in remaining ingredients. Cook until the mixture just begins to bubble and then cook and stir one minute. Drizzle on bread immediately and sprinkle with more chopped pecans, if desired.

Our Field Trip to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas

Hi friends! It's finally Fall in NW Arkansas! I've got the windows open and it's not supposed to hit 80º today! Sometimes that's as good as you get in the South---but I've also got walnuts and acorns slamming the tin roof over my porch and the leaves are turning a million gorgeous shades and I wouldn't trade it!

Last week, some members from our homeschool group took a tour of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville. I decided to take just a few of the kids so I could spend some time in good discussion with them. Lynzie, Cainan, Selah, Avalon, and I got dressed up and spent a lovely morning out. We are blessed to have this awesome collection right here where we live!

Crystal Bridges was named for the nearby Crystal Springs that feeds the ponds surrounding the museum. It was opened in 2011 and is free to the public. 

John Cage Robot II, Nam June Paik, 1995

We began with a guided tour geared toward the younger kids. 

Endangered Species Series, Andy Warhol, 1983

Lynzie learned about Andy Warhol last year in an art class I taught so it was neat for her to see some of his work in person.

Rosie the Riveter, Norman Rockwell, 1943

Norman Rockwell is one of my favorites---I love his depictions of American life and history.

Coca-Cola (3), Andy Warhol, 1962

Here's the part where I get more honest than I probably should publicly. The museum bought this artwork at auction for $57 million. Fifty. Seven. Million. Dollars. It would take me all day to list the things that could have been done for this community with $57 million. I have a hard time buying the argument that this is a justifiable use of that kind of money for the future of Northwest Arkansas. Especially since---(oh y'all are gonna hate my guts!!) it's not even an original design. Andy Warhol is one of those artists that I want to put quotation marks around. Most of his stuff looks like he took advantage of a great big copy machine. Ok, don't stone me, moving on...

Hanging Heart, Jeff Koons

After a few more stops, we headed to the museum's restaurant, Eleven, for a catered lunch. We ended up sitting right underneath that big heart. It's only just now that I've read about it on the website and learned that it's made of steel and weighs over 3,000 pounds! Um...yikes?

We had a nice lunch of turkey sandwiches, chips, and apples. It was so great to sit in that sunny room and just enjoy my kids. Happy!

Night Zag Wall, Louise Nevelson, 1969-1974

After lunch we had the choice of seeing a special exhibit of work by Dale Chihuly or touring the museum on our own. The kids had some favorite things they wanted to go back and see so we opted to venture out on our own.

Supine Woman, Wayne Thiebaud, 1963

 This painting was the "most meaningful" to me because, on this particular day, I happened to be breaking in a pair of leather boots. OH MY. My feet were on fire by this point in the day---as were Lynzie's and Selah's as they'd chosen to wear heels. We all felt a little like Supine Woman. Ha!

Depression Bread Line, George Segal, 1991

On a more serious note, this exhibit actually did mean a lot to me. These children were here on a field trip with a school group. I wished we could join in on their discussion about the Depression Bread Line.

Passing by a window, Avalon spied this "big golf ball" outside and wanted to see what it was all about. It was 90º with about 90% humidity but we decided to be adventurous and go check it out.

American architect and inventor, Buckminster Fuller, created the Fly's Eye Dome as an answer to the need for inexpensive, portable housing in the early 1980s. Crystal Bridges recently acquired the dome, as well as Fuller's archives, and we were some of the first people to experience it in almost 40 years.

Fly's Eye Dome, Buckminster Fuller, 1965

A French Music Hall, Everett Shinn, 1906

Just about the time we began roasting, we headed inside to the part of the museum that Lynzie and I love best---the antique collection. She and I plan to go back (in sensible shoes) and check it out further soon. 

Summer Day, Frank Weston Benson, 1911

The Reader, Mary Cassatt, 1877

These are the oldest works of art we saw this day: a collection of six Colonial-era portraits attributed to Gerardus Duyckinck. This is the Franks family and they were painted around 1735.

Maman, Louise Bourgeois, 1999

On our way to the gift shop (postcards!!) we encountered this gigantic spider! Yikes!

To top off a great morning, we found a painted rock on our way to the car! Yay! What a fun day out!