Have you ever had those days when you want to do something, but you can't think of anything? What about rainy days, especially with kids, where you're stuck inside and everything sounds boring? Today's DIY is something to have on hand to make figuring out what to do in those times a bit easier, activity idea jars.

This project is a particularly good one for those with small children in the home. Some of the activities, especially those from the rainy day jar, may be things you do all the time or that seem boring, but there's something about pulling the idea at random from a jar that makes it seem fresh to a child. This is especially true if it comes out of a pretty or cool looking jar.

​So let's get started...

Today's recipe is one for the coffee lovers in your life. It's simple and easy to make, and it's one of those dishes that gets even better if you make it a day ahead.

It's a variation on an icebox cake, so it's perfect for late spring and into summer. It packs a lot of coffee flavor, and each bar is quite rich. So a little goes a long way.

Growing up, learning how to use a sewing machine is one skill I never learned. Oh, I had one of those silly little craft machines, and I did everything I was told to do when using a machine. But everything I tried to make unraveled the minute I took it off the machine. I concluded I must be a horrible seamstress, gave up trying to use a machine, and just learned to hand sew a little.

Then I got one of those craft machines for my girls a couple years back. You know what I noticed about them then I'd never noticed as a kid? Those things don't have bobbins! Of course nothing I sewed held together. There wasn't anything holding the stitches to the underside of the seam!

Armed with that bit of knowledge and many years more experience, I went to my mother-in-law to learn the basics of using a sewing machine. Then, I've been watching videos and reading everything I can about reading patterns, creating patterns, and construction using fabric.

I still have a lot to learn, but I thought maybe I could bring you with me on this journey. If you've never learned to sew but would like to, maybe you'll find inspiration. If you know what you're doing, maybe you'll find a lot of laughs.

Valentine's Day is coming up next week. I thought I would share a fun and simple cookie recipe with an impressive presentation you can make for your someone special.

Chocolate covered strawberries and chocolate covered cherries are a Valentine's staple. They're delicious, but they can be a bit predictable. This recipe shakes up the concept just a bit by incorporating those classic flavors in cookie form. They're a variation on the classic Jello cookie, and you can make them in any flavor variation you like.

The batch pictured above was made using strawberry because that's what the dollar store I went by happened to have in stock, but I'd imagine they'd work just as well with any fruit flavor you might dip in chocolate.

As I said in the last crochet tutorial, half double crochet is my favorite stitch, but double crochet runs a close second. It's a perfect stitch for when you want something super soft but don't mind having a relatively loose weave, and it's the foundation for many of the other "complex" stitches and patterns.

Today's tutorial assumes you already know how to make a slip knot, chain, and yarn over. If you haven't learned those techniques yet, please go to the first tutorial in this series first, where you will learn those as well as the single crochet stitch. You may also want to check out the half double lesson before continuing with this one.

If you have those stitches down, let's move on to double crochet.

Soups and stews might not be "traditional" holiday fare, but this recipe always seems welcome during the colder months. Plus, it makes for a perfect, laid back meal, and who doesn't want one less thing to stress about during the holidays?

This recipe calls for all canned items and some common spices that tend to be available in most pantries at any given time. So, it's a great turn to recipe when you're not feeling great, don't have a lot of time, or unexpected guests drop by with too little notice to head to the store.

You can cook everything from scratch using all fresh vegetables and herbs if you want. I have before, and it's turned out really well. It's just going to take a good deal longer than five minutes to prep and require an additional hour or three to cook.

Because our family avoids gluten due to troublesome symptoms experienced when eating foods made using wheat, rye, and barley, we've developed a habit of carrying desserts, mains, and sides without them to potlucks. This has caused us to get a bit creative now and again, so I thought I would share a few of our favorite holiday recipes with you this year.

Mini pies are wonderful desserts to carry to family get togethers and potlucks of any sort. They're individually portioned, and the forgiving nature of the gluten free pie crust recipe used makes them relatively quick and easy to make.

Today's post is a throwback to a DIY tutorial I wrote for my old mommy blog back in the day. My girls loved wearing hair bows, but they also had a tendency to tear them apart to "recycle" the ribbon whenever the mood struck. So I took to making their hair bows.

Several years back, Chris and I started trying to redecorate our house. Up until then, we'd had almost all hand-me-down furniture and just whatever was already on the walls when we rented or bought a place. As most newlyweds do, right? But we were several years into our marriage and a couple of years into our first house, and we wanted to make it feel like "ours."

So, we started with paint, both for the walls and, we thought, for art. Unfortunately, life happened, and the canvases I started way back then got shoved in the back of a closet and forgotten for several years. However, I found them back at the start of the summer, and I've been working on a couple of them whenever I had the chance these past few weeks.

Today I have another crochet basics lesson for you. If you missed the first one, you can find it here. You'll want to check that one out to learn how to get your yarn on the hook, chain, and do the single stitch. Today's lesson builds on those skills.

The half double crochet stitch is my personal favorite. It's compact enough to be very warm, but it 's also loose enough to create a much softer and more flexible material than single crochet.

You will want to cast on and chain your foundation the same way we did last time. The only difference is, this time you will want to chain 36 instead of 35 because you will need two stitches for the height of your first half double crochet.