Sweet Sixteen, a Hope Chest and a Giveaway

Today is my daughter's sweet sixteen birthday!  Sometimes it is so hard for me to believe my kids are growing up so fast! Saturday she will be taking a trip to New York City with her dad and a friend.  They have plans to see the Statue of Liberty, shop in Times Square and possibly even take the subway across the river to Hoboken, NJ to Carlos Bakery (Home of the Cake Boss) for a birthday cannoli.

The Birthday Girl

One of the gifts my daughter has asked for this year is a hope chest.  While the chest has not even been started (we are thinking of building something simple like this and then painting it really fun colors), we are looking forward to helping her start a collection of items she will need when it is time for her to begin life on her own or as a new bride.  I moved into my first apartment with not much more than a handful of clothes, an old bed and a handful of kitchen items. Fortunately I was working at Target at the time and was able to use my discount to slowly accumulate a few more items to make life easier before getting married at 19.  Our hopes are that when she moves into her first apartment she will have all the basics plus a few extras to feather her first nest.

We have started to collect recipes, homemaking tips and DIY projects and will add them to a binder for easy reference (I will be doing a post sharing our binder in the future). We are also printing out a copy of my Shortcut Cooking Cookbook and putting it into a binder with page protectors.  These are the recipes that she has grown up with (it was a carefully guarded secret in our house for many years that you could actually get graham crackers from a box) and are used daily in our house.

Now for the giveaway--you can win a printed and signed copy of the Shortcut Cooking cookbook in a three ring binder with page protectors for yourself or to give to someone special in your life who is starting out on a new life of their own or to add to their own hope chest.  The winner can choose the color for the cover.

How to enter:
1.) Leave a comment with something you would place in a hope chest (maybe something you wished you had when you first started out or maybe something you can't live without) or a favorite recipe, tip or DIY project (even a link to a favorite). You may leave up to 3 comments.


2.) Share this post on your blog or facebook or like Heart-Hands-Home on Facebook.  Leave a separate comment saying you shared and a link (if possible).


Hannah will choose a winner on Sunday night!