Sometimes You Just Have To...

I wanted to share some photos with you as a reminder that even though our kids do things that are frustrating, sometimes you just have to laugh!  Before I get too upset about something, I try to remember to ask myself a few things.  Is it hurting anyone?  In the grand scheme of things, is this a real problem?  Did my daughter have fun?

Yes, there was an entire roll of toilet paper on the floor, but she worked so hard at it.  Is it really going to hurt to have to grab pieces of toilet paper out of a grocery bag to use up the roll?  (Yes, this means I did not waste the roll, thank you very much!)

Maybe she was truly concerned that Woody wanted mashed potatoes or that Donkey was hungry for the dirt that is in the pot of a plant in my living room?

                

My daughter didn't do any of this in defiance, she is just learning, experimenting, exploring, and imagining.  Don't get me wrong, there is an ounce (and sometimes more) of frustration that creeps up for a few seconds, but again, lets remember what is really important.  Don't sweat the small stuff.  Toilet paper can be saved and used out of a grocery bag, Woody can be wiped off, and Donkey can be thrown in the wash, which took my less than a minute of my time in each situation, but I can't even begin to fathom the fun that my daughter was creating in her head when she was doing these three things!

Until Next Time,

Blair

Happy Accidents

Everyday I try to make environmentally friendly choices for my family.  One of the consistent ways we go about this is by composting.  We have a small container on our kitchen counter.  You can purchase elaborate contraptions at the store with charcoal filters and nicely sealing lids, but the flip lid plastic container that has a latch lock works just fine for us.  There is no need for the charcoal filters because we empty it every couple of days depending on how fast it fills it up.  

In goes our coffee grounds and filters, egg shells, and any other fruit and veggie scraps that we create.  One rule I follow is absolutely no animal fats!  

This is our compost pile.  This aspect is more my husbands department, unless our container on the counter needs emptying and he is not home.  He adds yard waste like pine needles, leaves, hops, and grass clippings. Every now and then he tosses it with a large pitch fork.  He made it out of wood scraps and placed it in the back corner of our yard.  It does not have a bottom so the worms can get into it and help along the process.  Before you know it, you have beautiful, nutrient rich soil for your garden.  Every spring and sometimes fall, depending on how full our compost pile is, we empty it into our garden. My husband tills it in to the existing soil and it creates a nice fresh bed to plant seeds and seedlings.

Every year we end up with at least one happy accident.  This is what I call it when seeds from our compost pile do not decompose and they end up growing in our garden the following year.  My in-laws bought our daughter a small pumpkin for Halloween last year and after the holiday we dumped it into the compost pile.  Sure enough, this year we had pumpkin pie pumpkins growing in our garden.  Sure, they aren't expected in my nicely planned out garden, but how could I get rid of the little seeds that could?!

This year we also had acorn squash grow from last year's garden scraps.

I'd love to hear what kind of things you compost.  Maybe I'll learn a thing or two.  Happy composting to you all.

Until next time,

Blair

Fun With Baking

I am not a professional baker by any means, but that doesn't mean I can't have fun with my baked goods when I'm decorating.  I try out new recipes when I make small cakes and cupcakes, but if I am making a large cake, I use the same white cake mix every time.  So, to add a spark, even though it is very yummy cake, I get creative with the decorating.  Here are some pics of cakes and cupcakes I have made in the past.  Remember, your first taste is with your eyes!

To start out any decorating project, I plan, whether it is with ideas I have previously seen, pictures or sketches.  Then I execute, but I always stay open to changes.  Not every idea works out perfectly, so I try to go with the flow.

The first thought that I have is if there is a theme for the event the cake is for.  This was the cake I did for my nephew's Star Wars birthday party.  They brought me the figures and I we went from there.

Is your baked good for a holiday?  Google images and look up ideas in books.  The possibilities are endless.  This is my twist on the bunny feet idea from "Hello, Cupcake" by: Karen Tack & Alan Richardson - Rabbit Holes.  I added the Peeps.  Have fun and play around.

Try new recipes.  This is the Darkest Chocolate Crepe Cake (A Martha Stewart Recipe-January 2006 issue).  Keep in mind, if you are doing a specialty cake, use something that is in the recipe to decorate the baked item.  It is a simple, yet elegant idea.  This cake has hazelnut liquor in it so it is topped with candied hazelnuts.

Another idea is to keep in mind the age of a person if your baked good/goods are for a birthday party.  This is my dad's 62nd birthday cake.  I google age 62 and realized he was eligible for Social Security, so I thought I would make his cake comical and decorate it with a Social Security card.  Other mile stones are 16, 18, 21, 30, 40, etc.  Think outside the box!

Here is a birthday cake for my mother-in-law.  You can't go wrong with icing flowers, so pretty.  A trick I learned from my mother, you can build the icing rose around the tip of a pencil and then lift it off with scissors and then place it on the cake.  That makes it super easy!

Another way that you can't go wrong is using fresh items like fruit or flowers.  Keep the icing plain and just add some produce or some flowers to the top and/or sides.  Would you guess that this was a red velvet cake?  I made this for a Memorial Day picnic at my brother's house.

Last but not least, this is the first large scale cake I ever made.  It was for my daughter's first birthday party and it was pink themed.  I wasn't sure how well my decorative icing skills would be on a large scale, even though one of my jobs in and after high school was at Dairy Queen.  (Where I used to decorate ice cream cakes.)  It was so long ago and they were usually fairly simple.  I was making sugar cookies for the party favors, so I decided to add a few more cut outs to the batch.  I kept it simple and it ended up perfect!

Always look for ideas, everywhere!  There are pieces to your puzzle everywhere you look.  Keep a notepad with you or even take snapshots to remind you of ideas you like.  I always say that copying is the most sincere form of flattery, just remember to give credit where credit is due!

Until next time,

Blair

You've Got A Friend In Me..

My daughter is currently obsessed with Toy Story 1, 2, & 3.  So naturally, this quickly became the theme of her second birthday party.  I thought I would share some of the items we made for her party.

I made her invitations to look like an Etch A Sketch.  I used round label stickers for the knobs and gold ink at the top just like the toy.  For the text, I typed out the information in Photoshop and then connected the letters with a series of horizontal and vertical lines to mimic what it looks like when you use an Etch A Sketch.  This took some time, but put a nice touch on the invites.

We didn't go crazy with decorations, we kept it simple

My mom made this cute banner with her Cricut, "Happy Birthday" was flanked by aliens.  We also had small hanging decorations that had Woody on one side and the Toy Story logo on the other.  We hung them from all of our chandeliers and hanging lights.

The cake was a classic white cake that my mother is famous for.  I am getting closer and closer to her perfection every time I take a try at it.  I think this was my 4th or 5th try.  I originally wanted to decorate the entire cake with fondant, but due to lack of experience, the base quickly became the icing that we normally use for this cake recipe.  I used cookie cutters to utilize the fondant by making small decorations I placed around the base of the cake and I used miniature figurines that my daughter already had.

      

I wanted to give people the option to have a chocolate dessert, so I made chocolate cupcakes.  Here are the websites that I found the decorating ideas from...

For the BoPeep's sheep-

http://family.go.com/food/recipe-909608-bo-peep-sheep-cupcake-t/

For the aliens-

http://family.go.com/food/recipe-857832-green-alien-cupcakes-t/

The only difference from these was that I used dried kiwi fruit for the ears and antennas instead of mint candies.

I had a lot of fun planning out the cookie decor.  These cookies are what I passed out as favors at the end of the party.  I made a mixture of 4-5 cookies in each bag.

I hope you enjoy these ideas.  We had so much fun with this party!

Until next time,

Blair

A New Twist On An Old Favorite

I recently brought dessert to a family get together.  I was thinking cookies, but wanted to step it up a notch.

One of the favorite cookies in our household is Quaker Oats own oatmeal cookie recipe called Vanishing Oatmeal Cookies, and they are named that for a reason!  I usually make a double batch because they are eaten so fast.  The only thing I do differently is leave out the raisins.  I decided to start with the idea of the oatmeal cookie we love so much.  Then I started thinking of Little Debbie's Oatmeal Creme Pies.

*Side Note:  If you ever have leftover cookie dough, here is a suggestion.  I place the leftovers in a small container and stick it in the freezer.  The next time I bake muffins, I grate the frozen dough over the tops of each muffin cup of batter and bake as the muffin recipe recommends.  It adds a little pizazz to an everyday muffin!

For the filling, I searched online and combined a few recipes to make it my own.  The biggest difference was using some butter.  I don't think there is one original recipe for this because I saw many similar if not the same recipes for the filling while searching.  After whipping all the ingredients together I added them to a piping bag fitted with a large piping tip.

Here are a few tips, if you do not have any cake decorating supplies, use a quart freezer bag and cut a small snippet off one of the bottom corners.  Line a tall glass with the bag and fold over the top of the bag around the outside of the cup.  The cup enables you to use two hands to fill the bag and keeps the top of the bag much cleaner.

Then I piped the filling onto half of the cookies and placed the other half of the cookies on top.

After all cookies were in place, I firmly pushed on each sandwich to make sure that they would not come apart.

This is the finished product.  Want the recipe?  See below.

Here is the link to the Vanishing Oatmeal Cookie recipe-

http://www.quakeroats.com/cooking-and-recipes/content/recipes/recipe-detail.aspx?recipeid=474

For the filling-

1/4 cup unsalted butter at room temperature

1/2 cup shortening

3 cups powdered sugar

7 oz. of marshmallow creme

1 to 2 tablespoons milk

Please enjoy!

Until next time,

Blair

Here's To The Start Of MY New Year!

I do believe this has been the most unproductive start to a new year I have ever had.  I think its weather & lack of sun mixed with stress and a touch of laziness.  I started with a detox, failed miserably, partially due to a back problem and the rest was just purely awfully!  Now that I am reflecting and realizing how bad this month has started, I am ready for a change!

I have realized I don't need to detox, I need to eat healthy.  I don't need to train for a marathon, I need to get some physical activity.  I don't need to label every bin, basket, and shelf, I just need to slowly go through what we have, get rid of what we don't use and straighten the rest.

Here goes the start of my new year now that motivation has set in.  I plan on using the Lose It app on my iPhone.  We'll see.  Here is to a new year!  Cheers!  

Until Next Time,

Blair

Baked Gifts

Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays!

It has become a tradition that I bake cookies before Christmas.  This is a nice way to share something with friends and neighbors without breaking the bank.  And lets face it, I love baking and decorating!  This year I thought I would share a few photos and the links to some of the cookies I baked.  I must give love to Pinterest, of course, for supplying some of the ideas I used for decorating my sugar cookies this year.

Last, but not least, always remember to use cute packaging. It gives the treats a nice touch. I usually scope out a store called Hobby Lobby. I always get mine 50% off. I've used bags, actually cookie boxes, photo boxes, and even disposable Tupperware. I think they were Ziploc and they come in a festive red this time of year. Think outside the box, no pun intended.

Here are some of the links...

Coconut Cookies...

http://www.marthastewart.com/336889/coconut-cookies

Sugar Cookie decorating ideas-

The melted snowman...

http://www.crazydomestic.com/2010/12/melted-snowman-cookies.html

Rudolph...

http://mojewypieki.blox.pl/2011/12/Waniliowe-kruche-ciasteczka-z-Rudolfem.html

Santa's belly...

http://tidymom.net/2010/decorated-christmas-cookies/

Including your children in your holiday baking is a great way to establish a family tradition.

Have a wonderful day and enjoy your friends and families.

Until next time,

Blair