Guess Who

So Halloween was nearly a month ago, but I participated in a couple crafts worth mentioning.

Other and I are advisers for our church's middle school youth. They had an exciting retreat over the Halloween weekend and I led them in a craft of mask making.

I found plain white masks on a school supply site online. I also found fun glitters, spangles and feathers. Give them to 12 year-olds and magic happens. They had a lot of fun with this project and we were able to use the masks to decorate the worship center for their special Sunday service.

And for some Halloween fun (since I just had a baby), I decided to keep it simple in terms of Halloween costumes. For those of you that know me personally, you'll know that I usually spend a solid six months planning, finding and creating my Halloween costume. This year, however, I spend all of about an hour.

I went as a Hungry Hungry Hippo (yes, as in the game). I was the orange one. That other girl in the picture is my dear friend Traci who went as the light blue one.

I first took a plain white ball cap (from Hobby Lobby: $1.99) and painted it orange. I then took an egg carton and cut out two of the egg bumps, painted them orange and stuck them on with Tacky Glue. I rolled some paper and made nostrils, painted orange. I then painted on those goofy eyes and there you have it. A Hungry Hungry Hippo hat.

Surprisingly everyone knew exactly what we were. And Monty got a big kick out of being a Hippo for the week following Halloween.

Up next: Daring Baker's Challenge Result! Yipee!

I'm baaaaaack!

Ok...ok...I know it's been an eternity since I've updated my blog (6 weeks, actually), but I've been a tad bit busy with this little beauty.

Isn't she cute?

She also takes up a lot of time and energy. So do the bigger ones...you know...the Other and Monty.

I have been working on some projects, though. I participated in this month's Daring Baker's Challenge, so I'll be posting on that soon. I'm also in the process of making my Christmas cards (every single one is different...and I'm making 40! I'll post when I'm done to explain).

Also, I just celebrated my very uneventful 27th birthday (I got puked on by both of my children) and I've been promised a sewing machine by my Other. So, hopefully, that means I'll have even MORE projects to show you! I'm planning on starting out with a very simple and sweet tote bag that I will hopefully be making for Christmas presents.

So, I hope I still have a reader or two...and I promise that I'll update more often now that I'm in a more normal state of mind now!

Baby Girl

Sorry for the lack of updates. I'm very pregnant. And tired. And I have a rash all over my body.

SO...I really haven't done anything. No baking. No crafting. Nothing. I have thank-you cards I need to do. I have baby announcements that need to be made. Monty had his 3rd birthday. We got a new dog. I can't even believe the amount of stuff that needs to be done. I'll get there...you just wait.

Apples!

Our heirloom apple tree had a huge crop this year. I picked more apples than I have in my whole life combined. Tons and tons of them. I made apple pie, apple crisp, apple empanadas, and, of course, applesauce.



I have a super easy and delicious recipe for applesauce and it's a nice way to use up apples if you find yourself with a billion of them. I froze almost all of mine, making some with my awesome recipe and some without any sugar or spice for upcoming baby. I gave the two jars above away as a gift (hence the cuteness with the fabric top), but the rest I froze in glass jars from pickles, jams, etc. that I've been saving.

So, here is my recipe:

use about 1/2 cup water
around 8 apples, depends on the size and how many you have
1/2 cup brown sugar
cinnamon and nutmeg to taste (figure about a tablespoon of each)

Peel and core your apples. Put them in a pot with the water and let them cook down on a medium heat. You can move the experience along by mashing them as they go. Add the brown sugar and spices when it's still chunky. The Other likes chunky sauce (yup, I really wrote that), so I don't let mine cook down all the way. However I made some for Monty and I that I let cook for around 2 hours so it was super smooth and had a lot of nutmeg in it. YUM.

We'll have more apples soon (two more trees are coming ripe any moment now). Let me know if you'd like some!

Chocolate Heaven

This month's Daring Baker's Challenge was a chocolate symphony in my mouth. Hosted by Tony Tahhan and MeetaK (Google them!), the recipe of choice was Chocolate Éclairs by Pierre Hermé.

I was supposed to post on August 31 (which was yesterday), but I was unable to get a steady enough connection until nearly 5pm on September 1. Sorry fellow Daring Bakers! I guess that's the consequence of peace and quiet out in the country.

No, on to the éclairs. First of all, it has never ever occurred to me to even attempt to make an éclair. It always seemed like one of those things one should save for France or, at the very least, a professional. However, I took it on (despite being very pregnant) and had a very successful outcome.



See? The pastry part was actually very simple, even though the directions at first seemed very difficult. They weren't that much different than a traditional cream puff, which I've made dozens of times.

I splurged a little and got some supa-fine dark chocolate to use for this recipe. Chocolate cream with sub-par chocolate just wouldn't be right. And the filling turned out very very rich, but very very worth it.



I did, however, run out of chocolate for the glazing on top. Luckily I had some plain ol' Hershey bars laying around. I took a risk mixing the delicious dark chocolate with regular milk chocolate, but it actually added a nice milky sweetness to the overall end product that made it just melt in your mouth. Plus, I had a bit of glaze left over that will be perfect on some ice cream sometime in the near future.



The Other (who claims not to like chocolate) ate about half of these already. I made them on Saturday and, although not as good two days later, they are still delicious after being popped in the microwave for about 20 seconds. If you'd like the recipe I can give it to you!

Update on the rag rug for baby's room: it's not as spectacular as I anticipated. I'm not really sure what it's turning into, but it certainly isn't a rug. Once completed, I'll post.

As always, thanks for reading!

Oh my God. Shoes.

So I'm obsessed with baby booties. I didn't really use them with Monty because, well, he's a boy. And, despite my best efforts to remain gender neutral, baby booties on boys just doesn't work most of the time.

However, totally awesome baby booties have gotten much more popular in the past year or so, so there are lots of super cute ones for boys AND girls. And etsy.com (of course) has lots and lots. I bought two pairs.

This one is for my soon-to-be nephew:


My sister loves her some monkey and I got him a little monkey outfit. So it should be very sweet.

And I had to get a pair for my little lady:


I love how they look vintage with the olive and white. SO cute. Let's hope I don't get all pink and purple clothes so she has something to wear them with.

Baby count down: 7 more weeks. Eek!

I'm currently making a rag rug for her room, so stay tuned for pictures of that. Also, I made a rag quilt for the nephew and am waiting for my sister to send pictures because I forgot to take some (woops!).

I'm beyond bad...

So, June's Daring Baker's Challenge was...challenging. First of all, it was hard. And I mean HARD. Lots of time. Lots of steps. Lots of ingredients. I can't even remember the name of this cake. (Filbert Gateau with Praline Buttercream) But I can tell you that it is SO SO SO good.

Although, my version is quite possibly the ugliest thing I've ever made.



See? It looks like poop with poop on top.

Here's more proof.


I made this cake for my dear friend Traci's birthday, which, sadly, was surrounded by some sad family news. Hence the terrible pictures.

My cake is so darn ugly, however, because I didn't get my Swiss Buttercream Frosting warm enough for it to be smooth. Also, the recipe called for a nut paste made in a food processor and all I have is a cheap blender. So it was a mite chunky.

C'est la vie. It still tasted SO SO good. I mean it. Like really good.

So why am I beyond bad? Because this was supposed to be posted on Wednesday and, instead, I'm not getting around to it until Sunday evening. I blame my pregnancy. And the fact that I was directing a play that had it's closing week/weekend, so I've been beyond busy. I know, I know...excuses. But, damnit, a girl's gotta have somethin'.

I'll have more soon. Hopefully prettier.