Thursday, November 21, 2013

Stroke of Genius

I'm always looking for more ways to get organized, especially when it comes to my kitchen.  Anything that can make my life simpler gets my vote.  Plus, I'm teaching Ms. AniBelle how to cook and organization not only makes it easier for her, but it gives her a good starting point for when she has her own kitchen.  Hopefully it won't take her the 15 years it took for me to learn these lessons.  

I try to buy most of my baking supplies in bulk at Sam's Club.  In order to not have to drag out the ginormous bags each time I wanted to bake, I bought several Rubbermaid containers to hold more manageable amounts.  I also made chalkboard labels by spray painting printer labels with chalkboard paint.

 Another habit I try to keep up with is doubling one or two meals a week and freezing the second portion.  First, it is very convenient to have meals prepared that I can just thaw and pop in the oven on busy nights.  Second, it's helpful for my hubby on occasions that I'm in the hospital or feeling too ill to cook.  My man is wonderful at grilling things but cooking anything beyond simple basics is not up his alley.  The problem I have with the meals is keeping track of what I have.  A dry eraser board solved that for me.


 Last week, my daughter was foraging through our pantry cupboards to find some nonperishable items to bring in to school for a food drive and I had a stroke of pure genius.  As she was pulling out items, I realized that there were plenty of staples hidden in the pantry that I didn't realize I had which meant I was buying them with regularity.  To solve this issue, I painted the insides of the cupboard doors with chalkboard paint (it may or may not be an addiction folks!).  Now I have each item listed on the doors.  When I use one, I erase it or change the quantity, and when I buy more, I update the list as well.  Voila! 



 

Saturday, November 9, 2013

Cheater Caramel Frappucino Cupcakes

I have a dirty little secret to share with y'all.  Don't tell anyone, but I infinitely prefer box mix cakes, cupcakes and brownies.  Oh, also store bought frosting. I'm a heathen, I know!  While I'm at it, I might as well admit that I prefer instant mashed potatoes to the lumpy, dumpy real ones.  Please don't hate me.  Maybe it comes from growing up eating only box mix cakes and instant mashed potatoes.  My mom, while she enjoys cooking does NOT like to bake at all unless it's simple and easy. I suppose I am passing this legacy on to my children.  I know all about the additives and preservatives in these quick mixes but I just can't help myself.  It's like trying to resist a bag of Laffy Taffy's in my cupboard, impossible.

I myself love to both bake and cook but sometimes I have no patience for the intricate cooking required on more complicated recipes.  In addition, I lack some of the proper equipment.  Cooking tools, like my crafting tools, are something that I have to accumulate one piece at a time.

All those excuses aside, I'm always on the lookout for recipes that I can adapt by substituting my precious box mixes instead of going the fully homemade route.  Today's recipe is one of those.  I surfed my favorite source for inspiration (Pinterest of course!) and mixed and matched ingredients in several recipes to come up with one that would work for me.  So here it is:

Cheater Caramel Frappucino Cupcakes

 Start with a box of chocolate cake mix (I prefer devil's food cake) and prepare it according to the directions on the box but substitute one cup of fresh brewed coffee for the water.  

Bake as directed and once the cupcakes cool, cut a hole in the top with a knife and fill with caramel frosting (recipe to follow).  Then pipe some of that store bought yummy frosting on top and add some chocolate shavings.  Voila!  

Caramel Frosting

1/2  cup butter
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla
1-1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Put the butter, brown sugar and whipping cream in a sauce pan.  Bring to a boil over medium heat and then cook & stir regularly for 2 minutes or until thickened.  Remove from the heat and add vanilla.  Once the sauce has cooled to lukewarm, whip in the powdered sugar until it reaches the consistency of spreadable frosting. 
 

Friday, November 8, 2013

A few small projects

While I've been MIA from the blogging world, I have been keeping myself busy with several projects both big and small.  Redoing our master bedroom would be one of the bigger ones but I thought I would share a few of the smaller ones today.

I had a great find recently at our local Dollar Tree of small glass jars.  I knew they would be perfect both for my crafting purposes but also for some of the homemade Christmas gifts I will be doing so I bought the entire lot of them.  For my craft storage, I painted the lids with chalkboard paint and now they are holding supplies like buttons, pom poms and googly eyes.
I also used Mod Podge and some adorable gray chevron scrapbook paper to cover my light switch and plug plates.

 And finally, I took three 12x12 canvases from Michaels and covered them with fabric.  Two canvases are covered in a black chevron and then I painted wooden letters to glue in the center and the third canvas is a print (tactfully called "busy" by my mother-in-law heh).

Stay tuned, I have a ton of projects in mind for the near future!

Wednesday, November 6, 2013

Bedroom updates and a DIY craft desk

In all of the years we have lived in this house, and all of the room updates we have tackled, we somehow always skipped our master bedroom.  Now that the chemo treatments seem to have curbed some of my crazy hospitalizations, I finally decided enough was enough and began to work on our room.

A few before shots


It is not quite finished yet (I decided to retain my sanity and only paint one wall at a time) but here is a sneak peak into the progress.
 In addition to painting the room and adding new curtains, I also built myself a crafting table (one my bestie is entirely too envious of!).
 
 The desk was very easy to make.  I took two 6 cube ClosetMaid storage cubicals from Target and a 2x4 project panel from Home Depot that I painted black.  Viola!  I debated on using Liquid Nails but for now, I just have the 2x4 resting across in case I want to move the desk in the near future.  If I need more stability I will use Liquid Nails and some screws.

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Bedskirts and Pugs, Pugs, Pugs

A few posts ago I mentioned that we redid our daughter's room in order to make it a bit more age appropriate.  Recently I decided her bedroom was missing something...a bedskirt.  And being the new crafter and Pinterest addict that I am, I found a cute idea and ran with it.  

Since the bedskirt is directly attached to the bed frame, I had to spend hours upon hours on the floor in AniBelle's room tying on the tulle.  Of course, no project like this would ever be complete without the pugs!








Two things of note that I learned during this project.
        1.  With a trundle and an attached bedskirt, it becomes a pain to put the trundle away.   You have to pull out each piece of tulle after you are done.
        2.  Never ever use tulle with glitter on it when doing a project that will be touched and moved often.  It looks like it snowed glitter in my daughter's room on a regular basis.         

Monday, November 4, 2013

Mother/Daughter Craft Day

One of the many (many, many, many) blessings of being able to stay at home is the time I have had to devote to hobbies such as baking, cooking, and crafting.  My bestie calls me Betty C2 (Betty Crocker Cooking & Crafting) but she's just jealous of the time I have to do those things...as well as of my new craft desk but more on that later.  Anyway, a few weeks ago, my best friend & I got together with our daughters for an afternoon of crafting. 

Our first project was some wall art with the girl's initials:
This one was super easy, even for a crafting novice like myself.  We simply used a 12x12 piece of MDF from Hobby Lobby & mod podged some scrapbook paper on it.  Then the girls painted their wooden initial and I used a hot glue gun to attach that and the little black flower embellishment.  This one belongs to my daughter, Annika. 

And this one is Ali's (my besties kiddo):



After that, we made some flower headbands for the girls following these instructions:


The headbands were super easy, if a bit time consuming, to make.  The girls love them.  

All in all, it was a fun afternoon and we've already got a slumber party craft night planned for later this month.  I love the fact that this gives me something to do with my daughter so that we can continue to build a strong and loving relationship.