Belated Valentines

As like everything this year I was flying by the seat of my pants to get it all done.  Four sets of Valentines, 4 parties (last one ending today) and 2 birthdays and one friend birthday.

Here are the Valentine cookies I made for Micah's kindergarten class.  

Thirty-three to be exact.

Vanilla rolled cookies with royal icing, melted chocolate chip mouth and Wilton's candy eyes.

Third grade got these full size Laffy Taffy bars.  Simply bought a box at Sam's and stapled tag to them. 

According to Zachary they were a big hit.

Kalla made these little treat boxes for her first grade class.  I had a ton of these big matchboxes left over from parties.  We put in some dollar candy and stickers inside.  Then I let Kalla decorate with heart stickers I got at the Target dollar section.  Tied off with twine.  Super cute.

When I saw these last year I was determined that someone was going to take them for Valentines this year.

Sent these with Micah to his kindergarten class.

For all the teachers I made some mixed berry muffins (from a mix). 

 Thought they would be a nice change from candy.

Maressa gave these gunny bear tubes.  Skinny cellophane bags from here on etsy.

For my kids this year I admit I wasn't as into it as usual or prepared.

I had bought them all a book a couple of weeks ago.

Didn't really wanna give candy or sweets since they come home with bags of it from school. 

Not to mention we still had cupcakes and birthday cake.

But I remember as a kid this one year when me and my sisters came home from school on Valentines day and my mom decked out the kitchen and had special surprises for us.

It made us feel so special. 

 I don't recall all the details, but I remember it involving a mini heart shaped cake and new shoes.

So I figured, it didn't have to be fancy.  So I taped some heart doilies together and hung them from the ceiling.  Put a snack on special paper plates and water in fun colorful cups we hadn't used yet.

Picked out a couple of conversation hearts specially for them and a few kisses and popcorn.

Added it to their new books and a Valentine Charlie Brown video to share.

They were thrilled.  :)

Do you guys celebrate with your kids?  With your romantic Valentine?

Sit and eat chocolate alone?

I did 2 of them.....

Hubby and I are having a do over next week when our babysitters his parents are in town and we get to go out on a date night.  :)

Valentines

Working on all of our class Valentines today.  Hodge podge for the 4 of them.  Two have parties tomorrow, one on Monday and a reschedule of Maressa's party on Tues that was supposed to be today.  

Today we are home for a snow day.  Not real excited about that simply because it makes day #6 we have to make up later of school missed this year from snow.

But we did enjoy the day home.  It's all melted now and we appear to have the only big snowman in the neighborhood, resting comfortably in the shade.  We only got just under or about 2".  But the kids were out at 10am with their daddy making a big old snowman.  

He missed the last snow fun due to some work deadline constraints.

Anyway, just thought I'd list some fun stuff we did last year and a few links to some fun ideas by other this year and a couple of oldie, but goodies.  :)

Beary valentines

Shovel valentines

Heart marshmallow pops

You're the Bomb, homemade fizzy bath bomb by Skip to my Lou
adorable kid drawn heart guy holding candy valentines by Inchmark
origami heart with sucker valentines by Zakka Life
butterfly valentines pops by Skip to my Lou

Tomorrow will share the stuff we did this year.  :)

Yummy Teacher gifts...all bottled up!

Foud this cute gift idea in a magazine and did this for a couple of our preschool teachers.

To make your own, you need a bottled drinks in a cardboard carrier.

I found the Starbucks Frappuccino to work best and the bottles necks aren't to skinny to fit in yummy snacks.

So to begin, I peel off the front and back labels.  Then stick them and the caps in the dishwasher.  There will still be a sticky film on the bottles where the labels were.  Use Goo Be Gone to remove the stickiness and I found the ink printed exp date on the bottle to come off with it as well.  Once the stickiness is gone I washed the bottles again in warm water.  If you want to skip this step you could always use pretty paper to cover this area, but I liked the whole clear bottle to show off treats and peppermints and whatnot.

Now to cover the cardboard carrier.  I first secured the bottom that likes to move around with regular tape.  Then I used the box to make templates of Christmas paper to cover the carrier.  I did rectangular pieces for the front and back and then 2 separate pieces for each side.  Once I had templates for each size and shape, I used those pieces to make more to have enough tocover the whole thing.  To attach all this fun paper to the original carrier I simply used my favorite tool:  double sided tape.  :)

Then I punched holes and used double sided tape to attach to the tops of the caps.  Filled jars with teachers fav snacks and tied a festive silver ribbon.

This would be a fun way to present small office supplies or any other small items.

And here is another set of teacher gifts we did:

I got these cute boxes from Target dollar spot.

And put some goodies inside.

Inside I put a small jar of snack mix.  Then I included a suggestion card to resuse jar when snack was gone.  I added a baggie of rock salt and tea lights to put in the jar when it's empty.  We also included some yummy homemade chocolate dipped marshmallows with peppermint sprinkles.

A homemade ornament post

Ornaments from this year and years past made by someone in this house.  :)

Felt ones

Pom pom ones

Wire ones

Shrinky dink ones

Clay ones

Craft foam kit ones from Target

Suncatcher ones

I love our handmade decorations on the tree.

Ane we all enjoy reminicing about all of them.  Many are preschool memories too.

Oatmeal Cookies~Holiday Version!

White Chocolate Cranberry Oatmeal Cookies

2 sticks of butter (or 1 C) softened

1 C packed brown sugar

1/2 C white granulated sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

1-1/2 C all purpose flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

pinch of nutmeg

1/2 tsp salt

3 C oats

1 C craisins

1/3 cup chopped blanched almonds (you can get them in the baking section in slivers)

3/4 C - 1C white chocolate chips (depending on how chocolatey you want it!)

Cream softened butter and sugars til mixed well. Beat in eggs and vanilla. In a separate bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg. Beat into the creamed mixture. Add oats and almonds and beat til well mixed. Stir in craisins and chocolate chips. Drop teaspoon size dough onto cookie sheet. Bake 350F 8-10 mins (though mine took 12 mins).

These are so good and would make a most yummy gift for neighbors or teachers. You could also put all dry ingredients into a jar with recipe attached for gift giving.

Pumpkin Cream Cheese=YUM!

Yesterday I had my monthly sewing day where I lead a sewing project with ladies who want to gain experience using a sewing machine, just learning and those who just want to fellowship and make fun projects. *If you live in the Huntsville AL area and want to join, click on the Huntsville Craft Club link for more info!* Anyway, it's just not a proper gathering to me if there isn't yummy snacks. So I make goodies for it too. Well, my oven just decided to get sick on me and won't even get diagnosed til Wednesday, so all my goodie making is limited.

So I made yummy pumpkin cream cheese. I love pumpkin so much that I think I look to add it to nearly every thing during the fall. So this seemed like a logical choice. Add a box of crisp ginger snaps and you've got a most delicious snack. Course it would be great spread on whole grain bagels as well. So if you are having company staying with you this Thanksgiving, why not whip some up for snacking and/or breakfast?

Ok, so to the recipe. I used a BHG recipe as follows:

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Spread

1 8 oz package cream cheese

1/2 C canned pumpkin

1/4 C sugar

3/4 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/2 tsp vanilla

Beat together and refrigerate at least 1 hour before serving.

I also made those MS cereal bon bons from my edible gift list for the first time. Just cornflakes and semi-sweet chocolate chips. I also drizzled white chocolate on top. These disappeared at my sewing day. One of the easiest and most yummy treats I've made! Will be making these again!

For this month's project I used a free pattern/tutorial for our project (usually I use my own pattern/tutorial but there are already so many cute aprons ones on the net). Go here to get the tutorial (I googled for a tutorial and this is the link I found and can't really figure out how to get there from the actual blog). It's super cute and easy and would make a great gift!

Revisitng Last Years Kids Turkey Craft

Visit this link to make your own play dough turkey craft kit for kids. It was quite the hit last year! They make great preschool party favors!

It's getting to be that time!

Time to start those handmade gift projects!

To get things started I'm going to put the lists I made and some others in my right hand column for those looking for ideas.

Here are a few ideas I've had over the last year:

Beary Cute Tic Tac Toe and personalized memory game

Personalized tin lunch boxes filled with craft supplies

Super simple art drawing tote

Felt plates tutorial and felt cookies/apron/doll playset

Super simple art drawing turned stuffie

Bubble letter alphabet book...this one is bunny, but you can find other bubble letters on craftjr.com

Other ideas I can't resist on other blogs:

Personalized family Yahtzee game

Book and felt food sets

I'm going to make some other lists to this year. A teacher gift list, an edible gift list and friend/sister/mom type list. :) And I'll add kid gift ideas here too when I come across them/think of them. :) Have a few ideas/tutorials coming up!

Red, white & blue cookie pops

I wanted to make something yummy and festive for this weekend and didn't feel like going to all the trouble as I did with roll, cut, bake, color icing...etc etc. like last year. So I thought these playdough cookies would be great candidates this year. I really wanted to make them into stars. I rolled out the 'snakes' and then pinched them into stars, but they spread too much in the baking and didn't look as distinct as I would have liked.

If you are looking for festive food, try these ideas out and switch the colors to red, white and blue.

*Jello cantaloupe~maybe watermelon and blue jello...I have no idea if they would set though with how much water is in watermelon...would def want to try ahead of time
*Chocolate button pretzels~use Hugs hershey kisses and red and blue M&M's
*Cupcakes~use 'rainbow' technique with red, white and blue frosting
*White choc popcorn~tint part of the chocolate red and some blue, drizzle red on half of popcorn, blue on other half, then wait til chocolate sets and toss both colors in a bowl together
*Shaped marshmallows pops~tint marshmallow with red or blue then cut with star cookie cutter
*Gourmet chocolate caramel apples~use red apples, dip in caramel then white choc and drizzle blue tinted chocolate over them and use red, white and blue sprinkles
*Star pies~make the mini tarts with the stars (make some blueberry too if you like) or make the pocket pie in star shapes

Happy Independence Day everyone!!

Let your kids make a 4th of July shirt

Ok, forgive the pictures as these are 5 years old. :) These are some shirts that I made with my first 2. I did Kalla's (she was not quite a year old) and Z (he was almost 3) helped do his. Super simple to do with your kids.

You need a white tee, red and blue acrylic or fabric paints and some thick corrugated cardboard (from a packing box). To make the star stamp I used a star cookie cutter to trace a star on the cardboard. Make several and cut them out. Now peel one side of the cardboard to reveal the ribbed corrugated section in the middle. Pour your paints onto a paper plate to dip the stamps in. Lay shirt flat on table. Place a piece of cardboard in between the front and back side of the shirt so the paints don't bleed through to the back. Now press the stars down on the shirt. Do this all over as desired with both blue and red. Then let dry completely.

Here's little Miss Kalla in her shirt that year. It's hard to remember that she was that little...she's going to be 6 years old in a month!

Awwwww...... :)

Some last minute Easter goodies

* Image by allsorts

For the Easter basket

Sweet paper doll bunny set seen above...I got one and it's just too cute, I'm going to make a little fabric pouch to keep it all in

(or just play online here)

Glitter playdough

Glove bunnies

Paper pinwheels

For Easter breakfast

Baked French toast

Decorations

Paper bunny garland

Gifts

Easter baking kit

Just a few things I've seen out and about on the web or thought of. Hope to make that garland this week and dying to try the french toast. :)

Copycat Goodies...caution:this post may cause waist line expansion

I really need to stop perusing blogs with scrumptious goodies posted on them! Because I then need to make said scrumptious goodies, and further more eat them! So I am sharing the agony. ;)

I HAD to make these chocolate pretzel 'button's seen here via Crafty crow.

Mine are slightly different in that I couldn't find the round pretzels so I improvised with these round pretzel/peanut butter sandwiches. And boy oh boy! The peanut butter, pretzel and chocolate! Mmmmm! These are very addicting.

I tried these candy cane hearts seen here with leftover candy canes. I didn't have much luck making these look very neat. So I gave up.

These however were SO good! I saw them made here and went to try them myself. I never got around to making the icing/ganache but they are quite decadent just plain.

I made some of my own creations as well. Will share some strawberry white chocolate dipped marshmallow pops and strawberry candy popcorn next week. Will also do that rice heating pad tutorial, twirl skirt tutorial and Two at the Zoo party next week! That is if we aren't in at the NIH...still waiting for that fever!

Happy Weekend all! We will be enjoying 60+ degree whether here! Unfortunately we have basketball game, birthday party to take kid to and cubscout banquet to attend to instead of enjoying the sunshine....gonna try to squeeze in some if we can...even if it's eating at Chick fil a on their patio/play area for lunch in between all the rest!