mmm, homemade granola

Yep, Baby Girl still hasn't arrived.  Which means that I'm really nesting now. Baking. Sewing. Knitting. (but not cleaning - somehow I haven't had a burning desire to get my 6-day-overdue belly bent over to clean things ...)
And yesterday? I made granola. (and a few other things :D)

 (this recipe is from a woman in my MOPS group - thank you Cathy! I tweaked it just a bit)

1/3 cup oil
1/3 cup honey
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup shredded coconut
2/3 cup nuts, roughly chopped
2/3 cup raisins (I used a mix of craisins and raisins)
2 1/2 cups oatmeal

• combine sugar, honey and oil in a saucepan and cook until sugar melts and begins to boil. Add vanilla and cinnamon, remove from heat.
• combine oats, coconut, nuts and raisins in a large bowl. Add sugar mixture, and stir until oats are well coated. 
• Cover a jellyroll pan with foil (for easy cleanup) and spread oat mixture evenly in pan.
• bake at 325 for 30 minutes, stirring twice during baking.
• Store in an airtight container.

Once it's cooled, you could also stir in other things - chocolate chips, perhaps?
 

And I also finally got around to making curtains for our kitchen window :)

recipe: Apple-Walnut Spice Cake with Cream Cheese & Praline Frosting

This apple bundt cake is sooooo yummy. And the photos I remembered to take before it disappeared don't do it justice!

Have you read the Brown Eyed Baker's blog? If not, I highly recommend that you start - she posts some wonderfully delicious stuff! I get the updates emailed to me and am starting to think i might need stop reading them when I'm ready to lose the baby weight - or have some serious self control - since she targets baked goods, which are definitely my weakness :)

When I saw this recipe for apple cake I knew it would be perfect for us right now! Our little ones have taken to asking for "big" apples for snack time, meaning whole apples, and most of the time they only eat about half of the apple before they lose interest (which leads to a bowl full of brownish apple pieces in the fridge). A recipe like this was just what I needed to use them up!

The only things I changed were to use whole wheat flour, un-peeled apples and walnuts in place of the pecans, and the result was just scrumptious.

If you'd like to make your own, here's a link to the recipe - enjoy!

<3

recipes as art

My dad's mom died in March, and she was an excellent cook as well as a wonderful hostess. She left oodles of handwritten recipes, some that she hadn't made in years, and some that were family classics. As I was looking through them I was inspired by this pin to frame some of them to decorate our kitchen.

{source}

I picked up these frames for $0.33 each from a thrift store, and once I had decided which recipes to use I painted the frames white. The can of paint cost $0.98 at Walmart. Amazing!

Once the frames were dry - after several coats to cover the black and gold finish - I used some natural colored photo corners to mount the recipes onto white cardstock (so that I can switch them out if I want without damaging them). I really love how they turned out! Although after living with them for a while I think I want to go back and add ribbons like the originals. : )

and this last photo shows how they fit in with the decor of most of our downstairs (really the only thing left out is the kitchen, which is behind me!) quite a bit of which is still in progress. Imagine the red turned to a creamy white or very light yellow, for example.

There is something so sentimental about being able to see the handwriting of someone you love, handwriting that will never write you another card, spelling out the recipes from your childhood every day. So, yes, I am very happy with how they turned out!

hello again : )

It's June 23 and Summer has officially been here for 2 days. And I haven't blogged since May 14 - yikes!

I had every intention of posting a new silhouette in the shop for Father's Day, using the one that I was making as John's gift as the example. Um .... I got his done on Father's Day afternoon. Definitely not in time to post.
His dessert this year was a Strawberry Upside-down Cake (recipe from here) and it was delicious. : )

Emma had seconds. : )

Blurry, but the best shot of John and the little ones from the day.

Father's Day was relaxed, fun and John got showered with loves from our children. He's such a wonderful daddy, and their love is proof of that!

So, yes, I have plans to post about all that I've been doing during the silence on this blog. And it's been a lot!

a Valentine's Tea

A belated Happy Valentine's Day to you all! I have been working on this post for several days, hoping to get it posted in time to celebrate Valentine's Day with you, but life kept moving and babies kept needing mommy. Oh well - at least late is better than never. :)

Did you catch my brief mention that we are moving? This move is happening in two stages, the first stage of which is complete but now we are waiting on some paperwork and other details before the second stage can happen - so blogging here has moved a bit lower on the priority list!

As we were packing things up in the middle of January I realized that we probably wouldn't be settled by Valentine's Day - and that I really wanted to be able to celebrate Valentine's this year!
The solution? Celebrate early. :)

Emma Grace and I invited my sister-in-law and her friend over for the day and then we (I) pulled out all the red and pink things that I could find (read, all the ones that hadn't been packed yet). We had so much fun taking a break from moving to just decorate and enjoy the holiday. :)

We had strawberry scones, pumpkin bundt cake, lemon curd, sweetened cream cheese and my sister-in-law and her friend brought some cucumber tea sandwiches and a plate of baked ham sandwiches (Leah, if you still have the recipe could you email it to me? thanks!) that were really good.

I used this totorial to make a pom-pom garland. I loved making it (so fun and easy!), and love the actual garland even more! I'm thinking of maybe making more (in white perhaps?) to put in our master bedroom - or in the family room. :)

We had a wonderful time, and Emma Grace absolutely loved her first tea party.

I'm linking to a few of these blogs - can you believe that Spring is coming? They are posting some really darling decorating ideas!

handmade Christmas, part III

I made several jars of Lemon Curd to go with the tea towels that I gave as gifts this Christmas, and they were a huge hit!

Lemon Curd - makes about 1 quart

6 lemons
2 cups sugar
3/4 cup butter, cut into pieces
6 eggs, beaten

Zest 2 of the lemons.
Juice the lemons to get 18 Tbsp juice.
Combine the zest with sugar, lemon juice, butter and eggs in the top of a double boiler over medium heat.
Stir frequently until thick, about 20 minutes.
Pour into jars, cool and refrigerate.

This is a family favorite (my grandma used to make it every year for her church's Christmas tea) and is delicious on scones, toast, waffles, pancakes, crepes ... pretty much anything!


I'm posting a link to this on some of these blogs. :) 

because I bought a muffin pan this morning ...

... today I made muffins (recipe found here on Joy the Baker).

Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins.

Mmm, mmm, mmmmmm.

(I'm posting a link to this post on a few of these blogs - head on over and check out the other fun projects!)