2012 So Far...

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Hi, Everyone! I just realized that we are almost a third of the way through 2012 and so I thought it might be fun to look back at some of my favorite projects of the year so far! I can't believe how fast this year has been going, it's like time goes by faster and faster every year! Here are some of my favorite craft projects and recipes of 2012 so far... hope you enjoy the little tour!
WHAT I'VE BEEN COOKING AND BAKING...
Cookie Recipes: Mocha Swirl Cookies, S'mores Cookies, Chocolate Chip Shortbread Cookies

Breakfast Recipes: Crunchy Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Granola Bars, Baked Blueberry and Banana Oatmeal, Strawberry Oat Squares, Baked Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal (clockwise)

Sweet Pastry Recipes: Italian Easter Bread, Apple Turnovers, Pain au Raisin (Raisin Snail Pastries).

Dessert Recipes: Molten Coffee-Chocolate Cakes, Vanilla Panna Cotta with Balsamic Strawberries.

Savory Recipes: Asparagus Tart, Cauliflower and Leek Gratin, Lentil Vegetable Soup

WHAT I'VE BEEN MAKING...
Wreaths: Spring Silk Ruffle Wreath Tutorial, Easter Ruffle Wreath

Pillows: Cardigan Pillow Tutorial, Pink & Gray Bow Pillows

Felt Crafts: Valentine's Day Love Tree, Tea Lover's Bookmarks, Egg Cozy Tutorial, Spring Love Birds Tree (clockwise)
I hope you all found something you liked here so far, I have lots more fun posts coming up soon! I love sharing my love of crafting, cooking and baking with you all, and love reading your comments! Thanks for stopping by my blog! Have a wonderful rest of your weekend!
I will be linking to:Skip to My Lou, Tip Junkie, The Shabby Nest, My Romantic Home, Tatertots and Jello, and Six Sisters' Stuff.

Rosemary Olive Focaccia

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Hi, Everyone! I hope you all had a fun weekend! For me, this weekend was a time to catch up on some things around the house, so it meant lots of cleaning, washing, ironing and cooking. I knew the only that would make the piles of laundry and ironing more pleasant was a Downton Abbey marathon, and it sure did! I went through almost the entire first season! The Dowager Countess kept me entertained! One fun thing that I did in the kitchen was bake this Rosemary Olive Focaccia! It was really good! I served it along with a great big salad, but it would also be really good with a bowl of some hearty soup!
ROSEMARY OLIVE FOCACCIA(Adapted from Taste)
YOU WILL NEED:3 cups all-purpose flour1 1/4 cups warm water1 packet (2 1/4 tsp or 0.25 oz) dried yeast2 tsp sugar3 tbs olive oil2 tsp sea salt1/2 tbs dried rosemary (or 1 1/2 tbs fresh rosemary)Kalamata or black olives (about 20 of them), pitted
DIRECTIONS:
1. In your electric mixer bowl, combine yeast, sugar and warm water. Cover with a kitchen towel and let sit for about 5 minutes, until it's frothy. Then, begin adding flour, cup by cup, and half of the salt and all the rosemary, until a dough begins to form. (If the dough is still sticky, add more flour.)
2. Using the dough hook attachment on your electric mixer, knead the dough for 10 minutes, then form into a ball and place in a large greased bowl, cover with a kitchen towel and let rise in a warm place for about 45 minutes.
2. Once the 45 minutes is up, punch down the dough and knead it on a lightly floured surface for about a minute or two, until the dough is nice and elastic. Brush some olive oil onto your baking sheet, and form your dough into about a 9x13 inch rectangle. Cover it with a kitchen towel again and let rise for 20 minutes. Preheat your oven to 400 deg F.
3. After the 20 minutes, press holes into the dough using your finger, brush it with olive oil, sprinkle with the rest of the salt and press the olives into it. Bake for 10 - 20 minutes, until the top is golden brown. Once you take it out of the oven, brush it with a little bit of olive oil again (and sprinkle with some more salt if you like).
Serve the focaccia warm, with some soup or salad! I could seriously eat bread all day long (I wish it wasn't as full of carbs as it is!) and I love some homemade fresh bread with a meal! If you're looking for something new to serve as a side, try this Rosemary Olive Focaccia!Have a great week, Everyone!
I will be linking to:Mangia Mondays, Makin' You Crave Mondays, Skip to My Lou, Tip Junkie, Cozy Home Scenes,The Shabby Nest, My Romantic Home, Tatertots and Jello, and Bubbly Nature Creations.

Frozen Raspberry Yogurt Drops

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Hi, Everyone! I don't know about you, but I don't know what we did before Pinterest was around! I love all the inspiration and great new ideas I find every time I look through it! One of my favorite things I've seen on Pinterest lately are these frozen yogurt drops. You see, one of my worst habits is (unnecessary) snacking, especially in the evenings. It was one of my new year's resolutions to stop doing that, or to replace the unhealthy snacks with healthy ones, so I was really excited when I saw this idea on Pinterest through One Sweet Appetite. I always have some yogurt in the fridge, so I made them as soon as I had some time. I used low-fat raspberry yogurt, and they were really good! This is hardly a recipe, but here's how you can make some to satisfy those late night cravings for ice-cream!FROZEN RASPBERRYYOGURT DROPS
YOU WILL NEED: Yogurt (your choice of flavor, I used low-fat raspberry), baking sheet/large tray, piping bag and tip (or just a regular ziplock bag will do).
DIRECTIONS: All you need to do is empty your yogurt container into the bag, cut off the tip and pipe equal size yogurt drops onto your (clean) baking sheet or tray. Place in the freezer for one to two hours, and you're done!!!

And that's it! I told you it was hardly a recipe! So easy, and so good! They just melt in your mouth! I'll never forget how when I first went off to college, my roommates and I would go to our local Sainsbury's (a British grocery store) and buy Ben&Jerry's ice-cream and I was so excited because I was "all grown up" and could eat as much ice-cream as I wanted! Lots of fun memories! I still love ice-cream, but don't love the amounts of sugar that it contains. These Frozen Raspberry Yogurt Drops are a great snack and you don't have to feel guilty eating a bunch of them!
I will be linking to:Skip to My Lou, Tip Junkie, The Shabby Nest, My Romantic Home, Tatertots and Jello, andBubbly Nature Creations.

Handmade Paper Bow Tutorial

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Hi, Everyone! I hope you all had a great weekend! Since a special someone's birthday is coming up soon, I've been looking for some cute gift wrapping ideas, and one of my favorite things I found were handmade paper bows! I tried a couple different ways of making them, and finally came up with this, so I'm sharing the tutorial with you today! I love nicely wrapped gifts, it just makes what's inside the gift even more special! These bows may look a little complicated at first, but they are actually really easy to make, and once I started making a lot of them it only took me a couple of minutes to make each! All you need is a sheet of paper (you can use anything from brown paper bags and magazine pages to scrapbook paper and felt!), a hot glue gun and a good pair of scissors! Later on in the week, I will show you how I used these and other recycled materials for cute gift wrapping ideas, so be sure to come back! Here is a tutorial for my paper bows...

HANDMADE PAPER BOW TUTORIAL
1. First, cut your paper into 7 strips, each 3/4 inch wide. Cut the first three strips to be 10 inches long, the next three strips 9 inches long, and the last one to be 4.5 inches long.

2. Next, begin twisting each of the 6 long strips so that they have a loop at each end (see picture below). Secure with hot glue in the center. Make a loop out of the last strip (the 4.5 inch one).


This is what all all the loops will look like when you are done! Now you are ready to start layering and sticking them down to make your bows!

3. Layer and stick the three largest pieces, then layer and stick the next three pieces, and finally stick the loop in the center.


This is what the bow looks like when the first layer of the longest three strips (now loops) is done:

This is what the bow looks like once you've stuck the second layer of loops down:

This is what the bow looks like when it's done, once you've attached the ring into the center:

And that's it! I told you this was super easy! These bows are so much fun to make and make for really cute additions to plain wrapping paper! I hope you try this out! And make sure you come back later on in the week to see some cute recycled gift wrapping ideas! Happy Crafting, Everyone!
I will be linking to:Skip to My Lou, Tip Junkie, Cozy Home Scenes, The Shabby Nest, My Romantic Home, Chic on a Shoestring Decorating, Tatertots and Jello, Six Sisters' Stuff and Bubbly Nature Creations.

Recycled Gift Wrap Ideas!

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Hi, Everyone! So, a couple of days ago I shared my Handmade Paper Bow Tutorial with you, and I promised I would be back with some cute and creative gift wrap ideas! I had a couple of presents that I needed to wrap up, and even though I have a whole drawer full of pretty wrapping paper and ribbon, I decided to recycle some different materials and come up with fun ways to wrap the presents up! Here is what I came up with, I hope it gives you some good ideas...!

RECYCLED GIFT WRAP IDEAS


For this present, I used a recycled brown paper bag, a strip of burlap and some old buttons. I wrapped the present in the brown paper, cut a strip of white paper with some decorative scissors to give it a nice edge, then glued that onto the brown paper. I cut a thinner strip of burlap and layered that on top of the white paper, and attached three buttons on top using hot glue.


Here, I recycled some old tissue paper, I crinkled it up and then straightened it out again, and wrapped the present in it. I cut the handles off a gift bag and used those as the ribbon, I attached them onto the tissue paper using hot glue. Then, I added my handmade paper bow, made out of an old brown paper bag; you can follow my tutorial for how to make a paper bow here!



For this gift, I used a brown paper bag as the wrapping paper again. Then, I cut up strips of burlap and used that to tie around the gift, attaching it with hot glue. I made a bow out of burlap strips too, sewed a button on top of it, and attached the whole thing onto the present using hot glue.


I used the crinkled up white tissue paper again to wrap this present. I cut thin strips of burlap to make the ribbon and frayed the edges a little bit to make it look a little more decorative. Then, using hot glue, I attached a handmade paper bow made out of thick scrapbook paper.



 I embellished this brown paper bag wrapped present with layers of white paper with a decorative edge, more brown paper, a thick strip of burlap, and a string of "twine" (a gift bag handle). Then using hot glue, I attached a couple of blue and green buttons, spacing them evenly.



For this last gift, I wrapped it in brown paper, using decorative scissors I cut thin strips of white paper and glued then onto the length of the package, and then I made a paper bow using a page from a magazine and attached it on top.



 I love wrapping gifts, I always have, so this was a lot of fun for me! I hope I've given you some good ideas for the next time you're wrapping a gift for someone! There's nothing more fun than receiving a present that's as pretty on the outside as it is once it's unwrapped! Have a great weekend, Everybody! Happy Crafting!
I will be linking to:Skip to My Lou, Tip Junkie, Cozy Home Scenes, The Shabby Nest, My Romantic Home, Chic on a Shoestring Decorating, Tatertots and Jello, Six Sisters' Stuff, Bubbly Nature Creations, House of Hepworths, The Shabby Creek Cottage, Grits & Giggles and Somewhat Simple.