Minion Birthday

So, my friend K's little girl turned two yesterday. Cutest little kiddo ever. She's using her manners, with a little prompting, she enjoys helping in the garden and around the house (I can't tell you how many times I've turned around to find her 'sweeping' the kitchen floor, or 'dusting' something), and will talk up a storm for you.

This adorable little blue eyed, blond curls of a little American Girl doll also LOVES minions. Like OMG every other word it seems is Minion. So for the birthday girl, her Momma and I decided I would make Minion cupcakes. I was super stoked, plus it gave me an excuse to buy a mini cupcake tin (everyone needs one those right?)

I looked up a few ideas online, and found pictures of people using Twinkies, and marshmallows, all sorts of different frostings, or fondant, and some painted on eyes, or used Smarties, or something else. I finally settled on how I wanted to put everything together, and took inventory for what I already had, and K and I headed off to the store.

I used a basic butter cream frosting, and about a half batch of the batter I used for K's birthday cupcakes last December. Plus, marshmallows, chocolate, candy eyes, black painting icing and sprinkles.

I started off by melting the chocolate, but of course I couldn't use my double boiler, because I used it with all sorts of fragrances and other things making lotions and candles last year, and yea well, didn't wanna risk it. No worries, we'll make this work the way my Momma taught me. A pan, and a bowl.

*DISCLAIMER* I don't really consider these candies as chocolates, but I can never get white chocolate to melt properly so I went with these.

Anywhoo....once it was all melted down, I added a splash of oil, and a pinch of vanilla, and started prepping the marshmallows. I found that if you just stick a toothpick in them, they pull off and get stuck in the chocolate, so I dipped the toothpick into the chocolate a little, then shoved it into my marshmallow, let it cool, and THEN dipped the marshmallow. Also...don't cover the whole marshmallow, because you'll have nothing to hold later without melting chocolate, and it makes it tricky getting the tooth pic out. Unless you want an excuse to eat half of your minions...then go ahead.

I used a styrofoam circle to hold the minions while they were cooling and drying, popping them in the fridge to hurry the process along since I'm not all THAT patient of a person.

How minions are born

Once I had all my Minions dipped, eyed, and haired, I started making cupcakes, and icing. I used Wilton Royal blue coloring to get the batter and icing as close to the shade of blue as their overalls and I could. 

Yay! First batch in mini cupcake tray!!!

After everything had cooled, and I took a break for dinner, I sat down and tried to draw the goggles and mouths on with a food writer pen. Thanks to the waxy nature of the chocolate, the pen tip just gummed up and didn't work for more than a tiny little mark that was REALLY faint any way. 

I tried to Google home made edible ink...and kept finding all these really cool ideas for making ink out of beets, and dryer lint, and walnuts, and all sorts of things, but not really what I was I going for. So I thought, well I have the black Wilton gel coloring, but it's too thick to paint on, so I'll try to water it down. Well that didn't work well, because the waxy-ness of the chocolate just had the water beading up and not drying. In the words of the minions "well, poop". 

I'm not sure what made me think of it, but I tried mixing some powdered sugar into the black water until it was about the consistency of an acrylic paint. Found my detail paint brush that I bought because I wanted to paint stemware, but never got around to it. I proceeded to paint, every minion's goggles, and mouths by hand, and assemble the cupcakes, while watching an outrageous comedy about a haunted house. 

MINIONS!!!!

WOW did they turn out pretty well! Some of them were a little wonky, some looked a little messed up, but overall, I had my own army of minions sitting on my coffee table.

The birthday girl, was so excited when she saw the minions that it didn't take her more than 5 minutes to snag one (after being told to wait) when no one was looking. K and I were in her kitchen getting dishes ready to set out and heard her say "I ate it". K and I looked at each other wondering what she was eating, and go into the other room to see this:

One very happy, Minion demolishing, birthday girl. Guess which one she snagged? The one I made with little piped stars on it so we could put her star candles in it for her to blow out....So we had to put the candles in a different one, but thankfully I had more cupcakes than minions.

Now that I've seen Despicable Me 2, I'm going to have to figure out how to do the new minions. Thinking, of cotton candy for the hair, and coconut for the teeth. If I ever actually make them, that is. I think I'm slightly minion-ed out for the time being. But we had one happy little birthday girl!

Summer Garden, Goals, and Ideas

Well, it's summer here in my part of the world. With the exception of the last week or so, it's been relatively mild and comfortable, hanging in the 70's but the humidity can't seem to make up it's mind. But all this means is my garden is THRIVING!

Small orange rose bush rescued from the mint

Acorn Squash

K and I have now planted carrots, onions, tomatoes, basil, eggplant, acorn squash, green beans, corn, cabbage, lettuce, broccoli, spinach, beets, radishes, green peppers, spicy peppers, zucchini, cucumber, spaghetti squash, and ambrosia melon. The carrots are just about ready to be pulled, and I'm impatiently waiting. We've got garlic growing all over the yard, and also waiting to harvest it. As well as mint....tons and tons of mint growing wild through my roses. So much, that I think I'll have enough to do everything from HappySimpleLiving's blog, and still have plenty left for a Mojito or two (*ahem* dozen) over the course of the summer.

Corn and green beans reaching for the sky!

I've read a lot that things like cabbage, and broccoli don't do too well with warm summer sun on them, so K and I strung up some string and cheesecloth to make a bit of a sun shade for our cold loving veggie bed, and it seems to be working OK. I just have to be careful when watering, and make sure to check it after a rain to make sure the cheesecloth isn't trying to push the plants back into the ground.

Happy Tomatoes and basil

Surprise! Apparently tomatoes will grow just about anywhere.

K and I planted about five tomatoes when we started seeds this spring. Now we have 25 plants. When the big garden was tilled by our husbands, apparently a tomato or two got tilled in, and they sprouted. We also found a volunteer growing out of a barrel where we dumped all the tiny rocks from the onion and carrot patch. So we now have a few varieties of what appear to be heirloom, beefsteak, roma, cherry, and a few unidentified tomatoes.

We also found a few pepper plants that popped up in the tilled ground, so those got transplanted as well.

The Ambrosia Melon we are growing is an experiment. Not sure how it's going to turn out, but since the plant cost me like $2 I'm not complaining. It looks like it's something like a cantaloupe, but it is supposed to be super sweet.

This past week we had a bit of a heat wave, getting up into the upper 80's but with high humidity it felt more like 90's. Our air conditioning is out, so we ended up spending about a week at my mother-in-law's house, taking advantage of her cool air. During this time, I ended up teaching her how to knit a dish cloth. She had one she loved that has just about reached the end of its useful life, so it was time for a new one. I ended up picking some thread for a few wash cloths for myself (I just can't bring myself to use such pretty things on dirty dishes) and worked right along side her while she made her first dish cloth. I must say, for her first time knitting in several years, she got right back into the swing of things very quickly. She picked a skein of red/blue/grey mix that when I looked at it on the shelf, I wasn't too much of a fan, but after she started knitting with it, it pulled a transformer on me and ended up looking pretty kick-ass! Enough that I'm planning on making a few out of the same stuff. 

A nice bright and cheery wash cloth!

I am now into my second batch of home made laundry soap, and I am loving it! Some stains that I thought were there for good have magically disappeared, and it rinses out so well there isn't anything left to irritate sensitive skin. Bonus - It works beautifully in my H.E. front loading washer. Next time I make a batch, I'll have to put up a tutorial on it. 

While reading around online for something...I think ideas for more wash cloths since I get bored pretty quickly, I stumbled across something I haven't thought about in a few years. Hot Process Soap.....but in a crock pot! Sign. Me. Up!

I love homemade soap, especially the kind with herbs and flowers in it. I stumbled across the blog Little House in the Suburbs and have been browsing through the wonderful entries there, getting my creative ideas flowing. So of course now I'm reading up on making soap in a crock pot, and the ratios, and what to do if it doesn't work, and how to tell if it's not working before waiting for it to set up. 

I'm hoping to have my first batch of crock pot soap in the next few weeks, (seriously, not standing over a hot pot of soap stirring away in summer, umm yes please), now I just have to decide if I'm going to make plain old soap, or if I'm going to do something fancy, like oatmeal and honey, or lavender chamomile, or even a mint and lemon. This is especially exciting for me, because I'm always looking to find ways to pamper myself, without spending all the extra money at the store. Also because this year I'm really trying to cut back on our seeming dependence on store bought items, and be more proactive incorporating nature into our lives. What more wonderfully pampering way to incorporate some of our summer garden into our winter lives than including some of the herbs and flowers in the soap we will use all winter? Add to that the scrumptious wash cloths, maybe some homemade candles, and hey, who needs the spa?

Well, that's all for now folks. Need to get off of here before I get any more ideas and try to do too much at once!

Faith, spirit, and nature

Some days, things just fall into place. You feel whole, connected. Your body seems to hum with an energy that is but isn't there. Something so beautiful and perfect you feel your eyes tear up, your heart swells, and an overwhelming sense of peace settles around your shoulders like a favorite warm blanket. 

Yesterday, the air reminded me of Scotland, humid, but cool and breezy. Scotland was the first place I truly felt this overwhelming surety of who I am, and what it means to be me. To the point my soul cried "This is home, I am home!". The sense that my spirit, my body, and my mind were in sync, and for a brief moment, even the stars and time could move nothing unless I willed it. I felt what I have long believed, in so profound of a moment, that it no longer was a belief, but became a soul deep knowledge. 

Yesterday, I had a similar feeling, not as strong, but an echo of what I had felt before. Even if we hadn't already planned it, I would have found myself outside and in the garden, or the woods. Barefoot, bare hands, sinking into the damp ground, with the breeze a gentle brush against the face. 

K came over, and we got the side bed weeded and planted. We were able to put corn, green beans, acorn squash, tomatoes, basil, carrots and onions in the ground. We will be putting some eggplant in as well in the side garden. The carrots, tomatoes, and basil are all showing, but nothing else will sprout for a while yet. I am looking forward to dinners made with freshly picked food, shared with loved ones. 

Some people may wonder why go through the trouble of doing all this when you can just buy it. Well, there's many reasons, but only a few are very important to me.

The most important is that for me, working in the garden is very spiritual. Some people pray, some people meditate, some dance, or use rhythm and find that solace the soul is looking for. Gardens, nearby woodlands, and rivers have always been my solace. There is a sense of wonder, a sense of peace when in nature. It's where we came from, before there were cities, before there were modern conveniences, we lived in and with nature. There is a harmony that I have not found elsewhere. When you let nature set the pace of life, life is more full. There's less stress, and it's easier to accept that what will happen will happen, and we can't control everything, as much as some of us may want to. 

Part of the spiritual aspect is all of the sensory input, that when I focus on it, or simply sit surrounded by it creates a very humbling feeling. As humans, we tend to forget how important the earth around us is and that in one way or another we all depend on nature. Getting my hands into the soil, knowing that what I have my hands in provides life to the plants that will be put there, and thus to me. The scent of the plants is to me the scent of life. The sound of the breeze, and the air around me that carries the sound of leaves rustling, or birds singing, lifts my spirit. 

Another reason this is so special to me, is that working with the earth reminds me of loved ones, and cherished memories. Memories that come bursting through the misty reaches of my mind to stand bold, front and center when I'm in nature. Remembering my mother, and my grandmother taking walks and pointing out different plants, with my mother sometimes explaining a medicinal use of the plant if she knew it. Memories of my grandfather carefully saving and cataloging seeds from his favorite plants, or taking the time and care to paint leaves of prized plants one at a time to protect them from some pest, or blight. Friends that I remember talking to their plants, encouraging them grow, and thrive, and the excited phone calls when a bloom appeared. 

http://tattoos-and-doodles.blogspot.com/2012/01/triskel-plant.html

Another is it fills a special part in my heart. My faith. My belief that life is sacred, and deserving of reverence. As a Druid, there is so much more than simply having a spiritual connection, there is an underlying, fundamental belief, in love, wisdom, and creativity, all of which I find in the garden. The proof that our lives are more connected than they appear on the surface. The peace that is present when all is in harmony. In my experience, some of the most wonderful moments of freeing the soul have been found setting roots into the soil.

All of this sums up to the fact that I do this because it's who I am. 

Repairing a crochet bedspread, and preserving a family heirloom

So, I keep hearing how amazing something I did is, and how in awe some people are, but to be truthful, I don't think I did anything that incredible. Yeah, I'm proud of myself because I did something new, and it worked better than I though it was going to, but I don't really see it as anything as amazing as others have said. I will admit to a guilty flush of pleasure at hearing other people praise my work, but all I did was fix an old blanket.

I've had a few people ask me how I did it, and, well a picture is worth a thousand words, so here's a few for you. I've had a few more admit that they never thought about repairing a blanket like this, and wouldn't know where to begin, so hopefully this will help.

Original damage

I got lucky, this was right on a seam, so I didn't have to try to pull tension just perfect like if it had been in the middle of a piece. I sat down with my thread and a bunch of hooks, and just kept making the center of the square with each different hook until I matched the gauge. Ended up with size 5 steel hook, and size 10 thread.

The pattern is a pretty simple center out block, with popcorn stitches up to the edges on a double crochet background as the design. The popcorn stitches took a little playing around but eventually I noticed they were treble crochet grouped in 5.

I decided I wanted to rebuild the damaged part, as this was bottom center of a bedspread, and would be very visible if used. I had originally thought of trying to sew it back together, but like the perfectionist I am, I couldn't bring myself to do that. I started to carefully pick out the damaged thread, and unraveled stitches until I got to a point where the thread was still good, and tied the thread off at the top of a stitch. I got really lucky, there were more good stitches left on the lower rows, than on the rows above them, so I didn't have to pull out good stitches, or try to pick them up from the bottom as I went.

First half damage picked out and tied off. 

Once I got this damage cleaned out, I attached with a slip stitch to the top of the bottom right popcorn, leaving a long tail, probably at least 6 inches. I then worked the missing 3 double crochet between the two popcorn stitches, slip stitched into the top of the left popcorn, tied it off and left a long tail again. For the top row, again, I attached to the right popcorn, made 3 double crochet, a 5 treble crochet popcorn in the next double crochet, then three more double crochet, and attached to the left popcorn. The result was this:

First half repaired

Now to repeat on the other half, clean it out, and restitch the missing parts. This time I had a bit more to remove and re-do. I ended up needing to redo two popcorn stitches on this side, but thankfully only one row needed work. There was still a good double crochet stitch to the right of the missing part, so I tied that off securely, and used a slip stitch to join new thread to it. Then I filled in the two missing double crochet, a popcorn, three more double crochet, another popcorn, and one final double crochet. Joined to the existing stitch on the left with a slip stitch, and tied off securely.

Second side cleaned out.

New work filled in

I don't have a picture of it, but I tied the new and old strings together at the beginning and end of each row, but didn't trim them. I left them long, so it can be washed once or twice to make sure it'll hold, then I'll weave them in and make it all neat and tidy.

Unfortunately, this blanket sat in a smoker's house for a while before they quit smoking, and it doesn't seem like it got cleaned after they quit. It was a really weird dingy yellow, probably from a combination of age, and  smoke. So I ended up soaking it in the bathtub with some Seventh Generation Oxy Clean.

Oxy is all bubbly and working it's magic

The color of the water after soaking for only ten minutes. YUCK!!! 

After soaking it a second time, and feeling it was mostly clean, I had to figure out how to rinse this thing. Rinsing it out made me wish I had a giant pool, or lots of helping hands. Thankfully we have one of those shower heads you can detach and use as a sprayer, so I situated the blanket as spread out as I could and spray. I had tried draining and refilling the tub with water and gently swishing the blanket around, but it just didn't seem to get clearer water even after several rinses. So I used that sprayer part to start at one end of the blanket and rinse and shift and rinse until all the water was running out clear. I don't think I've spent that long in a bathtub since I was a kid and played in the tub in the summer to cool down!

Once it was all rinsed, I rolled it up and tried to squeeze out as much water as I could. This blanket in over 50 years old, so I was trying not to put too much stress on it. I didn't really want to have to make more repairs. Once it was as dry as I could get it, I tried to pick the thing up. Yeah, not happening. I think it had to weigh 50 pounds. Big, strong husband to the rescue. He picked it up (didn't look that heavy at all when he did it!) and carted it to the washing machine for me, and I put it through a couple gentle rinse and spin cycles, just to make sure it was all rinsed out.

It still weighed quite a bit after that, but more manageable. I didn't want to put it through the dryer, and being winter, and colder than the freezer outside, I draped it over the ironing board, and one of the couches to dry. It made a great little tent! It took a couple of days to dry, but it finally did, and it was so much whiter.

The repaired section after the cleaning. Much, much less noticeable. 

I packed it back up to give back to my mother-in-law, and waited till Christmas day. I'm glad I did, because she was so happy to have it back and repaired. Here's a few shots of the bedspread on her guest bed.

The repaired section is right in the middle at the bottom edge of the mattress.

This one I just thought was a cool shot

So that's it, that's what I did. I repaired an old blanket. My mother-in-law remembers her mom working on this when she was just a child. Now it'll be a family heirloom to be passed on to future generations.

Christmas, New Years, and Life

Ok, I know I said I would get a post up a few days after Christmas, but I kinda forgot about the crazy cleaning that takes place between Christmas and New Years, and then forgot about the mess we always make for sauerkraut and pork. Especially when we get to have a bunch of people over! I loved every second of it too. Well except for when my lemon meringue pie didn't set up, and I had to run to the store to get a dessert while everyone was still sitting at the house :(. I'm putting off the cleaning from New Year's Day to work on this (shame on me, I'm being a bad housewife)

Christmas went well, we missed a few people due to colds, and work, but most of us were there. We had Christmas dinner at my mother-in-laws house, and OH MY GOD that ham was delicious!! I ate way more than I should have, but it was all so tasty!! I have to get the recipe from her for these cookies called Angel Squares I think. I like them better than rum balls and coconut macaroons, and if you know me...well that's saying something.

So now let's back track a little to the Saturday before Christmas, and Katie's birthday bowling bash! I made Lemon Curd Coconut Cupcakes and they seemed to be quite a hit. Of course I forgot to take my usual gazillion pictures until after they were half gone....

Lemon Curd Coconut Cupcakes

nothing to fancy about these, but here's the recipe.
Basic vanilla cake recipe
2 1/2 Cups AP flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 2/3 cup sugar
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 large eggs
3/4 cup whole milk

Mix the flour and baking powder in a bowl. In another bowl, beat sugar, butter, and vanilla until smooth and fluffy (it's very important to make sure there are no chunks of butter, as that will make a gooey under-baked mess). Add eggs one at a time, beating until well combined. Add flour and milk alternately in two additions, beating until just blended. Pour into cupcake tins line with paper, and bake at 325º about 20 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean.

Let cool, then fill a pastry bag with Lemon Curd. You can buy some at the store, or make it yourself. If you make it yourself, I find that the Lemon filling for a lemon meringue pie works beautifully. If you don't know how to make that, check out Betty Crocker Classic Lemon Meringue for the filling. Using a large tip (or the one made for filling), squeeze lemon curd into the center of each cupcake until you start to feel the cupcake swell. If some oozes out, just spread it on top and let it air dry so the icing will stick.

For the icing:
1 1/2 cup coconut flakes
3 TBsp butter, softened
8 oz marscapone cheese
2 2/3 cup powdered sugar
1 tsp Vanilla

Combine and beat all ingredients until smooth. This icing is too soft to really do anything fancy with, so just glop it on top and try not to eat it all before it makes it to the cupcakes.

A big part of our Christmas gifts to everyone this year were cookies! On top of traditional chocolate chip cookies, I made these three

Almond Sugar Cookies

I didn't get any pictures, but I put them in these cute little clear baggies with red stripes and tied them up with ribbon. 

Checkerboard Shortbread Cookies

For the checkerboard cookies, I'll have to do the recipe with lots of pictures showing how to make the cookies at a later time. This post is already going to be ginormous.

Apple-Cinnamon-Raisin-Oatmeal Cookies with Maple Icing

These are by far the most amazing oatmeal cookies I have ever had, and I will be making these again, if I can remember how I did it.







I also made some peppermint fudge, and peppermint bark to give out this year. It was my first time making peppermint bark, and that was an experience in and of itself. I had tried to melt white chocolate for some other cookies I had made, but ended up throwing it all out cause I couldn't get it to melt well, it just seized up. So for peppermint bark I chopped up those Hershey's mint kisses, and spread them on top of milk chocolate I had already melted and poured onto a cookie sheet. In my research for how to melt the white chocolate successfully, I found a video that showed a French Chocolatier using a heat gun during the tempering process. This sparked my imagination, and I pulled out our heat gun. Well, this melted the chopped pieces on top, but to get warm enough to let the top stick to the bottom, the top was browning. So I popped it in the oven for about 10 minutes, and viola! We have peppermint bark!

Melted, and cooled milk chocolate

Chopping an entire bag of Kisses

I also made Peppermint Chocolate Fudge!!

2 pkg semi-sweet Bakers Chocolate squares
1 14oz can sweetened condensed milk
1 tsp peppermint extract

Melt chocolate and milk in double boiler, add peppermint, pour into foil lined pan, cool, cut ENJOY! I sprinkled a little sea salt on which made it absolutely delectable.

I also ended up making coupon name tags for everyone this year. Thanks to Microsoft having all sorts of templates out there, I found some really pretty Christmas themed ones, and printed them out of heavy paper.

Here are a few more things I made for Christmas but won't go too far into detail. 

Lotion Squares (more in my post from 12/1

Body Scrub

Crochet doily for my MIL

Lotion that worked!

Name tags for the sweet treat bags

Vanilla Peppermint Chapstick

Book tote bag for Pam

Tote for Melinda

Tote for Dd

Peppermint swirl cheesecake!

Well that's it for now, I need to get to cleaning so I stop stressing about how bad the house looks. I'll be back later with a post on mess free soy candles, so stay tuned.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, and a Happy New Year.