Thursday, October 29, 2009

Homemade PB Cups

Once a month
my 10th/11th grade girls' small group
does a craft.

This month we made PB Cups!

They were so yummy!
I even learned a few tricks!

The fabulous recipe:
(makes 16-20)

12 oz bittersweet chocolate
1/3 cup creamy peanut butter
1/4 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup crushed honey graham crackers

I lined mini-cupcake pan with paper liners. This is a good idea but paper was not a good choice. I'm thinking maybe the foil liners might be better? Okay, so my big new trick.....rather than melting my chocolate in a double boiler....I just put a few chocolate chips in the bottom of each cup and baked them at 200 degrees for about 5 minutes!!!! They melted perfectly, I just swirled through them with a table knife to smooth it out.

Worked like a charm!

Mix the rest of the ingredients together. I formed them into balls ahead of time to make sure I had enough and that they were all about even and then smooshed them a bit into disks. Put one disk in each mini-cupcake, top w/ more chocolate chips, put back in the oven for 5 more minutes to melt the top chocolate...remove from oven, swirl through top chocolate to smooth, and let cool!

Delicious!

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Halloween Party

Cute kids, fun games:


Make for a fun party!


Btw, One's friends favorite part?
When we went outside to ride scooters....

Hmmm.

Monday, October 26, 2009

Christmas Quilt Along: Week 4

Last week's assignment was
16 small trees!

I don't know about you, but I butchered my first tree pretty good. Those directions were more than a little confusing and didn't create the tree at all like one would think you would create a tree! Thank goodness for forgiving fabric! If you look closely at the pic above, you can see the two diagonal lines where I pieced my fabric back together after completely slashing it the first time.

I've decided I'm going to start showing you the pieces I've messed up on. Crafting perfection is no fun. Stressing over perfection.... Who would ever craft?!? So my hacked up and pieced back together pieces are what make my quilt MINE. Not store bought. Made with love. I cut one of my courthouse square strips too short and had to piece it back together too to make it work. Oh well!

So don't stress about this quilt or whatever else you happen to be working on. If you're a little behind, if you made a mistake...just enjoy what you're doing. We're not working towards perfection.

This week's assignment is
step 3 of the pattern (here).

8 large trees!
You can do it!

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Counting

One

Two

Three

FOUR!

Coming in April!

Monday, October 19, 2009

Christmas Quilt Along: Week 3


Eight Courthouse Squares...check!



This week's assignment is
Step 2 of the pattern (here)

aka Small Trees!

16 of them
to be exact.

Have fun!
See you next week!

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Sunday

My mom and the kids and I
spent the last few days in Seattle.
Naturally we needed some coffee...
Even Three's eyeballing my cup!

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Craft Hope!


Craft Hope has announced their next project!
They found a group that committed
to providing a quilt to every homeless child
in their local school district in Michigan.

And if you're new to quilting but still want to help,
they will even do the quilting and binding for you!
You could just send in a quilt top!

Even if it's your very first quilt top...

...ever!

All the quilts are to be made
with squares of fabric.
Super easy,
nothing fancy,
but super cute!

This really could be your first quilt.


Go here to find out more.
Commit to one quilt if you can.


Read the story of the woman behind this organization.
Her family is doing great things in memory of her
and her tragic death.

Monday, October 12, 2009

Christmas Quilt Along Week 2

Last week's assignment was the purchase fabric,
wash, iron, and cut.
So here's my fabric.
The four on the left are for the blocks.
On the right is for the trees.
I fully admit to copying the colors
of the quilt on the pattern
as closely as possible!
Hey, their quilt looks great for a reason!


I have a confession.
I cut all the tree fabric.
Then the fabric for the blocks.
Then I realized that we were
only sewing the blocks this week....
so I didn't cut the rest of the fabric!
If you are doing this quilt-along with us,
you know why!!!

So this week,
bring on the courthouse squares!!!

See you next week!
Just joining us? Pattern is here.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Saturday, October 10, 2009

You'll never guess!

I bet you can't guess who this gift is for!!!


This pillow case is so stinkin' cute,
it just might be my new favorite gift!
You don't even know how much
I wanted to keep this for myself!
Of course, none of my children
are named Hailey....

Is that too much of a problem?

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

It's gone!

My quilt-along quilt is finished
and today I dropped it off at the quilters!


I made it to be the perfect length
to curl up on the couch in;
it's also a good picnic size.

I had a hard time picking out
what color thread I wanted.
Because I used such a variety
of light and dark fabrics,
threads that would show up on dark fabric
would disappear into the light fabric.
If only I had gone with monochromatic
like I had intended to when I walk
into the fabric store...

I ended up choosing a lemon yellow
and I can't wait to show it to you....

in about a week!!!

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Soccer

Today is the kids' last soccer game.

We have been playing Mormon soccer.
That usually trips people up when I say that.
We're not Mormon, but we have some friends
that are and they invited us,
so let's compare:

City League vs Mormon Soccer:
Volunteer Coach vs Volunteer Coach
Different practice fields vs Both kids at same field
Different practice times vs Both kids at same time
Fundraising vs No Fundraising
Soccer League Shirt vs Cotton team shirt
$160 vs $5

Is there any question?!?

So go make friends with some Mormons!
Everyone at the games has been so friendly,
no one has been judgmental that
we went to a different church
and my kids have had a BLAST!!!
The focus was on sportsmanship
and having fun, I really cannot say enough
about how great it's been!

But let's get real here, with a really awkward time
of 5:30-6:30pm, I'm also really glad
that the season is finally over! :o)

Monday, October 5, 2009

A new quilt

I finished my Quilt-Along Quilt!
I'll post that on Wednesday,
but when Kari at Ucreate
posted this quilt:

(picture from Ucreate)

I knew it was the next quilt I had to make!
So call me C-R-A-Z-Y,
but if I break this up into six steps,
I'll have six weeks to make the quilt top,
two weeks to have it quilted
and it will all be done by December 1st!
Seems like perfect timing!

A crafty, non-blogging friend of mine
is going to be making this too
so if you would like to join us
in a very informal quilt-along,
the pattern is here,

and for this week, your assignment is to:

1.) Purchase your fabric
2.) Wash your fabric (optional, I'm not doing it)
3.) Iron your fabric, if necessary
4.) Cut your fabric

Are you in?

Sunday, October 4, 2009