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Friday, August 31, 2012

Homemade Peanut Butter Cups Recipe

So…

Are you past the Mouse Quest, post yet?
Good, cause I have a recipe.

No, not the jello!

This one is for homemade peanut butter cups.


I wanted to make the hubby some sweets for his lunch pail,
something that didn’t require turning on the oven.

So I started rummaging around in my “CLEAN” cabinets.
I found almond bark, marshmallow cream, toffee crumbles,
colored sugar sprinkles,
mini baking cups, most of which were left over from the
Christmas candy making frenzy.
Peanut butter, powdered sugar salted peanuts and raisins.
That’s a start!

I know, peanut butter cups are just that, peanut butter.

But what fun is that, good yes, but could be better with a
little extra goodies thrown in.
I tried to come up with more goodies for the inside besides
creamed peanut butter, peanuts and raisins….
But canned tuna or salmon, or dried beans just didn’t sound good,
although, if I would have had bacon, I would have fried it up,
crumbled it, and put it in too.

Everything’s better with bacon, Target has a t-shirt that says so!!!

Anyway here’s the recipe.

Peanut Butter Cups Ala Terry
Ingredients:
Inside
½ cup creamy peanut butter
½ cup powdered sugar
½ tsp. salt
4 ½ tsp. Butter, softened
¼ cup marshmallow cream (optional)

Cream these together in a bowl.

Outside
1 cup creamy peanut butter
A handful of toffee bits (optional)
About 14 oz. almond bark (7 squares)
(I had the white almond bark, chocolate colored looks better).

Melt these in a double boiler, stir to incorporate.

Method:

1. Line your mini muffin pan with the mini baking cups.
2. Drop a teaspoon or so (the kind you stir your coffee with) of the
chocolate mixture into the cups, add a slight teaspoon of the creamed peanut butter mixture.
Here you can add a few raisins, peanuts, almonds, bacon, whatever.


(Probably not canned tuna or salmon or dried beans though).

3. Top off with another teaspoon or so of the chocolate, add some sprinkles and your almost done.
I put a raisin on top of the ones with raisins inside, a peanut on the ones with peanuts inside.


I sprinkled toffee bits on the ones with no bonus ingredients.

4. Set in fridge to harden up, and now you’re done.

Makes about 48

There you have it, easy munchies, no oven involved!


Better go wash my face, I feel something sticky on my chin.
Marshmallow cream I bet!

Till next time, happy cooking,

Bonjour

Thursday, August 30, 2012

DIY End Table Redo/Staples And Glue


New To Me, And Improved!
Are you still grossed out from yesterday’s post?
Maybe I should hold off on the jello recipe?

Ok then….

I was out with the Daughter and grand-daughter
thrifting a few months back and ran across
this end table.

Not so pretty when I found it!

"The guy" thought it was worth $15.00.
He says, it's a Broyhill, that's good furniture.
I'm looking at the construction, staples and glue.
Good furniture is dovetailed, not staples and glue.

Staples And Glue
But I needed a table.

$15.00 I say, look, it's all scratched up and
the drawer doesn't even open, it looks like
someone glued it shut.
 He beats on the bottom of the drawer
trying to free it up, yanks at the knob a few times till he finally
pulls the knob completely off. Oh look, now you've broken it I say.
I said a lot of other things, just cant remember what.
(He did get the drawer free though).

By this time he's sweating and I'm pretty sure
he wants to get rid of me, so he says,
$7.00
So, now I'm the proud owner of staples and glue.

Potential Firewood?
I brought it in the house, (hubby just rolls his eyes)
thinking I'll eventually get to it.

Eventually is here, and I got to it!

I sanded the top (broke the sander in the process)
to give the paint something to stick to,
got out my paints and started mixing colors.

Custom Colors


Didn't like the first color on the legs, it was too close to the main body color
so I lightened up the paint a bit and repainted using a dry brush technique.

Much better!!!.

I wanted a third color for the drawer so I added some blue paint
to the darker pink color and got a dirty lavender tone.
Looks good.
The top I painted well, several colors,
didn't like any, so I finally decided to marble it.

Sponge Paint-O-Rama
Final out come?
Not too bad!!!!
 
Finished:-)
Knob got lost en-route,
but I found this medallion in the hubby's stash, (spray painted it)
 had a large holed, pink bead and a small nut and bolt thingy....
Viola, new knob!
 

I even had time to re-do a chair!

Need to help the grand-daughter with her coffee table re-do.

What say ye?
Yea or nay?

Till next time, happy up-cycling.
Bonjour

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Mouse Quest, So Gross

DAMM....

Please excuse my language.

Mice....
You know when you have them, there are signs.
I'll skip the graphic descriptions,
 cause,
it makes me want to,
well, you know.
 Ew, Ew, and again Ew!

I put out the bait last week,
three goners thus far,
Ew again!

Yummy grill stuff!
Today I'm cooking the hubby breakfast taquito's
from the stuff we grilled on Sunday.
Veggies, meats, you know!

Breakfast Taquito's.

Nat6han says, "yum".
And I still smell Ew!

DAMM!
Again, please excuse my language.

Gross, gross!

Since this place is still under construction....
I pulled out every cabinet/drawer I could, looking for said Ew.
Lots of dust and you know what, but no Ew!

Drawers, floors and cabinets are sparkling clean,
even cleaned the oven and fridges.
Not a Ew in sight!

Needless to say,
no sewing/soap-making happened today!

Although,
 I did learn how to make my own flavored jello,
stay tuned if your not too grossed out.

Till next time,
Bonjour

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Traveling Road - Show

I had every intention of sewing today, really I did.
Several projects are waiting in the wings,
begging to be started, completed, dreamed.
But you know as well as I do, sometimes
reality steps in and whacks you straight across the kisser.

Terry's Traveling Road - Show.
This traveling road - show that I call my company
is high maintenance to say the least!
There’s displays, tables, chairs, canopies, tarps, dollies, corner weights….
Bla, bla, bla!
All of which, at some point or another, need
maintaining/repairing.

Pail-o-concrete!
Last week it was the weights.
4 - 80lbs. pails of concrete that we tie at each corner of the canopy.
Sometimes it can get pretty windy here in North Texas!
Pails are worn out/cracked/falling apart.
Ok, chisel/beat off old pails, replace with new/recycled ones.
(I order my palm and coconut oils in 5# pails, perfect for the weights).

This week, canopies/ dolly!

Let me just start off by saying, hurricanes in the gulf, mean mucho rain here!
I’m not complaining, just saying….
We’ve missed the last 2 Saturdays at The Farmer’s Market do to rain.

So, need to fix holes in canopies.

SO…

Today it was, patch holes in the canopies day and
fix flats on the good dolly day.
Soap + water in the shower is a good thing,
soap + water at a show, not so good.
Sewn and vintage items in the rain,
not so good either.

Mini Bags.

Vintage Items
I have 2 canopies,
one looked like it had been involved in a drive by,
the other?
Mice, puppy, starving child, hungry husband?
I don’t know!
Patch, seal, pray, done.

Fix a flat did the trick on the good dolly,
not that the other one is bad, it’s just not the good one!

Hopefully the weather is good for the weekend market.

Maybe some sewing tomorrow?
All hold hands and pray/chant.

Hope things are good on your end.

Till next time,
Bonjour

Satellites are not linking up in outerspace, damm hurricane!
I’ll be lucky if this even posts!
(Oops, that was a tad bit insensitive).

Friday, August 24, 2012

DIY Skirt To Purse To Skit Refashion

SO, SEW

The skirt!

Another thrift store score!
At only $2.00 I really couldn't pass this up, never mind that it
was a size 4, and well....
I'm not.
 I figured I could do something with the fabric.


It had all these pleats at the waist, so, I just popped one out.
I wore it this way a few times till inspiration hit.

~INSPITATION HITTING~

I took out all the pleats and was rewarded with a giant piece
of fabric-ness for my crafting pleasure.

  The excess fabric on one side was cut away, and I shaped what was left into an a-line.
On the one side I had the zipper, and the length was perfect, so all I had to do was
 sew up a seam and....

Vola cute skirt.


Wait, I'm not done!

What did I make with the excess fabric-ness you ask?

Why, a bag of course!


The green stripe band at the top used to be curtains
and the lace I've had for awhile.
I wanted a lace pocket but the lace wasn't wide/long enough.

Drat

I cut two pieces of lace, laid one atop the other and staggered them
to get the length I wanted and sewed a pink ribbon
across to hold the two pieces together.
Next I pressed under ¼”
on either side of the pocket's raw edge
and then sewed it to the bag.


I gave the bag gussets on the bottom to provide some width/depth,
but didn't line it.
Maybe I should rethink and add a lining?

What do you think?

~BTW~

The photos were taken in two different parts of my house, so,
 the fabric colors look totally different
between the skirt and bag.

I hope you' all have a lovely weekend,
we'll be at the Farmer's Market on Saturday, selling our wares.

Till next time,
Bonjour


Monday, August 6, 2012

DIY Cuff Bracelet Tutorial

SO....

Marie Claire Photo

I was flipping through last months Marie Claire and saw this
bracelet, (the one in the middle).
I'm thinking to myself, that looks a lot like a miniature crazy quilt block.

The idea has been stewing in the back of my mind so today
I decided to see what I could come up with.

I went to my fabric scrap stash for the little bits and pieces
I've been saving and got to work.

Scraps

Starting piece

I started out with a 18" x 10" foundation fabric and placed my
first scrap in the center. (This piece was already stitched together).

Adding bits of fabric scraps
I aligned my second scrap, raw edge
even with one of the raw edges of the first scrap, right sides together
and stitched a 1/4" seam.

Close up
 Pressed the scrap over the raw edge,
trimmed off the excess and continued adding scraps around the starting piece.

More scraps being added
As I continued adding the scraps I angled some and
pieced smaller scraps together until the whole foundation was covered.


I trimmed the finished block to 17" x 9",



then cut it up into various width strips all 9" long.
I ended up with seven strips.

Next I chose backing fabrics and buttons for each strip .
I cut lightweight fusible interfacing 1/4" smaller
all around than the finished piece and
pressed it to the pieced strip.

 I sewed the buttons onto the pieced strips first because I didn't want
the thread to show on my backing fabric.
(I used the sewing machine to attach the buttons cause that's how I roll).

I used ponytail bands for the loops over the buttons.
That done, it was time to attach the ponytail loops and the backing fabric.

I placed the backing and the strip right sides together,
sandwiched the ponytail loop between the two, pinned, stitched
and left a small section on one long edge open for turning right side out.

Wrapped loop
I found that if you wrap the ponytail loop with thread a few times
it's much easier to control/insert.

Insert long piece between the sandwich with
the short wrapped piece extending beyond your seam.

I also found out that if you use a large button it's not so easy
to stitch past....  Zipper foot to the rescue!
When you're making things up as you go stuff happens!

I turned it right side out and slip-stitched the opening closed.


Finished
Feel free to add lace, beads, ribbon, flowers, yarn, charms......smaller buttons....
What do you think?

 What creative things have you been up to?

Till next time,
Bonjour