when all the valentine stuff makes you happy

even though you have no idea what to do with it...

sugar rush {a little post valentine's day goodness}

I've had this idea for magic bars for years. Years, I tell ya! Even before I made the pie. I don't know why it took me so long and while the photos look a bit tired, I have to tell you, these were ooey-gooey good! If you do decide to whip up a batch of valentine magic bars make sure you have a crowd over to enjoy them!

 

One of the things I did differently than the classic recipe was cutting out much of the butter to make the bottom crust. I used strawberry wafers, the kind that used to come with a scoop of ice cream when you ate out in the 1970s. Not necessarily good for you but these are magic bars which are simply tasty. I used about 3/4 of a pack I found at the dollar store. so gourmet!

I also added a second layer using Nabisco's Famous Chocolate Wafers. It's the chocolate and strawberry combo I was after in the first place. Pop about half a package of the wafers into a plastic bag, seal, then crush with a rolling pin. Your kiddos will love this part!

Next up I scattered marshmallows, m&ms and chocolate chips. On top of that I poured 140z of sweetened condensed milk. I know. Sweet! If you do try this, do not do what I did, add the sweetened condense milk on top of the cookie crumbs, then add the chocolate chips. Bake at 350 for about 25 minutes then add your marshmallows and m&ms. This way, the marshmallows will get gooey without browning...same as the m&ms.

Enjoy with a cold glass of your favorite milk drink. These are much better cool or the next day and of course shared with friends in small bites.

make: chocolate cashew ginger candies (guten-free!)

Just a few ingredients pack a powerful tasty punch! This is a roundabout recipe, something I make without measuring. There was a variation of the recipe once form a book I no longer have that used graham crackers and macadamia nuts but darn if macadamia nuts aren't so expensive, so I made up this recipe instead...

Here's what I used...
*1 pack (8oz) of gluten free ginger snaps from Trader Joe's
*2 10oz bags bittersweet chocolate chips (guitard)
*2 10-12oz  bags milk chocolate chips (guitard is a fave)
*1 1/2 cups or so of lightly salted cashew pieces
*1/2-1 cup candied ginger chips
*flake sea salt

 

These chocolates are not labor intensive but do take a while to make as the chocolate needs to set between dippings. Make sure to clear space in your fridge or freezer for a cookie sheet to rest without toppling over. Fill a medium to large soup pot with water and place a heat proof bowl on top making sure the water does not touch the bowl. Dump both bags of bittersweet chips into the bowl and let them melt. Stir every now and then to distribute that heat. While the chocolate is melting, place cookies into a plastic bag and roll over with a rolling pin to crunch them up a bit. They will crumble a lot so don't roll until you have only crumbs, leave a few chunky bits in there. When chocolate is melted, remove from heat and add your cookie pieces, ginger chips and cashews. Stir until combined. The chocolate will be glossy and the mixture will be loose.

 

 

Use two spoons to drop very small blobs of the mixture onto a cookie sheet lined with parchment or wax paper (they will not be pretty). You can go bigger but they are very difficult to bite through and enjoy when they are more than a mouthful (but cutting them half has its advantages). Think almond sized blobs. You can place the blobs fairly close together to use up as much space as possible on the cookie sheet. Place in your refrigerator or freezer for fifteen minutes or until set. I had to use three cookie sheets for this but only had room for one sheet at a time in the fridge. This part can be done a few days before the next round of dipping.

 

 

Once the chocolate is set it is time for round two of dipping. Pour one bag of milk chocolate chips into a microwave safe bowl. I use a four cup measuring cup. You want the container to be taller than wide so that the chocolate, once melted, is deep enough for dipping. Melt in 30 second increments and stir in between. Make sure your container is absolutely dry and that you check on your chocolate. Both water and over heating can seize it making it unusable. Once your chocolate is melted, use a fork and your fingers to coat each piece of candy, placing it back onto your covered cookie sheet. To make this easier, remove all of the to-be-dipped pieces and put them on a plate or in a bowl before you begin. When your cookie sheet is full add a pinch of sea salt to the top of each candy. Return to fridge to set. To use up as much chocolate as possible, use a spatula to scrape sides of container. I usually abandon my fork by the third piece and end up with one hand completely covered in chocolate. To finish of the remaining chocolates, add your second bag of chips to the container and return to the microwave for melting. By the time you finish dipping the last round your cookie sheet in the fridge should be set.

 

These are crazy good candies! I made these gluten-free as I was bringing them to a potluck where I knew someone was gluten-sensitive. Not all chocolate chips are gluten-free so do your research before you get to melting the whole shebang. The ginger chips from The Ginger People are gluten-free and super tasty. If you do not need gluten-free chocolates, go wild! Chop up a fancy candy bar and use nutter butter cookies or pie crust or oreos! I did up one batch last week and ran out of milk chocolate for dipping (I only used one bag) so I popped the candies that needed to be double dipped into a container and did them a few days later when I had more chocolate. I also had only used two-thirds of the crumbs so used made up another whole batch. By the end of all the dipping I was left with three candies un-double-dipped. They were pretty tasty too, not so pretty to look at but yummy all the same.

Pop a bunch of sweets into a wax bag, add a pretty tag and gift away!  Throw a candy making party where people bring different nuts and cookies, customize the candies for friends with allergies, add dried cranberries or chop up candied orange peels...soooo many ways to make these! Happy Holidays!

ten garlands in ten days: paper chain hearts

Not one to waste a lovely sheet of painted newspaper, I managed to use up almost every bit in this newest round of ten garlands. With a few snips of the scissors you can create a nifty chain of paper hearts. Grab a length of painted paper and accordion fold it four or five times. Once folded, draw a heart that extends to all edges of the paper. Kinda like a top part of a heart and a bottom part of a heart. I am sorry I do not have photos here for ya...lemme see if I can find something on the internets....oooh, like this! 

ten garlands in ten days: paper hearts

This is simply an assortment of hearts punched from scrapbook paper. I used three differents sized punches and a handful of papers. If your paper is not double sided, join up two hearts back to back before carefully feeding them into your sewing machine. I use a simple straight/running stitch set on 2 for length. I have no idea what my tension is but I do know if I go too fast and leave too much of a gap between the shapes my thread gets all knotted through the needle and bobbin. This is super easy to make but the longer you want it to be, the slower going it may be. Enjoy! 

ten garlands in ten days: fingerprint hearts

This happy garland can be easily be made in a day. All you need is sturdy white paper, ink pads, scissors, yarn, glue, and a paper trim punch. 

Create fingerprint hearts by pressing your finger into an inkpad and then stamping your fingerprint onto white paper. Overlap and position the second print to create a heart shape. I used my thumb for this part. Use scissors to trim hearts into rectangles and scallop the bottom using a paper punch. Trim sides to your preference and get read to galrand it all up.

Fold over the top part of each flag just enough to hold your yarn. Arrange flags face down and add your glue. Nudge a long length of yarn onto each flag, making sure it is hugging the glue and wait for it to dry.

Once dry, trim yarn ends, add loops and hang in a happy space! Enjoy! 

the february bed

Ah, the february bed! One of my favorites to make as I like to pile on the pink. This year, I went for pink in the pillowcases and a smidge in the shabby chic thrifted duvet cover I found over the summer. The army of love sets off the tone and there ya go! 

February is my birtday month and this month, mister is making me a pie. I'm also trying to promote my etsy like crazy as this a-go-go needs new shoes, a cookie scoop, camera lens and jeans that fit. I also have my eye on a quilt from a box retailer. I think I will get it for myself. Thank goodness for coupons! 

diy: army of love

I had the idea for htis project back when we still lived in Los Angeles. I got as far as spraypainting my army men but the finished project never happened. This year, I thought it would be perfect for my february bed. Thank goodness for the wood scrap pile behind the mama a-go-go's house! 

I spray painted the army men purchased from the dollar store with multiple coats of florist spray paint, front and back (after a good soak in soapy water). The spray paint doesn't really stick very well but if you can get the whole thing all glued up you should be okay. Maybe good old fashioned regular spray paint would work better? 

I first thought I would glue them onto a painted white board but I liked the way this scrap piece looked and left it as is. I even thought of adding the words army of love underneath the heart but couldn't decide how or what with so I left it. Before you do any arranging or gluing, add a hanging fixture to the back if you wish to hang it on a wall. I forgot to do this part and when I was trying to hammer in a nail, a half dozen fo my army guys popped right off and needed to be reafixed. After you get yer fixture on, arrange your guys into a heart shape and play around with them until you like the way they look.

Heat up your glue gun and get to gluing. Ignore all the thready bits. You can pull them off once everything is set. 

Hang or prop in a happy place and enjoy! 

pinterest: edible love

My pinterest boards are bursting with ideas, recipes and projects. Most of the time, they serve as eye candy or color inpsiration though I have managed to attempt a good number of the recipes I have pinned. Mostly though, I pin and then kind of, sort of, forget about it until I take a walk through a baord and think...."Oh yeah!"

Occassionally, I am so smitten with a pn or idea that I drop everything and DO it. That is what happened when I spied this popular pin. Thank goodness I was actually going to the market anyway and so I picked up the store brand in all it tubular glory. 

 After fearfully pressing the spoon into the seam,  I was able to liberate the dough and so I got to rerolling. I had to pinch two smaller lenghts of dough together to create one log that I then formed into a V before rolling the tops inwards to create the heart.

My cakepan was a little too large to nestle the whole bit of pretty inside but I went for it anyway.

 After baking the rolls for the allotted time, I added the icing and then a healthy does of Valentine's sprinkles. After a photofest, I may have enjoyed three with a hot vintage mug of creamy coffee. 

My hearts aren't quite as heart shaped as the ones in the pin but they were still a kick to make...and eat. Hop on over to Spice Blog to see how they did it! 

be my valentine: red velvet shortbread bites

 I really wanted to make cake batter shortbread bits but I had no yellow cake mix in the pantry. I did have Red Velvet cake mix and since it is the month of lurve I thought why not? So I mixed up the dough and liberated my cookie press and got all cookie happy until I discovered the sad truth. Cake mixes have baking powder and such in them...my happily pressed cookies oozed into blobs and showed no hint at their pretty pressed selves. Back to the drawing board I went and I came up with these red velvet sandwich bites which were totally inspired by these photos from Heather of Sprinkle Bakes.

Ingredients:

*3/4 cups confectioners sugar

*1 stick (1/2 cup) butter, soft

*1 cup red velvet cake mix

*1/3 cup flour (more if your dough feels too sticky)

Mix all your ingredients together with a wooden spoon and chill until firm. When mixing ingredients, mix butter and sugar first then add 1/3 cup of flour until incorporated. Next, add the cake mix and then add more flour if the dough is too sticky. I popped my dough into the fridge overnight and let it come to room temperature before rolling.

Roll dough into small balls (smaller than a large marble) and place on cookie sheet covered in parchment paper.

 

 

 

Fill a small bowl with rainbow nonpareils and coat each cookie with the rainbow goodness. Bake at 375 degrees F for 10 minutes, the cookies will flatten out considerably.

Once cool, swipe a smidge of cream cheese frosting to the bottom of one cookie, placing another on top, sprinkle sides out. Enjoy!