Thanksgiving: Candy Acorns and Turkeys

My mother-in-law hosts Thanksgiving every year.  The only food item I'm allowed to contribute is bread.  And sometimes appetizers.  Oh, and the canned cranberry sauce - but I'm the only one who eats it, so I just bring it for myself :)

So when I found these candy acorn and candy turkeys on pinterest, I KNEW I had to make them.  Like, the crafting gods were calling down to me demanding payment.  So I agreed.  I mean, it was the crafting gods TELLING me to do it!

 

Hershey kiss.  Nilla wafer cookies.  and Ghirardelli chocolate chips.  Glue is chocolate frosting.  Really pretty easy.  

These turkeys.  Oh boy.  Everyone 'claimed' they didn't like candy corn but everyone seemed to enjoy eating them :)  

These were WAY more involved.  Pretzels.  Rolos.  Reeces Pieces.  Candy Corn.  Sugar Pearl Sprinkles.  And for the love of all that is good and holy, DON'T.PUT.CANDY.CORN.IN.THE.MICROWAVE. 

Yes, that deserved to be in all capital letters.  It melts SUPER fast, like, 5 seconds fast.  And its 1000% sugar, so it's sticky and gets hard.  and takes a lot of effort to get off of whatever it's stuck to.  I'm serious. Don't even think about it!

Getting ready to chomp.chomp.chomp.

If you want to make your own, here's the tutorials: 

Acorns:  It'sWrittenOnTheWalls

Turkeys: HeavenlySavings

Happy Creating!

Lunch: Hearts, Lady Bug, Tiger

Heart Pancakes:

For valentine's day, I made heart shaped pancakes - used some red to dye the pancake batter and then poured into a heart shape.  I overbrowned the first side so that when I flipped it, they were basically cooked all the way through.  This way, the second side stayed nice and pink (see the middle pancake).  

Vanilla yogurt with chocolate frosting shaped hearts (they just look like little turds to me...) and some colored sprinkles. 

and red grapes.

Lady Bug:

Circle cut sandwich with a slice of white american cheese for the "wings".  i freehand cut out little hearts.  The antennae are toothpicks with a raisin stuck on them.  

The red heart silicone muffin liner has fruit loops and a few sweet tart hearts I found in leftover halloween candy.

I free hand cut a heart out an apple half (a small cookie cutter would work too, but I don't have one!)

Tiger:

After the San Diego Zoo visit, the Little One was all about Lions and Tigers so I got this AWESOME sandwich cutter from amazon.  I used the cutter on fruit leather for the face and free cut the stripes for the body.  The tiger is sleeping in a bed of lettuce leaves (which my child will NEVER eat)

I peeled the clementine and just place it over the fruit, so that I could have tiger stripes :)

I also got some letters for spelling TIGER with her hummus, carrots and crackers.

This is BY FAR one of my favorite lunches and I'm really loving this sandwich cutter.  It's easy to use and has 4 different faces.  There is another face set that you can get to go with the body too....so many uses.  LOVE :)

I'm still not sure how good her lunches look when she actually sits down to eat them.  I walk her into class on Fridays for Lunchbox Club, so I know the sandwich stays up right for that part.  We have a lunch bag that allows her Easy Lunchbox to stay upright, but I still wonder...

Happy Creating!

Bendy Dolls: Accessories for the Garden

Last week, I showed you the chicken coop.

Today, I want to share apples, potatoes and the wheelbarrow.  

Making clay apples is pretty easy.  It's basically a round piece of clay with a brown stick in it :)

SoupIsGreen on deviantart has a basic tutorial if you need some help.

This Charming Stuff has a youtube tutorial for making the crate that is pretty straight forward.  I made one the same size as her instructions and it was waay too big for my bendy doll fairies.  The second one (shown here) is half the size of hers.  For reference, my sides are made from popsicle sticks cut in half (talk about tedious!) - I went out to later buy stir sticks in the wood section of the craft store.  It's worth it if you are going to make a few things, but cutting popsicles sticks if that's what you have on hand is totally do-able.

There are a dozen or so apples in there....

I also made a sack of potatoes.  Zooplies Miniature Haven has a wonderful printable to make these Prince Edward Island potato bags using real potato bag images :)  The above crate tutorial also talks about making potatoes!

Finally, I made a wheel barrow from a walnut shell half.  I had The.Hardest.Time cleanly cracking a walnut in half, so my suggestion is to rummage through the walnut bin at the grocery store (Christmas time is really good for those nut bins!) to find some that have naturally split.  There are also a bunch of "tutorials" that include freezing the nut, using a sharp knife etc - i think I tried them all, and none of them consistantly worked for me.  I got them in half (one side with extra bits) and used some pliers to break some pieces off until it was pretty clean.  That was the best I could do!

You can find a wheel barrel tutorial here.  I ended up filling it with some tiny silk leaves (½ in long!) that I bought ages and ages ago for some craft project I never got around to doing (the bag was still sealed!)  I wish I had aged the silver, but I'm sure that will happen pretty quick on its own!

Happy Creating!

Happy Easter: Bunny Bum Pancakes

Happy Easter!!

We made some bunny bum pancakes for breakfast this morning.  They weren't too complicated to do, and the kids got a kick out of them (plus, whipped cream?  yum!)

Instead of strawberries, you could use banana slices or a blob of chocolate frosting or even some chocolate syrup.  I always have chocolate frosting in a piping bag for lunches, so I used them for bunny toes, but if you have various sprinkles, you could use those for bunny toes.

I tried out little bunny feet (above) and some bigger feet, and definitely prefer the smaller ones.  They are harder to flip with a regular spatula, though!  

For the batter: I poured a regular 'old round pancake for the bunny (bowl with a pour spout) and did small ovals the feet using a squeeze bottle (like this one) - they are actually great for doing all sorts of pancake shapes!

Assembly: The bunny feet are just placed on top of the pancake, with a strawberry slice and a few blops of chocolate frosting (from a piping bag).

The bunny tail is a short burst from RediWhip (in the can) whipped cream. 

I hope everyone had a fun and safe weekend!

Happy Creating!

Super Moon Lunar Eclipse: 27 Sept 2015

So I finally got around to compiling my pictures from the Lunar Eclipse waay back in September.  

It was cloudy all evening and I wasn't sure we would be able to see anything, but around 8:45 there were some cloud breaks and the moon could be seen peeking through.  Then just as the eclipse was starting, the clouds cleared so I could get these pictures :)

This is actually the page I made for our family yearbook which I ordered earlier this week.  Yay!  Now I have time to do other things :)

This is what Space.com had to say about the event:

"The moon passed through Earth's shadow on Sunday, Sept 27, in a dazzling total lunar eclipse during a "supermoon."  Supermoons occur when the moon reaches its full phase at or near its closes approach to Earth and appears abnormally large and brights as a result.  The Sept 27th event is quite special; the last supermoon eclipse occurred in 1982, and the next won't take place until 2033."

Pretty cool, huh?  

Bendy Dolls: Rainbow Bright!

I'd like you to meet Rainbow Bright!

She's is very out-going and loves to meet new people.  She is happiest on sunny days just after the rain has stopped.  She may even do a little sky painting for you if you tell her a story that makes her laugh.  

Today,  she is caring for the chickens in the yard.  It was windy after last nights storm and a bunch of leaves had blown into their coop, so she went to clean them out for the chickens :)

She's carting the leaves off to the compost.  

Ahh, now to sit and relax under this tree :)

Happy Creating!

Lunches: School Bus, Dog Face, Bunny

School Bus:

Peanut Butter and Honey sandwich (because that's what she wants EVERY day!) with the crusts cut off to form a slight rectangle.  Slice of american cheese with window cut out.  Bumper cut from the bread end.  Stop lights from grape/cherry tomatos.  Eyes and nose/grill are cut from mozzerella string cheese with eye balls made from chocolate frosting.  Mouth and tires are fruit leather.  All cuts were made with a regular 'ole knife.

A+ apple and some Star Wars graham cracker cookies.

Dog Face:

Another peanut butter and honey sandwich cut in a circle.  Mozzarella cheese stick slice for eyes with chocolate frosting eyeballs, nose and whiskers.  The muzzle and ears were cut from bread ends (pumpernickle or some other dark break would be great here!)

Vanilla yogurt with dog bone cut from a fruit leather.  

carrot sticks with a touch of ranch dressing and a heart cut from a cucumber slice (she never eats the cucumber, but will sometimes eat carrots)

Bunny:

another round cut PB and honey.  more mozzarella cheese stick slices for eye balls, teeth and bunny ears.  sharp cheddar for inner ear and muzzle.  Blueberry halves for eye balls stuck on with chocolate frosting; also used for nose (i'm going to try using honey for glue next time around!)

more blueberries

and carrot sticks.

Happy Creating!

Bendy Dolls: Fairy Garden

I've been busy.

Lunch: Turkey, Sailboat, Elephants

Turkey Sandwich:

Turkey and Cheese sandwich cut freehand with a knife.  Eyes are a slice of a cheese stick with a black frosting pupil.  Beak is a triangle of cheddar cheese and gobble is a wedge of grape tomato stuck on with a bit of frosting.

Snack mix:  teddy grahams and candy corn mix.

Apple wedges with chocolate whipped peanut butter

Sailboat:

Peanut Butter and Jelly sailboat cut from two sandwiches (meaning:  mom ate leftover sandwich for breakfast!)  The sails are one sandwich and the hull is the top part of another sandwich.

Teddy Bear sailors are cut from cheddar cheese (at the holidays, stores have mini cookie cutters and gingerbread men and women would work too!) and have a life preserver made from a rolled out tootsie roll.

Boat is floating in a sea of colored goldfish crackers with an octopus made out of a cheese stick (edible marker face).

Sea Turtle is a slice of banana with vanilla tootsie roll arms and legs.

Elephant Lunch:

Almond butter and honey sandwich using cutter:  

Cheese and fruit roll up elephants using a different sandwich cutter.

Vanilla pudding with banana slices.

Pistachios.

Happy Creating!

Art Journalling: Maps and Lighthouse

Another Art Journal swap on swap-bot:  Mini Handmade Art Journal R19.  The theme for this journal was Maps.  

This is what I came up with:

made from strips of a cut up map.  You can see Juan De Fuca (above), which is in Puget Sound  (below).  I purposefully cut the words and placed them, because if you are going to cut up a map, you should at least pay a little tribute!

I liked it so much (and still had a lot of map bits leftover) that I did another one. 

Here is some other artwork from those journals:

Happy Creating!