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Friday Favorites

Posted on December 6, 2013 by Cupcakes

Our elf arrived on December 1st, bringing pajamas and new Christmas books. And the pajamas didn’t fit. And so now OUR ELF is on a mission to find new ones. And by Elf I mean me. HA!

So here are a few of my favorites from around the web this week….I would make this mocha mint frappe and then read through them! Happy Friday!

A cool and quirky bottle opener for the dude in your life.

An awesome splurge Chanel nail polish set.

Gorgeous fox in the night meadow print.

A great laugh-out-loud fashion book.

Thoughts on helping all students with math.

Simple household tasks to do during the holidays.

A holiday party outfit idea…love the coat!

After the Grey’s Anatomy episode two weeks ago, I announced loudly that I was DONE with the show. And apparently I’m not the only one.

These adorable candy cane mice seem like a great Christmas Eve treat for the boys.

I absolutely love these sweet holiday cards. I would like them just for decor.

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A was VERY excited about Thanksgiving this year. Similar to how he is now VERY excited about Christmas. A was thrilled about his Thanksgiving “feast” (as he called it) at school, and wanted to know all about all the different things we would be making for Thanksgiving. And he wanted to help make the apple pie, which I can confidently say would have thrilled my Nannie to no end. And that’s all I’m going to say. Here’s the pictures!

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Peanut butter chocolate chip cookies

Posted on December 4, 2013 by Cupcakes

There seems to be many new chocolate chip variations this year! When I was shopping last week, I came across peanut butter chips mixed with chocolate chips, and thought ooh peanut butter chocolate chip cookies! Hence the recipe:

Peanut butter chocolate chip cookies

(adapted from Katie Lee Joel’s The Comfort Table)

Ingredients

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 stick unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup light borwn sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 large egg

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter

1 1/2 cup Nestle peanut butter chip and chocolate chip mix

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

In a separate bowl sift together four, baking powder, and salt.

In a stand mixer whip the butter until fluffy. Add sugars and beat until smooth. Add the egg and beat until well incorporated. Add the vanilla and peanut butter and mix well. Slowly add the flour mixture, mixing on low speed. Lastly mix in the peanut butter chips and chocolate chips. It should look like this:

Finally, using a tablespoon cookie scoop, scoop the dough onto silpat or parchment lined cookie sheets about an inch a part. Bake for 10 minutes until lightly golden on the bottom.

Let cool on the cookie sheet for three minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.

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Snowflake monograms

Posted on December 3, 2013 by Cupcakes

This craft is literally the easiest, ever. It was great for J’s very short attention span!

All you need is

Wooden snowflakes (I got them from Hobby Lobby for 50% off…never pay full price for anything at Hobby Lobby! It will be on sale the next week).

Monogram letters (I got metal hanging letters from Hobby Lobby)

Paint (I used kids’ paint in red, green, and white).

Paint brushes

So….

Paint the snowflakes:

Let them dry:

And then hang them up looping the monogram over the snowflake string (that comes with the snowflake!):

And hang them from little command hooks! So easy!

A few side notes:

I could only find black monogram letters, and I wanted them to be white for the snowflakes, so I removed the original hanger and I spray painted them white. It will take the spray paint about an hour to dry.

We used sponge paint brushes and regular smaller paint brushes.

I used just one snowflake on each door, and then used the rest of the snowflakes for other decoration in the house, but you could attach all three in a line with ribbon to make a fancier hanger (I could not do this, because J can reach it…and would pull it down for sure!).

Posted in Seriously Crafty Treats, The Christmas Countdown | Tagged christmas craft, monogram door hangers, preschooler craft, snowflake craft | Leave a comment

A boy and a dog

Posted on December 2, 2013 by Cupcakes

Of the many things I am thankful for this year, one of them is that despite the fact that we cannot have a dog at home, J and A always have puppies to love close by.

Posted in How was your weekend?, Philosophical Cupcakes | 1 Comment

Friday Favorites

Posted on November 29, 2013 by Cupcakes

Why are you reading this post? Aren’t you out shopping???? HA!

A helped put all the Christmas ornaments on the tree…a full day before Thanksgiving. To say that this boy is excited about Christmas would be an understatement.

So in case you are taking a break from shopping…here are my favorites from around the internet for the week!

This necklace would be a great dress up for a plain T.

Just in case you are prepping for next Thanksgiving (only a mere 364 days away!), or reminiscing about it here is a great foodie book about the holiday.

States United. Love this print!

If we ever had a girl, I’m assuming it would be less doll, more awl. Ha!

A great DIY holiday banner idea, with printable!

The solution to all those embarrassing back pocket phone dialing accidents.

Some gift ideas for the grill enthusiast.

Love this shared boys’ room.

We are not planning to travel with a toddler this holiday season (because have I mentioned that J hates the car? No? He hates the car.), but in case you are, here are some great tips.

You may have seen The Hunger Games this past weekend, but have you seen The Hungry Games?

As cold as it has been these past couple of days we could sit this project outside to freeze. It’s a birdseed ice ornament…pretty crafty!

This list of appetizers that should be banned for life made me laugh out loud. My favorite? Cheese Plate on a Stick…How about Cheese Plate on a Plate. Hilarious!

I want this stamp for when I grade topic proposals!

And if you have some leftover sweet potatoes…make this salad!

Have a great weekend!

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Happy Thanksgiving

Posted on November 28, 2013 by Cupcakes

From our little turkeys to yours!

Posted in Philosophical Cupcakes | 1 Comment

DIY Monogrammed Wreaths

Posted on November 27, 2013 by Cupcakes

My sister, Mom, and I had a great time at our craft night this past Friday. Our original wreath idea didn’t exactly go as planned (they have very few beads at Hobby Lobby to create the 96 bead garland I had planned), but they turned out terrific! We came up with our own idea and design, so I thought I would share the process!

This is my sister and I’s process of thinking: “Hmmm….so that won’t work, let’s just spray letters!” “Okay they don’t have enough letters to make more than one word…ok let’s do an initial wreath.” “Wait they don’t have a larger M, let’s go with a smaller wreath!” “What is a wreath that we can stick some stuff on?”

So the materials you will need for each wreath are:

A natural wreath (check the floral section)

4 berry stems (we found these in the Christmas sections)

1 wooden initial

1 spool of wrapped each burlap ribbon (we used green)

Red glitter spray paint

Directions:

So the first thing we did was laid out all our materials and took off all the wrappings and stickers. Then we went outside and spray painted the letters (I would recommend two coats applied according to the package directions, they were dry within an hour) and set them aside to dry.

You can put the wreath together two different ways. You can first intertwine the berry steams and then wrap the ribbon underneath the stems like so:

Or you can wrap the ribbon first, and then put the berry stems in second:

Either way this will be your finished product:

It has a pretty whimsical look to it doesn’t it? They thing that’s really great is that you can tuck the stems in and just kind of free form it around.

After you get that part done then you will need your monogram initial:

And you can either craft glue it or hot glue it to the wreath:

And then just let it set! And voila:

To hang the wreath we just took extra burlap ribbon and made a big tied bow:

And then I hung mine on a command hook on the pantry door:

And that’s it! A terrific project, that you can easily do in one night and it costs less than 15 dollars per wreath. Enjoy!

Posted in Seriously Crafty Treats | Tagged Christmas Wreath, DIY Wreath, Monogram Wreath, Natural Wreath | Leave a comment

Chocolate chip snickerdoodles

Posted on November 26, 2013 by Cupcakes

I was looking for a new/classic recipe idea for A and I to make and I came across this recipe:

My favorite Snickerdoodle recipe from my very first cookbook: Better Homes and Gardens Cooking for Kids.

I went through the recipe and made some adjustments to update it and added my new factor: chocolate chips.

I wasn’t sure how much they would spread out, but they did not spread out very much at all. I first put them on the tray like this:

But I could have easily fit another row with no issue, and so I did that the second time around.

Here’s the recipe! Enjoy!

Chocolate Chip Snickerdoodles

(Recipe adapted from Better Homes and Gardens: The New Junior Cookbook)

Ingredients:

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup softened butter

1 egg

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

1 cup of chocolate chips

For topping: 2 tablespoons of sugar, 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

With a mixer: cream softened butter, then add in sugar and mix until smooth. Beat in egg and vanilla.

In a separate bowl sift together flour, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, and cream of tartar.

Slowly add flour mixture to butter mixture until just mixed.

Stir in chocolate chips.

In a small bowl mix together sugar and cinnamon for the topping.

Scoop tablespoon size amounts of dough and roll in the sugar/cinnamon topping. Place about an inch a part on parchment or silpat lined cookie sheets. Bake for 9 minutes until set and slightly golden. Don’t over bake! Makes about 24 cookies.

And here’s another shot of them with one of my Christmas mugs from B:

B declared them “best cookies ever” and ate most of them before I could take the picture with the cup!

And the boys liked them as well:

Although J’s face seems cautionary here. He ate them up! And we had to hide them, so he didn’t demand them at dinner when he saw them!

Another satisfied cookie eater. Happy baking!

Posted in Favorite Recipes | Tagged chocolate chip snickerdoodles | Leave a comment

Operation Christmas Child

Posted on November 25, 2013 by Cupcakes

I’m sure you have heard of Operation Christmas Child before. If not, it’s a charity organization that provides boxes of gifts to children around the world. We have participated in the past and this year my Mom wanted to take all of the boys out to pick items to each fill a shoe box. You can view the pictures of our shopping process by checking out my Instagram, but here are few of our filling session:

We weren’t sure exactly how it would go taking all four boys through Target to pick out gifts that were not for them, but they were so excited to be together and to pick out gifts for other kids. They definitely had opinions about what we should and should not get (they were rooting for a very large car and a big imaginext set, but we informed them that would not fit in the boxes), and are excited to track their boxes to see where they go.

It may have taken four hours on a very cold Saturday, but it was very much worth the experience!

Posted in How was your weekend?, Philosophical Cupcakes | Leave a comment

Cupcakes and Commentary

Friday Favorites

A’s first apple pie bake

Peanut butter chocolate chip cookies

Snowflake monograms

A boy and a dog

Friday Favorites

Happy Thanksgiving

DIY Monogrammed Wreaths

Chocolate chip snickerdoodles

Operation Christmas Child

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