thanksgiving centrepieces!

Hi Everyone

Tonight i went to a craft night hosted by the local church and i thought i would share it with you, i dont have a lot of pictures mid process because i didnt think of it until it was too late (</3) however it is super simple and you should be able to recreate it without too much difficulty!

Supplies
3 Pumpkins (various sizes)
1 Piece of Flower foam (roughly half a brick, depending on the size of your pumpkin)
Flowers
Stick pins
Ribbon
Water
Butter / Sour Cream / Round container (washed please)
---> anything you want to decorate your pumpkins with let your imagination go wild!

* There is an alternative method of doing this which i will explain at the end*

Large Pumpkin Centrepiece
Step 1:
Take the largest pumpkin you are using and cut a wide circle around the top, big enough for the container you are using to sit comfortably in the pumpkin. Take out all the seeds and inside goodness and toss it along with the top.

Step 2:
Put the container into the pumpkin and push it down about halfway, depending on the size, if you are using a deeper container push it too the bottom, then take your flower foam (soaked with water) and put it in the container in the pumpkin (should be about flush with the top of the pumpkin, if you have small stemmed flowers then have it sticking out about 1 - 1.5 Inches.

Step 3:
Remove leaves from the flowers and start cutting them to fit, ideally cut small ones for around the edges and gradually get longer as you get to the centre, you want to have some volume up there to make it stand out,

Step 4:
Once you have filled in the flower foam and it is nice and full you can add your own design to it, i just made a simple bow out of ribbon and used a zip tie to keep in in place, if you dont cut the tail of the zip tie you can easily stick it in the pumpkin (cut a little slit to make it easier on yourself) and then you dont have to mess around with glue :)

Other Pumpkins
--> for the smaller / medium size pumpkin the flowers (red and white) were not stuck into foam, i used stick pins and took the flower off its stem and put the pin through it and stuck them inside, if you want your flowers to last longer and have some foam left over you can definitely use the same method as the larger one
--> for the baby pumpkin i just put ribbon around it and secured it again with stick pins and then place two flowers at the top
--> Alternative method: buy a large pumpkin, cut it and take everything out like you are going to carve it into a jack-o-lantern, buy a large pot of flowers, and pop it inside, no muss no fuss! (super ultra duper simple)

Present them any way you want! if you have tiered candle holders they are really nice and gives the pumpkins some height at your table 

or set them out on a charger or like i did in the top picture just arrange them on your table! 

they should last you almost a week (the large pumpkin) and you can keep putting a little water in them to soak in that foam!

Good Luck, let me know if you try it out yourselves!

Peanut Butter Cookies

Hi All

It was super late the other night and i really wanted something sweet...but didnt want to leave my house so BOOM peanut butter cookies to the rescue, i had enough ingredients to make the more "complex" cookies however there is a super easy recipe you can find here

Ingredients:

2-1/2 cups flour

1 tsp. Magic Baking Powder

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

1 cup butter, softened

1 cup Peanut Butter

1 cup each: packed brown sugar and granulated sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

Step 1:

Pre-heat Oven to 350F

Step 2:

Mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt and set aside. beat together the butter, peanut butter and sugars in a larger bowl then the dry ingredients. 

Step 3: 

Once that is mixed together add the eggs and vanilla, gradually add the flour mixture in about 2-3 additions, beating well between each one. (at this step i added about 1/2 cup more flour because they were really greasy and tasted too peanut buttery, once they were done i regretted adding so much because they were a little too bland, but it's completely up to you.

Step 4:

Drop tablespoons of dough 2 inches apart on a greased or non stick baking sheet. then flatten each with a fork in a criss cross pattern (preference)

Step 5:

Bake for 8-10 minutes or until golden brown, i made 12 cookies and ended up saving the other half for a later date (i rolled it out on parchment paper and then i rolled in aluminium foil and tied up the ends)

Handmade Geo Jewellery

Hi Everyone!

Summer is in full force and i have some more recipes and stuff ive made to indulge yourself and enjoy but at risk of constantly making recipe posts i thought i would show you guys a little something AWESOME that i made for my friends birthday that just passed (and ... for myself of course)

sorry it's a little lot blurry

I'm sure if youve been around pinterest or etsy youve notices these guys popping up all ovefr the place, so i thought i would give these geo beads a go.

Supplies:

Polymer Clay: assorted colours (i used three)
Toothpick
Tin Foil
Knife / Razor Blade
Cording / Chain etc for putting your jewellery on.
Plastic gloves (optional)
Superglue (optional)

That's it!

Step 1:
Open up your polymer clay and portion out how much you need, for reference i used half of each block colour and was able to make six big necklace beads as well as a set of earrings in each colour, however they came out on the medium side, so if you want them larger and as more of a statement i would use more.

Step 2:
Roll up your polymer into the amount and size of beads you desire and make them a round ball, i would recommend if you have any to wear gloves, i didnt have any and there are some slight finger prints that i wouldve liked not to be so obvious. Once you have all the balls you like take your knife or blade and start cutting into the balls. I made two lines at the bottom and then just worked around that but obviously you can it look however you like.

Step 3:
Make sure you remember to use the toothpick or any other device o put holes through the beads you want to string and any earrings you want to make leave as is. Once you have everything done that you want to bake, it's time to put them in the oven! Depending on what you kind of clay you are using the directions will be different, if the clay doesnt specify you can look it up all over the internet.  I preheated my over to 260 degrees and placed all my beads on some tin foil and then on a plain baking sheet (again there are other options out there for cooking clay so do some research depending on what you want the end result to be!)

Step 4:
I ended up making three necklaces and 4 sets of earrings, i purchased some rose gold chains and was planning on making some really nice pieces however the rose gold didnt go well and silver / gold didnt make sense with the colours i chose.  I ended up purchasing some beige cording and some silver earring posts. I love how they turned out, like i said i would prefer if i had gloves to wear while working with the clay and it was my first time ever experimenting with making my own jewellery, but it was super easy!

Good luck and link me to your blogs if you have tried this tutorial or any suggestions you might have that i missed!

Happy July :)

chocolate chip mint cookies

DELICIOUS!

I have made these once before and they were so simple and so delicious! my boyfriend and his roommates could not get enough of them! I found the recipe on pinterest but looked it up again for you all and found this one to be quite good, i didnt use the menthe baking chips however.

What you will need
1 - Sugar Cookie Mix
1/2 - Cup Butter or Margarine, softened
1/4-1/2 - Teaspoon Mint Extract
6-8 Drops Green Food Colouring
1 Egg

1 Cup Semisweet Chocolate Chunks

Step 1:
Heat Oven to 350°F. In large bowl, stir cookie mix, butter, extract, food color and egg until soft dough forms. stir in chocolate chunks / chips

Step 2:

Drop dough 2 inches apart on cookie sheet, place in freezer for 30 minutes or so, i find it helps to leave it in there for a while so that when you cook them they stay nice and fluffy

Step 3: 

a little brown around the edges, still tasty though

Bake for 8-10 Minutes, cool as needed and serve!

SO TASTY
let me know if you guys try it out and link me to some pictures especially if you add some fun things to your creations : D

chicken curry!

Tonight we made some delicious chicken curry and i thought i would snap a few extremely crude and unprofessional photos and show you guys how to make it! super simple and takes about an hour in full from chopping the onions to draining the rice.

What you will need:
2 - 4 Garlic Cloves
1-2 Onions - (depending on size, we used quite a large one, chopped filled up a full cereal bowl)
1 Can Diced Tomatoes (obviously if you have about 5-6 tomatoes around feel free to cut fresh)
1 Can Tomato Sauce
1 Can Coconut Milk
1 Tbsp Curry Powder (recommend small amount for your first time, but you can add to taste, especially if you have had / made curry before)
1-3 tbsp - Olive Oil
2 large chicken breasts
Rice


Optional
1-11/2 Tbsp Sugar (depending how spicy/sweet you want your curry)
1 tbsp curry paste (we added some red curry paste)
Vegetables

Yields: 10 Servings (depending on how much you can handle ;) )

so blurry, i know

As you can see the recipe is SUPER flexible and you can add / subtract a lot of the ingredients for your own personal taste, we make it a little sweet just so the spice doesn't get overwhelming but honestly itll be good no matter what way you want to go.

Step 1:
On low heat put the olive oil, garlic, curry powder, paste (optional) and onions in small pan, simmer for 5 minutes, stirring well, then add the two chicken breasts (cubed) and cook for 5-7 minutes

Step 2:
Place the onion and chicken mixture in a large pot, add in the 1 Can Diced Tomatoes, 1 Can Tomato Sauce and 1 Can of Coconut Milk on medium heat, stir together and add in sugar (optional.)

i realize it looks mildly disturbing at this point (thanks coconut milk)

Step 3:
Once stirred, turn curry to low heat and let simmer for 25-35 minutes, checking on it every 5 minutes or so to stir.

Step 4:
Cook the rice and serve!

It is totally simple and the most delicious thing ever! takes a little bit of time with the simmering but otherwise its a great meal for a dinner party or just a meal for two (4 times over)

:D

gift for those hard working people in your life.

Hello!

Last weekend i was looking around pinterest and found a whole bunch of projects for fathers day for some reason, but this can used for just about anyone, i made it for my boyfriend to go along with his birthday present.. It is super simple, especially cutting some corners and using flannel pants instead of metered fabric!

What you will need:
Flannel Pants / Fabric: 1/2 yard should be good
Sewing Machine
Rice: 6-8 cups depending on the size youre making

Step 1: Cut off one leg of the pants, mine ended up being about 29 x 7 before sewing
Step 2: Turn the pant leg inside out and take the inside seam in so that measured across the leg ends up being 6inches across, it will already be closed, so you can keep it as wide as you want but i wanted to to be uniform so i sewed it as if i was taking in a pair of pants

Step 3: Sew the bottom seam closed while the pants are still inside out
Step 4: Flip the leg back the right way so all the sewing you just did was on the inside, you can cut the lengthwise flap that you sewed off if you want but it was going to be on the inside so i just left it.

Step 5: Now you will have a long bag that looks like youre smuggling wine, fill it about 2/3 of the way full with rice so that when you sew it closed it wont be too stiff.
Step 6: Sew the top closed (watch out for the rice! i had a little bit of a spilling situation ... multiple times)
Step 7: Pop it in the freezer or microwave and soothe those aches and pains!