Easy Peasy Gift Ideas

So V-Day has come and gone but tweak or tuck these gift ideas for a rainy day, an "every day, I love you" gift, or next year.


Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Brownies
I made these for Nick for Valentine's Day.  I cut them into small-ish (holy moly are they rich!) sizes, wrapped them in saran wrap and tied a red ribbon around them.  I took brown paper lunch bags (five of them) and stamped random love sayings on them.  For example, "Chocolate spells love in any language."  He shared them with me so it was as much for me as it was for him. 

FYI, heavy whipping cream is the same as heavy cream....I think.  At least, I used heavy whipping cream and they turned out spectacular. 


Conversation Blocks
I can attest to the simplicity of this craft.  Momma Michelle and I, in the midst of three other crafts, made these.  We would paint, switch crafts while paint dries and then go back later.  Each craft had it's own room.


Portable Tea Party
For little ones with a love imagination, making accessories for their tea party would be a frugal, imaginative way to show you care. 

Cookie Cups

 

On one of our mall excursions (in order to avoid the heat), Nick and I walked past a cookie place and saw cookie cupcakes.  Not actually cupcakes but actually big huge cookie cupcake shaped blobs.  Both of us had mouths hanging open, practically drooling over said cookie cups. The conversation went a little something like this.

"Wouldn't those be awesome at the wedding?" says Angelala.

"Wouldn't those be awesome now?" says Mr. O.

"We could make those," Angelala said.

"Totally," replies Mr. O.  

So last night, we attempted to create them.  We knew they wouldn't turn out perfectly.  We were experimenting.  We ended up with mixed results but delicious results nonetheless.  So what did we do?

We started by making good ol' Toll House Chocolate Chip recipe.  And by we, I of course mean me.  Here's what Nick was doing.

 

Yeah....I don't know either.

Now being that I'm, well, me.  Something will go wrong.  Yeah, well no real measuring cups or teaspoons/tablespoons.  It happens with only guys in the house.  Had to estimate for some stuff.  I was just glad they had an electric hand mixer and I didn't have to kill my arms stirring by hand.  

The results:

We're good at sharing.  That's a fire extinguisher...good handy spot.  Sorry but I didn't need to use it.  Not that exciting.  

 

Nick got greedy eating the cookie dough and was banished out of the kitchen with the dog.  

 

I promise I let him back in the kitchen right after he promised to stop stealing the dough.

We just put the dough in a muffin pan.  Sprayed the crap out of that thing.  You really don't need the little muffin paper cups....just makes it harder to eat later.

Before and After baking:

We cooked the first batch at 325 degrees for about 15(ish) minutes.  The second batch was 300 for a little longer and it worked better.  Sadly, they deflated in the centers about three minutes after taking them out of the oven.  But that was ok...

We had some cream cheese frosting.  We even made, that's right, made our own pastry bag out of a ziploc bag with a hole cut in the bottom corner. 

 

So in the end, here's what we learned.  

Need to add baking powder in lieu of baking soda. 

They don't need to be so big.  Seriously, it's like eating three cookies....After one it's like a sugar overload.

Keep the temp at 300 and cook them longer.  

You can use the baking powder and use the cookie cup as an actual cup....for ice cream perhaps!  YUM!!

If you have any other ideas to make them look prettier (cause they taste awesome), please let me know.  Or if you try them out, I'd love to see/hear your results!

Greetings from Philly

 

Tiny alley in Philly

I have an ingenious blog in store for you tomorrow.  I wish I could give it to you today but it's a baking blog.

Unfortunately, we are out of flour.  I had every intention of walking the few blocks to the store but it's a-raining in the City of Brotherly Love and Nick has the car today!  Not that I am complaining....it has been unbelievably, record breaking hot recently.  The last week has consisted of freezing cold showers, loitering at the mall (in order to bogart the AC) and take-out (turning on the oven was painful).  So, tune in tomorrow for a hopefully productive and effective cookie deliciousness.

A Day in the Country is Worth a Month in Town

 

Streets of Philly

Angelala is currently stationed in Philadelphia PA for three weeks visiting Nick. Now before first coming out to Philadelphia in December of 2008, Minneapolis was the biggest city I'd ever been in.  And in those instances, I was sheltered to shopping malls and the like.  My first trip to Philly involved my first plane ride and a day trip to New York City.

Now, I've lived in rural Iowa all of my life.  Pig confinements are the stinkiest things I've had to deal with.  My mom and I regularly get stopped at the store by someone we know.  There is only one decent coffee shop in town. 

My extended, bi-yearly trips to Philly have really opened my eyes to the reality of city living.  Since I was a history major in college, the importance of Philadelphia on American history isn't lost on me.  I am truly lucky to see this city before entering a classroom to teach.  My first trip here was a history nerd's dream with the hot spots.  This is my third trip since then and I've done most of the history stuff.  I've been experiencing big city living these days. 

Today I went on a trip to the grocery store by myself to get a few things for dinner tonight.  Nick moved since I was here last I was here so this was  a new adventure for me.  I walked the five blocks or so to the store.  Not sure if you know this...but it is unbelievably hot in Philly!  I don't want to sound like a complete country bumpkin.  I'm not ignorant or (extremely) naive.  But the cultural difference is a huge change.  A Kosher section in the grocery store?! Not in Iowa.  I stood and stared at the matza balls.  Center City (basically downtown) and the olde city are the tourist-y places in the city.  The difference between those areas and the real Philadelphia is blatant. The picture above is a quick snap I took on my home from the store.  It was relatively clean compared to other streets in the neighborhood.  One thing I can't convey to you is the smell.....downtown smells rank.  In this neighborhood, the smell is like a carnival....sweat mixed with something sweet like a funnel cake mixed with gasoline.  The combination that makes your stomach roll after a few minutes of smelling it.

It amazing how one city can be so many different things to different people.  Two years ago, Philadelphia was a wonderful, exciting city  to me. To Nick, it was the means to end for an education.  To the tourists, walking through the historic district today....well it's a hot sticky mess full of Ben Franklin statues!

Crafting Class...Say wha?!

First of all, I must tell you that I'm blogging from 30 thousand feet on an airtran flight to Philly by way of Atlanta by way of Minneapolis.  Very cool and making my six hours of flights less painful. 

My exciting news of the day (besides the entertaining flights) include my craftiness.  I will be teaching a series of green crafts at the Rustic Corner (RC) on Main in Charles City Iowa.  The first class will be on July 20th from 5:00pm- 6:30pm at the Rustic Corner's new location on main street in Charles City.  

You may be asking what the topic of this class will be....well, I'll tell you!
The class will be a T-shirt necklace.  To test out this creation's viability, my dear friend Kelsey and I took a night to create it over wine and beer plus vegan din-din.

Since I'm teaching a class on this...I can't give away all the gory details but here is how it started...

 

And here is how it ended!! with Kels drinking beer

If you want to sign up for the class (16 person limit) or have any questions, check out the RC on Main.
Should you sadly miss the class, have no desire to put the work into it, or both, they will most likely be on sale from angelaladesigns after the class is over.

Cinnamon Pizza

 My mom has made this pizza for years!  It is a wonderful, quick morning (or afternoon) treat.  Believe me, it goes fast.  Here is how old the recipe is....

 

Recipe:

1 stick of margarine (to cut back on calories, it helps to cut the butter in half.)

1 cup of sugar

1 egg

1 tsp. of vanilla

1 tsp of cinnamon

2 tablespoons of flour

Melt your butter

 

Add your massive amounts of sugar

 

Mmm cinnamon

Throw in your vanilla.  FYI don't ever drink vanilla.  It doesn't taste like vanilla.

I threw in the egg and flour.  Pre-mixed

 

This is the crust we use.  Just follow the directions on the bag.

Pour your mix on the crust.

Cook the pizza at 350 degrees for about 10 minutes.

The finished product...delicious, cinnamon-y goodness.

If you are like me and enjoy eating the yumminess as you go, you probably look like this.  Who doesn't love eating raw eggs?  :)

Rin tin tin...Can...Pincushion

 

How freakin' adorable is this picture?!

I was wandering through blogland this afternoon but I came across a wonderfully adorable blog named Living With Punks.  Now with a name like that...how could I not read all of it!  She had an adorable tin can pincushion tutorial that was just about as precious as can be.  Her tutorial is so well written and very self explanatory.  I decided I had to make it this afternoon.  She covered her almond can fabric...I did pink paisley scrapbook paper I got at a garage sale on friday.  She used fiberfill but I didn't have any and with no patience, I couldn't wait til I got some.  So I used batting and a few layers of foam stuff Mom had.

Here's what you need for supplies:

Remember what I always say...if you are going to mod podge something, you mod podge the crap out of it!

But like always, I ripped and wrinkled the paper in a few places.  I just covered them with fabric polka dots and flowers. 

You don't need to measure out how much fabric you will need I just cut a big square out and trimmed any off that made it look weird or lumpy in places.  

After you have super filled your can, tuck all the edges inside and voila!