Rosebuds and Chocolate - Edible Bouquet

A friend of mine will be celebrating a milestone birthday soon so I wanted to do something different for her.  I decided to combine 2 personal favorites, roses and chocolate, and I made her 40 Hershey's Kiss roses and put them in a personalized planter that I painted and Mod Podged.  This was super easy and I have another occasion coming up that I'll be making a candy bouquet for since I think this one turned out cute.

I used a plain old terra cotta pot, painted black and using my Cricut I cut out "40" with fancy scrapbook paper.  Then I decoupaged the "40" onto the pot and let it dry.  I found a styrofoam ball at Michael's that fit inside the pot and using BBQ skewers, floral tape, silk leaves, red cellophane and Kisses, I went to work. 

To make the roses, put 2 kisses flat end together in the center of a square of cellophane (about 4-5 inches big).  Stick the skewer in the center of the bottom kiss and twist the cellophane to hold it tight.  Then wrap tightly with floral tape, wrapping the stem of a leaf about 1/4 way down or so (it's crafts, not science so whatever you think looks good works).  Continue wrapping skewer with floral tape to the bottom, cut and twist the end up to stick to the bottom floral tape.  Voila ... you now have an edible rosebud.

I didn't want the styrofoam ball to show so I used paper crinkle from Hobby Lobby to cover it but there you have it ... a cute, edible bouquet to celebrate just about anything! 

Have fun!

PS:  The very first one of these I made years ago, I used floral wire so if you have that lying around, you could use that but I prefer the skewers since they seem to be more sturdy.

PSS:  The second one in purple is one I made this morning for my daughter for district speech which is coming up in a few weeks.  Hope she makes it to state! 

How NOT to Buy a Camper!

Even though I have a perfectly good Shasta LoFlyte (decorated even), I've always been in love with the little canned ham shaped campers from the 50s.  I've drooled over pictures and have broken the 10th commandment multiple times but they're just so darn cute, I can't help myself.

Anyway, I digress.  We decided yesterday to go prom dress shopping which naturally meant a trip to the "Big City."  Since the main highway was closed due to water over the road, we had to take a meandering secondary path to get there.  Now honestly, usually I'm bored to tears and have my eyes closed because there really isn't anything to see around here especially in the winter.  All of a sudden, my husband said "did you see that little camper back there?"  I quickly sat up in my seat, turned my head to see it and missed it.  So we decided to go back for a drive by.  There is was ... THE camper!  The only one I've ever seen around here ... the one I want ... the "cheese to my macaroni" as my daughter would say, sitting there in an overgrown yard filled with abandoned cars, other trailers and assorted junk and a boarded up house.

So we stopped at the neighbor's house to ask about it.  She said the house wasn't inhabited and the guy just left all his junk there.  She also gave us his son's name because she said no one was ever around and that would be our best bet.  We thanked her and I decided it wouldn't hurt to go take a peek at this little darling just to make sure she wasn't destroyed before we bothered some strange guy on a weekend.  After traipsing through mud (and almost falling on my butt a few times) we found a rutted path near a cornfield and walked down it to take a quick look at the camper.  It was adorable ... 50's birch interior, 99.9% intact windows, some water damage but looked like it had potential.  The "I wants" quickly multiplied in my head and so we decided to go back to the car and call the guy when we could find a phone book for the area.

In order to avoid the mud, we decided to walk along the highway.  Meanwhile, some guy is trailing us which kind of creeped me out but figured we were close to the car so could easily make a run for it if he was up to no good.  Well he stopped and yelled at my husband to "get the f**k out."  My husband calmly went over to talk to him and explain that we were just interested in looking at the little camper and had gotten the information from the neighbor about who to call.  Turns out, it was the long-lost owner of the property (cue Deliverance music here) who just happened to be driving by and was itching for a fight.  He cussed, he yelled, and bottom line told my husband "if the *$%&$ camper was for sale, it would be out front with a for sign on it."

Now maybe, just maybe, we were wrong to wander onto some obviously abandoned property to take a quick look at an abandoned camper ... but honestly, people do this all the time.  I just was interested but the guy obviously would rather see this little darling sit and rot rather than making some money and seeing her restored to her full potential.

I'm still looking ... anyone know of an inexpensive canned ham camper for sale?  Cheap?

Speech Team Good Luck Cupcakes!

I made these for the speech team kids for their meet tomorrow.  I'm taking a cake decorating class so learned how to make the fancy icing swirls using the 1M tip.  The picks were made using lollipop sticks and scrapbook paper.  I printed out circles in Word with Good Luck on them, punched them out with my 1" paper punch and then using the Cricut and Accent Essentials, I used the flower shape (using the shift key to make it solid) and made 2" flowers with the printed paper and 1-1/2" flowers with the purple paper.  I then attached the Good Luck circles to the front and hot glued them to lollipop sticks.  The cupcake papers also have multicolored dots on them and since one of our school colors is purple, I colored the icing a light purple ... would hate for the kids to perform with purple lips and tongues!  :)

This was fun ... hopefully they'll enjoy them and my daughter brings home gold! 

Banana Split Cupcakes!!

I was in a baking mood so grabbed Taste of Home Cupcakes! from the library.  Decided to make the "Chocolate Banana Split Cupcakes" and they are delicious!!  Very easy to make too ... the surprise is a square of chocolate inside the cupcake.  I couldn't find fresh maraschino cherries with stems so settled for the jarred ones. 

So many recipes in that book look amazing ... good thing I have a high schooler and her friends along with neighbor kids to give them to ... don't want to gain a ton of weight before summer!

Shabby Chic-ish Decoupaged Vintage Train Case

I really like the way this one turned out except for the obvious line on the back side where I screwed up and didn't match the patterns.  An easier way would have been just to have the line on the bottom but by the time I figured that out, it was already stuck on.  Oh well, live and learn.

I used assorted scrapbook papers from Hobby Lobby with this one.  I also spray painted it with Rustoleum Americana spray paint in Heirloom White but I don't recommend this at all.  The Krylon I used on the last case was fine.  The Rustoleum didn't stick, stayed tacky and peeled off so I slapped a couple coats of Mod Podge over the top and called it "shabby chic".  It's all good!

I haven't done the inside of this yet.  I did rip out all the plastic lining and will spray paint it with the Heirloom White because I know that will stick to the wood interior.  Then I might line it with scrapbook paper or leave it depending on what it looks like. 

This is a very addicting hobby!  I'm loving how these turnout and actually this one is more my taste than the paisley one.

Cookies!

I promised my daughter's ex-boyfriend homemade cookies at the next speech meet and needed something to put them in rather than just a plate.  I bought a package of the plain white gift bags at Hobby Lobby (at 50% off ... yay!) and was going to embellish them with Paper Studio "Baking" scrapbook paper but then decided that would be too "girly" and he'd probably be embarrassed. 

So, I looked through my stash and found some sandy beach paper, cut a 4-inch circle out of the sand part with the Cricut and then cut random snips (mostly trapezoid shapes) out of dark brown paper and glued them to the circle to make a chocolate chip cookie which I glued to a larger circle (4-1/4 inches using the Cricut) and glued it to the bag.  I then made just a rectangle on top of a rectangle out of the same paper and used white sticker letters to spell out cookies.

I think it turned out cute.  I'll put the cookies (chocolate chip naturally) in a Ziploc bag and nestle them into some tissue paper and call it good.  Hope he likes them!

Another Suitcase Makeover

Wow, I can tell I'm getting bored!  I redid another suitcase today using Mod Podge and some retro-licious fabric I found at Walmart.  It's called Santa Fe Paisley.  The 2 fabrics (inside and out) do coordinate and there was a third one to the set but it was brown so I decided not to get it.

I bought a vintage Samsonite suitcase with that lovely beige marble covering at Salvation Army along with a matching cosmetic case (square train case) that I haven't done anything with yet.  After removing the lining I was surprised to find that these old suitcases are actual wood inside.  Wow!  I then used Krylon spray paint in Bahama Blue and sprayed multiple coats to cover the outside. 

I was going to leave it blue and just paint dots or something on it to coordinate with the fabric and even went and painstakingly picked out coordinating colors of acrylic paint at Hobby Lobby but today decided to use the patchwork and instead just Mod Podge it to the outside.  It reminds me of those 70s patchwork hippie skirts.  I'm going to spray paint a coat of clear on top to give it a more smooth feel.  The Mod Podge did seal the fabric but it feels kind of gritty.

For the inside I cut the turquoise paisley, ironed a 1/2 inch hem around the pieces and glued them in place.  For the piece that goes over the two sides, instead of using butcher paper like the original, I just used fusible webbing and 2 scrap pieces of fabric to make it stiff and glued that into place.

I kind of like it.  My daughter said, "What are you doing this for?"  When I told her she could take the suitcase to college, she informed me she doesn't like retro so no.  That's okay, I'll use it to store my collection of vintage linens or something or maybe I'll carry it off to college myself ... just kidding.