Strawberry Brulee Cupcakes

 

I was messing around with some left overs last week and discovered a new delicious way to use up a boxed cake mix!  I want to share with you the Strawberry Brulee cupcakes that were the love child of my antics in the kitchen.

 

The brown sugar on top makes the most delicious crust and with the addition of fresh strawberries it takes a plain ol' boxed cake mix to a whole new level!!!

Enjoy!!!

Owl Towels

At Target awhile ago, I found some of their cloth towels on sale and have always wanted to decorate my own napkins.  The idea of this is not new - fabric paint, stamps or stencils, but I had a certain look in mind that I used my artistic dC to create! 

I love white owls, but not too many.  I have only a few here and there sprinkled throughout our house and would never want to overwhelm.  In an attempt to add more orange to our kitchen I thought it would be fun to have dC draw me my own owl, and then I could transform him into my new cooking pal!

dC drew me an owl, and I used the stencil techniques I've used in the past to transfer and paint the pattern onto the towels.  I realized he didn't have any distinct eyes, so I borrowed Fender's Angry Birds pencil to make them.  Shhhhh - don't tell Fender I used his pencil.

 

 

Then I just followed the heat setting directions for setting the paint so that they could be washed and dried.  I made some Ron Swanson towels and Storm Trooper towels too.  They are so fun I can't stand it!  Who doesn't want a little Ron with their bacon or tea?

 

 

This week I'm linking to:

Banana Valentines

In the past, I've embraced Valentine's Day a bit more, I've decorated, baked cookies, made crafts with Fender, but this year I decided to make a tasty frozen treat.  Thus banana valentines were born!

I sliced bananas into thin discs and using a 1 inch heart shaped cookie cutter I cut the slices into hearts and tossed them into the freezer for five minutes. 

Then I tempered some semi-sweet chocolate in the microwave and dipped the frozen bananas into it using a fork to knock off the excess chocolate.  Then set them on parchment paper to dry.

Since the banas are cold, they should set up right away but if you can wait to eat them and have any patience left you can always put them back into the freezer until they are hard.  Enjoy!!!

It's Sew Sunday - Dining Room Make-Over

Our dining room could use a little love...It's small, not technically a room, and has white chairs that have been sat on for quite awhile now - so to call them white is quite a stretch.  We needed an updated look big time!

Here are some of the before photos:

 

This long maroon curtain has been following me around since I moved to Seattle!  The wall art is old and from Target.  It hung on the wall in my first college apartment.  We love our little thrift store blue chair (off to the right in the photos) - so when we decided to change up the room's look, I kept this color in the back of my mind.

 

So dC and I found this great dusty blue Chevron print fabric and I was in chair love!  We simply removed the old seat using a screwdriver and stapled the new fabric on and cut the excess off.

 

I sewed some new curtains to match and it just brightened up the whole room! 

 

 



Sewing curtains is not much more than straight lines and  A LOT of ironing.  I love my new machine, so it's a pleasure to sit there while I sew yard after yard! 

 

 

The silver plates and Stencil Wall Art lighten up an otherwise empty wall!  I am really pleased with how it turned out!  What do it yourself projects do you have going on? 

 

 

Stencil Wall Art DIY

 

dC and I just recently refreshed the look of our dining room (more to come on that) and I found that there was a large empty space after I retired some of the old cheap artwork that used to don the wall.  I've been loving freezer paper stencils lately and decided to try making something of my own to fill the void! 

If you'd like to try too, here's what you'll need:

freezer paper

a computer image

printer

pencil

utility knife

self healing board

fabric with a fine weave

iron

fabric paint

paint brush or sponge

lots of patience while it dries

 

 

1. Start by printing out the image you'd like to make into "art."  I chose a mature deer head that was detailed enough, but not too detailed that tracing and cutting would be difficult.

 

2. Place a piece of freezer paper over the image and trace it.  If you are a fantastic artist, you could either skip this step or even create your own image.  I am not, and will rely on old school tracing to get the job done!

 

3. Using your utility knife with a self-healing board beneath, cut out the image. 

 

 

4. In the meantime, be sure to have your iron heating up to the highest dry setting your model has.  Place this paper over the fabric you've chosen.

 

5. I chose to use a cream linen fabric left over from making myself a Princess Leia costume eons ago!  The color went well with my new curtains and it was a way to bust through my fabric stash!  Gently press the freezer paper onto the fabric, trying not to fold or move any of the detailed parts.  Ensure there is a good seal between the freezer paper and the fabric so that your image will be sharp!

 

6. Protect your surface before you begin painting. (I may or may not have a deer head on my ironing board!!!)  Using any color of fabric paint you choose, paint over the stencil getting into all of the nooks and crannies.  Follow the instructions for drying that you paint suggests.  I made sure to at least wait 4 hours before removing the stencil!  This is where the patience come in. 

 

 

You could stretch your art into an embroidery hoop, or simply remove the glass from a frame as I did and staple the fabric into place. 

 

Happy stenciling!

I'm linking to: Craftberry Bush