Celebrate Celebrate Celebrate > Be Mine, Valentine - Part 2

Okay my little cupids, here are the photos of my DIY school Valentine's Day cards that I promised you yesterday. Finally! 

My laptop lives another day, but looking at these photos you might notice that my camera (or camera skills) have seen better days, but here they are!


This one is my playing card themed Valentine:

It's cute message reads, "King Cole commands you a happy Valentines day!"

Here's the inside:

I put a couple of minis in a cello bag and then stapled the tops together.

The next one I did was a pirate themed Valentine:

I used chocolate coins as my "treasure"

Last but not least is my "Fish in the Sea", themed Valentine:

It reads, "Of all the fish in the sea, thanks for being a friend to me!"

I finished it off with some gummy fish and sharks in a vase shaped cello bag.

Thanks for being patient! Now I have to go and try to distract myself from all this Valentines candy laying around...

~Angela

Celebrate, Celebrate, Celebrate > Be Mine, Valentine!

Love is in the air! Well "something" is in the air over here.  Love at my house must smell like bacon and boy feet...

With Valentine's Day just around the corner, I've started thinking about the dreaded "school Valentines" dilemma. I love a holiday that revolves around the color red and any excuse to eat candy (oh yea, yea, and love), but picking out school Valentines is like a supreme court deliberation. Oh. The. Pressure.

I usually trudge around store to store, hunting around for the best deal for 90 Valentines (Yes, I said 90!) , and looking for a Valentine that does not violate the "boy code" of Valentine giving. There is a detailed list of criteria for school Valentines for boys that rivals NASA's liftoff check list:

• There can be no mention of "love" or "kisses" or "hugs", because that is so "ewwwww!" and you will be witness to a full fledged freak out of, "This one says love! I can't say love to my friend Cameron!  Moooom!"
• There can be no "girl" stuff on them.
• No pencils or erasers, or anything else that doesn't involve a piece of candy.
• Has to have some kind of candy directly attached - and it has to be the "good" kind of candy.  No peppermints, sweeties or tootsie rolls. No recycling of the dredges of your Halloween candy (darn)!!
• It has to incorporate something "cool" or "funny" like fire, superheros, crossbones, four wheelers, ninjas, burps, or any other things that would impress a 7- 11 year old boy, and maybe one or two girls.

Why don't I let them pick out their own, you ask? I tried that once and lets just say, that we would probably still be standing in the Valentine aisle from last year, and someone left the store in tears - it wasn't the kids.

So I got ahead of the school Valentines game and made some great valentines that everyone will love, including your picky kids:

TA DA!

What? You can't see them?! Oh, that's right, that's because my computer is a hunk of junk and won't read the disk that have these awesomely cool Valentines pictures on them. ARHGGG! So while I curse at my laptop and try to repost them, here are some great ideas other fabulous gals came up with:

Plumadorable  (Free printable!)

Fiskars

Fiskars

Zakka Life (Free printable)

Check back later for pictures of my ideas - or pictures of my computer in the garbage, whichever comes first.

~Angela

I Need Minions > Get Out Of My House Continued

I bet you're wondering who's Fred and what does that have to do with getting things out of my house?  Maybe I want Fred out of my house!  No, not really.  






I've been on a "GO" roll.  Things I've "GOed" out of my house:

• Cranberries 
• Candy Canes
• Pumpkin - Had big dreams of using this at Christmas - but as usual my "I Want To Do" list was bigger than the actual number of hours in the day.  Anybody else have that problem?

Now for the results:
*Cranberries:  I made Pioneer Woman's wonderful Pork Loin with homemade cranberry sauce.  First time I've ever cooked cranberries myself. Yup, that's right I'm a cranberry cooking virgin!  I blame that on my Mama because she always makes cranberries and gives me some of hers.
*Candy Canes:  Like everyone else in America I made heart suckers.
*Pumpkin:  I made dog treats for all my kids' dogs.

Fred

Everyone (except us) has dogs (all are rescued dogs.)  I wanted to make dog treats for Christmas but I ran out of time so those dog treats are now Valentine Treats.  These treats were made with pumpkin because it supposedly is good for a dog's digestion, and rice flour because some dogs are allergic to wheat.  Okay, that is someone else's blog saying that - not me.  These dogs come over to my house, eat stuff off the floor and sometimes I look outside and one of them will be eating something that they have found.  I'm pretty sure I don't want to know what that something might be.  I do want to be a good Grandma to these dogs so I made them healthy treats.  

Cleo’s Pumpkin Dog Biscuits

2 eggs
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
2 tablespoons dry milk
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
2 1/2 cups brown rice flour 
1 teaspoon dried parsley (optional)

Preheat oven to 350.

In large bowl, whisk together eggs and pumpkin to smooth. Stir in dry milk, sea salt, and dried parsley (if using, optional). Add brown rice flour gradually, combining with spatula or hands to form a stiff, dry dough. Turn out onto lightly floured surface (can use the brown rice flour) and if dough is still rough, briefly knead and press to combine.

Roll dough between 1/4 – 1/2″ – depending on your dog’s chew preferences, ask first – and use biscuit or other shape cutter to punch shapes, gathering and re-rolling scraps as you go. Place shapes on cookie sheet, no greasing or paper necessary. If desired, press fork pattern on biscuits before baking, a quick up-and-down movement with fork, lightly pressing down halfway through dough. Bake 20 minutes. Remove from oven and carefully turn biscuits over, then bake additional 20 minutes. Allow to cool completely on rack.

Note:  I added more pumpkin so I could work in all the flour.  I also used white rice flour instead of the brown as that was what I had. The recipe came from Simmer Till Done.


I just realized that I make sugary, white flour treats for my Grandkids all the time.  Guess who got all those heart suckers?  Does that make me a bad Grandma?


-Laurie