Happy Easter!

Nothing says spring more than some unbelievably cute kids in their Easter finest!
Daddy and Bug hunting for eggs.
Easter cupcakes (idea from Bakerella)

Beautiful Sweets, in a dress!

This is how we spent a beautiful, happy, Easter Sunday with family.

Raspberry Shortcakes

I love strawberry shortcakes, they are one of the cutest desserts I know of and they always invoke memories of warm spring and summer days for me. My mom use to serve them when it was warm, the typical store bought little cakes, strawberries with glaze and some cool-whip to top them off. They were delicious, some times simple is good. I still occasionally make this variety for my family minus the glaze and I've even done super fancy ones where I baked my own shortcake. This time however I wanted something cute, easy and a little different. I went the route of raspberry shortcakes. Everybody in my house loves raspberries, Sweets can eat a container all by her little self. These were super fast to make and tasted so good. Here is the recipe.

Raspberry Shortcakes- makes 12 mini shortcakes

fresh raspberries

1/2 package cream cheese

1 c. confectioners sugar

black raspberry jelly- melted

pound cake- store bought or homemade

small amount of cream or milk

vanilla

In a bowl mix softened cream cheese with the jelly and vanilla until combined. Add the confectioners sugar and beat until combined. Add cream until the mixture is the consistency of toothpaste. Cut pound cake into squares to fit a cupcake wrapper.

Layer a square in the bottom, top with a tsp of raspberry jelly.

Pipe the cream cheese mixture on top of the jelly (about 1 tbs) top with fresh raspberries.

I hope you make this with your family today and remember you could easily substitute pretty much any berry. Or think outside of the box, how good would these be with orange marmalade?

Kim

I Won!

I received a lovely package full of paper crafting goodies this week from a very sweet lady who writes a lovely blog. Give her blog a peek.

Cutest Thing Ever!!

Teacup pig!! Seriously I can't stand it these are the cutest things ever! If I had a thousand dollars to mindlessly blow you would for sure see my carrying one of these around in a purse. Love it!!!

Curry Chicken Salad

Yummy, yummy! This chicken salad is soooo good. I don't know if I am even a person who is generally fond of chicken salad, but this, this I love. I found the original idea via taste of home, but like I usually do I glanced at the recipe and then several days later just threw some stuff in a bowl to make it. This is silly easy and I'm going to make it again for Easter. It makes a lot of sandwiches and I had enough left for 3 days of lunches after we had it at the shower. I served it on little rolls but for myself I just ate it with some sea salt crackers. This keeps really well and I think it's better to make it the night before so the flavors meld. So here is my basic recipe for this, but like I said I didn't really measure and I don't think you have to, just eyeball it!

2 cans of chicken- make sure it says chicken breast

1 c. dried cranberries

1 granny smith apple chopped into 1/2 inch pieces

2 celery stalks finely chopped

1 c. chopped pecans

a few tablespoons of mayonnaise (just enough to coat everything and get it nicely combined, you don't want to drench it)

2 tsp curry powder or more to taste

mix it all up, refrigerate and serve on bread, rolls, lettuce leaves or whatever you like!

Owl Baby Shower

Hoot! Hoot! This weekend I hosted a baby shower in honor of my dear sister-in-law. The theme was owls with pink, green and brown since that is also the theme for the babies room. I also threw in some strawberries for good measure because really could it be cuter than owls AND strawberries! Finding pre-made owl decorations was pretty much out of the question so I had to get crafty and you know how I like to get crafty! Here are some of the items I made.

Strawberry Fabric Bunting

Owl Cupcakes and It's a Girl Cupcakes- Chocolate With Vanilla Buttercream

Owl Cupcake Stand Topper

Owl Stir Sticks

Fabric Table Runner and Flower Arrangements With Painted Owl Masks

Decorated gift bags

I also made a bunch of cute items for my present and some yummy food, but I'm going to split those up in a couple of other posts. If you would like to know about the table dressings, I made runners for the main dining table and buffet and then just used fabric scraps as the runners for the little table and food table. We also hung tissue paper puffs ala' Martha and some cute store bought owl items that I found at Wally World.

I Flippin' Love Spring!

Awesome yellow shades from Anthroplogie (note- these are too pricey for me! I also found this cute pair at Hot Topic, for just 10 bucks!)

I am unbelievably happy that spring is finally here. I hate winter with a passion. I know I must have SAD because I feel like crap all winter, uninspired and lazy. Then as soon as the temps reach 60 or so and I see a little sunshine, I feel awesome. I've been out busting my butt in the yard the last couple of days and rockin' out the sewing machine and pretty much bursting at the seams with energy (probably partially due to my new addiction to energy drinks). My mind is full of things I want to do and buy to freshen myself and home up for the warm weather. So I thought I would share some of the things that are inspiring me these days. Oh and since I always feel like blogs that do this are just filling up space when they don't have anything to write, I want you to know that I have been working like a crazy person and have a ton of new craftiness to share but it is for an event this weekend so I want it to be secret until then. Also I tried to only pick stuff I might actually be able to afford!

1. Navy stripe purse from Bayanhippo on Etsy. I love this!

2. Havainanas from Piperlime, I'm asking for a pair for Easter. I love me some flips!

3. Miss Kim Lilac, I mean how could I resist? I bought one last year and I'm keeping my fingers crossed for blooms this year.

4. Anything with Popsicles on it. I especially love this dress from Crazy8 and I think I may have convinced Sweets that wearing a dress isn't that bad.

5. Frozen Yogurt. Last year we discovered that our little ice cream joint carries frozen yogurt in about 30 different flavors. I can't wait to go.

6. Kids Shovel from Lowes- I think every kid needs a real steel shovel that they use to dig in the ground

7. Floral head scarf- I use to wear these all the time, and I'm really feeling it again this year. I don't know where this one came from but Target has some great scarves in their Liberty of London collection here.

8. Essie nail polish in Looking For Love.