Elf is arriving soon

With 3 children, we are always going to birthday parties and I am always trying to think of a creative gift idea.  Kids love to paint and I love to give gifts that are keepsakes.  So, with the upcoming arrival of Elf on the Shelf, I decided to create the "Elf House."  I packaged a bird house with paint brushes and washable paint and I attached a note that says:

Elf is arriving soon and he needs a home 

So here is a house for you to make Elf's own

Get creative and have fun painting

When you are done let the paint dry

Then perch his new house high on a shelf 

So when Elf arrives he'll know just where to fly!

 

 

Best Wishes,

 

Heather

 

 



Bat-Attude

I offered to bring cupcakes tonight to our girls night out to celebrate a good friends birthday.  Stuck in Halloween mode, I decided to make these Bat-Attude cupcakes...a chocolate cupcake with a creamy peanut butter frosting.  Hope everyone is having a BAT-ty Good Wednesday!

Heather

I hope you have a Choc-tacular Thursday!
BOO!
Heather

Supper Club 2012

 

My husband and I have been part of a Supper Club for 7 or 8 years now.  We meet once a month with each couple hosting one month a year.  Some months are more formal dinners with fine china and good conversation amongst friends whereas some months we party into the wee hours of the morning.  We have done cookouts and tailgate themes and even game night.  Each year I try to give my guests a Dinner Experience.  It may be the main meal or the "House Drink" or it may be just the overall evening itself.  I  try to come up with a menu that is different...a menu that consists of food I may normally not coook or a recipe that pushes my cooking skills...(If I have any skills!)  I have cooked a Dr. Pepper Glazed Ham, Roasted pork chops with a bourbon-cider glaze, Pork Roast with sausage, fruit & nut stuffing, a Tenderloin of Beef and oh, yes there was the year I cooked a Standing Rib Roast for like 24 people and even with double ovens and an outdoor grill I think it was like 11 pm before we ate!!  Maybe its my crab cake appetizer that people really enjoy or the Cambert with Cranberries & Port.  Perhaps its the "House Drink" that people talk about or maybe the Chocolate Martini's that were appartently so good we slurped down one drink after another and we...well lets just leave it at that.  A signature I learned from my mom is party favors or a small gift at each person's place setting...it may be a box of cookies or a Christmas Ornament...it just depends on the time of year.  Sometimes I get my menu inspirations from the Food & Wine Magazine or a family recipe.  One year I was watching The Today Show and there was a chef who made several dishes but the soup recipe was not provided...so I spent 3 days tracking down the name of the Chef and where he worked and I got a hold of him at a Resort & Spa in Arizona and he happily had his assistant send me the recipe!  So here we are, and it's my turn to host supper club in November.  But my menu inspirtation has not hit me yet.  So, I thought I would reach out to the web and ask, "What should I cook for Supper Club?"  I am not sure how many readers I have...I think I have a few, maybe!?...hopefully!  But if you are reading this and you have a suggestion, I would love to hear from you!  Maybe it's a family recipe or a menu from our own Supper Club.  Food Trucks are all the rage...does anyone own a Food Truck they could pull up to my backyard?  Maybe you read a Food Blog and you saw an idea there.  Whatever or wherever, if you have a suggestion for my November Supper Club...please send it my way! 

I am excited to share another Halloween Creation with you.  We are heading to the Pumpkin Patch this week so I thought it was fitting to make some Sugar Cookie Pumpkins and sit them in the "Patch." 
I hope everyone is getting excited about Halloween!  Whether you are dressing up yourself or finding a costume for your child...or dog or cat...we want to hear what you are going to be for Halloween.  Having a party or going Trick-or-Treating...share your ideas with us.
Hope you are having a Spooktacular start to your week!

It's time to BOO!

I love Halloween...ok, I really love every holiday.  But what I love most is my children love to get just as excited as I do and get involved in the decorating, baking and crafting.  Although I do custom design and printing for invitations, I love that my kids enjoy making cards for their friends.  So when it came time to make our "BOO" signs for our "You've Been Booed" deliveries, I offered to design and print the BOO signs.  However, my children insisted that they make the signs and design them themselves.  So, here we are....the cookies are baked and the BOO bags are ready.  It's too hard to pick just one friend to BOO, so we try to be the first ones to "Boo" and we BOO several friends to help get the tradition started.  We decorated white paper bags and attached the "BOO" signs with a little peel and stick sticky dot so our friends could easily remove the BOO card from their bag and display on their front door.  Now I know that my childrens art might not be exactly what my friends want hanging on their front door, but I can't resist the beauty of children's art.  I love watching children be creative and so proud of their works of art...what's a mother to do other than tell them what a great job they did and keep encouraging their creativeness.