Homemade Samoas

Oh my goodness I love samoas! I wish they sold them in stores because I have never been lucky enough to cross paths with an actual girl scout... I know, it's weird. :) My mom used to buy these when I was a teen and my self-control pretty much went out the window whenever they were in the house. They are really that good. Anyway... I found this recipe for them at a cute little food blog called A Bicycle Built For Two. That recipe HERE... Her cookies are much better looking than mine. In fact, mine don't even look much like real samoas... but I promise they tasted good.


Start with the cookie recipe... (Makes about 12-15 cookies)

1 cup softened butter
1/2 cup sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon milk

Cream butter and sugar. Mix in the rest of the ingredients and roll out like sugar cookies. Use a small cookie cutter (I recommend something 2 inches or smaller because these are rich cookies) and cut out dough. Using a pencil eraser or your finger, make a smaller circle in the middle. Bake at 350 degrees for 10-12 minutes on a greased baking sheet.



Now for the topping...

3 cups shredded coconut
12 ounces of caramels
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons milk
8 ounces chocolate chips

Toast your coconut at 350 for about 15 minutes. (You can do this while making the cookies) Stir throughout and keep an eye on it. Unwrap your caramels and place them in a microwave safe dish with the salt and milk for about 3 minutes. When the caramel mixture is done, add the coconut to it and stir well. Pour this onto the baked cookies.


Melt the chocolate in a microwave safe dish or on the stove top. Dip the bottoms of the cookies in the chocolate or just spread it with a knife and place on parchment paper. Then drizzle remaining chocolate on top of coconut.

Like I said, hers cookies looked a lot more like the real thing. My problem was that I made them too big and I didn't have enough caramel to make the topping runny. I just ended up covering the little holes I made with coconut and chocolate.
My daughter didn't seem to care though... :)

Blueberry Muffins

I have been craving blueberry muffins sooo much lately! (Yes I realize I am not pregnant anymore) We had a pretty good recipe but I wanted something extra special so I searched a little and stopped right when I came to this title... "To Die For Blueberry Muffins." Sounds good enough for me! They really are the best blueberry muffins I have ever had. The recipe is HERE at All Recipes... or just scroll down.


1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 egg
1/3 cup milk
1 cup fresh blueberries
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup butter, cubed
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Grease muffin cups or line with muffin liners. I just used liners...

Combine 1 1/2 cups flour, 3/4 cup sugar, salt and baking powder. Place vegetable oil into a 1 cup measuring cup; add the egg and enough milk to fill the cup. Mix this with flour mixture. Fold in blueberries. Fill muffin cups right to the top, and sprinkle with crumb topping mixture.

To Make Crumb Topping: Mix together 1/2 cup sugar, 1/3 cup flour, 1/4 cup butter, and 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon. Mix with fork, and sprinkle over muffins before baking.

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven, or until done.

Super Cute, Super Easy Scarfs!!

Isn't that the CUTEST scarf you have ever seen? I saw the tutorial for these on KSL's Studio 5 yesterday and I fell in LOVE! I actually have already made two and I'm cleaning out the closets looking for old shirts and I am definitely going to the D.I. tomorrow!

What I love about these scarfs:

1. EASY and QUICK

2. Light Weight (I will totally be wearing these ALL year long!)

3. What a quick way to make a T and jeans looked girly!

4. INEXPENSIVE, totally FREE if you already have some T's to use or really inexpensive to find from a thrift shop!

LOVE IT! I hope you check it out: http://www.thediydish.com/2011/02/make-an-infinity-scarf-kim-shows-the-how-to-on-studio-5/

Wooden Doll Cradle

My husband made this beautiful doll cradle for our daughter for Christmas. I found the idea for it at Makebabystuff.com. I LOVE that little website. It has tons of ideas for homemade toys and other baby items. To find the instructions for this doll cradle, go HERE.

We didn't want brackets showing on the crib that we made, so Ben used a nail gun to put the pieces together. This proved to be a challenge because the wood was so soft and it cracked on us so use caution with the nail gun. We used a little wood glue to fix that and it still looks better without the metal brackets I think. We also adjusted our boards to be 16 inches instead of 18.

Yoga Mat Bag

Well I am finally jumping back into the blogging world after having a baby! I am now back tracking to post all the Christmas gifts I made last year. This yoga mat bag was for my brother-in-law.


The tutorial for this bag is by Laurie Wisburn. Go HERE for her instructions. I didn't follow her instructions exactly, but close enough to get some good ideas. For the inside material, bottom, and handle, I used ripstop fabric. That made it really durable. I also used something similar to a shoelace for the tie. Trying to make a tie out of fabric was a pain. (click on the picture for a closer look) My main pieces of fabric were longer and wider than the 17in.X27in. that she recommended. Mine was probably more like 20inX30in. I wanted plenty of wiggle room.

My brother-in-law loved it and to prove it's manly enough, I made my handsome husband model for me. :) Thanks Ben!

Sour Cream Pecan Coffee Cake

Mmmm I LOVE coffee cake! I especially love this coffee cake made by my mother. I have no idea where she got the recipe but it's pretty dang near perfect. :) Enjoy!

Mom's Sour Cream Pecan Coffee Cake

1 cup butter
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 cup sour cream
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt

Filling:
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 C. chopped pecans
4 tsp. sugar

Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, sour cream, and vanilla. Stir in dry ingredients. Mix filling ingredients in a small separate bowl. Spoon 1/3 of the mixture in a greased and floured bundt pan. Sprinkle with cinnamon filling. Then spoon more batter, then more filling, then last of the batter. Bake for 60 minutes in a 350 degree oven.

Super Cute Valentines....

I got an email to these SUPER CUTE Valentines. You can simply print them off and cut. Way cuter than anything I've seen in the store and much faster than makind them from scatch! (And did I mention, they are FREE!) Just click the picture!

Book Page Wall Art....

I'm not exactly sure what I should call this.... any ideas? I LOVE how it turned out, but I'm not sure what it is...

WHAT YOU NEED:

an old book (or one you don't like, I used a book I had to read in college and I will NEVER read again)

Styrofoam disc (2 pack/$1 from dollar store)

a lot of Hot Glue and Glue Gun

I started out by tearing pages out of the book, (GASP! I know I love books too) and the roll one page starting in the corner to make a skinny cone. One end will be bigger and more open and the other end will be smaller. Use hot glue to hold the edge then hot glue to the sytrofoam disc. The first layer was the longest out and I glued them right to the back of the disc. The next layers I folded the end to make them shorter and started gluing them in front in the side of the disc.

And I just went around and around until it was as full as I could get it.

Then for the Rosette Center. I followed a tutorial I found HERE. (I LOVE this wreath). And I just squashed as many rosettes as tightly as I could together to fill the center, Then I added a ribbon loop to the back of the disc so that I could hang it up.

 I just LOVE how it turned out and it is UNIQUE and AFFORDABLE wall art. Love it!

I linked up: