Strawberry Cheesecake Cookies

I'll admit, I'm not much of a cook or a baker. Most of my baking and cooking adventures happened when I moved out and they are very few and far in between. I also don't have very much time and when most recipes call for making things from scratch, I get a bit intimidated...

I like to experiment though, and so today I come to you bearing a recipe that tastes delicious, is quick, and isn't a lot of work! The type of dessert that I like best :)

"Not Scratch" Strawberry Cheesecake Cookies

• 1 bag of sugar cookie mix (I use Betty Crocker)
• 1 egg
• 1 stick of butter
• 2/4 cup Fresh strawberry puree
• 1/4 cup white chocolate chips
• 1/4 cup craisins (in the fruit aisle, essentially dried cranberries for those in the dark)
• 1 oz cream cheese

1. Pour sugar cookie mix into a mixing bowl with the semi-melted stick of butter and egg. 

2. Wash strawberries, cut off tops and using a food processor chop the strawberries into eensy little pieces.

3. Add white chocolate chips, craisins and cream cheese and stir until it is mixed well.

4. Bake according to sugar cookie instructions (I cooked mine for about 13 minutes in a gas oven).

5. Enjoy your flippin cookies because they are delicious. You don't need anything else in the world except these cookies. Seriously, enjoy them.

Let me know if you guys try out the recipe and if you liked it!

Phillip the red panda

When school started for me, it put me in a bit of a pickle. One of my classes was charging $150 for the textbook I needed for the class! Unfortunately, it was a specialty book and the only other place I could find it was on the website that publishes it for about $30 more plus shipping.

So I went to facebook and begged, and asked if anyone would be willing to pay me for crafts in order to help me pay for the unseen cost of my textbook. Because I have such wonderful friends, I had a lot of serious takers, one was my friend A., who requested a red panda.

I found a cute red panda ami on the internet, but when I showed it to her, she wanted it to be a bit more realistic. Taking a huge step for myself, I made my own pattern! Behold! Phillip the Red Panda!

Here he is without legs, ears, or tail! He looked pretty sad!

In this picture all he needs is a tail!

The final product.

I was very happy with myself because not only is Phillip one-of-a-kind because I didn't write down all of the pattern, but it was my first time making something all on my own. I've come a long way with my crochet!

My friend  A. even left this sweet feedback for me.

I got my red panda today! He's perfect, I'm so pleased! A++ gold star!

Wreaths

 I'm going to share some of my first dabs at wreath making from Oct-Dec 2011

Halloween is my favorite holiday. I always said when I had my own house I'd go ballistic! My boyfriend and I moved into our own place in May, and well, my funds were too tight for me to go too crazy with decorating, so I decided to make my first wreath.

It happened as bit of an accident really, I was in Michael's near Halloween for something or other when I saw this huge white basket filled with black wreaths for $5. That seemed like a really good deal to me, so then I spent the rest of my time in the store gathering things that I thought would go well on it.

The product was so much better than I thought it would turn out! I found some sparkly bat garland and a wooden "wreath" that I painted and glittery spiders with clips. I also found some purple battery operated LED lights to stick in it so I could show it off at night. 

When December rolled around, I knew I wanted a Christmas wreath since I couldn't afford to put lights out or buy any Christmas decorations. I know some people could go on and on about Christmas, but it is my least favorite holiday...So I didn't want to decorate with the typical reds and greens. I figured, if I went with a blue color theme, I could leave the wreath up through January without my neighbors judging me.

I found a cute ribbon wreath tutorial while scouring Pinterest, and decided to give it a go. You can find the tutorial here, Since I just so happened to go to Hobby Lobby to collect materials when they had ALL of their Christmas stuff like 40% off, it was a mad house and pickin's were slim. I probably would have been a lot more happy with this wreath if I had found more ribbon I liked so I could have fattened it up a bit, but I was pleased with the overall result.

Unfortunately, it is almost March, so I think it's about time for me to take it down and move onto a new wreath! Now..to decide a theme....

Craft round up!

  

2011 has been a very busy year for me, full of lots of things, and lots of crafts I haven't posted!
I thought I'd be a good girl and try to keep my blog up to date because it's nice to be able to have a place where all my crafts are, just in case I want to show people :)

So enjoy the crafts I have made from the last post (january of this year! OMG!) to my current finished product. They are in chronological order...to best my knowledge.

Rainbow Mohawk baby hat for my god-daughter Isabelle, made sometime in Feb when the weather was still cold.

A bear amigurumi I made for a "craft" trade with a friend. She loves Adventure Time, so I named him Finn Bear and gave him a Finn hat and backpack.

A cute dessert cake made out of felt.

A mini birthday cake amigurumi for my friend Jasmine. I embroidered "Happy B-day Jaz! 2011" on the underside. Just in case she forgot who gave it to her.

A croceted nesting doll bookmark made for a bookmark swap on swap-bot.

And the roundup is ended with a Boston Red Sox baby hat commissioned by a friend! There are probably some crafts I'm missing, but I"ll get to them eventually! I'm lucky that I remember to take pictures of everything! Tune in next time and thanks for reading.

Craft: Stamp Carving

About a year ago I discovered the wonderful pastime Letterboxing. For those who are in the dark about what that is and don't like clicking links, I'll sum it up for you.

The best way for me to describe Letterboxing is it is a mixture of Geocaching, stamp collecting, and a treasure hunt all at the same time. Before you actually go letterboxing you need the following key items

1. A stamp (hand made or store bought)
2. A small notepad/sketchbook
3. A stamp pad

You basically look up clues from people who have hidden a letterbox (normally a plastic container that holds a stamp and a small notepad) and once you find it, you stamp your signature stamp in the letterbox pad with your letterbox alias and the current date. Then you take the stamp from the letterbox and stamp it into your own pad with the date, and re-hide the box for the next person.

I really wanted to go letterboxing this weekend, but some of the plans we had fell through, so I decided to start on what my boyfriend requested as his stamp. Yes, I am dragging him with me when I do this. 

He requested the following image as a stamp:

It's the main logo from the anime series Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. I got out my carving tool and my little rubber disc and got to carving my little heart out! 

Not so bad if I say so myself! The carved version is a lot fatter, but all in all I'm happy with it and so is the boyfriend! Now to decide what I want to do for my stamp! Octopus or a pokemon? I CAN'T DECIDE!

Things to do before Craftmas Day

• Finish cupcake scarf
• Sew label onto granny square blanket
• finish crocheting little cousin's dog amigurumi (complete with leash in collar)
• start crocheting little cousin's older brother a deer amigurumi
• duct tape right wrist back to hand after intense crocheting session(s)
• Complete the task of wrapping the rest of Christmas and Craftmas presents.

I feel somewhat overwhelmed. Hopefully I will have the time to be productive tomorrow...

Craftmas- Finished : Sushi Scarf

Well, remember when I said I would post progress everyday of Craftmas?

I lied. I'm oh so very lucky if I can get everything I wanted to make people actually DONE before Christmas...
I swear, I had every intention of posting every day. Except finals happened, and so did a dead camera battery...

Anywho, back to Craftmas! I finished the sushi scarf! I really hope my friend will LOVE it as it took me WAY longer than I expected to complete it. There's a lot of individual crocheting and then sewing everything together and hiding ends of yarn in everything...well, let's just say I'm glad I'm done.

PICTURE TIME!

This is the whole thing! I left a few pieces off since I was tired of sewing (and losing maki pieces didn't help either) and I actually got so into the project that I didn't pay attention to how the book said to assemble it, so the fish ones would have looked wonky. I just left off with shrimp, because shrimp is always a good stopping point.

Two closeups of some of the helpings of sushi...

I also got super excited because I purchased some crochet labels to sew on the back of my projects as a label . I hand stitched my name on the label, and I'm really happy with the way it looks. Very close to my actual handwriting if I do say so myself :)

I can't wait to give it to my friend! I know she'll love it and I can't wait to see her wear it around :D