Homemade Gluten Free Dairy Free Pop Tarts

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!
 
I guess I should explain something.
Since September my younger brother and I have been off wheat and dairy due to what maybe allergies. 

SO! Since we started our new wheat free and dairy free diet, I've had to come up with some new alternatives to food. My mom found this recipe for gluten free pop tarts on Simply Gluten Free.

They looked amazing!

But the tasted bleh! I discovered it was probably due to the expired shortening I used. {who knew shortening could expire?!}

So I tried again and here's what I got...








I tried smores...




....and just plain chocolate....





....and even some blueberry!





They tasted great too!

After my first attempted, I decided to go ahead and use a pie crust recipe instead of Simple Gluten Free's Pop Tart crust. So I used her Gluten free pie crust recipe and then followed her Pop Tart directions. I wanted something a little sturdier. Although while the pie crust was sturdier, it tasted like a pie crust--so if you want a pastry crust use the Pop Tart recipe. At the same time the blueberry pop tart tasted like a blueberry pie. Yum!


Here's what I did for fillings...

Smore filling:
1 1/2 T of marshmallow creme/mini marshmallows {I had made my own marshmallow creme that I needed to use}
 1 1/2 T Chocolate Chips/Hershey Chocolate

Spread marshmallow creme onto center of tart. Sprinkle with chocolate chips. {My creme kind exploded but it still left the most delicious marshmallow flavor!} 

Blueberry Filling:
1 1/2 T Blueberry Jelly {we make our own}
1-2 t sugar

Spread Jelly over tart and sprinkle with sugar. 

Chocolate
2 T chocolate chips

Melt chocolate chips in microwave in 15 second intervolves. Stir and place in center of pop tart. I also melted my chocolate chips with an 1/8-1/4 t of butter, but I don't think its necessary.

Have fun trying your own pop tarts!

Linking up with- Just Winging It Tatertots and Jello , Flamingo Toes, The Well Crafted Home, The Grant Life,  One Artsy Mama  

Give Thanks

Happy Thanksgiving!

Gluten Free Dairy Free Mini Pecan Pies

Pecan Pie is my favorite fall dessert.

It's also the worst pie you can eat for Thanksgiving with around 600 calories a piece! Not idle..

This year I made mini pecan pies, but also cute the sugar down by about half but these things still taste oh so good! Not too sweet, but sweet enough and lots of nuts! Yum!!

Its impossible to just each one. Mmmm....









Here's my version: Makes Approximately 36 mini pies.

1 1/2 worth of pie crust dough.**
3 eggs 
1/2 corn syrup 
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 sugar
1/3 cup butter
1 1/2 cups pecans halves of pieces (I ended up using more, I like mine nutty) 

1. Lightly Beat eggs.
2. Add corn syrup, sugar, butter and vanilla extract. Stir until completely blended.
3. Add Pecans and stir.
5. Pull out your mini cupcakes tins and grease each tin, make sure you get the sides or your pies won't come out!
4. Roll out your pie dough. Cut circles using a cup or cookie cutter and place into the greased mini cupcake tins. (Bakerella has an excellent picture tutorial on how this is done!)
5. Pour 1 heaping Tablespoon on pie mix into each pie crust.

I was able to get 36 mini pies, which took about 1 1/2 worth of pie crusts. Bake at 350 for about 15 minutes, or until the edges are slightly brown. They might look a little foamy on top, that's ok!  Take them out and let them cool. If making a regular pie bake for 45 minutes, covering the pie edges for the first 25 minutes of baking.

**I use Simply Gluten Free's Pie Crust Recipe.. oh so good, fast and easy!




Linking up with- Tatertots and Jello , Flamingo Toes, The Well Crafted Home, The Grant Life,  One Artsy Mama 

Thread Rack

I got this idea from The Creative Homemaker.  This was something I really needed! Ever since I bought those 64ish embroidery threads spools.


I
Love
it!



Its not perfect, but exactly what I needed. Again my dad did all the work. But I used some simple plywood strips and made it about 24"x24". It doesn't look quite so crooked in my room...



For an added piece I painted an old piece of wood I had and glued "thread" {which I cut with my silhouette, just some card stock} with mod podge.

'til next time! 





Linking up with- Tatertots and Jello , Flamingo Toes, The Well Crafted Home, The Grant Life,  One Artsy Mama 

Fall is Here!

Photo Credit: Allison Griffin

Fall is here! Its actually getting cool enough to wear long sleeves.  Time to pull out the jackets. {I don't do sweaters} :)

Room Reveal {Finally}

I guess I could just say I'm Back... again.

Every once in a while I'll have this thought "I should go post something".

But I never quiet get around too it. Well here I am! Finally!
 
My room's not quite finished, not sure if it will every be 'finished', but I was able to accomplish quite a lot over the summer. (which was how long ago?!)

Then Allison took her camera to China. :(

And I got really busy.

But I have finally settled down to show you the big reveal!


>

New shelves, hanging basket, mason jars, flowers, bows, mirror, pin and needles, sewing machine.
What could be better?
I mainly did one wall in my room {which was empty} adding the shelves, mirror and baskets. I love how it turned out! Thanks to my dad for helping my with this project! He bought the wood, hardware and put it together.

My cubicle which also holds my fabric bolts. Plus my fabric bulletin board.

Homemade flower accents and bows.

Hooks to hold a few diaper bags.

Mason jars to hold my scissors, pencils, pens, and anything else.

Embroidery Hoop projects. Sew on shop labels. Pins. Mason Jar with elastic.

Add some buttons, lace and homemade flowers. I painted the shelves a lighter green than my wall and 'tried' to distress it with brown undertones. It didn't turn out perfect, but that's ok.



Don't worry I'm not addicted to Star Bucks! {to be honest I've only been there once} But they make great button jars!



I also have a new thread rack! {YES!} Which I'll share next week. :)



Linking up with- Tatertots and Jello , Flamingo Toes, The Well Crafted Home, The Grant Life,  One Artsy Mama 

Tuesday 11:12 PM

I'm Back!

Actually I never left. :)
But for the past 4 1/2 weeks my two older siblings were in China and they just got back! (YAY)

But Allison's took her camera, so I was left a little... picture-less. We have a little point-n-shoot but it wasn't the same.

I'm back with pictures and news.

Packaging Your Etsy Items (Part 2)

I'm back with another great and inexpensive way to  packaging you Etsy items.

If your selling handmade items your most likely a creative crafty person and want to reflect that in how you package. But you don't have to be a scrapbook expert or a avid sewing to get these great packing styles.

If you sew (like me) your likely to have tons of fabric scraps on hand perfect for this packaging style.




But if you don't sew and you don't want to go off and buy a few yards of fabric then here's a quick and inexpensive way to package using scrapbook paper!



This is best for smaller size items because the paper is only 12" long, but I also taped 2-3 pieces together to get a longer strip.



All you need is some tissue paper, tape, paper cutter, paper stack and your item.



1) Start by wrapping your item in  tissue paper/kraft paper. I use 2 sheet of tissue paper for larger items and one for smaller ones.



Pick two coordinating papers. Cut a 3" for one and a 2" from the other. I used two 12" pieces taped together to get a 23" piece. This is where a paperstack comes in handy. Most of the time you can get these half off for $8-$10 with 48 sheets of paper. Plus most (if not all) coordinate together.



Trim down if necessary and tape into place.



Now just add a thank you circle, sticker or even your business card. I made these thank yous circles with my silhouette.



A great, fun and easy to to package your items. Plus they look great too. :)

Linking up with- Tatertots and Jello , Flamingo Toes, The Well Crafted Home, The Grant Life,  One Artsy Mama 

Packaging Your Etsy Items (Part 1)

The other day I went packing happy. Meaning I had a great idea and before I knew it I had packaged over half my items.

Would you like to see?




I must say, I really love how they turned out! Why didn't I think of this before? You can use your fabric scraps to beautifully package all your Etsy items. :)




All it takes is some tape, tissue paper, your item and some fabric scraps/ribbon/twine.

Here's the easy process:

1) Grab your item and wrap it in some tissue paper or kraft paper. I used to use kraft paper but when I started running out I just switched to tissue paper. I use 2 sheet for larger size items and one for smaller ones.

2) Grab a piece of fabric and cut it down to 3" wide x "amount need to wrap around item".  Wrap it around your item securing it with tape in the back. I used a painters drop-cloth for some of these and some cheap $3yrd muslin for others. You could also use kaki, or any solid.




3) Grab a ribbon, twine, or another fabric scrap and cut it about 1"-2"wide x 1.5 the length of your previous piece. (in other words so it can wrap around your item 1 1/2 times) Wrap around a tie a knot in the front.

There you have it! A super cute way to package item for all you sewers out there!



Now you can go and wrap all your stock items! Or if you rather wait until it sells BUT want to make packaging really easy simply pre-cut a basket full of different sized scraps to have on hand. What took the longest for me what determining which fabric I was going to use on each package. :)



Since I did pre-wrap at least 20 packages I also labeled them so I knew what was in them. Because I used tissue paper I could still see the print on the back side, but to make it quick after I wrapped it a stuck a little note on it with the prints pattern.












And for all you non-sewers out there I'll show you another easy and inexpensive way to package your items next week.


Linking up with- Tatertots and Jello , Flamingo Toes, The Well Crafted Home, The Grant Life,  One Artsy Mama