Fill Your Heart with Love

Or M&Ms. 
Or ice cream. 
Or Hershey's Kisses.
Or whatever your heart desires.

These heart-shaped treasure boxes are made from a simple batch of brownies. Just bake a pan of brownies. Cut the shapes with a heart cookie cutter. Press them into acrylic, heart-shaped molds. Fill them up with your favorite treat, and seal them shut with a dab of frosting.

They're sure to bring a smile to your loved one's lips.

The complete tutorial and photos are at SheKnows.

Fruit Roll-up Fortune Cookies

This could be, quite possibly, the easiest thing I've ever made.

Fruit roll-ups that look like fortune cookies. The only trick is, you gotta write your "fortunes" on some kind of paper that won't stick to the fruit roll-up - like parchment paper or a plastic Tyvek envelope.

Also, it's not as easy to find solid, red fruit roll-ups as you would think. So many of them in the store are tie-dyed or have some kind of crazy tongue tattoo print. Ugh. These are actually 2-toned (yellow & red) roll-ups. I just put the yellow flavor on the inside. 

So simple. So cute. Why can't all my ideas be like this?

Follow these easy, step-by-step instructions at SheKnows.com.

Pop-up Punxsutawney Phil Cookies

This ridiculously fun and easy-to-make groundhog cookie occupied my thoughts and dreams for weeks. Seriously, just ask my husband. I was completely obsessed with creating an edible version of Punxsutawney Phil that you could move up and down. (Insert much-deserved kuddos to Eric, for making this animated gif. It really helps sell the fun factor of this cookie. If it's not already moving, click on the top image.)

After five or six failed attempts, and about 10 trips to the grocery store later.... I'm happy with how they finally came together. Just  a simple chocolate no-bake cookie, on top of a Tootsie Roll groundhog, sandwiched to a Keebler Fudge Stripe Cookie (or any cookie with a hole big enough for your finger.) 

The complete recipe and assembly instructions can be found at SheKnows.com.

Go ahead, play with your food!

Wanna add some snow to his mound? Just sprinkle some powdered sugar on top.

Love Bites

Wanna learn how to make a fabulous dessert table for your next party? 

Then join me Saturday, February 2nd at 10 a.m. for another Social class at Adriene Rathbun's house.

The theme for our table will be: LOVE BITES. I'll share some of my simple Valetine's Day treat ideas, show you how to create an entire display of edible art, and BONUS: you can learn from all of my previous dessert table mistakes.

Plus, you'll leave with a ton of treats to share with your loved ones.

Class size is limited, so sign up at Social today! 

P.S.
Here are a few links to some of my previous dessert table adventures:
You are the Sweet to My Salty
Visions of Sugarplums
Home Sweet Home
Vintage Book Baby Shower

Super Bowl Slushie?

Halftime Hooch? 
First & Ten Frosty?

I couldn't quite decide what to name these dessert cocktails that I concocted for a recent tutorial on SheKnows.com.  They'd be perfect for tailgating, or a Super Bowl party. (My favorite part is the little field-goal straw.)

I'm typically a baker, not a bartender. But I have to admit, these are downright delicious. A dash of Medori liquor, some rum, lime sherbet, crushed ice and spinach. Yes, you read that right... spinach. But don't worry. It's only for the green color. You can't taste it AT ALL. I promise. The complete dessert cocktail recipe and instructions for making the field-goal straws and yard-line glasses can be found here.

Anyone know of a good First & Ten drinking game?

Funny Onesie

Our niece, Ashley, was due with her first baby on 12/12/12. 
Well.... 12/12/12 passed. 
And so did the next 11 days, before the little guy finally arrived on 12/23/12!

Just for fun, I made this silly onesie to welcome Archer, and to give his mom & dad a chuckle.

I've seen t-shirts with this saying before, but never a onesie. (Kinda perfect for a baby two weeks overdue, dontcha think?)

Anyway, the new little family is doing great. Haven't seen any photos of the baby in his new shirt yet. But from what I understand, he's got an entire closet full of Kansas Jayhawk apparel, so this might not make it into the rotation anytime soon. 

Better late than never. (Pun intended.)

Taking time to taste the snowflakes.

Happy New Year!

We've had some glorious time off work this week to enjoy family & friends, sleeping in & lounging around in our pajamas, and watching movies & catching a few snowflakes on our tongues.

My resolutions for 2013: simplify my home, see more live performances, and stop to enjoy the little things with my kids.

All Bea wanted for Christmas.....

... was her two front teeth.

It really happened. Bea lost both of her front teeth, just days before Christmas. She was all smiles showing her grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.

I asked her if she thought the tooth fairy might bring her a pink bunny Pillow Pet (since Santa had forgotten.. oops), and she said "Mom... the tooth fairy is too little. She can only carry small money."

Good point.

George Strait said it best.

I sure do like those Christmas cookies, sugar.

As the designated cookie-baker for my family, I always try to come up with a theme for my holiday treats. This year, I decided to bake one of the lyrics to George Strait's song: Christmas Cookies. Mostly because I wanted to surprise my brother, Kevin. He's a pretty phenomenal singer too, and this year, he professionally recorded a CD of Christmas tunes. Of course, Christmas Cookies was my favorite song on the album.

My brother, Kevin - singer & cookie-eater extraordinaire.

As you can see, it didn't take long for the nieces and nephews to eat their way through the batch. And make up some new words with the remaining letters.

Nephew, Tayler, rearranging the letters.

Bea, enjoying her mom's cookies.

Ice Skating Penguin Cookies

It's cookie-baking-palooza at our house.  Cookies for school parties. Cookies for office get-togethers. Cookies for family holiday gatherings. Cookies. Cookies. Cookies.

I made these ice skating penguin cookies for an office party at WSU this week. I used my favorite, simple, Kansas Sugar Cookie recipe, frosted with a light blue, lemon-y royal icing. The penguins are made from black licorice jelly beans. I added white chocolate eyes, bellies and skates, and used orange Nerd candies for the itty bitty beaks. If you look closely, you can see the little skate marks on the frosting "ice."

They made a fun & festive addition to our potluck party table.

* FYI... I made more of these for our family Christmas gatherings and couldn't find any more black jelly beans for the penguins, so I used Junior Mints instead. They were just as cute, and even more refreshing!

This made me laugh.

From Dog House Diaries, found on This Isn't Happiness.

The Good Life, with Guy Bower

I had the pleasure of chatting with Guy Bower today on KNSS radio. Guy hosts a talk radio program - The Good Life - every Saturday from noon to 1:00 pm, and I was his in-studio guest to discuss SheKnows.com and my recent recipe adventures with them.

What a great guy, that Guy! (No pun intended.) We visited like old friends and the hour just flew by. Amazing really, that we've never met before in this corner of the world called Wichita. There's a podcast available online, so click here if you'd like to have a listen.

This is the second radio interview I've done for my baking projects with SheKnows. Which seems kinda strange, since radio is all about hearing, and my stuff is all about seeing and tasting. Ha. Oh well. Who am I to question?

I hope the folks at SheKnows are happy with the interview. Guy did a phenomenal job of promoting their website as well as all of my projects. It's always enjoyable to see (and hear from) others who are excited about my crazy baking.

It was a lot of fun, and bonus - he even gave me champagne to drink! (His second guest was a woman from Barefoot Wine talking about their line of holiday bubbly, so it was only natural.) Don't mind if I do.

Cheers!

My view.

These two are pros. They were like a well oiled machine.

A glass of this at the beginning of the broadcast would have done wonders for my nerves.

I brought a few samples of my edible art.

Snowman Jello Shots

Snowman Jello Skewers?

Snowman Jello Kabobs?

Pina Colada Popsicles?

Frosty the Snowshot?

Holly Jolly Jello Fellows?

Call them whatever you want. I just call 'em fun.

Skewer up some simple snowman jello shots and serve a Christmas cocktail that's both clever and crafty.

Made with gelatine, rum and pina colada mix. Really easy. I swear. Check out SheKnows.com for the easy instructions.

Ho. Ho. Ho.

Christmas Canine Cookies

Bow-WOW! These little Wiener Dog Santa cookies turned out almost cuter than I imagined. I bought a dachshund cookie cutter back in August, not knowing what I wanted to do with it, but I just had to have it. Glad I did. This idea hit me on a Saturday night, and by Sunday morning these pups were baked and assembled in my kitchen.

To make them stand upright, I frosted two, molasses-sugar-cookie dogs together. Added some candy eyes and noses, a few Tootsie Rolls for the ears, and the festive hats & scarves are made out of red, white and blue Airheads candies. You can find the complete instructions at SheKnows.

They just make me smile.