FRUIT SKEWERS

We love these things, because we love fruit! Except for Thomas - he doesn't like fruit. In my book, if you don't like fruit you are weird:) Just kidding! But how could someone NOT like fruit. There are so many different kinds to choose from and in so many beautiful colors.

As for our family, one of our favorites is watermelon. Thanks to my father-in-law, we get them all summer long for free. He has the best home-grown watermelons around. We can't wait for a visit from Pappy to get a few watermelons. The kids and I will eat watermelon non-stop in the summer time.

We also have many other fruits we love to enjoy. We only chose our favorites for this particular bunch of fruit skewers. My kids love to put these together. Of course, some end up with missing pieces because they eat them along the way. But that's part of it, right?

The easy thing about putting together fruit skewers is that there is no wrong way to make them! The how to is very simple! Get fruit skewers and your favorite fruit and start working!

We used watermelon, cantaloupe, grapes, strawberries and pineapple!

Watermelon

Cantaloupe

Grapes

Strawberries

Pineapple

These fruit skewers are pressed into the top of a watermelon. The watermelon was cut in half and hollowed out. Turn it over and place it on a plate or platter and place the skewers however you would like. Now you have a nice display of fruit. These can be used for all different occasions! Parties, showers, graduations or just to eat for fun!

Projects

Mini Badge Album
Fabric Covered Elastic Headbands
Valentine Shirts
Christmas Tree Shirt
Turkey Shirt
Trick or Treat Bags
Fabric Covered Wall Art

Digital Art Canvas

Painted Wooden Beaded Sports Necklace
Surprise Play Dough
Tutu
Painted Linoleum Mats
Applique
Fabric Covered Buttons, Ponytail Holders, and Magnets
Light Tent
Flower Pinwheel

Recipes

Red, White, & Blue Salad
Crock Pot Chicken Chili and Potato Soup #2
Crock Pot Potato Soup
Taco Soup
Chocolate Chip Muffins

Crunchy Romaine Strawberry Salad
Choco Hoto Pots
Football Brownies

Butterfinger Cake

Chocolate Caramel Pretzel Sticks

Lemonade

Peach Cobbler

Cinnamon Rolls
Fruit Skewers
Peanut Butter Cow Patties
Barbie Cups
Cornflake Clusters

How to Make Peanut Butter Cow Patties

These Peanut Butter Cow Patties are so delicious and very easy to make! Our mom was given this recipe a long time ago from a friend and it's been one of her favorites! You should definitely try it!!

Ingredients:

2 cups sugar

1 stick margarine

3/4 cup evaporated milk

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup peanut butter

2 cups oatmeal

1. Bring sugar, butter, and milk to a boil over medium heat.

This is what it looks like when the butter has melted and everything is combined.

2. When it starts boiling cook for 4 more minutes, stirring constantly. The picture above shows what it looks like when it begins to boil but you don't start your 4 minutes until it looks like the picture below.

Start your 4 minute timer now.

3. After the 4 minutes, remove from heat and add the remaining ingredients. Peanut Butter.

Vanilla

And Oats.

4. Stir everything together.

5. Drop tsp fulls on wax paper. It helps to spray the wax paper first to prevent from sticking. Leave them sitting for about an hour or until they harden.

Enjoy!

Another Treasury!!

We were featured in an Etsy Treasury!! How exciting!!

Click the picture to go directly to Etsy's treasury page!

HOW TO MAKE FABRIC COVERED BUTTONS, PONYTAIL HOLDERS, and MAGNETS

Supplies: Button Cover Kit, fabric, pliers, fabric, magnets, ponytail holder, glue

The first 4 directions are on the back of the button kit itself. This shows you how to make a simple button.

1. Cut out fabric circle that is twice the size of the button.

2. Center the fabric, wrong side up, and button shell over button maker, push into button maker (white object).

3. Tuck in fabric.

4. Using Pusher (blue object), snap back into shell.

To add a magnet, simply remove the wire on the back with your pliers before you begin. Then follow steps 1-4. Finally, glue the magnet onto the back on the button.

To make a ponytail holder button simply remove the wire using your pliers. Then, put your ponytail holder in the loop. Using your pliers, bend the wire back into the back just as it was before. Now, follow steps 1-4.

You can look at the pictures below to see how everything was done!!

WE HAVE A WINNER!

Congratulations Kimberly! You just won a Williams Sonoma 12 cup muffin pan!!

A big thanks to all that entered! Keep checking back for more exciting giveaways!!

BARBIE CUPS and a GIVEAWAY!!

Some of you may know what Barbie cups are and others may not. They have been around in our family for as long as we can remember. We thought our mom made it up herself, but more than likely many moms have made this recipe without even knowing it. Mom just always called them "Barbie cups." Here is the quick how to!

Ingredients include:

Hamburger meat, your favorite barbecue sauce, Grands buttermilk biscuits and cheese

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

First, you cook the hamburger meat and strain it. Next, add your favorite barbecue sauce to the hamburger meat. At this point you can add any of your favorite ingredients to the hamburger meat to enhance the taste. You could try a little brown sugar, onions, ketchup or green peppers. Whatever your family likes best. Mix the meat and sauce in a bowl.

Now, open the can of biscuits and flatten them out. Lay them each in a muffin tin opening leaving a large dip in the center. This is where the hamburger meat will go. We love to use the Grands buttermilk can biscuits, but you can also use a regular size biscuit. We like them big and chunky!

Now, place spoonfuls of the meat inside the biscuits and place in oven at 350 degrees for 15 minutes.

After they come out of the oven, sprinkle some cheese and now you have a wonderful dish. Our kids love these! Hope you try them!

And now for our GIVEAWAY from

a commercial quality 12 cup muffin pan!

To enter all you have to do is leave us your favorite thing to make in a muffin pan. Leave this in the comments section along with an e-mail address or way to reach you. All comments are automatically numbered and one will be randomly selected using http://www.random.org/ to win the muffin pan. Only 1 comment per person allowed.

Contest will end at 10:00pm Friday night - May 22

Winner will be announced Saturday morning

GOOD LUCK !!

This contest has ended! Thank you to all who entered!

How to Make a Light Tent for Taking Pictures with White Background

Here are instuctions for creating a light tent that will help your photos look like they have a pure white background. Have you ever noticed pictures of objects that look like they are almost floating on the screen? You can achieve this by using a homemade light tent. We are certainly not photographers but just by doing a little research we've found that it can be easily done by a few materials and a little photo editing. If you need to sell an item on ebay, etsy, or any other online shop this is a great tool for you to use can inhance your pictures! Here is our version of a light tent.

Please Read All Instructions Before Beginning

Materials Needed:

*2 sheets of white foam board (If you wait until they are 50% off at Hobby Lobby you will only pay 99 cents for each.)

*Vellum paper (This is a transluscent paper you can get at Hobby Lobby. Really you can use any material that you can see through...white fabric, light interfacing)

*1 white poster board

*clear packaging tape

*ruler

*knife or razor blade

1. Measure and draw a line every 2 inches all the way down one piece of the 20x30 foam board. When you finish you will have 15 sections that measure 2x20.

2. Using your knife cut down each line until each section is separated.

3. Take your other foam board and draw only 5 lines this time, just like before, every 2 inches down your board until you get to 10 inches. You should see that you now have 5 long sections and one large square.

4. Cut through the lines of this board and now you should have 20- 2x20 long pieces and one 20x20 square.

5. Now you are going to take 10 of your 2x20 sections and cut 4 inches off of each of them. Now you have 10 pieces that are 2x20 and 10 that are 2x16.

6. Take 2 of your 2x20 pieces and 2 of your 2x16 pieces and lay them accordingly. Longest on the sides and shorter on top and bottom. You will be making a square and then tape each end together. The pieces do not need to be on top of each other when you are taping, only closely beside each other. Once you have one side taped together, flip it over and tape the other side as well. This is necessary for them to hold together securely.

7. Repeat #6 until you have 4 large squares that have been taped together.

8. Take your one large square (from #3) and one of your pieced together squares. Tape them together as shown above.

9. Continue adding the other 3 sides. You should have one taped square left and it will be used for step #11.

10. You need to cut 2 inches off your poster board all the way down the longest side so it will fit inside your box. Sit your poster board in the box and tape as shown above.

11. Now you can add the last taped square to the top of your light tent. Tape accordingly and securely.

12. You will need to cut 4 squares from your vellum paper. 18x18 pieces work well. Tape on to 3 sides leaving the front side open. Cover the top as well.
13. You can use 1 lamp or in the picture above three different lamps are used. The more lights the better. The desk lamps on the side were purchased for $5 each from Target. You will need to buy n:vision flourescent daylight bulbs and you can get them at Home Depot.

13. After a little photo editing using Gimp (a free photo editing program) with the brightness and contrast, here is the final photograph.

Good luck! Let us know when you try it or if you have already!