Holidays

I realize it’s a bit silly to post a Fourth of July specific recipe on the Fifth of July. But I just have to share this recipe with you! It definitely doesn’t have to be Fourth of July specific – berries and cream are good on any summer day.

The first time I ever made this shortcake, I brought it to a party, cut myself a piece, and walked away to chat with friends. I turned around no more than 10 minutes later to see an old man literally scooping up the last bits of whipped cream and berries from an empty platter with his fingers. I knew then that this would be my go-to summer dessert to impress. I make it a point to make this recipe for at least one potluck every summer.

Summer Shortcake

modified ever so slightly from Martha Stewart’s recipe

Shortcake ingredients:

• 2.5 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. coarse salt
• 1 stick (8 Tbsp.) cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2″ pieces
• 8 oz. cold cream cheese, cut into 2″ pieces
• 3/4 cups buttermilk, plus more for brushing
• Raw sugar for sprinkling

Filling ingredients:

• 2 pints blueberries
• 2 pints strawberries, hulled
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 2 cups (1 pint) heavy whipping cream

Directions:

1. Make the shortcake: Using a food processor or pastry blender, mix together flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt until combined. Add butter, and blend until largest pieces are the size of peas. Add cream cheese, and blend again until largest pieces are the size of peas. Add buttermilk, and blend until dough comes together.
2. Gently knead into a ball, wrap in plastic wrap, and let rest in refrigerator for at least 1 hour (or overnight).
3. Divide dough in half. Working with one half at a time on a lightly floured work surface, pat into a disk, then roll into 10-inch round. Transfer to a baking sheet.
4. Brush biscuits with buttermilk. Generously sprinkle with raw sugar.
5. Bake until dough has risen slightly and is golden brown, 12-15 minutes.
6. Leave biscuits on sheets. Using a 2.5″ star cookie cutter, cut out (but do not remove) 6 stars from one biscuit while it is still warm (careful, a metal cookie cutter can get quite hot in this process! ouch!). Let cool.
7. Using a paring knife, carefully remove star shapes. Snack on the stars (yum!).
8. Make the filling: Combine blueberries, strawberries, and 1/4 cup sugar, and let macerate until juicy, 10 minutes.
9. Beat cream to whipped cream with the vanilla and 1/4 cup sugar.
10. Assemble the cake: Place uncut shortcake on a large plate. Spoon half the berries and their juices on top, then spread the whipped cream over berries. Top with all but 1/2 cup berries. Make sure surface is even to support the top shortcake and prevent it from breaking. Carefully place cutout shortcake on top. Fill star cutouts with reserved berries.
11. Serve immediately, or refrigerate, uncovered, up to 3 hours.

Eeks, I just set up my very first item for sale on esty! If you didn’t win a calendar in my contest last month, you can buy one in my brand spanking new etsy shop.

My father-in-law also recently set up an etsy shop. He is making these awesome Euchre counters! (I know, who knew there was a fancy way to keep score in Euchre besides using a 4 and a 6?!) These would be a great gift for any of those Midwestern Euchre fans out there. You can find them in his etsy shop.

It’s a month of firsts for me! My first wedding anniversary, first blogiversary, first craft sale, and first CONTEST!

I made these letterpress calendars to sell at the craft sale this weekend. For the holidays New Years, Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, Memorial Day, 4th of July, Labor Day, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, there is a cute little holiday picture instead of the date. They fit into an empty CD case for display. I think they would be perfect for the office!

To win a calendar, simply leave a comment by Thanksgiving Day telling me your favorite holiday and why. I will pick one comment at random to determine who the winner is! Be sure to leave some way for me to get in contact with you. I am happy to ship internationally.

Here’s to another year! Thanks for reading!

Dave and I headed to Bend, Oregon this weekend to celebrate our first wedding anniversary. We had to drive through the Cascades to get there from Eugene. It was a beautiful drive, until we suddenly hit a blizzard. Eeeks! We are used to winter driving from Wisconsin, but Wisconsin doesn’t have very many curvy roads on the sides of mountains. Even though the snow was kind of scary, it was gorgeous in that first snow of the season kind of way. Or maybe I just say that because we made it safely through and enjoyed a relaxing mini-vacation in Bend before returning home on snow-free roads.

I broke out my gocco tonight to print up some snowflake Christmas cards. In Eugene, I just have to enjoy the gray rain outside and make my own bright winter snow!

Thanks everyone for your encouragement about my first craft booth. I have a lot of work to do in the next two weeks!! My goal is simply to have enough items to fill up a table. Maybe some day I’ll make the goal to sell something.

Halloween is over, which means it’s time to start on Christmas crafts! From reading other blogs, it actually looks like I’m a few months behind. But I just can’t bring myself to start in earnest until November officially begins.

Somehow I agreed to share a craft booth with a friend at the end of the month. Eeeks!! Right when I thought my life would slow down and I could just relax. This will be my first time ever trying to sell my crafts. I am SUPER nervous about it! But also excited, because maybe this will be the kick in the pants that I need.

I started out small, making these little reindeer tags on my gocco. For the paper I used recycled manila folders and some cardstock I found at a reuse store. I think they are cute, but am still nervous about the prospect of attempting to sell them. Do any of you crafters out there also have a really hard time accepting that someone may spend money on something that you made? Hopefully jumping into this craft fair will help get me over my neuroses.

Good luck to everyone getting a start on holiday crafting!

As you can see from the few opened presents under the tree, Dave and I already exchanged our gifts. And he got me a gocco!!!!

For those of you who don’t know what a gocco is, here is a great video about it. I can’t wait to start printing to my hearts content.

Merry Christmas everyone!!

Growing up, I loved to wake up everyday in December and pin a new ornament on our advent calendar tree. I think my sister made this one, plus a few others to sell at craft fairs. A few years ago I stole it from my parents house so I could have one of my own. Dave thinks it’s kind of an ugly piece of burlap, but it holds a close place in my heart! Only 5 more ornaments until Christmas!

I’ve been busy baking Christmas cookies, since our first Christmas celebration is this weekend. I made cowboy cookies (I’m currently obsessed with this recipe – you must give it a try!), sugar cookies (from an old family recipe), and brown sugar and walnut rugelach (I made these for the first time. I learned from Wikipedia that they are a German Jewish sweet. They are quite good!). See the recipes below the cut.

I also read this NY Times article about butter, and have made the vow never to microwave butter again.

Read the rest of this entry »

I know it seems a bit early to start making Christmas decorations, but I’m so excited about the holidays! I decided to spend the evening making a wreath to give as a hostess gift for Thanksgiving. Making your own wreath is way easier than you would imagine, and very inexpensive. I spent $4 on freshly cut greens (free if you’ve got a yard with evergreens!), $2 on a metal wreath frame (that can be reused year after year), and $5 on decorations.

Step 1: Gather supplies

You will need:

Metal wreath frame (found at any craft store)

1-2 large bundles of evergreen boughs (Douglas fir, Hemlock, Spruce, or a combination of the 3)

Pruning shears

Thin green wire

Wire cutters

Gardening gloves (to keep your hands from getting all poked up!)

Decorations (ribbons, small ornaments, cookie cutters, candy, anything your heart desires)

Step 2: Prepare greens and wire

Use pruning shears to cut greens into 6″-8″ sections. Don’t worry about each one being perfect -  you want your wreath to have a natural look. You will be able to hide any pieces with cut tops in the back while still giving fullness to the wreath.

Also cut about twenty (20) 15″ pieces of wire.

Step 3: Bundle greens

Make a bundle of 4-5 greens. Be sure to put the nice and full tips in the front.

Step 4: Attach to frame

Place your bundle along the metal frame. Lay a piece of wire across the bundle about 2/3 down from the tip. Carefully flip the frame over and twist wire tightly on the back. Trim wire ends.

Step 5: Work your way around the frame

Make another bundle of 4-5 greens. Place the new bundle so that only the top 1/3 of the secured bundle is showing. Repeat step 4. Continue until the whole frame is covered.

Step 6: Decorate!

Tie a big bow and attach your decorations. Have fun! Attach cookie cutters or actual cookies! Wrap with popcorn strings! Tie on little toy trucks! Use it as your canvas and be creative.