Macarons

Back in January, a friend and I took a class on making French Macarons (not to be confused with macaroons - an entirely different, and if I may say so, lesser entity.  Macaroons are hard, splintery things that are often reduced to crushed tasteless powder, whereas macarons are decadent, light-as-air, melt-in-your-mouth confections of happiness).

ANYWAY, the class was fabulous, and I bought ingredients with every intention of making this glorious little bites of wonder on a weekly basis.  My best intentions are quickly paving the road to nowhere, because it took me til April to finally commit an entire Saturday to making them (also required a shopping trip to purchase fresh ingredients).  The results were better than expected (though I learned my gas oven is not kind to macarons on the bottom tier - something in the air flow does strange things to them, and blows them up like little balloons that subsequently crack and the "foot" gets misplaced, spewing out from the top rather than at the sides).  This round I made:

• Lemon macarons, filled with lemon curd - possibly my most favorite thing in all the world.  They taste like summer.  I could eat my way out of a tub of them.
• Chocolate macarons, filled with expresso & almond infused buttercream
• Chocolate macarons, filled with raspberry buttercream
• Pink macarons, filled with whipped chocolate ganache
• Mint macarons (colored the appropriate light green), filled with chocolate ganache

Hopefully it won't take me another 4 months to make these confections again!

Coloring Book

I have always loved to color, but have never had much patience for really working on a picture to make it look just right.  However, I rethought my whole coloring method recently.  A friend gifted me with a bucket full of the most gorgeous bouquet of colored pencils you've ever seen, so I thought it high time I put them to use.  This conveniently coincided with a visit to my much more artistic sister, and she loaned me a wonderful book called The Colored Pencil Painting Bible.   Below are my first attempts to work through the exercises.

This was supposed to be a pear, but I think it looks like a halved avocado.

 



 

 

Calendar Making

I saw this idea at the little bit of heaven on earth known as PaperSource (at least to those of us who revel in all things paper-related).  It's a do-it-yourself desk calendar kit where they provide the beautifully printed basic calendar, and you decorate it as you wish.  This is my version, which will be soon gracing my friend Ruth's desk as a belated birthday gift.

Caramel Apple Scones

Autumn has arrived, and as any true resident of Michigan knows, the season of apple-picking, hayrides, cinnamon donuts and apple cider has also arrived.

In this spirit (and unwittingly, just as the official beginning of fall arrived), I made the trek to the beautiful Erwin Orchards, and picked my peck of apples (Northern Spy and Gala), chased my friend's kids through hay bales, and had my requisite donut (but passed on the cider - I know, I'm strange, but I really can't stand the stuff).

Back at home, I contemplated what to do with all those apples.  My many cookbooks yielded nothing of interest, so I moved on to the internet.  After much waffling, I landed on apple butter and caramel apple scones.  The apple butter is burbling away in my crockpot, and I hope it turns out - I guessimated on measurements, which is always a risky business.  If nothing else, my apartment smells AMAZING.

In the meantime, I decided to whip up the caramel apple scones.  And by "whip up" I mean forgetting to read the recipe through, doubling it, bemoaning the fact that I had insufficient ingredients, and then making some unorthodox substitutions (thus is the general nature of my baking). 

Anyway, the result is below, and they taste delicious, likely inspite of me. (I ate a few crumbs, my roommate ate a broken one, and I might have to eat another one that doesn't meet the standards of perfection).  Happy first day of autumn indeed!

The Wise Little Owl

So, since I did it for one niece, I felt I had to uphold tradition and do the same for my next one (at the time of this post, imminently due to arrive...actually fashionably late). So, back to good ol' Google for ideas on cute stuffed animals. And bingo - I found a super cute owl, which goes with this little girl's nursery theme. I don't think there were directions attached to the one I found, so I printed out the picture, and pretty much eye-balled the pattern. This method is not for the faint of heart (nor for those with limited fabric!). However, I do think this little wise owl turned out rather well, and will no doubt guard the nursery with dignity and aplomb.

My only regret here is that her wings look a bit like airplane wings ready for take-off, as opposed to bird wings, but I guess I'll know that for next time.

The Pink Giraffe

I occasionally get bit with a desire to "make something" and such an inspiration came over me when contemplating a shower gift for my first niece. I did some online searching for cute stuffed toys, and found a picture of the most adorable stuffed giraffe. Since my sister-in-law had some giraffes in the nursery decor, I decided it would be perfect.

I was unable to get the template attached to the picture to print properly, but decided I could do it just as well myself. I drew out a pattern on scrap paper (several revisions were necessary), cut out nice pattern pieces from tracing paper, and then the fabric - totally adorable pink gingham. I think it took me about 5 hours of solid sewing (including a late decision to add brown yarn hair). Sewing in the stuffing guts is a bit of a trial, but worth it in the end. I may have cut the legs a bit too narrow, as this giraffe mimics its real baby counterpart and has trouble standing on said spindly legs.

Traveling Stories

 

What could a princess, a dragon, and a

hot dog vendor have in common?

Or a dwarf, a woodsman, and a pig?

And why would a moose be envious of

a mouse, friend to a dancing bear?

The answers to these burning questions

 are within the pages of this book, a

collection of nonsense stories,

born of a game to while away the many

miles traveled to a summer family gathering.

                                                                                         

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is my first published book, thanks to the wonderfulness

that is createspace.  There are three

stories included in this compilation, composed by my

siblings and sisters-in-law one summer.  I have retold

them to the best of my memory (and possibly with some, or

considerable, embellishment) and then illustrated them.

It was a fun project, and I couldn't have completed it without

my sister, who is a genius at formatting, editing, and just

making sure things look the way they should.

We learned a lot about self-publishing, and I hope to utilize

that knowledge in future projects.

 

Should you wish to have your very own copy, click on the

link below to get to Amazon and order away!

Traveling Stories