Food

DIY Chalk Paint Halloween Apothecary Jars with BB Frösch Chalk Paint Powder

5 · Oct 29, 2014 · Leave a Comment

+ Guest Post by BB Frösch Master Jonelle Morris from Chalk-a-Lot +

EEK! It’s almost Halloween! I’m not one for the guts and gore of the holiday, but I do love me some fun Halloween decor. I have wanted to make an apothecary display for a few years now, but never got around to it thinking, “oh that will take too long,” or “that will be too expensive,” or “I wouldn’t make it look good.”

Well, since I have joined the BB Frösch team, I have been trying all sofrts of things I never thought I would do. I set out to good ol’ Michaels to see if they had any glass bottles I could turn into something amazing, and as luck would have it, they did!

And the best part, each one was a $1.29 or under—score! But my luck didn’t run out there. Most of their Halloween stuff was 50-60% off, so therefore I made my whole display with what I purchased at Michaels, plus a couple small things I already have for….drumroll….$25! Double score!

I wanted some of the bottles I made to be black, and thought I would put the “BB Frösch bonds to virtually anything” claim test. I started out with my plain glass bottles and put a quick few coats of BB Frösch chalk paint with some leftover black paint I had from another project. BB Frösch isn’t just for furniture!

And when I say quick, I mean quick. Three coats on those four bottles took me about 25 minutes, drying time included. I then took a wet rag to wet distressed the tops and corners of the bottles to create a more authentic vintage look. I chose to leave the other bottles clear, so I could put some water with food coloring inside.

Then, because I am cheap 🙂 I searched for free vintage apothecary labels online and found some awesome options! I printed them off on regular paper and Modge Podged them under and on top of the label.
I used the labels found here:

Two Crafty Paws

Love Manor

The Graphics Fairy

For some other wonderful options you can go here:
Lil’Luna

Then to complete my display, I printed a beautiful, but slightly creepy picture of an old Victorian house (that was most likely haunted) on burlap.

Yes, you read that right, I printed on burlap, as in on my home inkjet computer.

Amazing! You can find this easy to follow tutorial on Domestically Speaking. It seriously took me about 10 minutes. The graphic I used as well as several other vintage halloween images can be found on The Graphic’s Fairy.

There, I did something I never thought I could do, and quickly and inexpensively! Happy Halloween!

Chocolate Berry Pudding Surprise

1 · Oct 28, 2014 ·

+ Chocolate Berry Pudding Surprise +

Who doesn’t love to be surprised?

I ADORE a good surprise!!

This last weekend, I was hanging out with some of my favorite people…

This is my friend Sara Nitta and her sweet family. You may recognize her from The Biggest Loser season 11.

Isn’t she a cutie!! We were sitting around chatting the other day, talking about my blog work and stuff. I told her that I had a fun post coming up with Tofu…

Yes, tofu!

I already had a game plan in play and I was ready to share about my tofu adventure. To be quite frank… I really like tofu. I have never shied away from a dish because it had tofu in it.

I love having a plant based protein in my diet. I love that it can take on whatever flavor profile that you want. Did you know that? Tofu doesn’t have a flavor of it’s own. It’s a blank canvas. It takes on whatever flavor you give it.

Worried about the texture… Don’t!

You can get Mori-Nu Tofu in several different textures. If you like a firm tofu that you can season and pan sauteé, you’ll want to go with an extra firm tofu. You like a lighter, creamier feel? Then I would go with a Silken Soft Tofu. The softer tofu is perfect to add to smoothies, dips and sauces. You can even get a lite Tofu with lower calories and fat, but still packed with protein!

What makes Mori-Nu Tofu from Morinaga special, is it’s innovative packaging. With their special box system, you can keep your Mori-Nu Tofu right in your pantry for up to a year. It’s shelf stable and perfect to keep on hand for all kinds of recipes. Not only is is shelf stable, it’s verified Non-GMO, Kosher, Gluten-Free and doesn’t have any preservatives.

Now, when I told Sara about my Tofu recipe, she immediately said… You should create a dessert!

WHAT!

A dessert? For real?

I had a great savory recipe all ready to go, but this intrigued me. Sara had just returned from a week at Fitness Ridge and she told me about these parfaits that they served for dessert at the resort. She loved them! When she asked what the secret was to this creamy dessert… They told her, the secret was the tofu!

YEA, for real!!

She challenged me to come up with my very own parfait…

This is how I came up with my Chocolate Berry Surprise!

This is such a simple dessert to make… AND, it’s packed with protein so it’s not just empty calories. The funny thing, you would NEVER know that it had tofu in it!

First thing I did was throw my Mori-Nu Tofu into my mixer and mixed it up well. Then I a large Jell-o Chocolate Instant Pudding Mix and then continued to whisk on high speed. The mixture then turned into something that looked like brownie mix. Then I slowly added 1 1/2 cups of cold milk. You could even use Almond or Soy milk if you like to keep it dairy-free. Place the pudding mix into the refrigerator to chill.

Then all you have to do is layer your pudding with berries, granola and Cool Whip for a fun parfait!

Now, thanks to Sara, you have a tasty dessert that is packed full of protein and you can feel GREAT about indulging a bit!

Ready to add a little Tofu into your life?! You can check out all kinds of recipes and ideas at Mori-Nu’s Facebook, Pinterest and Twitter feed.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Mori-nu. The opinions and text are all mine.

The Party Bunch Link Party // no. 51

0 · Oct 25, 2014 · 12 Comments

Oh my stars… I LOVE the link party in the fall! Who’s ready to PARTY? Before you link up please let me introduce to you The Party Bunch!

Amy from The Idea Room, Mique from 30 Handmade Days, Heather from Whipperberry and Desiree from The 36th Avenue want to thank you for partying with us… You guys are the best!

Here are some of our favorite projects from this week!

Heather’s Favorite

Copper Pumpkins from One Dog Wolf

These pumpkins are simple but stunning!

Mique’s Favorite

Witches Brew from Your Homebased Mom

How creepy… Your witches and goblins will love this idea!

Amy’s Favorite

Caramel Apples from Swanky Recipes

Uh, YUM!!

Desiree’s Favorite

Geometric Deer Antler Printable from Delineate Your Dwelling

What a fun way to add a little pizzaz to your fall decor!

As always thank you for so may fabulous projects and recipes!

We hope you take a minute and button up HERE!

Also we want to invite you to click here and follow

The Party Bunch Favorites on Pinterest.

We are featuring more of our favorite projects and recipes from the link party on this board!

Now it is time to party!

TPB Party Bunch Link Up... Every Friday to Sunday link up your projects over at theidearoom.net , thirtyhandmadedays.com , whipperberry.com or the36thavenue.com Four bloggers = ONE BIG PARTY! We can't wait to see your projects!

Here are a few things to remember before you link up!

Please make sure to share the love and grab a button here to let your readers know that you linked up with us! By linking up with The Party Bunch, you are giving permission to any of us to feature your projects and recipes on our social media with a link back to you. Thanks!

An InLinkz Link-up

How Target Store Pickup Changed My Life

8 · Oct 21, 2014 ·

Ok, you may think “changed my life” may be a stitch over stated, but Target Store Pickup truly has!

It’s kind of funny, I get approached to write post like this all the time. Some fit into my normal life and I accept the gig, others aren’t something that I would use or participate in naturally, so I turn down the offer. Regardless, when I am challenged to write a post of this nature, I have to go out and in a way, contrive the experience so that I can photograph and document the experience to share with you all.

NOT THIS TIME!!

I naturally fell into this post and it is such a cool story!!

A few weeks ago, an article caught my eye over at the Today Show website, What to Buy For your Home at Target. I am honestly Targets number one fan, so naturally I clicked on over to the article. This photo of some of the most beautiful lamps just jumped off the screen…

Aren’t they just divine?

I knew I needed them! I didn’t even read the article, I needed those lamps!

I jumped on over to Target.com and there it was…

The price was great, but criminy… it was out of stock online. SERIOUS!?! What am I going to do? I had been to my Target just the day before, and they didn’t have any of these beauties. What they heck am I going to do? I needed them! Then I noticed the find in a store button. I was a little deflated knowing that it wasn’t available online, so I almost didn’t bother. I clicked on the button and sure enough. The Target that is just a few more miles away from me and 2 in stock.

Now… Here’s where the story get’s exciting.

I had 2 choices… I could drop everything and run over to Target that second with my crazy hair and in my lovely PJ’s OR I could try out this Target Store Pick-Up option. It was kind of a lazy Saturday morning, but we had a packed day ahead. If I were to drop everything and run over there it would have really messed up my busy schedule for that day. BUT I NEEDED THOSE LAMPS! I remembered the post that I was scheduled to write about Target in-store pick-up. I knew that was something that was available to Target customers, I just hadn’t ever used it before. I decided to give it a go.

I added the lamps to my shopping cart and added a lovely matching gold pillow to the mix and selected the store where I wanted to purchase it from.

I selected the free store pick-up option and completed my purchase.

Check this out… I completed my purchase at 8:22 am

then at 8:55 I received a text from Target…

How COOL is that!!

Now, with this service, I had four days to pick-up my purchase. I didn’t have to stop my busy day and run to Target. I knew that I could run over there when I had some free time, or when I happened to be in that part of town and not worry about this purchase messing up my schedule.

I LOVE THIS!! SERIOUSLY LOVE THIS!

I knew that I had secured those amazing lamps, no one was going to run off with them, and I could get them on my own time.

Monday morning I had some errands in that part of town, so Gage and I headed to that Target location and picked up my loot!

There they were… tucked away safe and sound for the rest of the weekend, just waiting for me to pick them up and bring them home. The cool thing is that they don’t charge for this service, nor do they charge your credit card until you pick it up. If you change your mind, they restock it after four days. No worries!

Now check one of them out…

She gets to live on this aaamazing desk that my friend and business partner created. It’s an old piano that no longer worked that she transformed into a desk and then painted with BB Frösch Chalk Paint Powder!

Doesn’t she look happy!!

Now do you understand why Target Store Pick-Up has changed my life? I will never view shopping at Target the same way ever again. Think about Christmas shopping… Yea! Kind of mind blowing right?

Give it a go… I have a feeling you are going to fall in love as well!

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Target. The opinions and text are all mine.

The Classic Jif Peanut Butter Cookies Giveaway

3 · Oct 20, 2014 · 6 Comments

+ This Classic Jif Peanut Butter Cookies Giveaway sponsored by Jif® Peanut Butter +

As much as I love old recipes dolled-up with fun new ingredients, I am a huge fan of the classics. Sometimes you don’t need to mess with a good thing. I have fond memories of my Mom baking peanut butter cookies when I was a kid. Everyone tends to lean towards the classic chocolate chip recipe when it comes to cookie baking, my Mom sure did. When she broke out of the norm and baked peanut butter cookies I thought I was something pretty special. Don’t get me wrong… I love a good chocolate chip cookie, but there was just something extra special about baking those peanut butter cookies with my Mom. I would push a chair up to the counter and my job was to press the cookies with the fork. I thought had made it to the big times then…

I would dip the fork into a bowl of sugar and then gently pressing the cookie with the fork creating that classic peanut butter cookies hash tag!

Ahhhhh, sweet memories! Have you baked peanut butter cookies with your kiddos lately?

Here’s a link to the perfect Peanut Butter Cookie recipe from Jif®

What an even bigger excuse to make some scrumptious Peanut Butter Cookies? How about a fun GIVEAWAY from the folks at Jif®!

Jif® Peanut Butter Cookie Prize Pack Giveaway

Here’s what you may win from Jif®, this is a $80 Value…

Jif® Creamy Peanut Butter
Crisco® Baking Sticks All-Vegetable Shortening Pillsbury BEST® All Purpose Flour
Jif® apron
Customized J i f® cookie j a r
J i f® branded fork for cookie imprint