Crazy Baker

We're having a bake sale Saturday for my daughter's dance team and I thought I would try some new recipes and 1 or 2 "tried-n-trues". I found a recipe for Lemon Poppy Seed Loaves from cooks.com. It calls for fresh lemon zest and fresh lemon juice for the glaze. I "had to" make an extra loaf for home. This is one of my son's favorite breads/muffins.

Our "keeper" loaf of Lemon Poppy Seed Bread 

Mini Lemon Poppy Seed Loaves with Lemon Glaze 

The pumpkin cake with apple cider glaze is a combination of Pinterest (sorry, can't remember the source but more than several people have pinned it) and my own glaze recipe. I've made this lots of times and it's easy with just 2 ingredients, canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling) and yellow cake mix. The glaze uses more ingredients! In place of milk, I use apple cider with the powdered sugar and vanilla. So... I forgot the apple cider so I made maple butter glaze. I just made it up as I went along and, YAY!, I remembered the measurements so I could tell you! Two cups of powdered sugar, three tablespoons of maple syrup (in place of some of the milk), one tablespoon milk, one teaspoon vanilla, two tablespoons melted butter. Stir with a whisk.
The sausage/cheese muffins came from makingahouseahome.blogspot.com. I had a hard time finding a recipe that didn't call for cheese soup (not a favorite ingredient of mine and I never have any in my pantry). This one calls for milk but no soup. Bingo!

Pumpkin Cake with Maple Butter Glaze

 

Sausage Cheese Muffins

Mini loaves wrapped and ready to sell

Ready for the bake sale!

My daughter loves to make candy bark so she made white chocolate bark with mini m&ms

Kitchen Table and Something to Serve

I made some cushions for my girlfriend's kitchen table chairs. I don't know about y'all but I just can't sit very long in a hard wood chair and, being Southern, I spend a lot of time chatting at friends' kitchen tables. And, much to my husband's dismay, I mostly just walk in the back door at my friends' houses to chat. Nothing says the South like going in the back door and sitting at the kitchen table. You know it's a stranger if they ring your front doorbell!
I take whatever is handy, usually newspaper or plastic sheeting, to draw my pattern with a sharpie and cut it out. She had the fabric, just had to buy some 2" foam, then I used spray adhesive to attach some sheet batting to the foam to give some extra cush to the cushion. Now we can sit for hours and talk! Well, we did before.... now we can chat at the table.

Last night was experiment night. I had some veggies that needed to be cooked, zucchini, potatoes, and eggplant.  I tossed them with olive oil in a plastic bag. Then, in another bag, I tossed them in a mixture of parmesan cheese, Italian bread crumbs, and garlic powder. I placed them on a baking stone and roasted them in a 425 oven for 20 mins, turning after 10 mins. 

The finished dishes, potatoes in back, zucchini and eggplant in front dish. 

Zuchinni and eggplant, you might want to cook for less than 20 mins if you like your veggies crispier in the middle.

The potatoes took a couple minutes longer. Crispy on the edges, the way I like 'em!

Daffodils and Gloomy Skies

7 Strand scarf, the edges like the petals of a daffodil

Double-wrap bracelet from the sleeve of the t-shirt

Sorry I haven't posted lately. I've had some back issues and I'm not able to sit at the computer or sewing machine long. I've been making these scarves. For one thing, they're pretty trendy right now... and the main reason, I don't have to crawl around on the floor to cut them out! I'm not good at doing nothing when I'm supposed to be resting. I hate wasting good leftovers (fabric or food!) so I used some from my t-shirt quilt trash stash. I cut out enough circles to make 7 strands for this one but, unlike the black one, I didn't sew the strands together in the middle. I figured I'd make this where I could add or subtract as many strands as I'm in the mood for (and the temp outside!). I chose yellow to wear with my grey shirt.

The daffodils have been blooming and this was my inspiration. 

I took the sleeve of the t-shirt, cut 6 strips and braided them together. Sewed on a button and made a button-hole.