scones don't have to be dry

I never had a scone that wasn't dry!  Until... I started getting them from Starbucks 6 years ago.   Any time you think of scones you think of this dry tasteless bread pastry that is never #1 on your guilty pleasure list...until you've had one from Starbucks... warmed! I would get my coffee before work once a week from Starbucks as a treat to my day of insurance.  blaaah!  And that fateful morning where I met my new guilty pleasure...the scone.  I ordered by grande macchiato as always from Jen, yes we were now on a first name basis now(this is when you know you go too often), and I ordered a raspberry scone with it.  Then those words which I will never forget, Jen asked, "Do you want it warmed?" "Warm? Yeah!" I didn't know you could warm anything there.  As I checked out, she handed me that warm brown bag, my mouth was already watering! This was in no way a scone, it was moist and sweet with pretty decorative sugar on top.  When I bit into it there were these delicious pockets of raspberry jam or some kind of raspberry filling chips.  After that day my trips went from once a week to the occasional two or three times a week for coffee with a warmed raspberry or cinnamon chip scone.   Yum!

Once I quit my job to stay home I missed my specialty coffees and warmed scones so I decided to find a recipe to make my own scones.  I've gone through a few recipes over the years picking things I've liked from one and carrying it on to the new recipe and so on until I came up with my own moist warmed cinnamon chip scone! Once you make these you won't have to go to Starbucks you can make them in minutes in your own kitchen!

Cinnamon Chip Scones

2 C. flour
1/3 C. granulated sugar
1 Tbsp. baking powder
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 C. (1 stick) unsalted butter, cold
1 egg
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 C.-1/2 C. buttermilk (measure out the 1/2C but you may not need all of it)
1/2 C. cinnamon chips

Preheat oven to 400 degrees
1. Mix first 5 ingredients on low in mixer with paddle attachment
2. Cube the cold butter and mix into the dry mix until you get the crumbled look
3. Add egg and vanilla
4. Start to add the buttermilk slowly until the mixture looks wet but not runny! You may not use all the buttermilk which is ok.
5. Lastly add the cinnamon chips folding them in until they are mixed in well but do not over beat or your scones could be tough (but they will still taste good)
6. Scope your dough; 1/3 cup; onto the tray 2 inches apart.  Slip into the oven for 15 minutes (if you mixed more buttermilk than you should have you may need to keep them in for a few more minutes to cook the inside) Then take them off the tray promptly onto a cooling rack.

You can find a good icing recipe to top them with, but I like them without, so I never perfected an icing.

I hope you enjoy these scones as much as I do!

live.love.eat

Back to School Sale!

It's almost that time again. Yes, Summer is quickly coming to a close and soon the kids will be heading back to school. It's never to early to stock up on the latest in stylish hair accessories for that first day of school or even for you Moms that want a little extra flair in your hair. Check out my etsy shop; Serenity Shoppe BACK TO SCHOOL promo and sale. We certainly hope you like our products as much as we enjoy seeing the smile on that child or teens face when they find that perfect accessory!

https://www.etsy.com/shop/SerenityShoppe

Summer Sweets

I was rushing through Costco last week and grabbed 2 quarts of heavy whipping cream instead of half n half.  What was I going to do with 2 quarts of heavy whipping cream!?!?  All I could think of was ice cream, but we don't have an ice cream churn. My husband emailed me this recipe for homemade ice cream that doesn't need to be churned.  So my daughter and I tested this out.  All we needed was 2 cups of heavy whipping cream, vanilla and sweetened condensed milk.  We made 2 batches separately then added 1 peach to one batch and added a Starbucks VIA blonde roast packet;instant coffee; to another to make our Ice cream a little more delicious!!  The only thing I'd change is if you are making the original recipe you may want to add less sweetened condensed milk.  I though the peach ice cream was very sweet, but the coffee was a perfect balance. The coffee ice cream reminded me of the Turkey Hill Coffee Ice Cream.  We grown ups really liked that.

No Churn Ice Cream
Recipe By Everyday Food on Yahoo.com

Ingredients 
 1 can (14 ounces) sweetened condensed milk 
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract 
2 cups cold heavy cream 

Directions 
 In a medium bowl, stir condensed milk and vanilla. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer, beat cream on high until stiff peaks form, 3 minutes. With a rubber spatula, gently fold whipped cream into condensed milk mixture.Then add any extras like peaches, strawberries,or 1 Starbucks VIA Blonde Roast Packet. e Creative!  Pour into a 4 1/2-by-8 1/2-inch loaf pan. Freeze until firm, 6 hours. 

Enjoy a cold treat! 

Delightfully Vintage

I wanted to share my new staple gun I bought from an Etsy seller; Seatown Vintage!! I am in love with this stapler. I found this beautiful green vintage staple gun from the new Fossil catalog, but it is $65!  I knew we needed a staple gun, but a pretty vintage one sounded so much more useful! Hehe! ...for me at least, my husband would be fine with any staple gun as long as it got the job done. Since I will be using it more; for projects; I wanted something nice to look at while I was working.  I searched eBay and Etsy and came across this one.  It is in such good condition and works perfect!! I am finding that Etsy is a great place to find more than just handmade items!

SALE SALE SALE!!

Also Starting Thursday August 1st I am having a sale on my Etsy shop for back to school time.  Take 30% off all orders of $10 or more at my shop, The Serenity Shoppe.  I sell hair accessories for little girls to adults!  To get your Code go to my facebook page and 'like' to access you code.  Have fun shopping!!

Pretty Things: Crackle Bracelets

There aren't many little girls I know that don't like a little pretty sparkle with their outfit. I know one little girl here who loves a little bling and even more excited if it matches her outfit. I had gone to AC Moore and bought a few packs(about 16 in each) of these crackle beads for $3.  I didn't know what to do with them, but they reminded me of the little girl jewelry that J.Crew had a few years back.  So fun, colorful, chunky, and pretty! I also bought some elastic cord for other projects I was doing, not the really thin elastic but the next one up I believe it was the .8mm size.  So finally I just strung them onto a piece of elastic cord for dress-up jewelry for my daughter, with a little silver bead in the middle. She loves them and they are smooth on her arm, not pinchy, as she'd say. I would not sell these because the beads are some sort of crackled plastic, not glass, and when one of my kids dropped one of the bracelets one of the beads cracked.  So they are a bit fragile, but they are fun for a little girl who's style from day to day. She loved these so I had to share them!  They are very inexpensive to make, you should be able to make about 3 for $8! Also I want to point out that this is a perfect craft for your child to do! You just need an adult to tie the cord and add the glue on.

Materials:
Beadalon Elastic Cord (measure your child's' wrist and double the length; this is for easy tying)
Super Glue (dab on the knot when finished)
10-12 beads same or different colors
silver bead (whatever you have in your craft box)
1 or more cute little children or grandchildren who love to dress up ;)

Have fun making some dress up Jewelry! 

Everything Is Better In A Fort

From ARMOMMY.COM

A birthday is a big deal in this household, at least for one little boy turning 7! This year I finally made him the fort he's been asking for forever.  I first found the idea on Jones Design Blog, that a friend had given one of her boys for their birthday.  She thankfully had a link to the tutorial on making your own fort kit and printables that came with it!  What a great idea! (Click here for the tutorial and printables.)  So this past year I happened to find this pirate fabric that I just fell in love with.  If I am going to fall in love with fabric it is definitely going to be Michael Miller's line of children's fabric; Out to Sea!!  Instead of using sheets; which is much easier; for this project I used 2- 2 & 1/2 yds x 44 inch wide pieces of my favorite fabric.  

This was quite simple, just taking a bit more time.  I used everything armommy.com calls for, I just switched up the twin sheet for 5 yards of fabric; 2- 2 1/2 yd pcs.  Here's how I did the "sheet" step. (I apologize for the lack of pictures, hopefully you get what I explain on the center)

Sewing Up the Fabric: 

1. I washed and dried the fabrics in cold water

2. Ironed each piece (while listening to Give them Grace)

3. Laid them out on the floor right sides together and pinned along one side lengthwise   

4. Sew in 1 inch, up the pinned side, this leaves room to make a nice finish in the middle

5. Iron the center seam (on the wrong sides) opening and folding each piece of the middle showing the right side of the fabrics;then fold under 1/4 inch; so each side is showing the right side fabric and then fold again so the raw edges are tucked under, pinning as you iron.  (see image, it should look like this) 

6. Making a nice hem in the middle on each side, sew each side of the middle up so the middle looks like this: 

The center where the 2 fabrics meet should look like this. 

 

 7. Once the middle is finished you can tackle folding the outer edges folding over 1/2 inch ; iron and again fold that over 3/4 inch; iron and pin. 

8. Sew each side up then pin your ribbon in place for ties ( I used 8 ties; 12 inches long; each at a corner and middle) sewing at the center of the ribbon. reinforce by back stitching a few times.  

Then enjoy your fort! 

My favorite part was the hand painted craft bag with the cool pirate map my husband hand painted from a clip art he found; then he added beautiful color! LOVE!! 

Family fort night! Such fun, baby and all! 

Here is what I used to make the kit: 

* Fort kit tutorial and Tag printables here; she also has a video how-to on her site

* 2 1/2 yds each print of Michael Miller, Out to Sea Pirate and Map fabric 

* 3 yds Blue Ribbon from local shop, similar

* Craft Cotton Tote Bag from local shop(about 15" x 16" x 6", find similar at local craft shop or Amazon

* Hand Crank Flashlight, Amazon

* Walkie Talkies found at Target or online 

* 16ft (Air Force color camo) Paracord found at my local shop, similar

* Reinforcements aka clothes pins ;)

Have Fun! 

Blog Facelift Part 2: Changing Your Blog Name and URL

I rarely post and rarely on the subject of design but more on a little bit of everything.  I am more about my everyday living amongst my little ones. So I decided to change my post name and URL to better fit me. I wasn't sure how to change everything, so I googled it.  It was quite simple! Now this is only for Blogger users, I am not sure about other blog sites.  I went to my Settings and clicked on the Basic tab.  All I needed to change was the title and blog address!    Hope this helped someone today!

Blog Facelift Part 1: Creating Your Own Banner

Yesterday in my spare time at 12:30am (haha) I thought about making my own banner for my blog.  I only write a post every few months it seems, but I hate to take it down in case I decide to dedicate more time to this.  So in my boredom I searched for how to make my own banner...Oh and I changed my name and URL (Part 2 of this post).  I found The Blog Guidebook to be very helpful! After reading this post it got me thinking about Picasa.  PicMonkey sounds just like it! So here's my guide to making a blogger banner on Picasa! 

1. First I picked out what pictures I wanted for the banner by looking through a ton of my most recent picture files in Picasa or you can download new ones to Picasa.  Each time I picked a picture I clicked on the Green Lightening Bolt (see pink arrow).  This icon will hold all the pictures you've chosen in the selections box at the bottom.

2.  After you've found your picture(s), go up to the CREATE drop down and click on Picture Collage to start your Banner!

3. Now you are on the Collage screen and you can choose your layout under the settings tab (hidden under the page format drop box screen).  Click on the Page Format drop box and you will see an option to Add Custom Aspect Ratio(See pink arrow) to create the banner size.

4. The Aspect Ratio box pops up and in the dimensions box type in how you see it here.  200x600 and name your banner for next time you change your banner. Click Ok to save it and it will automatically change the size of your collage.

5.Here is where you will arrange your pictures the way you want them and/or add grid spacing and  background color. Once that is finished make sure you click Create Collage(see pink arrow).

6.  Now you can move on to adding text or converting it to special effects(Sepia tone, etc) under the Editing. Make sure you click Apply (see pink arrow) to save your work. See Jones Design's Post for more on adding effects and making a collage.

7. Now to make sure everything is saved highlight(select) banner and click on File and Save or Save as to Save the banner in your computer picture files.

Now that you are finished you can upload it to your blog. I hope this has helped you! Have fun making your own banner!

Recycling Pretty Receipt Paper

I've saved up these receipt sleeves from my Anthropologie orders for the longest time.  They are just so pretty, I couldn't throw them out! So I wanted to find a purpose for them than just taking up room on my bulletin board.  Of course, iPhone covers for my clear case, Yay! I've made a bunch of pretty covers and so simple! You can use any pretty paper to make your own covers. Here are the steps:

 

Tip: I used an X Acto knife to cut the camera eye out.  

Enjoy!

Fabric Binder Clips

I bought the kids some school supplies the other day while I was shopping for craft supplies to make a new accessories display.  I found these binder clips on sale without the intention of doing anything with them but using them to clip up hairbands. So I was looking at them this morning and thought, what about spray painting them different colors, they just wouldn't look attractive looking like regular clips.  While I was looking online I saw pictures of  binder clips covered in scrapbook paper. That got me thinking, what if I Mod Podge the binder clips with scraps of fabric! There was no stopping after that. I was racing around the house getting my supplies.  This was going to be great!

I grabbed a few of my favorite fabrics from my scrap bin and the mod podge I just bought and a bunch of other supplies I needed.  I ended up not using the needle nose pliers as it made my clips look a little messy. They were initially to pry the top curled part of the clip to stick the fabric under it.  They looked just as nice without doing that.  So here is what I did to get ready to Mod Podge.

Now for the little messy steps:

1. Hardware is dried and ready to assemble

2. Apply Mod Podge to all 3 side of the clip

3. Press the fabric into the glue over each side and let it dry 

for 5 minutes before reapplying the mod podge over the fabric to seal it on.

4. Let them finish drying then you have pretty little binder clips to hang that
special piece of art up by your little one.

Good Luck Snoopy

So my husband and I made this cake for my brothers grad/send off party.  It has been 8 weeks since we've seen him and can't wait until next week when we get to watch him graduate from Training.  He was fortunately put in a great unit with a great group of guys and they have endured so much together these last 8 weeks.  It sounds like they work together encouraging and motivating each other like brothers should.  So thankful for the life changing experience the Air Force has given him. 

For his grad cake we incorporated the 3 things that summed up the end of high school and the beginning of adulthood.  The Mules, USAF, and his favorite Charles Schultz "Charlie Brown & Snoopy."

My husband did an amazing job creating the Mules and USAF logo BY HAND!! He is so amazing!! He used gumpaste for both logos and for the silver on the USAF logo he used luster dust mixed with vodka  

And I created the Red Baron Snoopy from gumpaste and gumpaste glue.  My brother loves Charles Schultz "Charlie Brown." 

I think the cake was good too, I just did a vanilla cake from scratch and a vanilla buttercream icing. 

We are so proud of you AB Kilby!!

A Field of Flowers in your Home

VIA

I am sharing with you one of my favorite designers who has a great site, Amy Butler Designs.  I've been obsessed with her fabrics for years and now she seems to have so many more products.  I love her design patterns, wallpaper, fabics and a of lot her craft books. The inspirations she gets from life for her ideas are fresh and exciting.  She brings the outside in, bringing life to a room.  Color and fun design patterns always seem to make me smile and her designs definitely do that!

Amy Butler: Gum Drops and Honeybun

VIA

Amy Butler Designs Wallpaper VIA

 I joined her mailing list and receive first look at new products, tips, and free patterns from time to time and more. You can join her mailing list here: http://www.amybutlerdesign.com/emaillist.php.  Enjoy her site for ideas, patterns and more!

Joy of Baking

While Brother was at school this morning, I let my 4 year old daughter make Chocolate Chip Bars today for her daddy.  She was so excited. I let her do everything all by herself.  From scooping the flour to cracking the eggs;"Because Nana lets me do it"- she says; to scooping them out of the pan and and putting them on a plate . So I stood beside her as her assistant and did whatever she asked.  She only asked me to help stir the butter and sugar, it was a bit tough, especially for a little girl.  I just loved watching her in her joy as she mixed all the ingredients in.  Only a bit of flour was lost on the table, but it didn't matter, they taste delicious.

Some little girls love dress up or dolls, and she really likes those things, but she LOVES baking.  She always asks me to bake, and for Christmas her Mimi and Pop Pop got her an EZ-Bake.  Her response was, hands on her face in amazement and said, "Is this a REAL oven, like REAL food that I can eat??!!"  She was so amazed by it, she squealed in excitement!  But, she still wanted to bake a real batch of cookies. So we did.

This was the best recipe to start with for a little ones first time baking with real size portions.  Some how if all the ingredients don't make it all the way in, it doesn't matter.  The Chocolate Chip Bars still taste great and making bars verses cookies cuts the time in half with one bake. Brother was home by the time the cookies were cooled and ready to move to a plate.  In the pictures below she is letting her brother help her, with a little instruction, as you can see, and observing him to make sure he does it right.  ha ha.  So cute! I was so proud of my little girl!! She is growing up so quickly.

Enjoy baking as I am sure this has put some of you in the mood for some Chocolate Chip Cookies. 

I also wanted to share a fun post from one of the blogs I follow.  The Handmade Home has given us over 2 dozen free fonts to download from her post today.  I had downloaded #21 from Jones Design in the past, as she mentions, which is another great blog. My favorite this time is Sketch Rockwell! Enjoy!! 

ooooooooo Felt Rosebuds ooooooooo

Large Rosebud

How to make a Felt Rosebuds without a fancy cutter:

Supplies: 
2 pieces of felt (one for the flower and one for leaves)
Pen
Scissors
Hot glue gun
tweezers or something like them (gator clip)

 The Large Rosebud is about 1.5 x 3/4in in size and the Small is 1inch x 3/8th inch in size

Step 1: Draw a spiral starting from the middle with ripple like motions as you go around to give it the petals, leave a 1/2 inch between each swirl, going around 2 times. (**To Make a Small Rosebud leave a 1/4 inch between each swirl going around 2 times)

Step 2: Cut from the Outside in

Large Rosebud

Small Rosebud

Step 3: I used a hair clip or pliers for the large rosebud & gator clip or tweezers for the small one.
Start from the center and twisting around until it is all done then add a drop of hot glue at the end.

Sorry for blurry pic

  

Step 4: Now you can cut out a circle to cover the bottom of the flower, just trace the flower bottom for most accurate circle size. 

Step 5: Add a glob of hot glue around the bottom of the flower and place the circle to hide the bottom and keep the flower together

Step 6: Cut out your leaves, I like one big and one small 

Step 7: Put a nice bit of hot glue on the big leaf and place the small one on top

Step 8: Hot glue the leaves to the bottom of the flower and then hot glue your Gator Clip, Pin, or Magnet to the back for a new accessory!

Small Rosebud Clip

The perfect clip for your little one!

Click on my shop link on the right, The Serenity Shop to see other accessories for sale that I have made.