Mother's Day Gift Certificate

Now that Easter is done, the next holiday on the way is Mother’s Day. To get prepared for that we have a few posts of some neat crafts and a yummy meal that you can make.

This week is a fun little craft that you can make for mom especially if you want to give her an “experience” as opposed to an actual physical gift.

We are going to show you a couple of versions of a gift certificate that you can make for your mom. Certificates are a little different from the coupon book of things that mom can ask you to do when she chooses to redeem them. We’ve made a couponbook for Father’s Day in the past and that is a cool idea if you want have a bunch of things that you want to give your mom. If you have a special idea of something that you want to do for your mom or with your mom, then this is a great idea.

You don’t need many supplies to make these certificates. All you need is some cardstock, punches and stamps if you choose to use those, glue, ribbon (again if you choose to use some), scissors, and a cutting machine if you have one.

We have a couple of versions for you that you can make.

The first one utilizes a cutting machine that will cut out things or write/draw things onto your certificate. It’s fairly simple to do. You just need to choose cardstock and lay it out in the software.  Just cut a certificate to fit inside of a card and then have your machine write the words you want and have it draw a couple of pictures to match your gift which you can clour afterwards.

The second one is more kid friendly but it’s also done without a cutting machine because not everyone has one to use. Pick some colours for your certificate first. Choose what gift you want to give your mom and then on a piece of cardstock (you can layer a lighter more neutral piece on top of a coloured piece), print the words you’d like on the certificate and then cut down to the size that will fit inside your card or envelope. Then you can decorate with punches and stamps and cut outs or even print pictures on the same layer as the words and colour them. We've done two for you to see...

Dessert Muffins

Sadly our muffin theme is coming to an end, but we saved the best recipes for last. Our focus today is on dessert muffins. Dessert muffins might make you think of cupcakes, but they are not cupcakes. There’s no icing or sprinkles or fancy piping. These muffins are just a little sweeter and have richer ingredients than most muffins. They also aren’t probably something that you would have for breakfast every day; they may be more of a treat so that’s why we think of them as dessert muffins.

The first one is a recipe that I have tried many times before. It’s a very chocolatey and delicious muffin. They are quite sweet and rich so we have made them mini.

Chocolate Buttermilk Muffin

1/3 cup of vegetable oil

1 cup of buttermilk

2 eggs

1 tsp. of vanilla

½ tsp. of salt

1 tsp. of baking soda

2 tsp. of baking powder

½ cup of sugar

¼ cup of brown sugar

½ cup of cocoa powder

2 cups of flour

1 cup of chocolate chips

Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a bowl and then whisk all of the wet ingredients in a separate bowl.

Add the dry to the wet and stir well making sure to incorporate all of the ingredients.

Stir in the chocolate chips.

Fill the muffin pans ¾ full and bake in a 350 degree oven for 18-20 minutes.

Allow them to cool slightly. Some people like to let them cool lots, but I like to eat them with the chocolate all melty.

Another dessert muffin recipe that you can try is this Chai-Spiced Cheesecake Muffins. Nicole’s tried it once and says they are quite yummy. She made a few changes to the recipe when she made them; I’ve made some notes about that in the recipe below.

Chai-Spiced Cheesecake Muffin

For the muffin you will need...

1 ¾ cups of flour

2 tsp. cinnamon

½ tsp. of ground ginger

½ tsp. of ground cardamom

½ tsp. of ground nutmeg

1 tsp. of baking soda

½ tsp. of salt

2 cups of applesauce (Nicole used 1 cup applesauce and 1 cup pumpkin)

1 ¼ cups of brown sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. of vanilla

½ cup of vegetable oil

For the filling you will need...

8 oz. brick of cream cheese

¼ cup of granulated sugar

1 tsp. of vanilla

Non-stick cooking spray for greasing

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.

First of all you’re going to make the batter.

Whisk the flour, spices, and salt with a fork in one bowl.

In a separate bowl, mix the applesauce, pumpkin, brown sugar, eggs, vanilla, and oil.

Mix it all up with a fork and then add the dry ingredients to the bowl of wet ones and stir with a fork until the batter is thick and smooth.

Now to make the filling.

In a bowl, use a fork to mix the cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla. Mix until fluffy and smooth.

Grease your muffin tin with non-stick spray.

Scoop about ¼ cup of the batter into each of the muffin cups. Add a teaspoon of the cream cheese filling to the centre of each muffin and use a toothpick to swirl the filling into the batter.

Bake for 18 minutes.

Cool for about 5 minutes and serve warm.

Flourless Oatmeal Muffins

It’s time for more muffins! Our focus today is on muffins that don’t contain flour. Nicole has tried some of these out and likes them quite a bit.

Oats are the basis of both recipes that we are going to share with you along with some really yummy other ingredients so that you don’t even notice that they don’t contain any flour!

Pumpkin, Chocolate Chip, and Oatmeal Muffins

1 ¼ cups of milk

1 egg

½ cup of honey

¾ cup of pureed pumpkin

1 tsp. cinnamon

¼ tsp. nutmeg

1 tsp. of vanilla

2 ½ cups of quick oats

½ cup of chocolate chips

First of all preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Mix the egg, milk, honey, pumpkin, cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla in a bowl.

Once all combined, stir in the oats and chocolate chips.

Transfer into silicone muffin pans (you can use regular greased muffin pans if you don’t have silicone).

Bake for 30 minutes or until golden on top.

Cool and enjoy!

Banana Oatmeal Muffins

2 bananas

2 eggs

1/3 cup of maple syrup

¼ tsp. of salt

2 tsp. of baking powder

2 tsp. of vanilla

1 tbsp. of cinnamon

1 cup of Greek plain yogurt

3 cups of oats

1 cup of whole milk

Toppings of your choice (cranberries and blueberries are good)

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

In a medium bowl mash the bananas and then mix in the eggs, syrup, salt, baking powder, vanilla, cinnamon, and Greek yogurt.

Now add in the oats and milk and mix well.

Allow the mixture to sit for a few minutes so the oats soak up the liquids. You want the consistency to be like oatmeal.

Line a muffin pan with liners and then pour the mixture into them. Make them about ¾’s full.

Add on your toppings. Push them down into the batter a bit.

Bake for 30 minutes.

Cool slightly before eating.

Banana Muffins

Spring is here and now it’s time for a mini theme once again!

Our focus is on muffins. They can be enjoyed for breakfast, as a snack, or even as a dessert. You can put many things in muffins. Fruit and berries are often common ingredients as are oats and chocolate chips.

For our first muffin post, we are looking at bananas in muffins. They add the right amount of sweetness and moistness to a hearty muffin.

We had a banana muffin baking day and we made over 500 muffins with bananas that we had in the freezer that turned brown fast in the heat last Summer. We don’t like to waste them so we make muffins for all of our friends and families and of course ourselves.

One recipe that we always use is my Grandma’s Banana Muffin Recipe. We’ve been making these muffins together since we were little.

Banana Muffins

½ cup vegetable oil

¾ cup white sugar

1 cup of mashed bananas or you can use ½ cup of mashed bananas and ½ cup of crushed pineapple which is what we always do

1 egg

1 ½ cup of flour

1 tsp. of baking soda

Pinch of salt

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. nutmeg

1 tsp. vanilla

Whisk all of the dry ingredients together in a bowl.

In your mixer’s bowl, add in the sugar and oil and mix.

Then add in the eggs and mix.

After mixing in the egg, add your mashed banana in along with the vanilla and give it all a good mix.

Slowly add in your dry ingredients and incorporate well.

Remove the mixing bowl from the stand and stir in the crushed pineapple.

Spoon into lined muffin tins, about ¾’s full is good.

Bake in a 350 degrees oven for 15-20 minutes. All ovens are different of course so it may take less time or in our case more time. Cool on wire racks.

You can add some semisweet chocolate chips into some of the muffins if you can’t do without a little bit of chocolate in your muffins!

This time we threw another banana muffin into our muffin baking day. We made banana oatmeal muffins which I think are so delicious. We actually made a mini version of this muffin back in February so that’s why you’ll see the some mini ones and some big ones. The process is still the same though. 

Banana Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Muffins

1 ½ cup of flour

1 cup of quick oats

½ cup of white sugar

2 tsp. of baking powder

1 tsp. of baking soda

½ tsp. of salt

½ (heaping) cup of semisweet chocolate chips

¼ cup of vegetable oil

2 eggs

¼ cup of milk

1 cup of mashed bananas

Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a bowl.

In a separate bowl whisk the eggs.

Mix in the oil, milk, and bananas.

Add to the dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Since we are making so many batches, it was easier for us to add the dry into the wet, but you’re really supposed to add the wet into a “well” in the dry ingredient bowl. 

Lastly, stir in the chocolate chips.

Spoon into lined muffin tins, ¾’s of the way full and then bake at a 400 degree oven for 15 minutes. Cool on wire rack.