Surfing Card

It’s week two of our Summer theme! The name this week is “Surf’s Up.” It’s a light blue matte shade and very Summery. We’ve been inspired to make a card from this shade. It’s a perfect “Just Because” card that you can use to celebrate Summer!

You don’t need very many things to make this card. It’s super easy.

First of all find some surf boards that you can print off and trace from the Internet. We decided on a few different sizes and shapes to make it more fun and whimsical. We kept them to about 3 inches tall/long and about an inch or so wide.

Then we decided on a colour for our card. We chose a light blue shade like the eye shadow colour that we picked for this week.

Then we picked out some colours that would look good with the blue and traced the surfboards on them and cut them out.

We found some stamps that we thought would make a good pattern (patterns/designs work best for this) on our boards and we stamped and embossed those on the surfboards.

Next we made some sand by cutting it out of some sand coloured paper. Draw a curvy line out for the top of the sand first and make it as deep as you want.

Lastly we glued the sand on and then arranged the surfboards in the centre of the card. You can put them in front of or behind of the sand; it’s up to you. Add some waves and a sun if you like.

Marbled Bundt Cake

Time for a Father’s Day treat. My dad is always asking for a marbled something when it comes to baked goods so we tried this one out and it was a huge success so give it a try for your dad this Father’s Day. I know I couldn’t stop eating it when we baked it!

You will need...

3 cups of flour

1 tsp. salt

1 tsp. baking powder

½ tsp. baking soda

¾ cup of buttermilk

1 Tbsp. vanilla

1 Tbsp. lemon juice

2 ¼ sticks of butter

2 cups sugar

3 large eggs

1 large egg yolk

3 ounces of semisweet chocolate chips

2 Tbsp. of butter

2 Tbsp. of unsweetened cocoa powder

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Prepare your bundt cake pan by greasing it and then flouring it.

In a two separate medium sized bowls, mix/whisk your dry (flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda) and wet (buttermilk, vanilla, and lemon juice) ingredients separately.

Now beat the sugar and the butter with your mixer.

Add in the eggs one at a time followed by the one yolk.

On low, add in one third of the flour mix followed by half of the wet mix and then repeat with remaining dry and wet ingredients.

Separate the batter evenly into two bowls.

Now it’s time to make the chocolate part of the marble cake.

Melt the chocolate chips, butter, and cocoa powder in the microwave until smooth and fully melted.

Stir the chocolate mixture into one of the bowls of batter.

It’s time to marble!

I put a dollop of each batter side by side until the bundt pan is full. That is one layer. Then on top of each dollop, put the opposite flavour for the top layer. Swirl it all around with a butter knife until you get your desired marbledness. You can also layer one flavour on the bottom and one on the top and swirl. I tried that the first time I made this cake but it didn't get as marbled as I wanted it. 

Bake for 50 to 60 minutes. It usually takes the full 60 minutes.

Allow the cake to cool for at least 10 minutes in the pan and then slide it out of the pan and allow to cool about 2 hours before eating.

You can eat it plain or you can make a glaze or icing to put on it (the second time around we made a caramel glaze). You can put whipped cream or ice cream and even some berries on top if you like.

Now it’s time to enjoy!

*You might have noticed that the last few final steps have no pictures. We were so excited to eat this cake that we got distracted and forgot. Next time!

Key/Change Holder Dish

In keeping with the key ring theme, we are making key/change “dishes” as a gift that you can give dad for Father’s Day. They come in quite handy. You can also use these dishes to hold jewelry or little knick knacks.

You can make these dishes from lots of different things. We are going with ceramic dishes and we are using a very cool technique to decorate them. 

You don’t need very many things to create this cool little gift. All you need is some nail polish (your choice what colours you’d like to use; we went with blues), a big plastic tub filled with warm water so you can dunk your dish, and a ceramic dish of some sort (we found a couple at the dollar store).

First of all prepare your work area and put some newspapers down. You might want to have some paper towels and some nail polish remover with cotton pads on stand by. You may also want to wear some latex gloves to protect your hands.

Fill a tub, big enough to dunk the dishes that you have selected, with warmer water.

First we drizzled the nail polish on the surface of the water, swirling it around to make a cool pattern.

Then we dipped the ceramic plate (we also made a little bowl) in slowly and the nail polish will stick to the plate. Don't wait too long after drizzling the nail polish to dip. It may start drying.

Once you have the plate etc. looking as you want it, find a good place to let it dry for a couple of days.

You don’t have to do this last step, but we used a protectant spray to keep our polish sealed on the plate.

Savory Popcorn for Mom

Mother’s Day is just days away and if you’re thinking about making her a treat, why not try something a little different like some savoury popcorn.

We’ve come up with a list of some recipes that can spice up the typical popcorn snack. You can make it for your mom as an appetizer snack, package some up as a gift, or serve it with an after dinner movie or some relaxing time with your mom.

I’m usually a plain butter and salt popcorn gal. Every so often I’ll make a batch of caramel popcorn (we blogged the recipe here a few years ago) as a treat. Today though we are focusing on the savoury type of popcorn with lots of flavour! Take a look at some of the recipes below and see if anything stands out and give it a go for your mom or just for fun.

All of these recipes are best on some freshly popped popcorn. The recipes will nicely coat about 12-16 cups of popped popcorn but you can cut down the recipes to however much you’d like to make.

Brown Butter Lemon – Cook 6 Tbsp. of butter in a pan until browned and then take the pan off the heat and add 1 ½ tsp. of lemon zest. Stir and pour over the popcorn. Toss with salt.

Garlic and Herb – Melt 4 Tbsp. of butter in a pan and add 4 cloves of grated garlic and a tsp. each of fresh finely cut rosemary, sage, thyme and Drizzle over the popcorn and toss with some salt and

cook for a minute.

Parmesan and Rosemary – Add ½ cup of grated Parmesan along with 3 Tbsp. of olive oil, 1 Tbsp. of fresh finely cut rosemary, and toss with salt.

Three Cheese – For this one you’re gonna want to make sure your popcorn is warm. Then toss in 2 cups of shredded cheddar, 1 cup of grated Parmesan, and a ½ cup of Pecorino. Spread it all on a baking sheet (lined is probably best) and bake it at 350 degrees until the cheddar melts. About 3 minutes. Keep an eye on it though!

Italian Cheese – Mix 6 Tbsp. grated Romano cheese, 2 ¼ tsp. of Italian seasoning, and ¾ tsp. of garlic salt.  

Sesame – Heat 6 Tbsp. of butter with 2/3 cup of sesame seeds and cook until the seeds are toasted (5 or so minutes). Stir in 1 Tbsp. of sugar and toss with some salt.

Sesame Ginger – Melt ¼ cup of butter and stir in ½ tsp. of sesame oil, a drip or two of soy sauce, and a pinch of ginger powder. Pour over the popcorn and toss well.

Bacon Chive – Cook up some chopped bacon bits (6 slices is fine but you can some extra because the more bacon the better!). Keep the drippings and drizzle 2 Tbsp. of that with the same amount of butter over the popcorn and then toss with the bacon, ½ cup chopped chives, and ½ tsp. of cayenne. Season with some salt but it might be salty enough with the bacon and drippings.

Sriracha Lime – Whisk 5 Tbsp. of melted butter with ¼ cup of  Sriracha , 1 ½ tsp. of lime zest, , and 1 Tbsp. of lime juice and drizzle over the popcorn. Toss with salt.  

Chipotle – Melt 4 Tbsp. of butter with 2 Tbsp. of Chipotle hot sauce, and 1 tbsp. of Chipotle chile powder. Drizzle over the popcorn and toss with salt and corn nuts.

Cajun – Melt 4 Tbsp. of butter with 1 Tbsp. of Cajun seasoning , 1 tsp. of lemon zest, ¼ tsp. of cayenne, and 2 chopped scallions. Drizzle over the popcorn and toss with salt.

Curry- Melt ¼ cup of butter add in 2 Tbsp. of curry powder and mix well. Add in a tsp. of salt and a Tbsp. of turbinado sugar pour over the popcorn and toss. You can add in some more sugar or salt while you toss.

Buffalo – Melt 6 Tbsp. of butter and mix in 1/3 cup of Buffalo sauce toss in your popcorn and mix well. Add in ½ cup of crumbled Blue cheese and some celery leaves. Toss with some salt.  

French Onion – Melt 6 Tbsp. of butter with a packet of French onion soup/dip mix and toss with warm popcorn. Sprinkle in a package of French fried onions.

Salt and Vinegar – Combine ¼ cup of malt vinegar with 2 tsp. of salt and pour into a clean spray bottle. Shake well to dissolve all of the salt and spray over the popcorn.

There you have it many ways that you can make your popcorn more interesting. You can even make small batches of a few and get your mom to do a taste test to see which she likes best. Pair you savoury popcorn with some nice wine or other cool beverage and enjoy.