DIY Paper Basket

With Spring in full gear now we are going to share with you a little how-to Spring/Easter basket that you can make. These are perfect to use as an afternoon craft project with the kids on Spring Break so they can have them ready for egg collecting on Easter morning or you can use them as decorations or even as a goodie “bag” at a party or gift basket to give to someone. They can be as cute or as sophisticated as you want them to be.

Here’s how to make them...

We actually made two different sized baskets. The first one (blue) is made from regular sized paper that we cut into a 8 ¼ x 8 ¼ inch square. You can really use any size paper but it needs to be cut into a square. The bigger the paper the bigger the basket. We also made one (pink) that was slightly larger so we made that a 12x12 inch square. We have also provided lots of step by step by step pictures as some of the steps are hard to explain.

So the process at the start is the same for any size. You will need to start off with a square then you mark it into thirds in both directions so you end up with nine smaller equal squares.

Then you cut the two lines on the bottom third and the two lines on the top third (as shown in the picture below).

Now fold all the side towards the middle along the lines.

Here’s where things get a little different.

Blue Basket (wider shallower basket): Put glue on the sides of the bottom middle square and then glue the bottom corner squares to the middle so it forms a triangle. Repeat at the top.

Then use scissors to round the four corners of the basket.

Take a long thin strip (ours is from what was left over of the paper that we made into a square which was about 8 ½ inches long but you can make yours whatever size you like) and glue the strip on like a handle.

Now you can decorate. We used some punches but you can draw, stamp, or sticker things to it. Keep in mind that stamping and drawing would be more difficult when the basket is already assembled.

Pink Basket (taller deep basket): Take each corner and spilt into thirds again and cut. 

Now take the middle bottom square and mark the middle of the edge and cut into a triangle and do the same on the other side. Fold along lines. 

Glue the inner third from the right hand side to the inner third from the left hand side so they are perpendicular to each other.

Then continue overlapping and gluing sides, adding thirds and alternating sides until you’ve used them all.

The last ones should be in line with each other.

Glue the remaining triangles upward to hide all of the overlapping gluing that you’ve just done and probably to hold things in place as well.

Fold little one inch circles (ours probably could have been a little bigger) to help hide all of the edges and corners at the top

Attach a handle. Again it can be whatever size and colour you choose. Lastly, decorate!

Donuts for Dad

 

It’s almost Father’s Day and if you have a Dad that loves a sweet treat, then this is the place to be because we are making mini donuts for Dad. You can wrap some up on a plate and bring them to Dad for his Father’s Day treat this weekend.

You can use one of those donut baking pans and do them in the oven, but these recipes will work best if you have a mini donut maker like this.

We are making three types of donuts, sour cream (plain), chocolate, and buttermilk spice.

I mixed all of the dry ingredients in separate bowls and then their corresponding wet ingredients in other separate bowls. It makes it a lot easier when you start doing all of your mixing.

The following are the ingredients and instructions for each of the batters.

Sour Cream Donuts:

1 ½ cups of flour

1/3 cup of sugar

1 Tbsp. of baking powder

½ tsp. of salt

½ cup of milk

¼ cup of vegetable oil

¼ cup of sour cream

1 egg

1 tsp. vanilla

Stir all of the dry ingredients together and in a separate bowl mix the wet. Add the dry ingredients to your mixer’s bowl and then beat in the wet ingredients until smooth. Make sure you don’t over mix. 

Set aside.

Chocolate Donuts:

1 ¼ cups of flour

½ cup of cocoa

½ cup of sugar

1 Tbsp. of baking powder

1 egg

¾ cup of buttermilk or see buttermilk recipe below

¼ cup of vegetable oil

1 tsp. vanilla

Stir all of the dry ingredients together and in a separate bowl mix the wet. 

If you don’t have buttermilk on hand, then you can make some up really quick. Just add 2 ¼ tsp. of lemon juice or white vinegar into a glass measuring cup and then add enough milk to equal ¾ cup. Let it stand for 5-10 minutes.

Add the dry ingredients to your mixer’s bowl and then beat in the wet ingredients until smooth. Make sure you don’t over mix. Set aside.

Buttermilk Spice Donuts:

1/3 cup of vegetable oil

1 cup of sugar

2 eggs

1 ¼ cups of buttermilk

½ tsp. of vanilla

2 cups of flour

4 tsp. of baking powder

½ tsp. of baking soda

¼ tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon

Once again mix all of the dry ingredients together. Beat together the oil and eggs and then stir in the buttermilk (follow the above recipe for homemade buttermilk; even though it calls for 1 ¼ cups still make the above amount seen in the Chocolate Donut recipe).

Now add the wet into the dry ingredients and mix until smooth being careful not to over mix.

After making your batter(s), you can now start cooking the donuts. If you have a mini donut maker, be sure to follow the instructions for cooking that comes with it. I preheat mine as according to the instructions and then I brush on a little oil so they don’t stick. I scoop in about a tablespoon of batter into each of the molds and cook for 3-4 minutes. 

Cool the donuts on a wire rack as you continue to bake the rest.

While all the donuts are cooling down, you can make the glazes.

You can put whatever glaze on whatever type of donuts you want. We put a vanilla glaze on some of the sour cream donuts and a chocolate glaze on some too and then we put a chocolate glaze on the chocolate donuts and dusted the buttermilk ones with cinnamon and sugar.

Vanilla Glaze – Melt ¼ cup of butter and then add 1 1/3 cups of icing sugar and stir until well blended. Stir in the vanilla and blend in 1 Tbsp. of hot water.

Chocolate Glaze – Whisk ¾ cups of icing sugar with 2 Tbsp. of cocoa, 2 Tbsp. of half and half, and 1 tsp. of vanilla until well mixed.

To ice/glaze the donuts, we just dipped the tops in the glaze that we wanted so that the tops got completely covered. Depending how thick you make the glaze, you could spread it on with a knife also.

Cinnamon Topping – Just mix 1 cup of sugar with 2 Tbsp. of cinnamon and mix well. We made the buttermilk donuts last and while they were still warm, we brush them with a little bit of melted butter and then dip the tops in the sugar mixture. If you want the entire donut covered, brush the donuts all over with butter and then put your sugar mix in a brown paper bag and toss the donuts in there so that they get covered.

The finished products...

If you don't have a donut maker, but still want to make some donuts for your dad, then try this recipe for mini Snickerdoodle Donut Muffins. We tried it a couple months ago, and it was pretty yummy!