A Personalized Hostess Gift

Plants make great hostess gifts, but they can sometimes be pretty ordinary. With just a small amount of effort you can add pizazz to your plants!

First, start with a cool pot. I got this one at at Anthropologie. If you aren't lucky enough to have an Anthropologie where you live, it is available online. Its description reads, "rough-hewn terracotta, worn and weathered as if it's spent a dozen seasons braving the elements, yearns for a sunny indoor perch to cradle fresh herbs and aromatics." Whatever. I just think it's a cool pot.

A great place here in Birmingham to buy plants is Leaf 'n Petal. I bought this maidenhair fern there. It is beautiful and delicate. I added some wild moss from our yard to the top of the soil. You can see it more closely if you click on the picture.

I used my chalk ink markers for the gift tag. They are available online and at Michael's. I would recommend the primary colors over these earthy ones because there are several colors here that don't show up on black.

I found this tiny chalk board gift tag at World Market. Isn't it cute? I love tiny versions of things. I used a small piece of wood inside to hang it onto. A popsicle stick would do. A cute bow completes it.

Crazy Birthday Fun

Today is my birthday and I had to work. I'm not whining, just stating fact. I love my job and my friends, so it wasn't too bad. Plus I received many birthday greetings all day long, which was nice. But it was, after all, my birthday and I had to work.

I seem to always have some kind of self-inflicted, overzealous cooking or crafting project looming over me. And I mean always. Since I was 12. My husband has not only been tolerant of this annoying quirk, but actually supportive of it. I guess you could call him an enabler. You could also call him a sous-chef. And an excellent one at that.

According to Wikipedia, a sous-chef de cuisine (under-chef of the kitchen) is "the direct assistant of the executive chef, and is second in command. This person may be responsible for scheduling and substituting when the executive chef is off-duty." Gil Franks is absolutely that. I took a magnanimously large chicken pot pie to work today for a fun lunch we had (totally unrelated to my aforementioned birthday). I prepared it yesterday afternoon while I was getting ready to go to my brother-in-law's birthday party, during which time I decided to bake him some birthday shortbread cookies and put them in a decorative box with a handmade tag. So goes my life. Gil helped me prepare the cookies as well as the chicken pot pie filling, and we were able to get to his brother's party on time, cookie gift in hand.

Here is the recipe, in case you would like it:

Chicken Pot Pie

4-6 chicken breasts, cooked and shredded
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 cup sour cream
½ cup frozen tiny green peas, thawed (opt)
½ cup sliced, cooked carrots (opt)
1/2 chopped onion, sauteed in butter
salt & pepper to taste
1 prepared piecrust in pan, such as Pet-Ritz
1 All-Ready Piecrust
1 egg, beaten

Combine ingredients. Spoon into prepared piecrust. Top with All Ready Piecrust and trim and seal edges. Brush crust with beaten egg, add cut-outs, and brush cutouts with egg. Cut 4 small slits in crust to vent. Bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes or until golden brown.



I had extra pot pie filling left, and really just wanted chicken pot pie for supper tonight. I was sooo tired. Gil would not hear of me making it for myself on my birthday, so, with a few instructions from me, he prepared a beautiful chicken pot pie.

I showed him how to crimp the crust, which he did beautifully:

I gave him my tiny alphabet cutters and he decorated the top of the pie and finished it off with an egg wash. Isn't it amazing? He also prepared a delicious side salad.

He got me this gorgeous cake. Savages Bakery has the best in all the land. Chocolate cake with chocolate icing. Have you ever seen such gorgeous flowers? Almost too pretty to eat. I did say almost.

Thank you to everyone who made my birthday so happy. My heart is full of gratitude for my precious family and wonderful friends.

Create Your Own Baby Blankets

The arrival of my little grandson (July!) has renewed my interest in sewing. I used to sew all the time. I made clothes for myself, my children, and my husband, and lots of gifts for friends and family. I got to the point where I was too busy to really concentrate on it and would only do an occasional project. My husband bought me a new Singer sewing machine when we were married in '79, and it was pretty worn out from extreme use, so I bought a Janome machine a couple of years ago that I LOVE. It purrs like a kitten. And now I have geared myself back up to do some sewing. Yea me.

I noticed one of the babies in the nursery at work was wrapped in a cotton gauze blanket which I thought was a really great idea. I looked up the website and thought they were pretty pricey (1 for $19.99, 4 for $44). So I decided to make my own and made them for about $7 each. Watch for sales at Joann and Hancock and pay even less. The gauze is great for summer.

I made these blankets about 45" square, which for 45" fabric, each blanket required 1 - 1/4 yards.
I folded over a 1/2" hem on all 4 sides and pressed. Then I folded over another 1/2" and pressed again. A hot steam iron really helps.






My machine does a lot of fun stitches, which I used on my blankets, but just a straight or zigzag stitch would be fine. I made some flannel blankets, too.


I found this cute alphabet print at Hancock. I love cute little animal faces.

I layered it with batting and backed it with muslin.

I machine quilted around each square.

I think there were 64 squares, but it really didn't take all that long.

It turned out to be really soft and cute.

I loved making these blankets. It is a great way to do a special baby gift. Especially for your baby's baby. : )

Homemade Pizza Dough

There is nothing like homemade pizza crust. It tastes sooo much better than the best you can buy in the grocery store. I use my basic roll dough recipe that I have posted several times. It is great for rolls, cinnamon rolls, cheese danish, cheese rolls, pepperoni bread, calzones, and PIZZA DOUGH. For the pizza toppings, I also think it's fun to scavenge through my refrigerator and use ingredients I have on hand to challenge myself to create culinary magic. I know. Kinda sad.

Here is my roll dough recipe again:

Basic Roll Dough

4 cups all-purpose flour

1 cup water

1 egg

1 stick butter, sliced

2 tsp salt

6 tbsp sugar

2 pkg yeast (either regular or rapid rise)

Place ingredients in bread machine. I like to add about 1/2 the water first, then the flour and other ingredients, including the rest of the water. Set the machine to the dough setting. This takes 90 minutes. When the cycle is over, roll the dough out onto a floured surface and cut into the desired sizes.

My toppings were: leftover grilled chicken, fresh basil, chopped red bell pepper, grated cheddar cheese, and a few strips of bacon. For my sauce I used Ragu Pizza Quick.

After the dough was ready, I divided it in half and sprinkled it with cornmeal as I rolled it out.

Then I placed it in a greased pizza pan. (I don't let it rise).

I covered it with my toppings.

Bake at 450° for about 20 minutes or until the crust is golden around the edges. This pizza did not last long at my house.

While it is baking you can reserve the other half of the dough for future small personal pan pizzas. I divided it into 5 portions and rolled them out individually. Then I separated them with pieces of parchment paper.

I wrapped them with plastic wrap and put them in the freezer. When you want to make small pizzas, you can pull as many as you need out of the freezer and place the toppings on them and bake them without thawing them first. How easy is that?

Tie Dye, Part Two: Onesies

This is my second installment of my tie dye adventures. I was inspired by the anticipated arrival of my grandson to try a onesies project. Please refer to my first post for any basic instruction, such as types of dye, etc.

I bought onesies at Walmart and prewashed them. I dampened them with water before I dyed them. For this one, I did the spiral technique. Place a fork at the center of where you want the spiral and begin to twist it.

Continue twisting...

Once you have twisted it into a circle, add rubber bands and apply dye to the front and back of each section. I used orange, yellow, lime green, and brown.


This is how it turned out.
After I finished each one, I wrapped it in plastic wrap and let it sit for several hours. I understand that there is a microwave technique that will set the heat but I haven't tried that yet.

You can also section it off like this:



I did several solid ones. They still had a mottled, hand-dyed look, which I liked.

I placed the rubber bands on the middle of this one. I don't have the pictures of it, but I dyed the onesie a turquoise color and the sectioned-off part a denim blue.

I made a pair of white knit pull-on pants and dyed them a solid denim blue to match the onesie.

And this is the outfit. The pants looked stonewashed.

I hope this helps to give you some fun ideas for tie dyeing onesies. It is a fun and inexpensive project and it makes a great gift. I will be posting a lot more fabric dyeing ideas soon!