Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day friends! 

Valentine's Day may be an overly commercialized Hallmark holiday, however, I think any reason to celebrate the people you love is a good reason...so bring on the Valentine's lovin'.

 This year was probably my favorite Valentine's Day to date. Austin and I haven't had a weekend off together in an extremely long time so the day seemed especially sweet. We went to breakfast, spent the morning thrifting, and lounged around with no agenda. It was lovely. We also flipped through some of our old Valentine cards. Austin truly has a gift for sniffing out the least romantic cards and can hardly contain his excitement every year when he gets to watch me open the cards while he laughs hysterically....like last year's "I'm still not sick of you card". There was a time (our first year dating)  however, that we took Valentine's day seriously as we both attempted to reel the other in and ensure many years of nonromantic, hilarious, and beautiful Valentine's days spent together.  I made this Valentine's Day Card video that year...

But that was year one...this is year five and year five calls for cupcakes.

I used a chocolate fudge cupcake to start and dipped strawberries earlier in the day using ghirardelli dark melting chips. But the real MVP of this Valentine's Day dessert is the frosting. Oh my goodness...this frosting. I am really excited about this frosting! I never measure out ingredients when I am making frosting as I usually taste as I go but I do think the measurements below are somewhat close to what I ended up using.

Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting

20 oz cream cheese

3/4 tsp. vanilla

1 cup frozen strawberries

4 Tbsp. heavy whipping cream

 powderer sugar to taste (I used ~1 1/2 cups)

I used my Ninja food processor to puree the frozen strawberries with the whipping cream until it was light and fluffy. I mixed the cream cheese, vanilla, and strawberry puree together and slowly mixed in the powdered sugar a quarter cup at a time. I feel like all recipes I have found for homemade frosting call for outrageous amounts of powdered sugar. I prefer to only use as much as I need to slightly sweeten and  stiffen up the frosting to the consistency I want to pipe onto the cupcakes. For this recipe, I would guess I used, at most, a cup and a half and I am so glad I did. This frosting actually tastes like strawberry cheesecake...not too sweet but so, so good and hands down my favorite frosting I have ever made! The frosting also has a mousse like texture which is great since the strawberry on top makes the dessert a little heavy.

I have made a lot of cupcakes this year but really think these might be my favorite and my Valentine seemed to agree!

Let me know if you try these at home!

Kid, You'll Move Mountains

When I was in 7th grade, my social studies teacher, Mr. Herbstreit gave me a copy of Dr. Suess's Oh, the Places You'll Go! If you haven't read this, do it. Right now.  I adore this book and have made it the "theme" of my therapy room. I really love the line "KID, YOU'LL MOVE MOUNTAINS" as it reminds me of so many of the kids I treat.  Their little minds are so powerful!

While I found a number of pieces of art on Etsy and Pinterest with this line, none of them were exactly what I was looking for for the room.  And so, let the crafting begin! I bought a frame on clearance at Hobby Lobby and decided to try the Americana Chalk Paint for the first time. I also decided to repaint an old chair my grandma had picked up at a garage sale for me a few years ago.

For the frame, Austin cut me a piece of chalkboard to put inside and I used a chalk pen and chalk to draw the picture that I wanted on the board. 

 I also needed some sort of storage for my treatment room. I LOVED the look of so many of the pieces at World Market and Pottery Barn however, they didn't quite fit my pocketbook. After hitting a few thrift stores, Austin and I found this hutch that needed a little TLC but fit right into my budget. 

Other than refastening most of the hinges, the hutch itself was in pretty good shape. Since I didn't care for the green flimsy particle board backing, Austin put together a few pieces of real wood wainscoting. We stained the wood and nailed the new backing on.

I also was on the hunt for a crank table so that the kids could do activities at a table top and I could adjust the height for each of them. You guys, those things are outrageously expensive. Instead of purchasing a $400+ small crank table, we found a metal stool on clearance at World Market. Austin took off the backrest of the stool and fastened a $6.00 precut piece of wood to the seat. We stained it to match the back of the hutch and it has worked great for the kids!

I had so much fun shopping for my new room and setting it up for the kids! I really like how it all turned out and came together.

Celebrating a Special Friend

I have seen an image floating around pinterest that says, "Everyone has a friend during each stage of life. But only lucky ones have the same friend in all stages of life." Taylor is that friend. We met on the sidewalk in front of my parents' home when I was 6 years old where we both made "peanut butter and jelly sandwiches" with mud and leaves. My entire childhood has memories of Taylor in it and even though we could not be any less alike, I shared a very active imagination and desire to create new things with my friend.  Despite entirely different interests and personalities, my childhood best friend became my college roommate and continues to be one of the dearest people in my life. I am constantly blown away by her creativity, her quick wit, and her deep desire to pursue the people and things that she loves. We don't have many opportunities to spend time together anymore, but when we do, it is as if nothing has ever changed. Her birthday was last week and since this girl is so worth celebrating- cupcakes and a homemade gift were in order. 

I had never purchased washi tape before and found these super cute fabric washi patterns at Michaels.  The wooden skewers I found at hobby lobby and had to cut for size as they were a bit too long for the cupcakes I was making. These little flags were so easy to make and were perfect toppers for some very simple chocolate and yellow cake cupcakes. I cut the washi tape into 3" sections and placed the skewers in the center of the sticky side of the tape.  I then folded the tape in half with the skewer in the middle and cut the ends on an angle. Easy peasy.

These cupcakes were so simple, I was able to send a dozen to a coworker planning a last minute baby shower.

Like I said, Taylor is extremely creative and talented. Her blog http://junkininstyle.blogspot.com is filled with furniture renovations and has been so fun to follow. She shares a dream with her mother of renovating a vintage camper, traveling the country and collecting junk to breathe new life into.  For her birthday, I wanted to make her a quilt that somehow tied in this iconic camper that she and her mom, Amy, have been including in their recent projects and posts. A not so quick trip to Joann's with my husband and a night with my sewing machine turned into the perfect birthday gift for my sweet friend.

Happy Birthday Taylor! Here's to 20 more years of friendship!