We Jammin'

This summer my pal Germaine and I made the most delicious jam on Earth (yes, it's that good). We made Marisa McClellen's Vanilla-Rhubarb Jam with Earl Grey from her new book Food in Jars. It is dynamite! Not too sweet with real vanilla bean and a beautifully subtle earl grey note. I've been loving it on sourdough toast, English muffins, over Greek yogurt with granola and over ice cream - but it would be great with pork or with other savories, too. At dinner last night there was a genius suggestion: doughnuts with this jam as filling.

It was super easy to make and I love the Food in Jars small batch mentality. Get the recipe here and the book from a local bookstore in your town. We doubled the recipe to make 8 pints. All but one jar has been given away to appreciative bellies. I'm savoring this last jar. So good.

[all photos by pinkshirtsandcarwrecks]

Scalloped Backdrop DIY

Remember our styling for the Scandinavian Inspiration shoot for Hearten? And how Ruffled featured it last month? Ruffled asked us to do a backdrop how-to to share on their blog! Check out the detailed instructions at Ruffled and make for your next party if you're feeling crafty. Go Honeycomb Collective!

[top photo: Jeff Loves Jessica]

Minneapolis Vintage Sale!

A few shots of the cute tags I made for the Vintage Sale I'm participating in next week in South Minneapolis. (Sneak peek photos to come!) If you're in town, here are the details:

Thursday, March 22 - Sunday, March 25
TH/F/S 11am - 7pm
SUN 11am - 3pm

E's Emporium
3911 Minnehaha Ave S.
Minneapolis, MN

Wrap it up

I was thinking of making some old-school gift bows as little brooches out of some crazy sparkly ribbon to sell in my hand made shop and came across this DIY from Whole Living [via 100 Layer Cake]. Super cute (and easy)!

be mine, valentine

happy valentine's day! here are the valentines i made to spread the love this year. i had a stack of vintage transfer lettering and vinyl stickers waiting for the perfect project. envelopes are lined with vintage dictionary pages, hearts are rubber stamped in black and scarlet ink, and i used vintage gold glass glitter for one heart on each card.

lots of love!

baby shower for arrow

I wanted to share a bit from Abby's baby shower at the beginning of October. I was excited to help welcome baby Arrow (who's due anytime now) with Abby's family and friends.

We were lucky to have great weather so food, drinks and gifts happened outside on the patio and the porch. Abby and I both wanted to stay away from the stereotypical baby shower activities,  so guests got their craft on with an arrow making activity in lieu of games.

We addressed envelopes (for easy thank you notes after) which were then drawn for little prizes. Craspedia in vintage milk glass vases made for non-traditional flower arrangements; fantastic cookies by my friend Brian for something sweet; local Joia sodas and cucumber water for thirst quenching; and favors with deluxe chocolate bars and DIY memo clips served as a going away treat.

cheers!

wanted to share a quick gift project i made last weekend - infused vodkas! i gave them to friends as new year's gifts during our first game night of 2011. i think new year's gifts instead of christmas presents are nice since you have time to make them after things have settled down. 

the recipes were from the january issue of martha stewart magazine (which isn't online yet). i chose three infusions: lemon + fennel for vodka tonics, celery + bay leaf for bloody mary's; and coffee bean + hazelnut for white russians.

i used 16oz canning jars and papered the lids (with west elm paper they use to wrap up your purchases) and made simple tags with a hole punch and some baker's twine. if our printer wasn't on the fritz i would've printed something cute out instead of hand writing everything. next time.

each jar took 1 1/2 cups of vodka plus ingredients as follows:

celery + bay leaf
1/2 celery stalk + 2 celery leaves + 1 dried bay leaf. infuse for 2 days.

coffee bean + hazelnut
4 coffee beans + 2 tablespoons toasted hazelnuts. infuse for 3 days.

fennel + lemon
2 sprigs fennel fronds + 2 thin lemon slices. infuse for 2 days.

store in a cool, dark place and shake occasionally. strain before serving. can keep at room temperature for one month or in the freezer for two.

it was an easy and cost effective way to make gifts for a large group. i think they were a hit. i had a white russian (or two) last night with my infused vodka - yum!

are you cussing with me?

have we all recovered from the trick or treaters and halloween parties? we went out on saturday night for only an hour, but spent all day thrift store hopping for the elements of my costume: mr. fox from wes anderson's fantastic mr. fox. (sorry for the over saturated photo - struggling for good light over here this morning.)

the whole thing cost me about $25. all the clothing: corduroy blazer, pants, white short-sleeved button up and brooks brothers tie (score at $1.99) was thrifted. the $5 mask came from the zoo gift shop, and originally depicted a red panda, which was close to a fox but i wanted to be more accurate so i painted over it. i made the tail using another thrift store sweater by cutting off one sleeve, filling with packing peanuts (recycling at its finest), sewing the ends shut, then painting the tip white. i just tied it with some yarn to the back belt loop on my pants and it looked great.

then i honed my sound effect craft with mr. fox's "click click, whoo-oo" whistle thing. and said "what the cuss?" a lot.

feels good to be featured

lovely to wake up this morning and find that a few of my little d.i.y projects featured on a couple blogs. my cupcake flags were part of this gorgeous garland round-up on 74 lime lane (above) and my laptop risers made an appearence over at yum! chocolate cupcakes. thanks for the props, ladies!

wedding weekend

attended a wonderful wedding on saturday afternoon in st. paul. beautiful weather (heat wave broke! no rain!) in a gorgeous backyard. i had the pleasure of doing the bouquets for the bride and bridesmaids. celena and i went to the farmer's market the day before and picked out flowers that matched her color scheme, purple and green with some orange lilies thrown in (although, i didn't get them to open quickly enough). the wedding was beautiful and celena was so organized and did it all on a budget. and she was cool as a cucumber! congrats celena and graham!

little d.i.y

this d.i.y is pretty white trash, but effective! been having heat issues with our laptop lately and saw real simple use doorstoppers for laptop risers. i made my own with wooden shims and japanese masking tape. four shims per riser. just line 'em up and wrap 'em tight.




easy peasy lemon squeezy. as opposed to difficult difficult lemon difficult. (did anyone see that one?)