Lemon Poppy Seed Cake

I made this cake to take to a bishopric dinner.  It was super easy, but tastes like it came from a fancy restaurant.  Light, sweet, and lemony, this cake would be a fun treat for a warm summer day.  I found the recipe here on allrecipes.com.

Lemon Poppy Seed Cake

Ingredients

• 1 (18.25 ounce) package lemon cake mix
• 1 (3.4 ounce) package instant vanilla pudding mix
• 4 eggs
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1 1/4 cups water
• 1/2 cup poppy seeds

• 1 (21 ounce) can lemon pie filling 

• 1 (3.4 ounce) package instant lemon pudding mix
• 1 cup milk
• 1 (8 ounce) container frozen whipped topping, thawed

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9x13 inch pan.
2. In a large bowl, stir together cake mix and vanilla pudding mix. Make a well in the center and pour in eggs, oil water and poppy seeds. Beat on low speed until blended. Scrape bowl, and beat 4 minutes on medium speed. Pour batter into prepared pan.
3. Bake in the preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Allow to cool completely. Spread lemon pie filling over the cooled cake.
4. In a large bowl, mix instant lemon pudding with milk. Mix well and let stand about 5 minutes until fairly set. Fold in thawed whipped topping. Spread over pie filling. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours before serving.

*I made a two layer cake instead - I put the pie filling in the middle, and used the cool whip/pudding mixture for frosting.

Little Nests

Jessa was home these last few days for spring break.  We decided to make a little spring treat to celebrate.  I found this fun recipe in Essential Mormon Celebrations by Julie Badger Jensen. 

I love this cookbook - it's one of my favorites. 

 Little Nests

1/4 cup butter or margarine

1 cup miniature marshmallows

1 cup All-Bran or Fiber One cereal

1 small package mini robin eggs (Whoppers)

In a small saucepan , melt butter or margarine over low heat.  Add miniature marshmallows.  Stir until marshmallows are just melted. 

 Remove from heat (umm..we didn't do that, but it still worked).  Add cereal and stir just until coated.

 When cool enough to handle, form into eight little nests.  Place on waxed paper.

 After about 1 hour, press in center of each nest to form indention(We just put the eggs in right away).  Place three robing eggs in center of each nest. (Our eggs were too big to fit three).

Makes 8 nests. 

These were fun and tasted good.  Ha ha ha but now I have a box of All Bran...anyone know any other good recipes with All Bran?  I think these would be fun to make with chocolate rice krispies too - they wouldn't look as realistic - but then you would have a box of chocolate rice krispies leftover instead of All Bran. :)  I think I have a muffin recipe that calls for All Bran...I'll have to look for that.  

Shepard's Pie With Bling

Ahhh, look.  He's so happy I made dinner. :)

While eating Shepard's Pie at dinner Jessa remarked
"it tastes better than it looks mom."

She's right.  It does taste better than it looks.  Shepard's Pie can be a yummy quick dinner. 

 Here's my recipe (more or less...sometimes I don't measure). 

Shepard's Pie With Bling

8 servings of mashed potatoes
 (I used Betty Crocker Instant Roasted Garlic Potatoes - only $1 at Wal-mart!)
about 1 lb of ground beef
2 cans of green beans or about 10 oz frozen mixed vegetables
2 - 3 tsp Italian Seasoning
1 - 2 tablespoons Worcestershire Sauce
1 cup of French's Fried Onions (this is the bling!)

Brown ground beef, drain fat.  Add Italian Seasoning, Worcestershire Sauce, green beans or mixed veggies, and French's Fried Onions to beef.  Spread meat mixture on the bottom of a 9 x 13 inch pan.  Spread mashed potatoes over meat mixture.  Cook for 25 - 30 minutes at 350, or until food is nice and hot. Serve with a fresh green salad.  I just always wanted to say that last part. 

Chocolate-Strawberry-Banana-Pops

Cooking in the kitchen today we have Chef Elsie and Chef Caleb. 

They will be demonstrating how to create

Chocolate Strawberry Banana Pops. 

If you would like to make your own pops, you will need:

More or Less:

1 banana

8 strawberries

2 cups vanilla yogurt

2 cups chocolate ice cream

a blender

Popsicle molds

Wash your strawberries, cut off the tops.  Add to the blender.  Make sure you have a grown-up helping. :)

 Peel your banana.

 Add your banana and yogurt to the blender.

 Add the ice cream - yum!!!

 Blend!

 Pour into your Popsicle molds...add your sticks.

 Place your pops in the freezer.

 Do a crazy dance while you wait for the pops to freeze...

 2 to 3 hours later...wha la!  Delicious Chocolate Strawberry Banana Pop!  If you have a hard time getting your pop out of the mold, run it under hot water for a few seconds.  This will help it to slip right out!

Sweet treat for a happy face!

Sour Cream Cookies

 I loved 'sour cream cookies' as a kid.  I have made them a few times with recipes I found on the Internet, but this is the first time I made them using my Grandma Madeline's recipe.  Ohhhh they are sooooo good!  My family kept stealing cookies while I was making the frosting.  They are good without frosting, but even better with!!!  Eating these cookies was like turning back the clock 25 years! :)

Madeline's Sour Cream Cookies

Cream together:
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla

Add:
2 3/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup sour cream

Mix well.  Add 3/4 cup nuts if desired.
Bake at 350 for 11-13 minutes

 Creaming the butter, sugars, eggs and vanilla.

 Adding the remaining ingredients.

Getting ready to bake.

 Cooling...and about to be snitched!

 Heavenly!  This is Shane's Grandma Allen's cookie plate.  Special cookies deserve a special plate, right?
So the frosting recipe for the cookies isn't exact...I didn't have 'canned cream' so I just subbed milk.  I started with a cube of softened butter, added 2 - 3 cups of powdered sugar, 1 - 3 tablespoons milk (ok ok I wasn't measuring!) and about 1 tsp Mapleine.  If you don't have Mapleine you could leave it out or use vanilla.  Then I beat together all ingredients till it was smooth and thickish.  Yes thickish.  Let's all say thickish...not to be confused with ticklish...oh when you spend your time with 5 year olds thickish is funny.  That is, funnyish.  Hee hee...

Doesn't this box look so old fashioned? 

It's like they never changed the label. 

You can make your own maple syrup with Mapleine.  It was really popular in the depression when people couldn't afford maple syrup, they made their own with Mapleine. 

This add is from 1909.

This one is from the 1950's.

Love these old adds.  Ha ha ha..."make delicious syrup instantly!"

Happy baking!

For Beautiful Eyes

For beautiful eyes,

look for the good in others;

for beautiful lips,

speak only words of kindness;

and for poise,

walk with the knowledge
that you are never alone.

Audrey Hepburn

Pretty Curtains, Bird Mobile and a Chandelier

Just thought you might want to see a picture of what Elsie's room usually looks like. :)  It's kind of like an I Spy book...Can you spy the baby? Two red shoes? One flashlight? 

 Yay! Today was a happy day.  We finally hung curtains in Elsie's room.  I have been dreaming of sweet white curtains to go in this room since I was pregnant!  Clearly I am not a photographer.  It was really hard to get a good picture of the window - must be all of that sun.  This is the best I could do.  It is also a tiny room, so getting a good shot is tricky. 

The curtains are Simply Shabby Chic White Voile Embroidered from Target.  I don't know how to pronounce voile and I'm not sure what it is except that it's hanging in Elsie's room and I think it's cute. :)

I didn't want to spend money on curtain tie backs, so I used a simple idea from my sister Mary Jane.  I bought pink ribbon, tied the ribbon around the curtain about 1/3 up, and then tacked it to the wall.  I only tacked the ribbon to the wall - the curtain is thin and I didn't want it to tear.  The tack actually seems sturdy - I'm not to worried about Elsie pulling it out. :)

Bought this from my talented friend Trisha.  We had our babies at the same time and she bought two chandeliers...and let me buy this one from her. I'm not sure where she found it.

I got the idea for this bird mobile at The Spotted Sparrow, and at Martha Stewart.  It's a Good Thing she was out of jail to share this great idea with me.  Hee hee hee...

I just used scrap book paper I had on hand, but I wish I had found some double sided paper.  I think it would be a lot cuter like that.  Oh well, some birds are white, right???

A place for everything, and everything in it's place!  This basket is from Hobby Lobby...and this tiny corner by her crib is where we keep the dress-ups.  Good she's a skinny little thing so she can fit back there. ;)

In my best English accent..."anyone want a spot of tea?"

Elsie's Nursery

These are pictures of Elsie's nursery about a year ago.   I have had soooo much fun decorating her room.  My inspiration for her room is this old blue chair -- it used to be Shane's mom's chair. Seriously the most comfortable chair EVER.  And I think it's made for short people...which I happen to be. 

Shane painted the walls Morning Glory, a Benjamin Franklin paint color.  I love this soft blue.  I think we got lucky the color turned out so nice.  Ha ha ha...we have had some really interesting paint colors in our house (interesting as in they did not turn out to great!) let's see...the purple bathroom...completely tomato red bedroom...the golden living room...yes I really don't trust myself to pick out paint colors anymore.  But -- the blue turned out lovely.  :)

* Elsie's Crib Bedding is Tiddliwinks, Cottage Chic from Target.  It has blue and pink in it - perfect!
* I made the fluffy garland over her bed - super easy, I got the idea from Nester.  Here is the link to her blog, where you can see instructions for making a 'ragamuffin garland.' For Elsie's garland I used strips of gingham fabric, leftover fabric from baby quilts, tulle, lace and ribbon.
* And my sister gave me the idea for the letter E - I just cut out an E, then used some iron on pellon to adhere it to the pink gingham. 

*one of a kind, handsome husband and Daddy...I found him at Rick's College. :)

*The little picture is from Etsy - from a shop called The Light Garden.  Verity Heyson Kizek is the artist.  She has adorable art for children and sweet stationary.  I have since ordered two more of her prints.  LOVE her style.  Sometimes she will offer 20% off, so if you want to order, watch for a sale. 

*Elsie name sign - Shane cut me a board, I painted it...and ordered vinyl from my great neighbor Ginger. 

* One of my favorite things in Elsie's room is her ribbon board - my sweet friend Trisha made it.  It's the perfect place for all of her pretty little bows and flowers. That ribbon board needs it's own post.  I'd like to make one for a friend and post how to pictures...if I can ever get around to it. :) 
*The shelf is from Hobby Lobby, spray painted white.  The dress is Elsie's blessing dress.
* I bought the lamp on KSL...
* This dresser is from my Grandma Allen's...but I think it was originally from Shane's great Grandma Pitcher.  I didn't paint it - I just left it all white and chippy.  I guess you can't see it's chippy...but it is on top.  It's probably lead paint...but I figure as long as my baby is not chewing on the dresser we're OK.  The knobs are from Hobby Lobby. 

*The shelf is a Kid Craft...I ordered it off of Amazon.

So tomorrow I would like to post some of the things I have added to Elsie's room...

*new carpet (I seriously HATE the Berber carpet we used to have...I am gagging just thinking about it...)

*finally bought some curtains...

*handmade bird mobile

*little chandelier

*and now her room is full of more toys - kitchen, table, dress-ups...so the chair is gone.

till tomorrow...