Valentine Day crafts

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It's Valentine's Day crafting week here on sweet and lovely crafts!!! I'm kicking the week off with a look at some of the crafts that we made last year for Valentine's Day.


love Bug Valentines

toilet paper roll Valentines

gumdrop wreath

find love & hold tight printable

love sign

delicious chocolate cupcakes

Pop back early in the week to have a look at some of the new projects that we've been working on around here.

Maple Cinnamon Sugar Baked Donuts

So for Christmas this year my sister (the best one in the whole world!!) gave me a donut pan. I've only had it for one week now and I've already tried out three different recipes. I really liked these donuts, but I found the bottom outer layer a but chewy. Next time that I make them (and there will be a next time) I'm not going to spray my pan and see if that makes a difference.

Maple Cinnamon Sugar Donuts
From Handle the Heat via Cooking with my Kid (altered ever so slightly)
Yield: 6 donuts ( although, I didn't quite fill my pans, so I got 9 donuts)

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• pinch of salt
• 1 egg (lightly beaten)
• 6 oz container of non fat organic vanilla bean yogurt (I couldn't find vanilla bean, so I just used organic vanilla)
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 2 1/2 tablespoons real maple syrup
• 1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 tablespoons butter (melted)

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Toss the cinnamon and sugar together in a shallow dish and set aside. In a large bowl whisk together all the dry ingredients. In another bowl stir together oil, maple syrup, egg and yogurt.
2. Make a hole in the center of the dry ingredients and pour the wet ingredients into the hole. Gently fold everything together until combined. The batter will be thick.
3. Scoop batter into a piping bag or ziploc bag, snip a bottom corner with scissors, and squeeze out the batter evenly into a donut pan. (Trust me when I say this is so much easier than trying to spoon the batter into the donut pan!)

4. Bake for 10 minutes or until golden brown. Transfer to a cooling rack while still warm.
5. Use a pastry brush the melted butter over your donuts and then dip each donut in the cinnamon sugar mixture to coat. Serve immediately after coating with cinnamon sugar mixture. 

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Linking up with: Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie &  Tatertots and Jello

thumbprint snowmen ornaments

 Now here's a craft that only takes about 15 minutes to do! (Minus drying time of course.) I picked up these ornaments at Michael's a little while ago with this craft in mind. I used some heavy vellum paper for this craft. I traced a circle slightly smaller than the ornament on the vellum and then cut out a bunch of circles for the kids to stamp their thumbprints on.

 We made two white circles for the snowmen, and then another colour thumbprint for the snowman's hat. Once the snowmen were dry Claire and I drew on the faces and buttons. (Not pictured here: the snowmen that Claire thought should have scary faces. Where does she get this from?)

I made this a double sided ornament by placing a small piece of double sided tape in between two pieces of vellum. Then just roll up the circle and slide it into the ornament. I am so happy with how these ornaments turned out- what a lovely keepsake ornament to have for years to come! To see similar ornaments that we made last year click here.

Linking up with: Tip Junkie &  Tatertots and Jello

winter garland

I didn't realize how long it has been since I last posted. Claire, Simon and I have been so busy making Christmas crafts that I've hardly had any time to post about the crafts that we've been making. The idea behind this one was that you could use simple shapes to create these designs. Turns out they're a little more tedious than I had planned. So this is a craft that you would need to do parts of (like gluing on the hands and feet) and then have your little ones add on some of the other details.




 The penguin. This was one of the easiest ones to make. I used a 3" black circle, 2 1/2" white circle, and a small circle punch to create the hat. I cut out two small black wings, and a small candy cane  for him to hold. To make the feet I used a small circle punch and cut it into quarters. Then we just glued on the eyes, and drew on the face.

The Santa. I used a 3" red circle and a 3" cream coloured circle that was cut in half. I triangle was used for the hat, and a heart punch for Santa's beard. To make the feet I used a small circle punch and cut it into quarters. I cut out his hands, and made a small belt out of black and green paper. Then we just glued on the eyes, and drew on the face.

 The reindeer. I used a 3" brown circle and a 2 1/2" tan coloured circle that was cut in half. I used my snowflake punch to create the antlers. I cut the ears out of the brown paper and a small cream coloured circle for the face. For the collar, I used a red polka dot ribbon. Then we just glued on the eyes, and drew on the face.

The snowman. I used a 3" white circle and then just embellished it a bit. Green mittens, and a small circle punch and cut it into quarters for the feet. A little hat cut out of black paper, and some green ribbon for the scarf.


Claire had a lot of fun drawing all the faces on the banner. To simplify things, you could probably just draw on the hands, it sure would save a lot of time!


Linking up with: Tip Junkie &  Tatertots and Jello

footprint angels

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas- everywhere we go...

We are getting a huge snow storm today and the kids are so excited! We've already been outside playing once, and I'm sure we'll be back outside this afternoon. It's starting to feel very Christmas-y around here and I love it. We've hung our lights up outside, and we've been hanging up some of the crafts that we've been making up inside.

This craft was quite easy to make.
1. paint the heel of the child's foot a cream colour and the rest of the foot a light pastel colour

2. once that's dry, use the cream paint to paint arms and legs. Use gold paint to paint a circle above the head and also the wings. (Don't worry about being precise painting the wings- you'll draw the details on later.)
3. using a black felt tip pen or marker, draw on the face and shoes. Trace around the body of the angel, adding some details like buttons, and a belt. Outline the wings adding scalloped detail to the bottom parts of the wings. Lastly, outline the halo and connect it to the head.

After Claire had finished stamping her foot a few times, I picked the best purple and blue footprints and took them to Staples and printed out some colour copies of them. Then we came home and added the details on all of the angels.  We like to be able to give the pictures away to her family. We just personalize each picture with a little message and then our family usually hang the pics on their fridge!

What are you making to get ready for the holidays? Link your projects up in the comments so I can check them out!

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Linking up with: Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie &  Tatertots and Jello

chocolate mint deliciousness (aka brownies)

You know what's delicious? Chocolate. And mint. Together. So good. I would recommend though, if you're going to make these, that you wait until you have a lot of visitors. Because you will eat all of the leftovers. ALL of them. They are so good.

I used the recipe from here and the icing recipe from here.

Brownies:

3/4 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon dark cocoa powder

5 ounces good quality dark chocolate, coarsely chopped

1/2 cup butter, cut into 1 inch cubes

3/4 cups sugar

1/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar

3 large eggs, at room temperature

1 teaspoons vanilla extract 

Filling:

1/2 cup butter, softened
2 cups confectioners' sugar
1 tablespoon milk
1/2 teaspoon mint extract
 3 drops green food coloring

Chocolate top:

6 ounces of chocolate (In this recipe I preferred semi sweet to dark chocolate, and I usually love dark chocolate)

1/2 cup of butter, cubed

To make the brownies: 

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

Grease a 9 x 13 pan. Line with parchment, and then butter the parchment. (It's so easy to pull the brownies out of the pan to cut them this way.)

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, the salt, and cocoa powder.

Place the chocolate and the butter in the bowl of a double boiler and stir occasionally until the chocolate and butter are completely melted. Turn off the heat, but keep the bowl over the water of the double boiler and add both sugars. Whisk the sugars until completely combined. Remove the bowl from the pan. The mixture should be at room temperature.

Add three eggs to the chocolate and butter mixture and whisk until just combined. Add the vanilla and stir until combined. Do not overbeat the batter at this stage.

Sprinkle the flour, cocoa, salt mix over the chocolate. Using a spatula  fold the dry ingredients into the wet until there is just a trace amount of the flour and cocoa mix visible.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan, smooth the top with an offset spatula, and bake for approximately 12 to 15 minutes. A toothpick inserted into the brownies at an angle should contain a few loose crumbs. Let cool completely while you make the filling.

(It seems like a lot of steps to make the brownies, but I've made these twice now, and you won't be disappointed.) 

Filling:

In a small bowl, cream butter and confectioners' sugar. Add the milk, extract and food coloring until blended. Spread over cooled brownies. Refrigerate until set.

Chocolate Top:

Using a double boiler, melt the chocolate and cubed butter, mixing with a spatula. Once the mixture has combined and melted together remove from the heat. I let the chocolate sit for a few minutes, to let it cool off, before pouring over the filling. Place the brownies back in the fridge until the chocolate hardens, approx 1 hour. Cut into squares (or giant rectangles!) and serve.

Linking up with: Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie &  Tatertots and Jello

thumbprint santa tags

Thanksgiving and Halloween have come and gone here in Canada, and we are getting so excited for Christmas. Claire asks every day if we can get our Christmas tree yet, and she's well on her way to learning her second Christmas carol! We've been busy working on Christmas crafts- this is one of the first ones that we did.

The supplies to make these are pretty basic. 

A few tags cut from cardstock

red and cream paint

red and black pen

googly eyes

sequin for the belt (or you could use a small button)

q-tips (we just pulled the cotton off the ends for the hat and beard. Admittedly, I was looking for our cotton balls, but I couldn't find them so we used the q-tips.)

twine to hang the tags (mine is from The Twinery and I love it!)

Sadly I have no pictures from along the way. Paint + toddlers = work fast before the paint covers everything.

Start with the cream colour paint. Have (or help) the child stamp a thumbprint in the middle of the card. Using the red paint stamp a thumbprint on top and underneath of the cream one.

Set aside and let them dry.

Once the tags are dry, add on all of the finishing touches. Use the red pen to draw the smile, arms and legs. Use the black pen to draw the belt. Glue on the eyes, sequin, and cotton. (Roll the cotton off of the q-tips and form ball the the top of the hat. Roll the cotton between your fingers to stretch out for Santa's beard.)

Embellish with some beautiful twine (or ribbon) for the prettiest Christmas gift tags.

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Has anyone else started their Christmas projects? Link them up in the comments, I'd love to see what you're working on!

Linking up with: Skip to my Lou & Tip Junkie &  Tatertots and Jello