S'more Banana Pumpkin Muffins....please!

 What do you make when you have only two overripe bananas, some leftover canned pumpkin, mini marshmallows in the freezer, a chocolate bar, and a box of graham crackers? Of course, I concocted a new recipe, ' S'more Banana Pumpkin Muffins.  Basically, I started with my Mom's much-loved banana bread recipe and dumped in the other ingredients.  It turned out fantastic!  Give it a try....enjoy!

                                                        S'more Banana Pumpkin Muffins

1 cup sugar

1/2 butter

2 eggs

2 over ripe bananas

1/2 cup canned pumpkin puree

2 cups white whole wheat flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

1 cup crushed graham crackers

1 cup chopped chocolate bar

1 cup mini marshmallows

Mix together sugar and butter. Add in the two eggs and mashed fruit.  Stir in the flour and then the baking soda, and salt.  Finally add 3/4 cup of the crackers, 3/4 cup of the chocolate, and 3/4 cup of the marshmallows.  Spoon the mixed batter into paper lined muffin cups. This recipe will make about 16 muffins.  Press the leftover crackers, marshmallows, and chocolate pieces onto the top of the muffins and bake at 350 degrees (no need to preheat oven) for about 25 minutes (until a butter knife inserted into a baked muffin comes out clean).  Enjoy!

Arigato (Thank You) Kokeshi Doll Card

Because the slimline card format is very popular now, I decided to retrieve some blank business-letter shaped cards from my bottomless craft storage bin.  Here is the thank you card I created to say, "arigato" for some wonderful birthday gifts that were wrapped in the Japanese 'furushiki' style.

I believe that Whimsy Stamps started the trend to decorate the slimline cards with creative die cuts.  I used the die to cut some of the wrapping paper (I think I wrapped the giver's gift in this paper for HER birthday...hahaha!) to make a frame for the kokeshi dolls. I cut solid papers with this die too, to make the inside pieces. By simply changing out the inside colors you can see that  there is a subtle difference between the cards.  The original card blank had a cut out square and a pink panel of paper for writing a message so I recut the square opening and stamped the inside design.  The dolls were stamped on origami paper, fussy cut, and glued onto the original stamped image so that their kimonos would look colored but didn't require much labor.  The larger word stamp was by Mari and Me and the smaller one is from Dandelion Designs; I think. Hero Arts made the set of three kokeshi doll stamps.  If you don't have any slimline card blanks, you can easily cut some yourself to fit a business envelope and punch out a window too.  Be creative and have fun!

                                        

 

Happy Birthday Mice Gift Bags

The plain Daiso dotted bags were the inspiration for these gift bags.  Can you believe that the bags came in a pack of three for only $1.50!!!  I knew that the colors and simplicity of the dots would be great background to add on embellishments.

I have two Sizzix dies (from HMBFC) which I seldom use because of their large size, but they were perfect for these bags.  The Birthday Wishes words were cut from pearlescent light blue card stock and the Hooray was cut from a foil blue card stock. (Fancy card stock is available in packs from HMBFC.)

Both die cuts have small holes on the sides through which I strung the Lawn Fawn rainbow twine and tied it into bows.  Fabri-Tac glue was used to adhere the words and stamped circles.

House Mouse stamps were used to apply brown permanent ink to Sizzix die cut circles before they were colored in with Copic pens.  The edges of the stamped card stock circles were rubbed with Distress Ink and a little crystal glitter was added to the pink cupcake frosting.

The small circle tags were serendipitous additions because I found some House Mouse clear stamps at HouseMart Ben Franklin Crafts that coordinated perfectly with the larger House Mouse stamps. (The small stamps were only $3.49....what a deal!) Fancy decorated gift bags are so expensive these days that it's economical and fun to make your own from 50 cent Daiso paper bags.  Yes, YOU can craft!  

 

I love this Art Impressions twin bunny egg hunters image and bought the rubber stamp years before my twin grandsons were born.  I'm psychic!  Anyway, I thought that it would make a great card front for the surprise inside the card.  Since I didn't feel like fussy cutting the image, I stamped the image on a 5-1/4" square of watercolor paper ad rounded the corners with a corner clipping tool. (I didn't clip the top corners of the purple card because it would show on the inside of the card along the fold.) Next, I colored in the image with Copic pens.  After stamping the image on a Masking Magic paper (from HM BFC), cutting it out and applying it over the watercolor paper Copic colored image, I started dabbing on two colors of blue and two of green Hero Arts reactive inks (from HM BFC) to form a sky and grassy area.  Leaving on the mask, I sprayed the scene with water and blotted.  Once I was satisfied, I removed the mask and  drew in the grass sprouts with a green color pencil.  I filled in any white spaces around the image by applying the reactive inks with a tiny brush.  The Impression Obsession words were die cut from pearlized pink paper and adhered after running through a Xyron sticker maker. A little bit of Scribbles crystal paint was applied to the eggs.

I actually created the inside of this card before the outside.  I watched the Lawn Fawn video of a card made with the amazing Create a Basket die set.  I knew that I HAD to try it.  I simplified the  basket contents and added a die cut Lawn Fawn chocolate bunny with a bitten ear.  To make the bunny look more like chocolate I coated it with Glossy Accents.  

The words were stamped on a Lawn Fawn die cut banner.  From this photo you can see how the card pops up and folds down.  I didn't have the SMILE die that was shown on the video, but I had a similar one that said Big Hugs and it worked well for this project.  I am pleased with this card because it represents the joy of the Easter egg hunt which speaks to the kid in me.  I'm excited to watch the excitement of the search that will surely shine in my grandsons' eyes this Easter.  I hope that all of you will never lose that thrill of the hunt....I'm still keeping my eyes open for that elusive antique, bejeweled Faberge egg!  Happy Easter to All!!!!

 

Rabbits With Easter Egg Balloons

Just after I got the Whimsy slimline cloud die, I was inspired to combine it with the stamp set of rabbits floating with balloons.  I had a funny thought that the balloons could be Easter eggs.  The card evolved  and I imagined that they could be tossing colored eggs to rabbits below.  I started by making the rainbow background with Hero Arts reactive ink pads (from HMBFC).  After making the color layers, they were spritzed with water to achieve a mottled look.  Initially, I wanted to use vellum paper with a cloud print, but that proved to be too see-through so I backed the cloud frame with another die cut made from white card stock.  Then both cloud die cuts were attached to the rainbow sheet and all of this was adhered to a blue card blank.  The rabbits were stamped with permanent ink and colored in with Copic pens before fussy cutting out the images.  The egg balloons were die cut (using a LF die, not shown) and glued over the original stamped balloons.  Smaller eggs were hand cut by simply clipping off any part that didn't look like an egg...LOL!  The rabbits and eggs were mounted on foam adhesive dots.  I was planning to put a sentiment where the small cloud (upper right) is.  However, I couldn't decide on an appropriate one so I simply put the cloud there and perhaps later I will attach a sentiment label.  Hope you enjoyed seeing this colorful, whimsical Easter card. Have a hoppy holiday!

 

Upcycling Paper Bags Into Easter Baskets

As a keeper of sturdy bags and boxes for upcycling, I couldn't throw away these great Hawaiian Airlines snack bags that were given during an international flight (taken way before the pandemic altered our traveling days).  I thought that the shape, color and woven handles would make great Easter baskets for my two honey bunnies.

I used the Lawn Fawn grassy hill dies to cut enough green card stock to go all around the bottom of each basket, adding extra hills as needed.  Next I stamped and colored the retired Sister Stamps bunnies.  They were fussy cut by hand and attached to the baskets with foam dot adhesives.  Because the bags had Hawaiian Airline logos on the top edge of each side of the bags, I made a 'happy easter' label for one side and used scrabble sticker letters on the other side.

For a little added color, I decided that Easter eggs would be perfect. However, I was too lazy to hand color each one and I didn't have the right size stickers.  I did locate a Studio G egg stamp set (from BFC) and combined with a long Colorbox rainbow ink pad I was able to create dozens of paper eggs that looked individually hand dyed.  

I discovered a long forgotten bottle of tiny Prima paper flowers and used them to further decorate the baskets.  The center of each flower was embellished with a tiny dot of Nuvo pearlized purple dimensional paint (available in an abundance of olors at HM Ben Franklin Crafts).  This was a satisfying upcycling project because I turned something others would throw away into Easter baskets special enough for two special boys.  Hooray for upcycling!!!!!

 

"Bunny, What's New? ?" Card

This is the third of my series of Easter-ish bunny cards.  Using a slimline Whimsy scenery card for the background, I simply added some My Favorite Things stamped, colored and Die-namics cut images.  Because the die cut images were popped up on foam adhesive dots, they stand out in an almost animated cartoonish way. The words were stamped in clear ink and heat embossed with white Nuvo powder (from HM BFC).  By stamping the words on card stock scraps which matched the scenery, they blend in nicely but are still readable.

As with the last two posts, the Whimsy scenery panel was adhered to a Making Memories card stock that has two slits through which the message panel is inserted.  This makes it easy to add additional panels for a longer letter.  This card would make a sweet Eater card, but can be used anytime of the year when you want to reach out to a good friend. Hugs!