New Etsy Shop: Feather & Webb

In case you aren't friends with me on facebook (hey, why aren't you friends with me on facebook?), I have a new Etsy store! Drumroll please! Introducing Feather & Webb!

I'll be selling my dream catcher necklaces, some other handmade jewelry and some choice vintage items. I just opened it last week and I've already sold one necklace AND I've had a lot of interest. I don't have everything up for sale yet, but when I do I'm gonna pimp it so hard on all kinds of blogs. How awesome would it be if I could start making some real money with this stuff? Very awesome.

So, go check it out for yourself and tell me what you think! I want to make this shop as good as it can possibly be and I am TOTALLY open to any and all suggestions.

Feather & Webb

I also plan on starting a new blog for F&W, so stay tuned for that, too.

Thanks, guys! :)

P.S. Be facebook friends with me (facebook.com/imuhwinner) and Feather & Webb (facebook.com/featherandwebb)! Yay!

BF BIRTHDAY: Part Two: Carrot Cheesecake

As promised, here's the birthday cake.
It was super good.
{Cheesecake Factory's Carrot Cake Cheesecake Recipe}
The cheesecake layer was like a huge layer of delicious, delicious icing--
under the layer of delicious, delicious icing.
{Magnolia Bakery's Cream Cheese Icing}
I used a half recipe and added a lot more powdered sugar.
I got the recipe book from my friend Tina.
She's the best.
I made those carrots and junk out of marzipan.
It was like making stuff out of edible play-doh.
Well, I should say yummy play-doh.
Edible play-doh is kind of redundant, as I learned from my cousin, Derek.
Who ate the stuff at a tea party when we were little.
They weren't real cookies, dude.
Sorry to throw you under the bus, D, but it was weird.
You're cool now, though.
This list isn't as pithy as I intended when I started the exercise.
I probably should have just written a real post.
Let's reign this back in.
Here's a birthday cake.
I made it for my favorite boy.
It was good.
Theeeeee ehhhnnnnnd.
:)

BF BIRTHDAY: Part One: Tamalés!

My boyfriend is the cutest.
I like him a lot.
It was his birthday.
I made him tamales.
They were a bitch.
But they were worth it.
He liked them.
So did I.
{Pork Tamales with Double Chili Sauce}
I also made him a cake.
I didn't make that cupcake.
But I did make that pineapple.
And my mom made my table cloth.
I like my mom, too.
Cake post next Monday.
{sneaky peeky here}
:)

Pillow Chalk

Over the weekend, Sean and I took a trip up to DC to see our good friends, Tina and Aaron. They just bought a BEAUTIFUL new house and I was trying to come up with a good housewarming gift. A couple weeks before the trip, Tina sent me a link to an "Etsy: How-Tuesday" and asked if we could do it together when I come up. I didn't want to waste precious Tina time behind a sewing machine, so I whipped it together for her as kind of a surprise.

The pillow instructions say to hand sew each rosette on, but, while I was sewing the rossettes at a Purls meeting, Kelly suggested I sew them in bunches of three to save time. GENIUS! I think it looks more lush/rich this way, too.

She liked it. She had just gotten this great new chair and I think it looks super on it.

Tina has a great eye for decorating (even though she doubts it at times) and helping her get some stuff this weekend was so fun. She painted a couple walls in her kitchen with chalkboard paint, so I had to chalk it up. It was a really fun weekend. We:
went to the Smithsonian and saw some ruby slippers, among other things
saw a TON of vanity license plates
risked my life for a Bomb Pop
had vodka gummy bears
had a half-smoke at Ben's Chili Bowl
saw the Lincoln Memorial, among others (my favorite was FDR's)
had a picnic in the front yard on the fourth (so much fun)
and so much more.

I'm sad it had to end. But there's always next year!

LOVE YOU, TINA! And remember to trust yourself! You know what's up. :)

MORE PIE: Blackberry

One of my Purl Gurls, Beth, is an awesome gardener. AWE. SOME. Her entire backyard is full of lush vegetation, flowers and what seems like, magic. Sometimes she'll be giving me a tour, and pointing out what everything is and then she'll say, "And that's a potato plant. How did THAT get there. Oh well." ...Stuff just grows! She doesn't have to do anything! Stuff just shows up! It's pretty much THE place for vegetables; You aren't a squash if you aren't in Beth's garden. :)

Anyway, one Sunday a couple weeks ago, Beth was going on about how awesome she is and how she's the best gardener ever and how she'll soon have blackberr--"YESS," I say, "BLACKBERRIES. WANT. LOTS." BTW, Beth doesn't really go on about how awesome she is, although she could, because she is. That's just what I'm thinking when she tells me things like, "I have an old bath-tub full of worms eating and pooping and making compost into fertilizer." I should probably keep a better check on my awe/jealousy, but it's so hard!

Beth followed through on her blackberry promise and it was up to me to turn those beautiful berries into something delicious. I was considering blackberry cupcakes for a while, from this cake recipe and this frosting recipe, but that was too complicated. I didn't have a lot of time. Then I remembered a recipe I saw for rhubarb tarts a while back. That recipe, specifically the corn crust, also seemed too complicated, with a bunch of crazy ingredients I didn't have.

However, the idea stuck, and after a little research, I decided on this recipe for the crust, and this one for the filling. Yes, I actually made the crust this time, and you know what, it wasn't that bad. Super easy, actually. And the inherently sloppy, or charmingly rustic, as I call it, method of making the tarts was super chill and turned out pretty great. I think if I ever do these again, though, I'll put a layer of ricotta or something in there too. Yumm.

I had some leftover filling and a super-old Pillsbury crust in the fridge, so Sean's mom got this lovely giant tartlette/regular tart.

In conclusion, my friends are awesome and I'm super lucky to know them, let alone eat their blackberries. :) <3

Mixed Berry Hand Pies!

Hey, look at these! Aren't they cute? And the pies aren't bad either. :) Here's how I did it: defrosted frozen mixed berries (couldn't find any fresh at the farmer's OR flea market) + store bought crust (cheating, I know, but I just wanted it to be a quick, easy project & I'm not good enough at crust making to notice a big difference between my "from-scratch" and Pillsbury) + {these directions} + a little personal touch on top = sweet little pies for my sweet little Purls. Love you gurls! :)

Strawberry Rhubarb Pie (minus the rhubarb)

About two weeks ago, I was shopping in the Publix produce section and stumbled upon, what I thought was, some exotic variety of celery. It was red instead of green and kind of weirded me out until I read the name on the package: rhubarb. Immediately, delicious memories of summer family reunions with my Grandma's strawberry rhubarb pie started flooding my mind and my mouth. Her SRP was the best and I always went back for seconds. The tartness of the rhubarb really allowed you to appreciate the sweetness of the strawberry. And the crust, oh my grandma's crust. The flakiest, most delicate crust EVER. I immediately started thinking of excuses to try baking one myself.

A week later, my boyfriend's uncle invited us to Easter dinner and, just like that, excuse--check. Saturday we went down to the Farmer's Market and bought some fresh, local strawberries--check check. On the way home we stopped at Publix to pick up the rhubarb and guess what, they were all out--ch-what?! I guess a lot of other people had grandmothers with great strawberry rhubarb pies, too. I was a little discouraged, but not completely, so we went home, sans-rhubarb, and I started googling strawberry pie recipes. Most recipes I found weren't baked, but chilled, with the strawberries suspended in some kind of gelatinous goo--not what I was looking for. I found a ton of strawberry rhubarb recipes but none with just strawberries. I had to make a decision: would I puss out and make a non-grandma jello pie or would I risk it and go all strawberry.

I chose to risk it, and it turned out great. It was super easy to make, too. I bought some pie crust, lame, I know, and used this recipe from Epicurious.com and just substituted the same amount of rhubarb with strawberries and cut back on the sugar a little. Even the lattice top was really fun and easy thanks to this tutorial. It wasn't my grandma's pie, nothing I make ever could be, but everyone at dinner seemed to enjoy and so did I. THEEE ENNND. :)

{ Lattice-Topped Strawberry Rhubarb Pie }