Chocolate Seashell Cupcakes!

It sort of looks like I'm turning this into a food blog lately. It's not my intent but I just haven't had any other decorating things to blog about lately. I have a new project I'll be working on this weekend. It's something wonderful that I just found at the thrift store! Hopefully I'll be able to share it with you soon! Anyway, when it was mega-hot last weekend I decided to try my hand at making chocolate shells. Remember when I made my fondant seashells awhile back? I used that same mold only this time I used melted white and semisweet chocolate. I melted the chocolate in the microwave. After you pour it in the mold you have to pop it in the freezer for a bit before you can unmold it. They turned out great and they taste a lot better than the fondant.

I had all these chocolate shells so then of course I had to bake something to use them on. It was too hot last weekend to bake so I did these on Monday night when it had cooled down a bit and I brought them into work yesterday. Everyone loved them! You're probably wondering why I took these photos outside...it was before 7:00 am and there just wasn't enough light in my apartment to get a good picture of them.

I used white cake mix that I bought at the cake decorating store. Then I made up some chocolate-almond whipped cream to fill the inside. I used Pastry Pride which is a non-dairy cream you whip up. I added some Hershey's Chocolate Syrup to it and some almond extract. After the cupcakes cooled I inserted a special filling tip into the top of the cupcake and then you just squeeze the pastry bag and it fills it up inside. Chocolate cream-filled cupcakes are just so over-the-top!

For the top I made chocolate ganache and then topped it with my chocolate seashells. I had a couple people tell me it was the best cupcake they ever had! And see those little lacey cupcake wrappers...I made those with doilies from the dollar store. I have to thank Mo from Mo's Cottage...she showed how to make these fancy cupcake wrappers on her blog! I think I made mine too short though!

Chocolate Ganache

1 c. heavy cream
1 Tbsp. butter
1 oz. sugar
12 oz. semi-sweet chocolate, broken into small pieces

Heat heavy cream, butter and sugar a saucepan. Stir frequently and bring the mixture to a boil.
Set chocolate in a stainless steel bowl. Pour hot heavy cream mixture over the chocolate. Allow to sit for 5 minutes to melt the chocolate.

Mix thoroughly, making sure all bits of chocolate are dissolved.

Cover and put in the refrigerator for 1 hour or until thick enough to put in pastry bag to pipe on cupcakes.

Guilt-Free Root Beer Float

I LOVE LOVE LOVE root beer floats! Vanilla ice cream and root beer, so simple but so good! It's such a refreshing dessert on a hot summer night!

I make mine with low fat, sugar free ice cream and diet root beer and trust me...it tastes just as good as the more fattening version. Look, only 90 calories for 1/2 cup and the root beer is 0 calories!

You even get that nice foamy top!

Yep...It was good!!! Now, I'm curious, is this just an American dessert or do those of you in other countries also make these?

Updated to add: For those of you outside the U.S. that have never heard of root beer before, it's not really a beer, it's more like Coke (Coca-Cola) but with a different taste. It's a carbonated, non-alcholic beverage. I wish I could send you all a can, it's really good!

Sunday Drive

It was HOT here this weekend...close to 100 degrees! Too hot to do anything so I sat around and watched a lot of TV which is something I don't do very often on the weekends. Yesterday afternoon Lauren and I were so hot and bored that we decided to go for a drive so we could at least be cool in the air conditioned car. We even took Beau with us! I grabbed the camera and we drove around the streets of Los Gatos to look at the pretty houses... It was too hot to even roll the windows down so there is glare on a lot of these photos.

(You can click on any of these photos to enlarge)

This house above is so teeny-tiny but so cute!

Luckily the weather is supposed to be really nice and only around 80 degrees next weekend for the 4th of July. I have Friday off so it will be a nice 3-day weekend!

Shrimp Louie on the Patio

Tuesday night I made Lauren and I Shrimp Louie Salads for dinner. It's a quick and easy weeknight dinner.

We ate out on the patio and I set the table with a seaside theme. I found these pretty napkins at Marshalls a couple weeks ago. I spread two of them out to use as placemats.

I also used my glass fish plates I bought at a thrift store awhile ago. Oops...I didn't even notice I had the plate upside down until I uploaded the photos! It was a week night and I was rushing to get the dinner on the table and photograph it before Lauren came home hungry and ready to eat.

For my "Louie" dressing I just use a jar of good Thousand Island dressing and I add a little horseradish and a couple shakes of Tabasco Sauce to spice it up a bit.

A glass of wine for me and water for Lauren. It sort of feels like a mini vacation when you dress up the table during the week! Trust me...I don't go to this much trouble every night of the week! I cook dinner almost every night but I don't decorate the table like this. I don't want to give the wrong impression here! haha.

Now you can go on over to Gollum's blog and see who else is joining in on Foodie Friday!

Pretty Bedrooms

After looking at the photos of my bedroom I posted yesterday I realized that I have way too much going on and I want to tone it down a bit. That's not easy for someone who is not even close to being a "less is more" type of person! I went to the Country Living website for some inspiration and I'm surprised that the bedrooms I like are all very soothing and they don't have all the clutter I do!

Photo credit: www.countryliving.com

My Bedroom

I mentioned last week that I moved my bedroom around and here it is. The funny thing is I thought it looked good until I looked at these photos which is why I didn't post it last week. I think I have too much going on in here. For some reason my bed looks really small in these photos but it's a queen-size bed! I didn't want you to think I was sleeping on a twin bed!

If you remember before, I had my bed under the window and my dresser was where the bed is with a big mirror over it.

I would have hung that cottage sign a little lower but I had to hide the screw holes from the mirror.

If I decide to keep the room arranged this way I'm going to redo everything on that wall so it's not so busy. Oh my gosh...I just realized my finger got in the shot above...oops!

This is the other side of the room and that's a chair that I've had forever that's waiting for a paint and reupholster job to done on it. I have too many projects and not enough time!

Beau liked the bed better by the window so he could actually look down and see what's going on outside! He can look out the window but he can't see what's going on in the parking lot now!

Well, now I need to decide if I want to leave it this way or put the bed back under the window...

Update: I always get asked about the paint color and my quilt so I'll include it now:

Paint: Glidden paint in Cancun Blue (it photographs nicer than it actually is though and it looks different every time I photograph it. If you look at the right photo in my header you will see what I mean)

Quilt: It came from Summer's Cottage. Her link is on my left side bar under "Favorite Places to Visit". Once you are on her website you can click on the picture to get to her eBay store.

4 Years Blogging!!!

Today is my 4 year blogging anniversary!!! I can't believe how fast it went and how much bigger blogging has become in the last 4 years. Just 4 short years ago, I had to explain to so many people what a blog was and now it seems everyone has one! My apartment has changed so much in 4 years which has all been chronicled here! It's been a really fun 4 years!

I was very honored to be asked to do a guest post over at Lookiloos! You may remember Lookiloos...they did a post on me and my blog and it was featured in the Home & Garden section of the San Jose Mercury News last February! That was one of the most amazing things that has ever happened to me! The article I did today for Lookiloos was a mirror makeover project that I showed here awhile back . I rewrote it a little for Lookiloos. Just click here to see it!

Summer Decorating

This weekend I brought out my $10 silver tray that I found at the Santa Cruz Flea Market last summer and filled it with shells and candles.

It's usually cool enough here in the evenings to have candles burning but there are those really hot summer nights where I don't even want the lights on! I'm hoping we don't have very many of those this summer!

I bought the candles and the small shells at The Dollar Tree...I'm loving that place lately! They have an online store now but they don't sell everything that they have in the stores so it's better to go in if you have one nearby.

Here are the shells from The Dollar Tree, I used these and then filled in with larger shells, beach glass and moss that I already had.

Happy Father's Day!

Happy Father's Day to my wonderful dad and all the other great dad's out there!!!

Cloche Party!

I'm joining in on Marty~A Stroll Through Life's Cloche Party today. Everyone joining in will be showing how they have their apothecary jars and cloches decorated. I still have my Spring decor in mine! I had planned to update them with a more summery theme this week but I haven't been feeling well all week. By the time I get home from work each day I'm drained!

The apothecary jar above just has some reindeer moss and a nest with faux robin eggs.

Here are some more I have on my birdhouse table in my living room.

Here's a closeup...I have a nest and some vintage postcards in this jar above.

It's a little hard to see inside this etched cloche, which I bought on sale at Marshalls last year but I have a miniature iron birdbath with some more faux eggs.

The one above has vintage lace trim and buttons. Please stop by Marty's blog and check out the other great ideas!
Have a good weekend! I sure hope I start feeling better soon. I hate being a couch potato!

My Son, The College Graduate!

Where does the time go? It seems like just yesterday Vince was a little boy so interested in learning everything he could. When most kids were playing with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Super Hero figures, he never once asked me for one of those toys. He was much more into bugs, rocks and plants. At 10 years old he had his own herb garden and knew all about their medicinal values. He was the most amazing kid! I guess it makes sense that a boy like that would turn into an amazing young man. I don't think any mother could be any prouder than I am of him! He's handsome, smart, artistic, funny, kind, considerate, loving and has the greatest laugh ever!!! I love to hear him laugh!!!

As I mentioned on Monday, Vince graduated from UC Davis with highest honors and is a Phi Beta Kappa member. He didn't go through the graduation ceremony because he didn't get enough tickets for everyone in his extended family to attend so instead his dad and step mom had a party for him at their home in San Francisco last Saturday.

This is Vince and his beautiful, sweet girlfriend Margot. They met in college and have been together a couple years.

Here's Lauren, me and Vince. Oops, I forgot to take my sunglasses off for a lot of the photos! Oh and no lipstick...I can't believe I'm putting these up here!

This is Vince's dad. We got divorced when Vince was only two years old but we've always had a good relationship and I think that is one of the most wonderful gifts you can give a child of divorced parents. Some people may think this is odd but I wanted a picture of me and Vince with his two step moms. Lisa, who is standing behind Vince was married to Ray after me. They later got divorced and now he is married to Anne. (have I lost you yet?). I must say that I could not have picked better step moms if I had to. The thought of sharing my son with another "mom" was something that was so difficult for me right after our divorce but you can't hate someone that is good to your son! It was one of those "light bulb moments" for me. The three of us have been there for Vince's 8th grade graduation, high school graduation and now his college graduation. I think it's great that we can all get along so well.

This is Vince with his three sisters. His dad and Anne have two little girls and then of course you know my daughter, Lauren. His two little sisters made the graduation cap for him. They did such a great job on it! It wasn't planned that they all were wearing blue by the way!

See the plane pulling the banner? That was in honor of Vince's graduation. Haha...just kidding. His dad pointed out the plane and told Vince it said "Congratulations Vince" but they had the banner going the wrong way. We all had a good laugh about that!

Here's Lauren all happy because Ray gave her a little champagne for the toast! "Only on special occasions Lauren!!!"

This is the view from their backyard balcony! It's the church from the movie "Sister Act" with Whoopi Goldberg.

As we were walking back to my car after the party I snapped a photo of typical San Francisco house. This one was for sale. I would love to see the inside, although I could never live in San Francisco. I'm a suburb type of person. We live about 50 minutes South of San Francisco.

I hope I didn't bore you with all this personal stuff but I'm just a proud mom!

Flowers Everywhere!

I had enough flowers in my garden to cut some more bouquets for inside! Roses and hydrangeas...that's the ultimate bouquet for me! I even planted ferns so I could put them in my bouquets. I love ferns!

I picked some gardenias for a small bouquet! They smell so good, unless, you are like my daughter Lauren...she can't stand the smell of them!

Isn't this hand-painted plate above gorgeous? Lorrie, one of my readers, who you may remember sent me really lovely things in the past saw this in an antique store and bought it for me!!! I realized when I uploaded this photo that I have it upside down in the plate holder...oops! I think the artist's signature should be on the bottom! It doesn't even matter because any way you put it, it's drop-dead gorgeous! The colors are amazing!
Lorrie sent me a lot of plates. This isn't even all of them...

I had so much fun opening the box full of these and unwrapping each one! It felt like Christmas! Thank you again Lorrie!

Change & Giveaway Winners

I really wish there were more ways I could change my living room around but there seems to be only two that I can think of; 1) the couch against the wall or 2) this way above. I actually prefer it against the wall but I really love change so last Sunday I moved it around again. Then I went upstairs and moved my bedroom around. I haven't taken any photos of that yet. It always feels good to move the furniture around and vacuum up all that dust! I recently had two giveaways and I just now got around to randomly selecting winners. Sorry for the delay! The first giveaway was for the $50 Pfaltzgraff gift certificate on my product review blog and that winner is Victoria Lynn~Sweet Victoria Antiques

The second giveaway for the Mary Engelbreit Cheese Dish and that winner is Beverly~How Sweet the Sound

Thanks to everyone who entered. I'll be having another giveaway in July!

Update: Sara at Shiny Red Houses asked me to get the word out...she is giving away a $25 gift card for TJ Maxx/Home Goods!

Mosaic Monday

I'm joining in on Mary's Mosaic Monday today. I apologize for using photos you've already seen here on my blog to make these mosaics but it was a busy weekend...
My son, Vince, graduated from college! He graduated with highest honors, Phi Beta Kappa with a double major in Political Science and Economics and a minor in Statistics! I couldn't be any prouder!!! His dad hosted a graduation party at their home in San Francisco and we really had a great time. I'll share some photos later this week.

Stop by Mary's~Little Red House to see more mosaics on Mosaic Monday!

Update: I'll announce the winner of the giveaway tomorrow.

Outdoor Mood Lighting

I think lighting is so important both indoors and outdoors! Even if I'm in my apartment in the evenings I like to look out the window and see the my patio softly lit.
I saw this hanging crackle glass candle holder at Marshalls months ago and every time I would go in there I would pick it up and look at it and then put it back. Yesterday while stopping in there on my lunch hour I put it in my shopping cart! I'm so happy I did! I love the way it looks in my backyard.

It holds a small tea light inside which gives off such a beautiful glow through the crackle glass.

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Garden Flowers

I've always wanted to have a "cutting garden"...you know, an area to grow flowers just for bouquets. There's no room for that in my tiny yard so I'm always struggling with whether I want the blooms in the garden or inside my apartment. The apartment usually always wins!

Last weekend I cut almost every rose I had blooming to bring indoors. Luckily our weather has been cooler than usual (low-mid 70s) so I still have pansies blooming...I cut some of those too!

I now have flowers in my bedroom, living room, bathroom and dining room! I LOVE it!!!

There's something so rich about flowers in every room...and I don't mean rich in the monetary sense, more like rich in the sense of celebrating every day and making it special. And I prefer garden flowers over florist flowers any day! Which do you prefer?

Roses:

pink: Climbing Eden

peach: Nancy Reagan

white: French Lace

I'm very thankful for having a small area to grow flowers for my home. Please stop by Rhondi's Blog to see more bloggers that are thankful! It's Thankful Thursday today!
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I had to move my "followers" to the bottom of my blog. Someone told me that should help with the "abort" messages you may have been getting when you try to open my blog. I sure hope this takes care of that problem!

Vintage & Vogue Part Two

Here are the rest of the photos from Vintage & Vogue! I LOVE the birdcage above!

I also love this piece above!

I think I love it all...

These are the women that work at Vintage & Vogue.

Below are the gifts I received...
The beautiful mosaic birdhouse was a gift from the gals at Vintage & Vogue! It's so beautiful and looks perfect on my birdhouse table! It was made by a local mosaic artist.

The also gave me this adorable cherub dish with a silver spoon! The sterling salt and pepper shakers are a recent gift from my mom.

The crocheted bag above was made by one of my readers, Carole! Carole came into the shop because of my blog and got a nice surprise when she found out a friend of hers, Linda, who she hasn't seen in over 20 years owns Vintage & Vogue!

Vintage & Vogue

Last Saturday was Vintage & Vogue's 1 year anniversary and they celebrated with a party at the store!

I was so honored to be their featured guest for the celebration!

Isn't this sweet? They made a sign that I was going to be there from 1:00-4:00!

It was so great to meet so many of my readers there! This photo above is me (with puffy allergy eyes) and Robin from Miscellaneous Thoughts blog. Robin and I met awhile back online through Flickr.

I took so many photos that I'm going to spread them out over 2 days.

There were lots of yummy goodies to eat! All baked by the women at the shop! Check out that beautiful vintage china cabinet above. The front has a solid beveled glass piece and the doors are on the side! It was gorgeous!

Here are two more of my readers that I met! This is Debby and Carole! Carole made me the cutest crocheted bag. It's in her hand. I'll show you a better photo of it tomorrow. I put the camera away after I took their photo so I didn't get any more people photos but I would say I met over 10 women that were there because they read my blog!

Here are some more photos of the shop (you can click to enlarge them)...

There is my favorite apothecary jar (above)! One of these days I may splurge and buy that!

I loved this cute pink hat! So cute!

I'll show some more photos of the shop tomorrow!

If you are in Northern California, this shop is a must see!

Vintage & Vogue

241 E Campbell Ave Ste A

Campbell, CA 95008

It's my monthly giveaway party!

It's that time already! The second Monday of each month in 2009 I will be hosting a giveaway party! I will be giving something away and also letting others link to their giveaways.

If you are a blogger and would like to have a giveaway on your blog please sign up with Mr. Linky below! Please make sure you get your giveaway post up first so you can put the url for your giveaway and not just the url for your blog. (You set your own timeline and rules for your giveaway)

If you would like to enter my giveaway, please scroll down to the previous post and leave a comment there.

update: Sorry, I think something might be wrong with Mr. Linky! Click on "Mr. Linky" below to open a new page to see the other bloggers that are having giveaways! I guess he's being shy today!

My Giveaway for June

UPDATED: A winner has been selected. It is Beverly ~How Sweet the Sound.

Some of you guessed correctly...My June Giveaway is a Mary Engelbreit piece. It's an adorable cheese dish I found at the thrift store a few weeks ago. It's in it's original box! You can click on the photo above to see it up close!
If you would like a chance to win it please leave a comment on this post by Friday, June 12th at midnight and I will draw randomly for a winner. Please remember to leave you email address if you do not have a blog so I have a way to contact you! If you prefer you can also send me an email (cindy95131@yahoo.com) to enter!

Reminder: Monthly Giveaway on Monday!

It's already time for my second monthly giveaway!   I'll have Mr. Linky up on Sunday evening if you want to join in and host a giveaway on your blog!  I'm often asked by other bloggers how they can get more people to visit their blogs...well, this is a great way! I'll send my visitors over to your blogs if you sign up to host a giveaway here!  It doesn't have to be anything extravagant at all.  My giveaway this month is something I picked up at a thrift store that I know some of you may like!  Here's a little hint of what's to come on Monday...
Have a good weekend and I hope to meet some of you at Vintage and Vogue in Campbell on Saturday!  I'll be there 1:00-4:00pm!  

Fruit Tarts & a Party

I love making fruit tarts. They look so pretty and always seem to impress everyone and they are so easy to make! For this one I used a Paula Deen recipe. It was really fast & easy because she uses cream cheese (of course she does) rather than making a pastry cream. The recipe can be found here. (I didn't use the glaze in the recipe because they didn't have frozen limeade at the store because the freezer was broken so I used currant jelly that I heated up until it melted and then brushed it on).

It was so good!!!

I still remember my first tart I ever made. It was a Martha Stewart recipe and I was in my 20s! I'm telling you...I was so darn proud of that raspberry tart! So proud in fact that I had my picture taken with it...

You can tell I'm just beaming with pride! Ahhh...youth!

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I also want to mention that I will be at Vintage & Vogue in downtown Campbell this Saturday, June 6th 1:00-4:00 pm for their 1st year anniversary party! They asked me to be the guest of honor! I'm so honored to be asked!!! If you're in the San Francisco Bay Area I hope you can make it! It should be lots of fun!

How to Recover Dining Room Chairs

I had a couple people ask for directions on how to recover dining room chairs so I took pictures when I did mine last weekend.

Supplies needed:

• Batting if needed (available at fabric stores)
• Fabric
• Scissors
• Screwdriver (regular or power)
• Staple Gun
• Hammer

These instructions are for the dining room chairs I have pictured above. It's the type of chair that has a removable seat cushion. There is also a type of chair where the fabric is stapled directly to the side of the chair, and I'll show you that at the bottom of this post.

• First you want to turn the chair over and use your screwdriver to unscrew the seat from the frame. There should be 4 screws, one in each corner.

• Next, get your fabric ready. Iron it if needed.
• You want to cut your fabric so it's large enough to wrap over and under the seat with a couple inches extra. As you can see below, I'm putting my fabric directly over the fabric that was already on the chair. If you are taking everything off down to the foam you may want to use some batting. It looks better if you put the batting on and not just the fabric over the foam. The batting will give it a smoother look. Use the instructions below for applying the batting.
• Lay your fabric face down and place the chair cushion face down on top of it. Make sure if you have a one-way pattern that you have it going it the right direction! You are going to start with stapling the sides. Pull one side up and staple, then directly across from it pull the other side up and staple it. You want to pull it taunt but not too tight or it will disort the fabric. Do the same for the other sides. If your staple doesn't go all the way in you can finish off with a slam of the hammer!

Next you want to work on the corners. If the corner is square you want to pull the corner up and staple it and then pull the sides up and staple...similar to making a bed.

If your corner is more rounded you want to ease the fabric around and pull up and staple (see below). Be careful not to cover the screw holes so you can get it back on the chair!
Then you want to work your way around and staple the fabric down all around. Turn it over every once in awhile to make sure you aren't pulling it too tight.
Then trim away the excess fabric.

Now just screw the top back on the chair and you are finished!

That is the easy type of chair to recover. Now, if you have the type below, which usually has either nail heads or some type of decorative trim around it, it usually means it doesn't have a removable seat. That makes it harder to recover.

I recovered this one by using instructions I found in a book called Singer Upholstery Basics Plus: Complete Step-by-Step Photo Guide . It's not quite as easy as the steps above but not too hard either. Sorry, I didn't take photos when I recovered this one so I can't share my step by step instructions with you.

Some changes

I was so inspired by the BHG.com photo I showed you last week (below) that I decided to recover my dining room chairs in a blue toile! It took me a few hours to get used to the new look but now I love it! I found the fabric online, 3-3/4 yards for $24 with free shipping so it was a fairly good deal. I still have fabric left over too. Below is the inspiration photo.
Now (and this may come as a shock to some of you) I'm considering stripping the paint off the table top and staining it like the photo above (just the top, not the legs). I think it might look better. What do you think? Let me know... I've set up a poll at the bottom of this post.

Below is a view from the kitchen, I think the wood table top might look good because of that pine wall cabinet. I also have a wood shelf way over on the right next to my TV armoire which you can't 'see in this photo. I think design-wise (not that I ever follow the design rules) it would be better with the wood table top.

Here's what the chairs look like now with the toile fabric,

and here is a photo of the fabric I had on there before. Something about this floral fabric made me think of a vinyl table cloth...I was never in love with it and I'm glad it's history!
I think the toile goes so much better with everything else downstairs.

Let me know what you think about the table top by taking the survey below:

Online Surveys & Market Research

Dollar Store Decorating!

I would have never thought I would find something nice enough at The Dollar Tree store to display in my blue cabinet but I did!

Three of them in fact!

Can you believe these were only $1 each? I found them in the wedding section at the Dollar Tree. They had 3 different designs and I couldn't decide which one to buy so I bought them all!

What a deal!