ICS Blog Hop Christmas is Coming

32665355_10216915228977740_1820335104300417024_o

Thank you for hopping around with us as we showcase holiday gifting projects. You may have arrived from Audra Monk’s blog and her fabulous project. My project is below.

I decided to create a belly band around our acetate gift boxes. The patterned paper is from the Under the Mistletoe package and measures 4×12 inches. Custom fold around the box for easy decoration.

10 25 18 pillowgift1-001

The middle candy cane is popped up on mini dimensionals. The outer two are adhered with glue dots. Our candy cane builder punch also includes a bow. The bow was the perfect accent to dress up the silver metallic edge ribbon bow.

10 25 18 pillowgift2-001

All the supplies used…

10 25 18 pillowgift3-001

These boxes fit about 5 greeting cards and envelopes or a pillow gift for my downline while at #onstage, our convention celebrating Stampin’ Up!’s 30th anniversary! I hope she likes it!

Please leave a comment and let me know what you would tuck inside the boxes.

Thank you for hopping with us. Now click on the next image below to travel to Debbi Green’s blog to see what fun colors she used in her project.

32855853_10216915229217746_6139564322663170048_o

Weekend Getaway at Cattail Retreat

We had a fabulous time during our weekend getaway at Cattail Retreat. We split the room with half working on paper crafts and half working on quilting and gifts. Creativity was flowing in all directions!

First up was piling kits for upcoming Christmas card making sessions. I took advantage of the free table space until other guests arrived. That’s about 100 kits pictured. I did another 100 after these were stuffed in their envelopes.

10 18 retreat2-001

The design for these kits uses retired designer series paper and ribbon…gingerbread punch is in our annual catalog!

10 18 retreat1-001

Since Halloween is next week, I designed a spooky pillow gift. Dawn sewed a fun pouch to share as a pillow gift too. Thanks Dawn!

 

After my kit piling was done, I worked on reducing my whisper white paper scrap pile by punching bows from the Candy Cane builder punch. I used all my scraps and created about 150 bows. I stamped the hohoho words using real red ink from the coordinating Candy Cane Season stamp set. They are attached to glue dots strips for easy assembly.

10 18 retreat4-001

We had lots of great food including taco dip, chili, southwest black bean soup and chicken chili in tomato sauce. Treats were an apple pie from #NorskeNook, gluten free brownies from #chocolatecoveredkatie and mango turmeric #Nessallakombucha. All delicious!

IMG_8906

I set aside my paper crafts to hook a few loops on my pear centerpiece. The photo on the left is progress from the August retreat, the first 2 pears hooked. The photo on the right is progress made this weekend. I completed 3 pears! #patience and #goals learned while rug hooking for sure! It takes me a couple of hours to hook 1 pear.

Group photo right before packing up with some of the quilts worked on while at retreat in the background. We missed a few people that departed early.

44653809_906185098564_6280116066567847936_o-1

The original retreaters…Tiffany on left, me in the center and Jeanette on the right. They are scrapbooking super stars! They design layouts and print photos prior to the weekend. During retreat, they match photos with layouts. They stay on task and usually meet their goal and matching all the photos with layouts. Pretty impressive since they have littles and take advantage of life experiences so have lots of memories to keep!

44613801_10161046143945092_2408106876316155904_n

Thanks for a great weekend! Catch you next time at Cattail Retreat!

Super Awesome Weekend Getawayer Shirley

P.S. Future retreats are February 8-10, 2019, August 9-11, 2019 and October 18-20, 2019. Message me if you are interested in attending these dates. Thanks!

 

 

ICS Blog Hop Fall for All and Cauldron Bubble

32665355_10216915228977740_1820335104300417024_o

Thank you for hopping around with us as we showcase Fall for All. You may have arrived from Janey Backer’s blog and her fabulous project. My project is below.

My starting point was Halloween! My family loves Halloween! I documented the reasons why in a scrapbook layout here.

The Toil and Trouble designer series paper is vividly colored so I decided to fussy cut a witch and adhere to a gorgeous grape mat. The gorgeous grape cardstock was run through the Big Shot using the Subtle embossing folder. I wanted a soft look so this folder delivered nicely.

8 18icsbloghop2-001

Trick or Treat stamping from the Caldron Bubble stamp set using Pumpkin Pie ink adds festive fun. All those frogs hopping around as the photo background are from the designer series paper package Toil and Trouble.

8 18icsbloghop1-001

About 15 witches can be fussy cut from one page of the witches pattern from the Toil and Trouble dsp making project completion easy.

Thank you for hopping with us. Now click on the next image below to travel to Melissa Tennison’s blog to see what fun colors she used in her project.

32855853_10216915229217746_6139564322663170048_o

ICS Blog Hop Passion for Punches!

32665355_10216915228977740_1820335104300417024_o

Thank you for hopping around with us as we showcase our Passion for Punches! You may have arrived from Deb Naylor’s blog and her fabulous project. My project is below.

My starting point was the strip of leftover Garden Impressions designer series paper. I highlighted the colors in the paper with the inks. Snippets of daffodil delight ribbon brighten the look and remind me of the sun.

2 19 18icsbloghop1-001

The ruffled embossing folder used on the garden green cardstock adds a little interest. The Pretty Label punch fits the sentiment stamp perfectly even though it was not officially designed to do so. Take a look at your punches. They may fit other stamps in this way too.

All the supplies used plus the Big Shot machine…

2 19 18icsbloghop2-001

Thank you for hopping with us. Now click on the next image below to travel to Candy Ford’s blog to see what fun colors she used in her project.

32855853_10216915229217746_6139564322663170048_o

World Famous Dill Rolls, ok maybe just in my family

IMG_5524

Yum! Need I type more? I make yeast risen rolls starting with warm water, yeast, flour and salt. Yes, the old fashioned way. I modernize it by kneading with the stand mixer to just the right texture. The smell of the dough rising is the best way to bring you into the present. A fresh, hot roll slathered with real butter is a treat!

Growing up, I remember Mom use to bake her own bread too. But she got the frozen dough which made her job a little easier. Fresh bread out of Mom’s oven was the best. A slice of bread with a layer of butter and cinnamon sugar was a frequent afternoon treat.

I am an admin of a Stampin’ Up! Demonstrators Facebook group for demonstrators that no longer have upline support. I host a once a month meeting where the first post is, Roll Call! Who’s online with us? I add a photo of my latest rolls or the dill roll photo if nothing has come out of my oven recently.

I just did a roll call post for the entire group with the dill roll photo and had requests for the recipe. I recalled I had created a post about the roll adventures already so I looked back in the blog and found it. Click here to read the original post about the Dill, the Dog and the Toad. In this post, I included the photo layout below.

6 3 2016 2-001

Here is the requested recipe for the dill rolls. They might make World Famous status if my demonstrator friends around the world bake them!

Dill Rolls Recipe by Shirley Merker

Melt 2 tablespoons butter in a pyrex measuring cup in microwave or stove top pan.

Add 3/4 cup small curd cottage cheese and 1/3 cup water.

Heat to about 105 degrees fahrenheit. Add to stand mixer bowl.

Into stand mixer bowl, add 2 1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast and 2 tablespoons sugar. Let proof for a few minutes. I like to see the yeast exploding before I proceed to the next step. Just the chemist in me I suppose.

Add 2 1/4 cups bread flour, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 2 teaspoons minced onion, 2 teaspoons fresh dill weed, 1 room temperature egg.

Use dough hook to mix until just to smooth stage. Add more flour if needed.

Cover mixer bowl with tea towel and let rise until doubled.

Divide dough into 12 pieces. Then divide the 12 pieces into 3 pieces. Place 3 pieces per muffin cup.

Let rise, uncovered, until batter fills the cup and overflows like in the photo above. If your room humidity is dry, loosely cover with a stiff bag so the bag does not touch the dough.

Bake at 400 degrees Fahrenheit about 12-15 minutes or until golden brown.

Remove from pan and place on cooling rack after asking everyone in the house to partake in a hot roll. If this is your afternoon refreshment, serve with a cup of #nessallakombucha, #treeripepeaches and assorted #eaugalleitalian cheeses. Dinner is then optional:)

I usually make note if I borrow a recipe from another source. The recipe page does not indicate an alternate source so I am not sure if I copied another recipe or made this recipe up. Either way, they are so good!

Please add a comment if you baked a batch and where in the world you are located. It would be fun to learn you enjoyed my recipe and shared with your family. Hmmm…maybe I should bake a batch again soon?

Super Awesome Stamper Shirley