Category: Home Highlights

Sweeten Up Your Cherry Pie

Recently, I made my first homemade pie crust.  For lack of Crisco, I forwent the family recipe and tried this little doozy instead. (Be sure to read the comments on lessening the salt!)  Here are a few items to sweeten up the baking and serving process!  I’m absolutely gaga over the Anthropologie dessert plates, and the colors featured in the measuring cups and spoons bring me right back to my early 80′s Tupperware childhood.  Here’s my finished product, below.  Happy Baking!

{a} Melamine Measureing Cups & Spoons by Williams Sonoma (44.00USD)

{b} Scenic Dessert Plates by Anthropologie (12.00USD)

{c} Vic Firth Gourmet Maple Rolling Pin by Target

{d} Emile Henry Artisan Ruffled Pie Dish by Williams Sonoma (18.00USD)

Of Fall Leaves & Light Fixtures

Thanks to Playful Learning‘s Leaf Family Project, we’ve had no end of acorn, fall leaf, and pine needle collections making their way into our home this month. Of all the places these leaves have wound up, here’s my personal favorite.  I ironed a few of my favorite little leaves between wax paper, and popped them onto the little shades on the chandelier above our dining room table, along with a little bittersweet vine.  I love fall!

Bread Box

At the risk of sounding like the children’s literature critic that I desperately wish I was, I would like to suggest that if you are not familiar with Rosemary Wells, you have a gaping hole in your literary life.  My daughter and I believed we had exhausted our library’s collection of Wells’ Max and Ruby series, a favorite of my sagacious three year old, when we stumbled upon Max Counts His Chickens in the Counting Collection section of the picture books. (Sneaky, sneaky!)  All this to say, Max’s sister, Ruby, finds her ninth chicken (the marshmallow peep variety) in the bread box, which began my pondering the topic of bread box altogether.

Not that I haven’t considered the subject before.  Every time I pass them in the Ikea marketplace, I wish they had a selection that tipped the functionality vs. style scale a bit more to the latter.   But Rosemary got me itching for one, so I began my search, from a surprisingly small pool of options, if you rule out the plain wood and metal lunch box variety, which didn’t suit my taste.  Here are my top picks:

{a} Summergirl Breadbox:: nothing but breadboxes by the Summer Girl Shop, on Etsy $50.00 USD

{b} Vintage Blue Painted Bread Box::  by Royal Oak Cottage, a lovely Etsy Vintage Shop $45.00USD

{c} Vintage Enamel Ware Breadbox:: by McCune’s Sporting Collectibles, not the most 2.0 website on the planet, but some pretty nice finds in their Kitchenalia & Household Bygones section $175.00

Globes

The globe that sits on the console table in our dining room may be my favorite garage sale find of all time.  It’s earth tone pallet blends with so many of the items in our home, while subtly tying in elements we’ve collected from our journeys around the world, along with the many souvenirs our globe-trotting friends have added to the collection! I love pulling it down to show my daughter the route a loved one is flying across the country (or world) or showing her where different wares and goods stem from.   A beautiful piece, an educational tool, and all for under $5.00!  If you’re not so lucky as to find your global treasure at a tag sale, here are some nice runners up:

{a}Pottery Barn : One of my first go-to’s for stylish replica’s, these 5 and 7 inch globes are subdued color scheme could go anywhere. $29.00-$39.00 USD

{b} Every Eskimo : This tin coin collecting globe is tiny, but packs a powerful style punch!  $18.00 USD

{c} Hindsvik Vintage : Just the description on this amazing vintage wares Etsy shop brought me right back to fourth grade: “This Rand McNally Old school Globe features Textured Mountains, ranges, types of land and vegetation” I think this is my fav. $33.00 USD

{d} Target : Classy and full of old world charm, I love the contrast of the dark wood base. $24.99 USD

the recipe

I had a little difficulty linking to Stonyfield’s Strawberry Muffin Recipe Monday, but thought it was well worth the post.  Be sure to chop those strawberries nice and eensy-weensy fine!  My strawberries ended up a bit gooey, but they were rather large chunks.  I loved the taste of the actual muffin though, and plan to try it again this weekend, exchanging the strawberries for blueberries.  Bon Appetit!

Ingredients
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
2 eggs
1 cup plain Stonyfield Farm Yogurt
1/4 cup butter, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup chopped strawberries, fresh or frozen

Directions
Preheat oven to 375°F. Grease a 12 muffin tin or line it with paper baking cups. In a large bowl, sift together flour, sugar and baking soda. In another bowl, stir together eggs, yogurt, melted butter and vanilla until blended. Toss the strawberries with the flour mixture.
Pour the egg mixture into the flour mixture and stir until the flour is just moistened. The batter will be lumpy. Spoon the batter into the muffin cups. Bake for 20 – 25 minutes, or until the tops are golden brown.

Yields

12 muffins (Hmmm… I think I got about 18…)
Nutrition Facts
(1 muffin) Calories 160; Fat Calories 45; Total Fat 5g; Carbohydrate 25g; Protein 5g; Fiber 3g