babes in vintage no. 2

Clémence wearing another one of my little baby blouses with her levi jeggings.

the betty crocker in me.

we had our home group this week and we usually all sign up to contribute to the meal. this time i chose to bring dessert. i have more dessert recipes piling up on my pinterest than i do actual main courses so i thought i would give two of them a try. the first; nutella cookies and the second; sopapilla cheesecake. they were both delicious and both easy to make so i thought i'd share.


nutella cookies

ingredients:
1 cup Nutella
½ cups Sugar
1 cup All-purpose Flour*
1 whole Egg

*to accomodate our host, i chose to make them gluten-free so i went with with red mill instead of flour.

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Blend all ingedients together well.

Form into 1″ balls. Place on a cookie sheet. Press down firmly with the bottom of a glass. Bake 7-8 minutes or until set. Cool.

sopapilla cheesecake

Ingredients:
3 cans pillsbury butter crescent rolls
2 (8oz) packages cream cheese (softened)
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup butter (melted)
Cinnamon & sugar

Instructions:
Unrolled and spread 1 & 1/2 can crescent rolls on bottom of un-greased pan. Combine softened cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla.

Spread mixture over crescent rolls.

Unroll and spread remaining crescent rolls over mixture. Spread melted butter over the top and sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar.

Bake at 350 degrees for 20-30 minutes.

i had to make enough for around 20 people so i made them on 2 separate cookie sheets and then after they had cooled for a bit, cut them up into more bite size pieces. and from what i heard, they went over well!

hope you enjoy! happy baking!!

p.s. this is what happens in my kitchen after making 2 desserts...

testing the waters.

speaking of my fab new camera that i'm super excited about here she is...
it has twice the amount of mega pix as the one i was previously using, an incredible zoom, smile and blink detection (which is perfect for the ever quick-moving babes) and a super user-friendly panoramic option (thanks darling!)...here are some random shots... those cheeks below are getting increasingly droopy.

she loves the camera.

just can't help it.

yes, another laughing video but her giggles and girly squeals are just too adorable not to post (plus i got a new amazing camera for my birthday from my loves and it takes superb videos in hd!!)

in cursive.

jeremiah is a list-maker. he makes lists for all types of reasons and decisions big or small: what to buy at the grocery store, favorite quotes, potential band names, top ten albums of the year, films to buy, birthday gifts and so on. and you can find them anywhere: scrap pieces of paper, notebooks, on his hand in between his pointer finger and thumb. i have always loved this detail about him.

while sorting through some pictures in a box recently, we came across the list he had made 6 years ago when he was trying to decide what to do on our first date. we had been good friends for about 4 or 5 years up until that point (i had always liked him a little more than that, but we both remained friends and did our own thing through those years). so when he finally did ask me out, i think we were both equally excited and equally nervous. it clearly went well and only took a year for us to be married. since then it has been a dream, better than i ever imagined when we were friends and i had a crush on him. and i love him more now than i ever have.

i didnt just want to put the list back with the pictures this time. i wanted to make a shadow box with it. i have made a few in the past and had a wooden box lying around that i bought from anthropologie before we even bought our home. what i made is a little more minimalistic than anything i have done before, but i didnt want the the list to be drowned out by anything else. here's what i used and what i created.

the list: a delicate glass ball with a feather inside it (this was my anniversary present last year):
and a handmade (not by me) little plate that aptly says 'adore':

melt our wittle hawts.

our cup overflowth.

a taste of the good life.

came up on another amazing recipe the other day and wanted to share it.
Panini with pears, brie, carmelized walnuts, and arugula pesto mayo. let me just say, if you want to 'wow' whomever you're cooking for, this may be your next go-to. here is your map to being crowned 'best chef!' :

arugula pesto mayo:
3 cups of packed arugula
1/4 cup of toasted pine nuts
1/4 cup of grated parmesan
1/2 cup olive oil
3 1/2 tbs mayo
sea salt and black pepper to taste

directions: combine arugula, pine nuts, and parmesan in food processor until smooth. slowly add olive oil and mix until well blended. season with sea salt and black pepper. add mayo and blend well. (you'll have some left over after making the sandwich) carmelized walnuts:

1 cup walnuts

2 tbs sugar*

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp black pepper

*the recipe i had called for 2 tbs light corn syrup and 1 tbs sugar. im not a fan of using corn syrup with anything so i doubled the sugar and just added a tiny bit of water so the sugar would coat the walnuts. they still turned out fine.

directions: preheat oven to 325. combine ingredients in bowl and toss well. spread mixture on non-stick baking sheet and bake until deep golen brown and sugar is bubbling. remove from oven and cool. (i also had a bit of extra walnuts after sandwich)now to make the sandwich:

4 slices of sourdough bread

1 pear, thinly sliced

4 thick slices of brie

panini: spread arugula pesto may on both sides of bread. on one side layer pears, then cheese, then walnuts. add top slice of bread and toast in pan lightly coated with olive oil. make sure to keep pressure on panini as you toast bpth sides evenly.

serve warm and let those tastebuds enjoy every bite.

'if you're a bird, i'm a bird.'

last night was our close friend (and god-parent to our daughter), leighanna's birthday party. if you know leighanna, you know there will always be a theme involved. this year it was Hollywoodland. upon hearing this, jeremiah and i started kicking around ideas for the three of us. we wanted to do mad men (because lets face it..its a good excuse for me to buy a vintage dress) but jeremiah isn't clean-cut enough (thank goodness) and i wasn't sure how we could tie clémence in. so after much deliberation, we chose to go the super cheesy route and be noah and allie from the notebook. we used the boat scene in that movie so we could have clémence as our swan.

once we decided, i went hunting at thrift stores for jeremiah and i's costumes and to michaels for supplies to make the swan outfit. let me just say as im sure you know, when you have something in mind it is never easy to find. noah's get-up in the film was easy: dark brown pants a little on the baggy side and a white button-up. 2 thrift stores later i was done. allie's on the other hand, not so much. but boy did i get lucky. after searching at multiple stores i finally went to a vintage shop that always has great pieces and it was there that i found the closest dress possible and it just so happen to be my size!

clémence's costume: i had been doing other projects all week so i ended up making this at the last minute. i just used a white headband, a piece of black, white, and orange felt for the face, and white feathers for her little bum with a piece of felt over the bottom of the feathers. brushed it with some tacky glue to hold it all together and voila!

our darling swan:

the makeup: the hair: (i don't consider myself good at things like this in any way, but i must say this probably took me like 20 minutes and i only had 2 pictures of her hair to go off of so i was quite pleased at how it turned out)me and my swan!
at the party:

grandma's pastime.

on the continuous quest for decorating our bedroom, i decided to embroider something sweet to hang on the wall. i bought all my supplies at michaels and it probably cost me maybe $12. after writing what i wanted to say on a scrap piece of paper a few times to practice, i then wrote it on the linen and was able to sit next to my sleeping baby and finish it before she woke up. and i'll be honest, i really enjoyed it. it was super relaxing, and while i love finding things like this at thrift stores, like i mentioned in a previous post, it is just so much better when you have made it yourself.