She wanted 100 pumpkins...

But Eric and I finally decided on around 10. I think I got just a FEW more than ten, but the baby ones don't really count. I don't know, you tell me, I think I need some more. This is only one room of the house!

After getting the pumpkins I was so filled with Halloween cheer, that I decided to sew myself a candy corn banner a la Sprinkles "Boo!" card. I had all that fabric in my stash! Damn I'm thrifty!

My Halloween cheer:











That's all I've got so far! I put out some candy corn, but I still need more! MORE PUMPKINS! Eric, however, does not agree! It's so hard to find Halloween decorations that aren't "country home." Don't get me wrong, those are fine, they just don't go with my home. I guess I'll just have to make some more!

Well I love you all! I hope you're loving pumpkins as much as me!

xoxo

Alison

Peach Cake and the Farmer's Market

Sometimes you just don't feel like baking pie...right? But peaches have been SO good lately, and SO CHEAP, so I needed to find a recipe that used peaches, but didn't require two days worth of prep/bake time.

*I can't find a peach pie recipe I like, they are all too runny, any tips or ideas would be greatly appreciated!

So I found a few recipes and combined them...to make the best peach cake ever!!!



Now, I made this twice, and the first time it was a bit mushy in the middle. It was still really really good, but nobody likes too much mush.

So the second time I made it, I covered the cakes with foil for the first twenty minutes, so it wouldn't brown too quickly, and then I baked it a little longer, probably about 30 more minutes, and it was perfect. I love perfection.

I used the first half of this Caramel Peach Upside-down Cake recipe, but instead of using their slighty odd cornmeal cake suggestion, I used this vanilla cake recipe. It makes two 8" rounds, and I served it with fresh whipped cream. The peaches get caramelized because you cover the bottoms of the pan with melted sugar. YEAH. So even though the caramel hardens by the time you place the peaches in the pan, when it's baking the caramel melts and covers the peaches and seeps down into the cake and makes it moist and amazing and SO GOOD.

You don't have to skin the peaches, which makes things a whole lot easier, and you actually don't need TOO many of them. It doesn't, however, keep very well. So plan on eating it within a couple of days. I was planning on layering it but it would just be too rich.

The second time I baked it I used these beautiful eggs from the farmer's market. It's so fun seeing the different colors eggs SHOULD be.


I also got these amazing cucumbers. You don't have to peel them to enjoy them (when you don't have a garbage disposal one must avoid peeling at all costs) and they have the most beautiful fluting on the edges! If only I could remember the name!



Anyway, I seriously suggest the Peach Cake. I'm so glad Fall is here because it means pumpkins and spice and everything nice!

xoxo

Alison

She gets back to her jewelry-making roots.

When I was little I loved, LOVED making jewelry. I started a business with my friends and siblings called Triple ACE Hemp and Beads "ACE" stood for Alison, Alexis, Andrea, Courtni and Evan, my brother. Except Evan never really helped with the business and I think we eventually kicked him out. We would sell our jewelry at a farmer's market by our house. We never really sold that much, I mean, would you buy jewelry made by a 12-year-old kid? But occasionally some nice mom would take pity on us and we'd get SO EXCITED!

I haven't really gotten back to my jewelry roots in a while, but those big flower necklaces I've been seeing everywhere inspired me to get my mini pliers back out and have a go.

I made this one necklace with some scraps of fabric I had, some cheap pearls and my favorite, a big gold chain. I wore it for three days straight. It really did brighten up every outfit!



I'm working on perfecting my yo-yo's (the fabric flower) and experimenting with some different chains. And keep this on the down low, I even have some Pony beads stashed away somewhere!

Eric and I spent the weekend at a cabin in Midway with his cousins, and I ended up giving the necklace to one of his cute cousin's ADORABLE little girls. She looked better in it anyway.

But this has opened up a whole can of bead-loving worms for me and I have to stop myself from going and looking at beads everyday.

I wish I wasn't SO COOL!

OK, love and kisses

Alison

Almond Joy Cake

It was my mom's birthday last week as well as my good friend's wedding! Such a party. My whole family came in to town (for the wedding) and so we were able to celebrate my mom's birthday together. I couldn't remember when the last time was that my mommy-kins had a birthday cake, so I decided to make her one! Mare-bear (Marilyn) loves Almond Joy's soooo much. So I wanted to bake her an Almond Joy inspired cake. I looked all over the internet for a good recipe but I just didn't think any of them looked that good. So I improvised and concocted my own. And I'm not gonna lie, it was honestly one of the best cakes I've ever had/made. IT WAS DA BOMB!

Here's the finished product:




Here's what I did.

I made two 8" chocolate cakes using my favorite simple recipe. Then I made a German chocolate cake filling, because it has coconut...like an Almond Joy...but instead of using walnuts I used sliced almonds.

When the cakes were cool I placed my first round on a cake platter, and I spread on some of my coconut-almond-filling. Then I placed my second round on top and put EVEN MORE coconut-almond goodness right on top of the cake. Then I put this in the fridge to cool.

Then I made what is perhaps the best frosting I have ever made in my life. I will share the recipe for it with you because I don't think it's fair to keep it to myself.

It's a variation of the whipped chocolate frosting from Baked. BUY THAT BOOK! To their recipe I added about a cup or so of powder sugar.

Here it is:

8oz bittersweet chocolate chopped up (get the good stuff)
8oz milk chocolate chopped up
1 1/2cups heavy cream (yes I know just wait)
2 Tbs light corn syrup
1 1/2 cups unsalted butter soft but cool cut into 1" chunks

my addition

powder sugar to taste/consistency

What you do is you bring the cream and corn syrup to a boil, and then you pour it over your chocolate which you should put in a metal mixing bowl. Let it sit and let it melt up a bit. Then you stir that GOODNESS together and once it is smooth, chunk by chunk while you're mixing add that butter. Yeah, just keep adding that butter.

Then! I added the confectioner's sugar because it needed a little something more. I refrigerated it to stiffen it up a bit and MAN! It is SOOOO GOOD. Not too sweet. Which can be dangerous because then you just keep SHOVING IT IN YOUR FACE.

And in case you're wondering it was actually really easy to frost over the coconut-almond filling on top of the cake. I was worried about that but it worked out fine!

Here's my mom enjoying the cake, and a sneak peak at the inside.




I had a good deal of almond-coconut filling and frosting left over so I decided to make some cupcakes with it. I used a yellow cake and put about a Tbs of filling in between two scoops of batter. It baked up yummy! I think you could even do like 2 Tbs of filling in the unbaked cupcake.



You can kind of see the almonds poking out down there at the bottom.

OK you can thank me later for how good that frosting is. I think I have some peach cakes that are burning in the oven.

KISSES,

Alison

She WILL make cupcakes.

I'm thrilled, THRILLED about this new etsy shop I found. It's called Cupcake Social. They have adorable liners at reasonable (reasonable if you're me and your reason has been skewed by design blogs and Martha Stewart) prices, toppers and basically anything else you'd ever want to make your cupcakes sassy.

I know that cupcakes have been the THING for a while now, and some may even say passe, but that doesn't mean I'm not still totally in love with them.

Why? Well it's like this see: You can't bake a cake and sit down and eat the whole thing...and then not want to stab yourself in the eye with your fork after wards. You CAN, however, use that same amount of batter to make a batch of cupcakes, and then consume them, yes all of them, throughout the course of an afternoon. For this reason and this reason alone I find cupcakes superior. And since you'll be shoving so many of them in your fat face, you might as well make them look cute.

So...without further ado, here are some of my top picks from Cupcake Social.





I will be purchasing some of these little babies just as soon as I have more than $30 in my checking account. Is it in poor taste to tell you how poor I am at the moment? Well if it is, I don't care, this is why, I hope it makes you feel richer.

I made some real cute cupcakes myself, to toot my own horn, the other day, and I'll be posting those soon.

xoxo

Alison

She Makes Pony Pie

After making a lattice pie top, I occurred to me that you could probably do anything you wanted with your pie top and it would most likely turn out alright-looking, if not edible. So I decided to get crazy! Well, as crazy as you can get with pie. I figured that if I love pies, and I love ponies, the only thing that could be better is a Pony Pie!

I think I was right...the ponies seemed fond if it too. Here are some tender moments I captured on film. Please note, there are no actual ponies in Pony Pie, in this case, there are just apples. Look, I can prove it.





Notice the jealous looks from the colt in the corner.

I figured if I could make Pony Pie, then I could also make "Ashton Pie" for a friend who just gave birth to a new baby boy named Ashton. Instead of Ashton parts, I used cherries and blueberries. I think it turned out well, but I didn't get to taste it. I might have been a bit juicy. Any tips?


And the because there was still some fruit left over, and let's face it, I'm unemployed and have the time, I made a "Seagull Pie" in honor of my favorite wall hanging in my home. Again, I was fresh out of Seagulls so I instead used peaches, cherries and blueberries.


The mangled remains.


If I do say so myself, my apple pie is pretty amazing. However, this was my first time trying mixed fruit pies and I think they were a bit, the word I guess would be "runny." The great thing about pie though is even if it's not perfect it still taste SO GOOD, and looks good too. Which is nice for a perfectionist. I will not serve a mediocre cake or cookie, but a sub-par-pie is still divine.

I love making fruit pies. Every step of the process is beautiful. Pitting the juicy cherries and spilling their red blood, peeling bring green apples to reveal soft flesh...how do I make baking pies sound like a horror film? Oh well, I still love it. Peeling the fruit, slicing it up, crimping the edges of the crust. It really is a labor of love. I adore that it's not easy, that it takes the time that most people won't bother to spend. I guess pies are kind of like the marathon of desserts. And a marathon is exactly what it would take to burn of the calories we have consumed due to so many pies.

Anyway, if you have any pie combos you'd like to share, I'd love to hear them. In the meantime I will be perfecting many variations of my Pony Pie.

xoxo

Alison

Arin and Evan or Gocco Heaven

I was so honored to be able to help Arin and Evan design their invitations for their wedding. I was even happier that Arin was totally on board with using my little Gocco printing press to make them.

The Riso Print Gocco is such an amazing little machine. If you're not familiar with it, it's like a little mini screen-printer of sorts. But of course, like all amazing things, they, meaning RISO, have decided to stop making the supplies for it. So it will become a dying art. But I'm hoping that, like Fuji did for Polaroid film, another company will swoop in and provide either a similar product or supplies that work with Gocco.

You have to press each color on different screens. So because their invites were two-color, we hand printed each invite twice. It's not TOO much work, but luckily the loving couple (and their AMAZING dog Costello) came over to help print their own invites. Here's some pix of the printing party.

They were a little timid to get started...


But soon started whipping out prints like masters.


I must say these drying racks were a GREAT purchase.


After we got all the flowers on, we pressed on the type in a rich chocolate brown that we mixed.


Here's Costello with the finished suite. Arin found the half-moon enclosures at Paper Source and we made the bands out of paper she ordered from French Paper.


And here's the invite paired with the Save the Date that I printed on the Gocco a few months back. They sent them out as postcards.


Arin and Evan were the easiest couple to work with ever! Which means, obviously, they will have a fabulous marriage and happy life.

Why do I love weddings so much? Mah! I'm seriously getting very excited.

I love you all,

xoxo

Alison