Fast Easy Bread

Recently, Kaitlyn and I were invited to a fun night of bread baking.  My friend Lindsey has a company called Fast Easy Bread.  She showed us, a few other ladies, and their daughters how quickly you can make homemade bread and a delicious meal in 2 hours!

Lindsey thoroughly explained all the steps and we shared her enthusiasm to make something so simple.

Dump all the dry ingredients into a bowl.  The recipe calls for lecithin, which comes in the Fast Easy Bread bundles.  Lindsey showed us an easy way to add the liquid ingredients.  Using the back of the measuring spoon that's needed, make a dimple in the dry ingredients.  Then, just pour your liquid into that dimple.  Easy!

Mix it well in a mixer or by hand and you'll have a good size ball of dough.  One ball of dough makes A LOT!!!!  You can make bread bowls, rolls, and much more.  With the first batch of dough, we were going to make pumpkin bread bowls for soup.  Round the dough and shape it like a haystack as best as you can.  Then, gently score the dough to make the pumpkin ridges.

Pull a piece of dough from the top center and shape it to make a stem.  Then, just paint the stem and pumpkin using food coloring.

Stick the stem on top of the pumpkin, cover with a cloth, and let it rise for just a little bit.  Then, it's ready for the oven.

When it comes out of the oven, you have a beautiful pumpkin made of bread.  

While the bread is baking, Lindsey showed us a very easy way to make Broccoli Cheese Soup.  Also on her site, she sells a cream sauce that is used in lots of restaurants as their soup base.  

Add lots of broccoli, cheese, and a couple of other ingredients and cook it over medium heat on the stove.

Cut off the top of the pumpkin and scoop out the inside.  Be sure to save the "innards" because it's great for dipping.

Fill your pumpkin with some soup and it's ready to enjoy!  The best part-it's completely edible!

 That's not all.  We also had dessert to make.  Kaitlyn helped her new friend, Loni, spread out some more dough onto a cookie sheet.

Kaitlyn mixed up a yummy cream cheese filling.

She spread the filling down the center of the dough and added some apples coated in cinnamon and sugar.  The sides were sliced into strips and "braided" across the apples.

The Caramel Apple Braid was delicious!

AND, there was homemade Monkey Bread.  Just cut the dough into pieces, coat in cinnamon and sugar, place in a bundt pan, and drizzle with caramel sauce.  

Kaitlyn and I enjoyed our experience.  We learned some new things, ate some great food, and got to do it all together in just 2 hours.  Be sure to check out Lindsey's site, blog, or Facebook page.

I did not receive compensation for this post.  All opinions are my own.

Craft Room Confessionals: Scrapbook Cart

I love my Cricut machine and wanted a special place for it in my craft room.  I also wanted to keep all my paper organized and sorted by color.  My husband said he could build me a cart...out of old display shelves from his grocery store!  He brought them home months ago, but we weren't quite sure what to do with them.  But once we figured it out, it only took him a couple hours to get it done.

The shelves were black, which matched perfectly.  Each shelf had one side with a metal trim.  That just made it look even better.

These were the only supplies needed:  L-brackets, screws, and casters so I could move the cart around.

My husband lined up the shelves and screwed in the corners.

The edges were unfinished so we used a small can of Rust-Oleum Protective Enamel in black.

My 8 year old daughter helped touch up the edges.

Finished!  It looked great.  After a quick wipe down, it was ready for my craft room.

I love my Scrapbook Cart!  Thanks hubby!

Craft Room Confessionals: Completed

I LOVE my craft room!  It is decorated how I've always wanted and it's inspiring and cozy and I could spend all day in there.  FYI, I enlarged all the pictures so you can get a good look at them.  Just ignore the margins.  :)

After my hubby painted the walls, it took awhile to decide if I wanted hanging shelves or bookshelves, etc.  Target had a deal on their 5-shelf bookshelves so I decided to buy 3 of them. 

Once those were built, I was so excited to pull out the totes of all my decor that have been stored away for years!

Here are the shelves!

I love vintage Hollywood.  I've always been a fan of old Hollywood movies and decor.  I am a HUGE Wizard of Oz and Elvis Presley fan, so I got to mix it all in with some modern decor.  I chose a black, white, and red color scheme to go along with the gray walls.  Let's take a closer look at some of the shelves.

The 3 clear jars were a steal at Goodwill for $1 each.  They came with lids, but more on that later.  The cookie jar is something I got for Christmas about 12 years ago.  It's Dorothy's ruby slippers and her basket.

I used to collect Coca-Cola, but got rid of a lot of that stuff.  I can't collect everything!  I kept just a few pieces and the red matched perfectly.  I love Elvis tins!  The black and white round boxes and square baskets were all found on clearance at different craft stores.

The ceramic black and white dishes were originally $24 at Michael's.  I grabbed them when I saw them on clearance for $1.60!!! The vintage postage stamps make a nice decoration.

I saw on idea on Pinterest where you turn a wine rack into a yarn rack.  Brilliant!  I've searched consignment stores for a long time to find a decent one and found one just a couple weeks ago.  I touched it up with some black spray paint.  Remember those clear jars?  I spray painted the lids too. 

I have a great Wizard of Oz collection and these dolls are my favorite.  I've had them since high school and they've been stored away, in their boxes, for most of the time.  Now, I can proudly display them.

My two craft totes fit perfectly under my craft table (another refinish by my husband).  This tote holds craft projects, felt sheets, and lots of foam stickers.

This large tote is my gift tote.  It contains cellophane bags for every occasion, tissue paper, shredded paper, and lots of goody bag prizes.

This is the scrapbooking cart my husband made for me.  I can't wait to share the tutorial.  You'll never guess where we got the supplies.  This contains my Cricut, blank cards and envelopes, thank you cards, stickers, die cuts, and paper in every size and color (separated by color).  Plus, it's on wheels so I can move it around very easily.

Tucked in one corner is the desk, computer, and filing cabinet.  My parents bought me a black/white office set to match the room.  Since I'm very involved with music and teach it to preschoolers, I have a collection of CD's that I need to access easily.  The red board on the left of the desk is a magnet board a former student gave me with music note magnets.  Perfect match!

This is an old popcorn can that just happens to be in vintage Hollywood style.  I use it as my garbage can.  Everything has to match, right?

I just love the room.  Every container has some type of craft supply inside of it.  Since my parents also just bought me a label maker, I can't wait to make all the labels.  I also have lots of things that are waiting to hang on the walls.  I can't wait to share that with you!

This style is not for everyone and is definitely unique.  However, it fits me and will continue to inspire me over and over.