Snowy Sunday

Another snowy Sunday - my favorite kind of day, especially when it's the week before Christmas. It was a great day for making bunches of bark for our neighborhood gifts and spending time in the "craft lab", as Annika calls it. I prefer "Santa's Workshop South" but the name didn't stick.


It's been a busy week of gift-making here, so I have a couple of projects to show you. The first is a bag I made for my Secret Santa at work. It's a simple lined fabric bag and the instructions are posted here at Tiny Happy's fabulous blog.

I'm sewing hats and aprons like a maniac and my very thoughtful husband presented me with my Christmas present a few days early. A new sewing machine! I absolutely love it and I can't wait to visit it tonight and test it out. I still have way too many projects to finish before we leave for Maine on Wednesday.

One last project to show you - a simple fleece stocking. It was a fun and easy little guy to make and was a great low-key-high-spirit break in the day's action.

Happy Crafting and an early Merry Christmas to you!
- Kate

Happy Holidays Bark

Today's craft is all about being edible and easy. So far this is my favorite discovery of the season. Delicious holiday bark. It's an adaptation of the Halloween bark we made in October and to adapt it for Christmas we switched out the orange Oreos for red and threw in some Andes mint candies. I made two batches - one with mint and white Oreos, and one without mint and with red Oreos. The kids prefer the non-mint version, though I am very partial to it. The combination of the salty pretzels, white chocolate, and creamy chocolate-y mint is so very good.
To make this concoction, I start with two bags of white chocolate chips, a handful of thin pretzels, 6-8 Oreos, and any candy you would like to add. I pop the chips into the microwave, stirring about half-way through. While that is melting, I give the kids a wooden spoon and let them crush up the other ingredients. I arrange the pretzels, Oreos, and candies haphazardly but somewhat evenly on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper and pour the melted chocolate over the top. To avoid smearing the Oreos and mint candies, I try not spread the white chocolate too much. After it cools in the fridge for a little while, just enough to set, I take it out break it into pieces. Ta-da! It's ready to go...straight into your belly, that is.