Oreo Truffles

  These are commonly referred to as "Oreo Balls," but the writer in me will not allow the title stand. I need something that sounds as delicious as these sweet balls of goodness are. Therefore, I give you:  Oreo Truffles. These are perfect gift for anyone you know that has nut or egg allergies. With three ingredients, they are so easy to make. Warning: these can be addictive.

Oreo Truffles

Ingredients:

1-21 oz. pkg. Regular Oreos (with filling), crushed or processed in food processor

1- 8oz. block of cream cheese*, softened

Melted Chocolate for dipping (any variety)

*or Neufchatel Cheese (for a lower fat option)

Directions:

Combine Oreo crumbs and cream cheese in food mixer until mixed completely.

Roll with your hands into small balls and placed on waxed paper. If dough is too sticky, place in refrigerator for 30 minutes to an hour and then roll into balls. 

Dip balls in chocolate and allow excess chocolate to drip off. 

Allow truffles to dry on waxed paper. Transfer to an airtight container and store in refrigerator or freezer.

Delicious cold, frozen or room temperature.

Perfect Egg-Free Chocolate Chip Cookies

      Inspired to do some baking magic, I attempted for a fourth time to create the perfect Egg-free Chocolate Chip Cookie. It was divine inspiration--no doubt. My seven year old son is allergic to nuts, eggs, and pet dander (not that you can cook with that). Anyway, it is difficult to find sweet treats that do not contain eggs. I have a couple I really enjoy (and will post recipes of those as well), but this one I figured out on my own and the results were amazing! I'm not a fantastic photographer, so there are yet to be pictures posted. But I will remedy that situation soon. Here is the recipe:

Perfect Egg-Free Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients:  

2 1/4 c unbleached flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 c butter (no substitutes)

3/4 c granulated sugar

3/4 c packed brown sugar

1-2 tsp pure vanilla extract

2 c chocolate chips

Egg Substitute:

1 tsp unflavored gelatin

3 Tbsp cold water

2 Tbsp plus 1 tsp boiling water

Directions:

Begin by making Egg substitute: combine gelatin with cold water, constantly stirring. Add hot water and stir together. Check throughout the mixing process so the gelatin doesn't set completely.

Combine flour, baking soda and salt in a small bowl. Beat butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla in a large mixer bowl until creamy. Add egg substitute and beat well. Gradually add flour mixture. Stir in chocolate chips. Drop by the spoonful onto an ungreased baking sheet.  

Bake at 350 for 10-13 minutes or until golden brown. Cool on baking sheets, then remove to wire racks to cool completely.

Butterfly Nursery

I started the redecorating of Heather's room first. I wish I would have taken before shots, but here are my unprofessional after shots. In this room I had a lot of help. Another wonderful neighbor of mine, Melissa, helped me with the name in vinyl. I used a stencil from JoAnn to trace the butterfly bodies. I cut out, painted and pinned the butterflies to the wall. Straight pins hold the butterfly wings off the wall to make them appear more 3-D. 

In the corner I made a mobile out of circles of scrapbook paper, held together by jump rings. I decorated the mobile with smaller cutouts of butterflies.

My talented sister, Andrea, made the curtains. She added dark brown ribbon bows to accent the fabric loops.

After 9 years I decided to re-cover my highly stained and dirty $80 glider chair and footrest from Toys R Us. With the help of my fantastic mother and sister we were able to finish the job.

Angry Birds Themed Bedroom

      I have been working on redecorating my daughter's attic space bedroom. She's 8 years old and loves Angry Birds apparently. I don't see her play it often, but when I asked her how she wanted her room decorated that was her first request. I put it off for months... mostly because I was busy, but I seriously thought she'd change her mind. Of course she didn't. So my next problem was overcoming the problem that she's a girly girl (though she won't admit it) and the fact that Angry Birds is in no way girly. So I had to really put two things together (without drawing bows on the bird's heads) and hope they'd come together well. Another obstacle to overcome was the knowledge that Angry Birds won't always be in style, so maybe in 5 years she'll be sick of it.
Here are the before pictures:

I repainted the space a beautiful custom shade of blue in three tiers, brushing the lines between each tier to give it a feathery blend between the lines. Then I started work on the birds themselves. Each bird, between free hand drawing on a piece of paper, outlining the stencil and redrawing on the wall to actual painting took me about 3 hours. Take note I am discovering new talents and trying new things--I have NEVER drawn Angry Birds in my life or painted murals on a wall before. I do not claim to be a majorly talented artist, so keep that in mind. Here is what the paintings look like:

Thanks to the input of my daughter and my husband we have a fairly interesting mural, that only took two months to finish (thanks to my baby and other projects)! Thank goodness this painting will last longer than a few months. If she gets bored with it in the next year or two she's just going to have to deal with it. Next project please!

Super Mario Brothers Themed Room

     I was able to find jumbo Mario Brothers Wall Stickers on ThinkGeek.com (one of my favorite websites).  I used these stickers on the main walls of the room. I also found medium and small sized stickers on other sites. They were cheaper, but not as good as the jumbo stickers.

This last picture is a warp tube I made myself out of a Homer Bucket from The Home Depot.

     The only problem I found with the stickers is that the slanted walls have more texture, so they didn't stick well. I'm still trying to resolve the issue. I tried super glue, which worked on the smaller stickers, but the jumbo Mario made a giant mess. I will try Modge Podge next. If you have any other ideas I'd love to hear them!

Super Mario Brothers Clouds

      All of the things I've looked up on the internet about clouds have said that making clouds is one of the easiest things to paint because they are so forgiving. I never believed it until I did these clouds. I started with a simple shape drawn in pencil. To give a nice edge to the clouds I made sure to bring the wall color inside the drawing slightly so my white would be the last layer on the wall.  I used a primer and paint combo in white so I didn't have to do three coats (although I did two coats around the edges). I made the outside of the clouds with a handheld paintbrush using simple round strokes and filled in with a small paint roller. I outlined each cloud with an acrylic paint in an ocean-blue shade.

Adding the happy faces was the scariest part for me. I created my own stencil for the eyes using "Auto Shapes" in Publisher and then drew the smiles below. 

Hills and clouds together:

Super Mario Brother's Themed Bedroom: Hills

In this discovery process of mine, I have found that I have a true passion for decorating. I took four days this week to paint a background for a Super Mario Brother's Themed Bedroom for my soon-to-be 7 year old boy. Thank you darling husband for watching the kids from 7-9 and letting me work until 1am every day, except for yesterday when I stayed up until 2:30am. Also thank you to my neighbors for not calling the cops with my music blaring until the wee hours of the morning. And finally, thank you to my kids who let me sleep in until 9:10am this morning. 

I will post another blog with pictures of the room with the fun smiley clouds from Super Mario All Stars and the Jumbo Character Stickers I purchased at ThinkGeek.com another day, but for now I'll show you some before and after pictures of the hills that I painted. Keep in mind that I am not a professional wall muralist, just a regular mom trying to create something fun for my boy (and hopefully something useful and interesting to those of you that need ideas on how to make a fun space for your homes). 

Before:

Here is a little bit of a paint test (that I didn't use) and the tape is the outline for the hills.

After:

 (and what a difference I must say!)

Just a fresh coat of blue all over the walls and then variations of the same color of blue (I used 1 gallon and 1 pint of the wall color, which I color matched at my local Home Depot from a favorite poster. I also used 2 pints of Swiss Coffee as my white, but I should have just dished out for the gallon. It would have saved me money in the long run). The darkest hills are two parts wall color, one part white. The lighter hills are one part wall color, one part white. 

Of course in Super Mario World there is shading on the side of the hills. This is the part that gave me the biggest headache. I used a ruler and some gentle painter's tape to create the three layers of shadow on the right. The lightest shadow is 2", the medium shadow is the size of a thin piece of painter's tape (a little over 2cm), and the darkest shadow is 1". From the center of the arch down to the beginning of the shadows I drew in the angle. 

To create the colors I took equal parts of the base color of the hill and added the mixture for the darkest hills (two parts wall color, one part white).  For the second shade I did one part original hill color and two parts darkest hill. For the third shade on the lightest hill I used the darkest hill color. For the third shade on the darkest hills I actually used a separate darker blue acrylic paint in the same undertone to outline. I couldn't use the wall color to darken the shades because I wanted the hills to stand out from the walls. Very technical.

 To create the spots I used Microsoft Publisher and created a full page oval and printed it out. I cut out the oval and then traced it on the walls filling in with lighter shades of the wall color. The lightest dots are two parts white, one part wall color. The darker spots are the same shade as the light hills (one part wall color, one part white).