Naan

I decided to make a curry for dinner and thought, what if I tried to make naan instead of making rice? So I looked up some recipes and ended up here 

http://www.halfbakedharvest.com/homemade-naan-step-step-photos/

I was happy to discover how fun and easy this was to make, not to mention delicious!

Ingredients:

1 package yeast

1 tablespoon sugar

1/4 cup warm water
3/4 cup milk
1 cup greek yogurt

4 cups of flour

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

Melted butter

Optional: herbs/seasoning

In a glass bowl dissolve sugar in water then add yeast and let sit at least 10 minutes until begins to foam

While waiting for yeast, mix milk and yogurt so it comes to room temperature

In a separate glass bowl mix together the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, baking powder)

Mix wet ingredients into dry ingredients with a wooden spoon, then with with your hands and form a ball, then cover bowl and let rise for at least an hour

Pull off a fist sized ball of dough at a time, roll out on floured board until 1/4" thick

Brush both sides with melted butter and sprinkle with herbs or seasoning if desired

Heat a frying pan, once hot place the bread in, cover, cook for a minute, flip over, cover again and cook another 2 minutes

Love Photos

Happy Valentine's Day! Today's post is just some simple love photos. Photos can be great for a card or a framed gift. 

Scrabble 

Cheerios

children's blocks

Scrabble 

a deck of cards with a little photo editing on the 10 and the Ace

Love You ThIIIIIIs Much

This was a fun quick card

I traced my hand and cut out two hands

then I folded a piece of paper, wrote "this much"  on it and glued the ends to the hands

that's it! 

A nice, quick message made personal with the use of your own hands for the card. 

This is also a fun one to do with kids. If you like to hold on to cards from your children it's a fun way to see them grow over the years as the hands get bigger. 

Open Heart Chain

Today I tried this heart chain decoration. 

What you need:

heart template

paper

scissors

tape

I found a heart I liked doing an internet search and used that for my template, I printed it out in two sizes then cut it out to use as a template

I traced the larger heart on the paper then cut them out, next I traced the smaller heart on the cut hearts I made a small slit at the bottom of each heart to cut the inside heart out

using the slit in the bottom of the heart link the hearts together to keep the hearts from slipping apart put as small piece of tape on the slit on the back of each heart (I did not do this on the ones pictured below)

Now just decide where to hang it!

Eye Love You

And eye love you! I've never really cared much about some big date with flowers and chocolate for Valentine's day. I prefer to use it to tell all my friends and family that I love them.

I found some goggly eyes and decided to use them for some quick cards.
I designed the cards on the computer then printed them out, glued on the eyes and for the ones with hearts I glued on the hearts as well.

Woven Heart Baskets

This is a Scandinavian Christmas tradition (with the red and white) but it seemed like a festive Valentine project as well. It's also something close to my heart as I remember making these with my mom as a child.

Here's what you need:
paper
scissors
tape or glue
a template - for this you either need a computer or cans and a ruler

 First make your template

On the computer - make two 3.25 inch circles and connect them with a 7" x 3.25 rectangle that bisects the circles. Draw a line down the middle of the the rectangle and then add another line on each side of the middle line so they are evenly spaced out. 

If you're not using a computer you can use two cans and a ruler to make the template, trace around the cans and connect the circles with the ruler then draw 3 evenly spaced lines down the middle

Once you have your template cut it out

use this to cut out the paper you want to use for your heart 

once you have that cut out, fold the paper in half, place template on the outside and cut along the 3 lines

now weave together to form your heart  

weave each piece alternating through and around

once they're all woven together cut a strip of paper, fold it in half and tape or glue it inside to make a handle

Fill the baskets with whatever you'd like and share the love

Heart Strings, String Heart

If you're looking for some Valentine decoration inspiration that you can also do with kids this is a fun and messy project. 

What you need:

yarn

cornstarch

water

glitter

heart shaped cookie cutter

parchment paper

Step one: make the cornstarch glue. In a small saucepan on the stove mix 1/4 cup cornstarch with 1/2 cup water and mix over medium heat, stirring until smooth. Stir in glitter - about 2 tablespoons

Step two: cut your ribbon into about 8 inch pieces

Step three: cover a baking sheet with parchment paper

Step four: when glue is cool enough to touch dip the yarn in glue and coat it, then pull between two fingers and place in heart shaped cookie cutter on parchment lined baking sheet. This is a VERY sticky process!  I used two pieces per heart. 

Step five: remove cookie cutter and place next to heart to repeat the process

Step six: bake in a warm oven, I put mine to the lowest setting which was 170 and baked for 2 hours. 

Step seven: once cool hang your hearts for festive decor

Heart Strings Card

You pull at my heartstrings. Two variations of a heartstring inspired card. 

For the first card:

photos

red paper

xacto knife

thread

tape

glue

Use the xacto knife to cut out a heart in the middle of the red paper

wrap thread around the red paper and use tape to hold thread to back side of the card

glue red paper to the photo

For the second card:

pink card

red paper heart - I used the one I cut out from above 

thread

tape

glue

 

Wrap the heart in thread, using tape on the back to hold it in place

Glue thread wrapped heart to the card

Heart Flower

Flowers are such a lovely thing to have this time of year but they are expensive! So I decide to make some festive heart flowers. 

What you need:

paper hearts - I cut red construction paper for this

pin

pipe cleaner 

ribbon

 line up the hears and push the pin through them all 

use the ribbon to wrap the pin to the pipe cleaner

spread the heart petals to show the flower

Written in my Heart

This is a Martha Stewart Valentine I came across that I wanted to try.

What you need
card stock
decorative paper
Martha Stewart heartstrings template 
scissors
needle and thread
glue
xacto knife
pen

Print out the template and cut it out
Fold the decorative paper in half, place the template on top with flat edge of template aligned with the fold of the paper, trace the template and cut out the paper
with the paper still folded in half place the template on top again and using the xacto knife cut along the template lines through the folded paper
open the paper so you can see the heart, place this on top of the card stock
draw a heart about half an inch larger than the heart cut out of the decorative paper
cut the heart out of the card stock, I have scalloped scissors so I used those
write your secret message in the middle of the card stock heart
Find the middle of the decorative heart then using a needle pull the thread through the middle of the decorative heart  and knot the thread to hold it in place
at the other end of the thread add a little of the card stock, I wrote pull on mine, so the recipient will be know to pull so they will reveal the message
The last step is to put a thin bead of glue around the underside of the outside of the decorative heart and glue it to the card stock be careful the glue doesn't ooze out and glue down other layers of the decorative heart

Heart Chain

More Valentine's decorations! Today I'm making a chain of hearts. This is also an easy one for kids to try too! 

Here's what you need

red paper - cut in to 1 inch strips

stapler 

string to hang the heart chains 

Fold the strips of paper in half

For the first piece, staple by the fold then fold down the loose ends to form a V under the first staple- the first staple will be the top inside of the heart

Can you see the heart shape now? 

the fold of the next strip gets stapled to the loose ends you just folded down to the V

Repeat until you chain is as long as you want it

Want to personalize it? 

Write one adjective on each heart that describes why you love your partner or children or whoever you're decorating for/with. 

Doily Valentine

Growing up when you had to bring a Valentine to class for each person my mom always made us make them by hand. It was usually not something I look forward to but it is a tradition that grew on me and one I continue to this day.

I used to just cut out a heart and glue it to a doily but what about cutting out the doily instead?
Some of the circles look like flowers and the ruffly heart also adds a nice framing element.
Who knew there's more to doilies then just getting glued to the back of a heart? And this is just a start!

Love Forest of Heart Trees

Today I made a little Love Forest that may be a nice place for the my Owls (see February 2 post)

to play but even without the owls, is a nice festive decoration. 

What you need to make heart trees:

paper

glue

scissors

cut out half circles, roll into a cone and glue to hold

cut out hearts, in a variety of colors and patterns, variety will add depth to the tree

glue the hearts to the cone, starting at the bottom, around the whole width, then add another row above, repeat until the whole cone is covered

you can either let them sit right on the table or use a candle holder or small bottle as a trunk and to add some height