Stuffed Animal Bean Bag

I saw these awesome storage bean bags on Boon, but they are like $80! So I made my own, out of $8 worth of fabric (4 yards) and a $2 zipper. It took about 2 hours to make it. I made it a little too big, it is the shape of a fat cylinder. Four foot diameter circles on the top and bottom, and eighteen inch strip of fabric around it. Even though it is huge, it is full....meaning Connor has WAY too many stuffed animals! It really makes a comfy seat. I had to take out the talking animals, they were getting annoying.

Car Pouch/Car Mat

I made this little play mat for Connor while he was away at Aunt Jessica's/Grandma's house this past weekend. It transforms into a pouch that can hold his cars, hopefully this will help us not lose so many. I wanted to do more embroidering on it, but the Walmart here does not sell embroidery floss. They told me other places to go, but I get lost to easily in this town. I had to make due with whatever bits of floss I had left over from other projects.

Monkey Bread

4 cans refrigerator biscuits
1 1/2 tablespoons cinnamon
3/4 cup butter
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar, packed

Melt butter on stove top, stir in brown sugar. Make a carmelly mixture, and allow to cool for about ten minutes. In the mean time, cut the biscuits up into quarters. Toss the biscuits in a bag white sugar and cinnamon. Make sure they are coated extra good. Put into a well greased bundt pan and poor carmel mixture over the biscuits. Cook for 35-45 minutes at 350 degrees.

Dried Fruit "better-for-you" cookies

• 3 cups quick oats
• 3 mushed up ripe bananas
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1/4 cup applesauce
• 1 cup dried fruit (I used raisins, apricots, and pineapple)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  1 tablespoon sugar

Mix everything together, put on well greased cookie sheet and baked at 400 degrees for 18 minutes. Makes about 15 "cookies". These work well as afternoon snacks.

Molten Chocolate Cake

• 2 tablespoons of sugar
• 3 tablespoons butter
• 2 ounces chocolate
• 2 tablespoons whipping cream
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 egg
• 1 egg yolk
• dusting sugar

Beat together eggs and sugar on high for ten minutes. Melt together chocolate, butter and whipping cream over low heat; mix in flour and vanilla. Fold egg mixture in with chocolate mixture slowly. Grease 2 ramekins dishes, dust inside with sugar. Fill ramekins dishes 3/4 full, bake at 400 degrees for 9 minutes. Center should be wiggly. Allow to cool for 5 minutes, flip ramekins dish upside down, serve away. Maybe dust some powder sugar or top with whipped cream if you can wait long enough!

Baby Bunch Bouquet

I got the idea to make this as a shower gift from Martha Stewart.
Instead of roses, I used bright gerber daisies, but I think you could use whatever fake flower looked the prettiest. I bought all the supplies to make this at Dollar Tree, and it cost $10. There are 2 onesies, 1 shirt, 2 hats, 2 pairs of socks, tights and wash clothes in it. I am putting it in an oversized vase, wrapped with a few extra clothing items. It was a little hard starting out, and would have been easier with another set of hand when taping them all together, but overall was a pretty easy craft. It took me about an hour to do.

Bacon Tomato Soup

• 4 Slices of Bacon, chopped up small
• 15 ounce can of crushed tomatos
• 4 celery stalks chopped
• 4 carrots chopped
• 2 garlic cloves chopped
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 tablespoon sugar

Fry up bacon in a large sauce pan. Remove the bacon, leaving the grease. Toss in the garlc, celery and carrots. Cook in the grease until tender. Put into a food processor. Return to pot, along with cooked bacon, tomato, milk and sugar. Cook up until nice and warm. Serve it with grilled cheese - of course.