Days of Chalk and Chocolate

17 Valentine's Day Desserts

Link up to this week's party!

I was browsing around the interwebs looking for a special Valentine's Day dessert and thought I'd share what I found! We're staying in this year to save money but I want our dinner to feel special nonetheless.

Sweet Pea's Kitchen

Red Velvet Cheesecake Brownies

There is not one thing not to like here. Red velvet? OK! Cheesecake? OK! Brownies? OK!

Cafe Fernando

Devil's Food Cake

This looks luscious and so special!

Becky Bakes

Dark Chocolate Cheesecake

Cheesecake is always so decadent and rich, adding chocolate just makes it sublime.

Cafe Fernando

The Best Chocolate Mousse

This dessert takes only two ingredients!

Tiffany & Company

Fancy Purplish Pink diamond ring

Yes, Tiffany. That is "fancy." It's also $650,000. And it's not dessert. But I sure as heck wouldn't say no if Jim had one of those for me after dinner!

Glorious Treats

Cranberry White Chocolate Bars

These are so sweet and pretty! Cranberries and white chocolate make a beautiful flavor combination!

Real Simple

Chocolate Pots

Look at how pretty these chocolate pots are when you do them in cute cups!

Sprinkle Bakes

Cherry Vanilla Layer Cake

I love the pink layers! What a sweet surprise and so festive!

Sweetalopia

Neapolitan Cake

This cake is so beautiful with it's gorgeous layers! I bet it tastes delicious.

Home Life

Mocha Crepe Cake

I've been wanting to try a crepe cake and this one looks yummy. Maybe I'll make it for our dinner!

Cream Puffs in Venice

Nutella Meringues

Anything is better with Nutella!

6 Bittersweets

Chocolate Macarons

Macarons are the new cupcake. They are all the rage and you can make them in so many flavors!

Martha Stewart

Molten Mocha Cakes

Nothing says love like oozing chocolate!

Williams-Sonoma

Buttermilk Tartlets with Berries

Not every special Valentine's Day dessert needs to be chocolate!

Joy of Baking

Coconut Cake

Coconut cake with lemon curd in the layers is one of my personal favorites.

Better Homes and Gardens

Chocolate Fondue

What is more special than sharing this dessert with your favorite person? Ok, not sharing it would be more special. HA HA HA! kidding.

ShopRite

Tiramisu

Tiramisu means "pick me up" in Italian and this creamy dessert certainly does just that. Tiramisu is easier to make than it looks, too. I've made this recipe but I did it in a large container instead of the individual ones.

And my ultimate favorite chocolate mousse....

Alton Brown

Chocolate Mousse

The recipe didn't have a picture but assure you, it's amazing!

Hope these give you ideas to sweeten up your Valentine's Day!
Cheers!
Jenn

Latest & Greatest Friday Link Party #17

5 comments

blogs, link party

Last week's party may have been my favorite one yet! I can't wait to see all your link ups this week.

Latest & Greatest Friday 16 Features!

5 comments

blogs, features

We did it! We broke 100! I'm so excited to see so many awesome link ups! Here were the top viewed links which were actually tied for first place!

By The Book

Cheesy Quinoa Bites

These look super yummy!

Tattered and Inked

The Notebook Quote Free Printable

And there's a little eye candy on the
link too. YUM.

Tales of Trophy Wife

Laundry Room Art

Maybe I'd do laundry more often if my laundry
room was this cute!

Creatively Living Outside the Box

Bedroom Renovations and Decorating on a Budget

I love this room so much that I'm
using it as an inspiration for my own
bedroom. It looks like a high end design!

Hello Newman's!

Adding Height to Kitchen Cabinets

Great tutorial and beautiful results!

Thanks to everyone who linked up! If you are a featured and are so inclined to grab my button it would be ok... : )

See you later at the link party!

Cheers!
Jenny

Oven Fried Onion Rings

10 comments

recipes

This is going to be quick because Jim needs the computer for work but I wanted to squeeze this post in. I often make oven baked onions rings as a low fat side dish. They aren't the same as fried rings but then again, you can't take the fry out and keep them the same. But we enjoy these too!

Here's how you do it.

Ingredients:

Onions (tonight I used 2 yellow ones but most times I use 1-2 large sweet ones)
egg
a few tablespoons of milk
seasoned breadcrumbs
salt, pepper, and a pinch of cayenne or paprika (optional)

Directions:
1. Preheat your oven to 425 F. Peel your onions and slice into thick rings. Separate the rings. I leave two rings together if they are thin layers so there is a decent amount of onion in each ring. Set aside rings.

2. Mix egg and milk in a medium, shallow bowl. Mix the breadcrumbs with the seasonings to taste in another. You're just setting up a breading station.

3. Use about a tablespoon (more or less) of olive oil to coat a baking sheet and set aside.

4. Dip each ring in the egg mixture to coat and then toss in the breadcrumbs. Transfer to the prepared baking sheet.

It's best to have them in a single layer but
I couldn't find my large baking sheet.

5. Bake for 20 minutes or so, flipping the onion rings over half way through or when the bottom is golden and crispy.

6. Chow down.

Cheers!
Jenny

Easy Ballet Cake

9 comments

decorations, party

We broke 100 link ups this week!! I'm so excited! Thanks to everyone who linked up and is making Latest and Greatest Fridays into such an awesome party each week!

I keep meaning to post about this and finally remembered. When Molly turned 3 we had a ballet birthday party and I made the cake myself. I wanted to do something that would be easy but look pretty without buying a lot of decorations. So I frosted the cake and then frosted two Twinkies to look like ballet shoes and propped them on top. How cute! Of course I'm not a cake decorator but that's ok because I don't mind if it looks homemade since it is.

Ballet shoe coookies are an easter egg cookie cutter that I
sugared and frosted. I'm not quite sure why I put them in the tray
toes up. Why would I do that? Weird.

Super simple centerpieces!
I used the colored M & Ms for the bottom
and then just clusters of lollipops from the party store

Anyway, I think the whole Twinkie-as-a-shoe thing is great and you could make all sorts of things. You could put some mini donuts on and make roller skates or roller blades. You could make skis by adding some licorice to the bottom and some donuts on top to make a boot and then frost. You could make a pair of running sneakers for your friend who just ran a marathon. The shape lends itself to all sorts of stuff!

In other news...

The stomach flu has come for a visit to our house! It's a really cruddy houseguest. It makes a huge mess but never helps to clean up. It occupies our bathrooms without thought to other people's needs, and tends to make meals miserable. I'm really tired of it and wouldn't mind if it would pack it's bags and move on.

When it first came to visit Ellie, I thought that it would leave before visiting the rest of us. But no luck...we were roommates Friday and Saturday (bed partners if you must know) and then it bunked in with Molly yesterday and today. And if that isn't bad enough...it's kicked me out of my spot next to Jim on the couch and is spending tonight and probably all of tomorrow with him. You'd think with all the Lysol sprayed around the house it would take a hint! Dumb flu.

Anyone have any other great and easy cake decorating ideas??

Cheers!
Jenny

Adding a Ruffle to Slipcovers

6 comments

decor, fabric, ruffles, sewing, slipcover

I tzujed up some store bought slip covers with some ruffles. Did you know that is how you spell "jujj?" I looked it up. It's true. Anyway, I have these slips I bought years ago when I married Jim and his kitchen set. The chairs are sturdy and well made but not my style at all. So I bought plain white cotton slips to go over them and so we lived with them for a few years before they ended up in the garage when we bought new chairs.

Fast forward to now and we are using our newer chairs in the dining room and Jim's are back in the kitchen with the slipcovers. But they annoy me because they don't reach the floors and the chairs are wearing floods. So I ruffled them this week and now their pants, or I guess skirts in this instance, reach the floor!

Here's how I sewed on a simple ruffle:

I measured around the bottom of the slip and added an extra yard for the gathers. I should have added a hard and a half to 2 yards because I would have preferred fuller gathers. I bought very basic white cotton fabric at Walmart that cost me a total of $8.91. I hemmed one of the long sides.

I made a simple ruffle using my sewing machine (set on the longest stitch, highest tension). I pinned it to the slip to size it around but then I took the pins out and sewed it into a loop by putting right sides together and sewing the short ends together.

Pinned to size

Right sides together and sew the short ends

Repin and sew the ruffle to the bottom of the slip, making sure the right sides are together. The ruffle will be upside down but when you turn it onto the chair it will hang properly.

So I went from this

Cute and easy! I was thinking about adding a ribbon around the bottom. We'll see. And I know I'm ruffling everything nowadays but it's so easy to tszuj stuff up with ruffles. I'm so excite I know how to spell that word.

Love to see what you are tszujing up this week! Keep tszujing!

Cheers!
Jenny