Little Koala

Halloween 2013. My internal brain dialogue went something like this:

"Meh, I haven't dressed up for halloween for awhile..."

"The baby doesn't need a costume. He's not going trick or treating."

"Um... but it's his first halloween! What kind of mother are you!?"

"Okay... but it's the morning of Halloween. I didn't do this ahead of time! Shoot!"

"I can probably pull off that koala idea... oh no! He's awake."

"Okay, lets do this. Sewing the costume while the baby is awake. Perfect. Not."

But it all worked out in the end. And here are the basics so you too can have yourself a little koala :) It turned out so cute I might just keep the toque going for a while and pull out the ears after Halloween.

You'll need: 

1 white baby toque

2 black buttons (for eyes)

1 pair of grey baby socks

Some black fabric or felt for the nose

Grey Clothing (I taped the white patch on the tummy, but stitched on felt would probably be nicer if you were more on the ball than me and thought ahead of time)

Stitch it up, find your green and brown garb, grab yourself some leaves to make a crown and Voila! Baby Koala in the Tree :) I'm pretty proud of this one actually...

I thought the grey socks added a cute touch for the legs instead of pants. (also I didn't have grey baby pants that fit) And who can resist a cute baby diaper bum? 

He certainly seemed to like think it was a pretty swell costume. And now this mama can tell her son that he had a first halloween costume. Crisis averted!

That delightful aroma of a fresh cup...

Is there anything better than the smell of a freshly brewed cup of coffee? It's pretty high there on my list of favorite smells,  so when I saw this idea I pinned it to try sometime. That sometime was this week! 

The previous pinner said "I placed a vanilla tea-light in with the beans and was wanted by a lovely French vanilla coffee aroma." Well that sounds awesome I thought to myself.  Although I've meet been a huge fan of flavored coffee or candles so I thought I'd try just plain unscented lights instead.  

PINTEREST FAIL

I'm pretty sure this pinner ONLY smelled the  heavily scented vanilla and no coffee because I got nothing.  No vanilla and definitely no coffee. I did have the lovely ambience from the candles though.  Better luck might time. 

Gluten Free Treats!

I was originally thinking that this would be more of a incentive to "get my craft on" so to speak, but one of the boards I pin to is called "Things that Look Nummy" and while I am typically distrusting of many online recipes... I had a wonderful friend (who also happens to have Celiac disease) babysitting for me. I wanted to thank her with a tasty GF treat so I thought I go to my pin board and see what I could find. Gluten Free seems to have been a bit of trend lately in the foodie and diet worlds (even for those who don't necessitate a GF diet) and there are plenty of tasty looking recipes out there that would tempt even the most bread, meat, and cheese kinda guy :)

I thought I should try my recipe out first on my husband and myself before preparing a "treat" for someone else (just in case it was a major flop) So I found this delicious looking "Cheesy Garlic Cauliflower Breadsticks" recipe and thought it would be a winner.... turns out not exactly as I thought it would be. It was tasty, however I was hoping it would be more crispy like breadsticks, and it turned out a little more omelette-y... we did eat it but I decided that it wasn't going to be what I would serve my stellar babysitter the next night. Pin, Lose or Draw? LOSE...

But now I was running out of time to do a trial run of my creation before hand so I took a gamble on this Gluten Free Dairy Free Pumpkin Cupcake recipe and it was DELICIOUS!! So good. I will definitely be making this one again. They pretty much taste like pumpkin doughnuts :) I switched up the icing from the recipe though and did a maple glaze (maple syrup mixed with icing sugar... yes sugar mixed with sugar) and like I said this is definitely going in the recipe box.  

They were the perfect craving kicker that this fall weather has been kicking up and would go wonderfully with a Pumpkin Spice Latte (if you love pumpkin as much as I do anyways). 

Happy Eating <3 p="">

Sarah.