Chocolate Chip Butter Pecan Cookies

Chocolate Chip Butter Pecan Cookies are nutty, chocolaty, chewy, and buttery too! These cookies are a southern twist on a classic cookie and will liven up your holiday cookie tray!

Crusty Artisan Style Bread

Crusty Artisan Style Bread has a wonderfully tangy flavor with a crispy outside and soft, chewy inside. With this no-knead recipe, it's easy to craft homemade bread just like the bakery! Makes a lovely hostess gift with a bottle of wine, and it's perfect for Thanksgiving!

Valentine's Day Snack Mix

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #RedVelvetLove #CollectiveBias

Valentine's Day Snack Mix is a delicious way to share the love with all of your favorite Valentines. This sweet snack mix is made with M&M's® Red Velvet candies, crispy cereal, crunchy pretzels, and salty peanuts all covered in creamilicious white chocolate and sparkly pink sprinkles! It is sooo incredibly satisfying and delicious!

Chocolate Cherry Cookies

Chocolate Cherry Cookies are a wonderful addition to your Christmas cookie tray. A delicately rich chocolate cookie studded with a sweet candied cherry is as delicious as it is beautiful. These festive cookies are easy to make too!

Double Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies

Double Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cookies are rich chocolate oval cookies packed full of salty macadamia nuts and drizzled in semi-sweet and creamy white chocolate! These cookies satisfy those sweet and salty cravings, and the drizzled chocolate makes for a beautiful presentation. Everyone loves to see these cookies on my holiday cookies trays each year!

Chocolate Macadamia Cookies

Rich chocolate combined with the creamy saltiness of macadamia nuts makes the perfect cookie for the holidays and beyond! I love these Chocolate Macadamia Cookies!

Cranberry Pinwheel Cookies

Cranberry Pinwheel Cookies are beautiful Christmas cookies made from my Vanilla Cookie Dough Recipe. The cranberry filled cookies drizzled with rich, creamy white chocolate are delicious and make a festive cookie for the holiday season. 

Striped Almond Cookies

Striped Almond Cookies are beautiful striped cookies made with almond paste for a rich almond flavor with a bit of a crunch. Striped cookies look so professional, but are actually quite easy to make.

Cinnamon Roll Cookies Recipe

Cinnamon Roll Cookies taste just like an ooey gooey cinnamon roll, but in an easier to make cookie! These cinnamony sweet cookies are the third in a series of five different cookies you can make with my Vanilla Cookie Dough Recipe.

Candied Cherry Cookies

Candied Cherry Cookies are a wonderful addition to your Christmas cookie tray. A delicate vanilla cookie studded with a sweet candied cherry is as delicious as it is beautiful. These festive cookies are easy to make too!

Caramel Crunch Snack Mix

Caramel Crunch Snack Mix is loaded with Winter Spice Mixed Nuts and pretzels all covered in a crunchy, rich caramel coating. It is an addicting snack mix that will be a big hit at holiday parties and makes a great gift everyone will love!

Nutty Granola Recipe #SundaySupper

My Nutty Granola Recipe is a healthy mixture of nuts and grains. This makes a hearty start to your day when served with milk or yogurt, but is also a tasty snack on its own!

Lemon & Thyme Sea Salt Scrub

Sea Salt is derived from evaporated seawater and is chock full of minerals beneficial to skin.  When mixed with oil, such as olive oil or almond oil, salt can breathe new life into tired skin.

Exfoliation with a salt scrub removes dead skin cells. The longer dead skin cells stay on the surface of skin - the harder they get. This hardened layer of dead skin cells will become thicker and thicker until it is removed - this can make the skin look dry and flaky; exfoliation with a salt scrub removes this layer and uncovers the moist, shiny skin hidden underneath! Who doesn't want shiny skin?

 This invigorates the skin and helps to improve circulation as well. Improved circulation gives the skin a natural, youthful glow. Scrubbing with salt also helps to remove bacteria from the skin and unclog pores. With its antiseptic qualities, salt kills bacteria and reduces inflammation along with any itching or pain associated with bacterial-related skin diseases.

Exfoliating with a salt scrub also encourages the growth of healthy new cells which tightens the skin, giving it a firmer and younger-looking appearance. Skin regeneration also reduces skin discoloration which evens out skin tone and improves the texture too! 

You don't have to spend a ton of $$$$ on salt scrubs.  You can make your own at home for your own  use and even for gift giving! I used about 1 cup of Coarse Sea Salt, 1/2 cup of Almond Oil, 1 tablespoon of Lemon Zest, some fresh Thyme Leaves, and a few drops of Lemongrass Essential Oil

Cupcake Bouquet

This would make a sweet Mother's Day gift!

BONUS - it was easy and inexpensive. The biggest cost was the strawberries and they are on sale

Here is how I made it...

Obviously I had to make cupcakes first.  I used Lemon Cupcakes (I seem to be on a lemon kick right now), but you can use your fave. Be sure to refrigerate them before assembling your bouquet so the icing can harden.

 You'll also need a cute vase or pot (If you don't have one on hand, you can pick one up relatively inexpensively - mine was only $1), Styrofoam, toothpicks, and strawberries or tissue paper.

Be sure the Styrofoam fits snugly in your vase or pot - try it out at the store before you bring it home! Now place the Styrofoam into the vase/pot like so...

Next you put your toothpicks into the Styrofoam.  This vase has a square opening just big enough to fit one cupcake on each side, so I put two (2) toothpicks in the center of each side.  Place them so one cupcake will fit over both toothpicks.  I also placed a cupcake in the center, so I needed 2 toothpicks there as well

Now that all of your toothpicks are in place, pop on those cupcakes!

Be careful not to smudge the icing!

One on each side....

And one smack dab in the middle - right on top!

Next, place 1 toothpick where ever you see an empty spot that needs filling, and this is where you will put the strawberries.  1 toothpick will be enough to hold 1 strawberry, so no need to get all crazy with the toothpicks!  I put the toothpick in the Styrofoam first and then stuck the strawberry on the toothpick.  Try to get strawberries that are on the smallish side...the bigger ones (like many of the ones I have) make it difficult to push them down in there to fill the empty spaces.  Your bouquet will look better if you get all those spaces filled up nicely! Chocolate dipped strawberries would be good too!

You can also use tissue paper to fill in the spaces.  Pick your favorite color that coordinates nicely with your vase/pot, and cut it into wide strips; fold each strip into an accordion and pinch the bottom and then just shove them into the spaces.  If they don't want to stay on their own, you can use double-sided tape to hold them in there.  Mine stayed just fine without any tape... I really like the added color

Once it is all assembled, place it in the fridge to let the icing harden again, and then you can use cellophane to wrap it up and tie a ribbon at the top for gift giving.  These are perishable, of course, so be sure to gift them within a day or two of making them - you don't want mom eating stale cupcakes!!