Orange muffins

I have so much citrus fruit on my trees at the moment that I've been looking around for lots of suitable recipes. For those of you who like fruit muffins, here's an easy recipe for orange ones.

Here are my ingredients:

And here's the final product. Super simple to whip up in a food processor:

Whole Orange Muffins
Ingredients (for 12 regular or 24 mini sized)

1 orange (about 200g)
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup canola oil

2 cups self-raising flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt

Method
Heat oven to 210 C.
Cut orange (skin and all) into quarters, then cut into chunky pieces. Process with sugar in a food processor until orange is very finely chopped.
Add egg, milk and oil and process briefly until well combined. 

Measure flour, baking soda and salt into large bowl and mix together thoroughly using a fork.
Tip wet ingredients into dry and fold together but do not mix more than necessary.
Coat muffin pans with non-stick spray and fill with the mixture.

Bake 12-15 mins until muffin tops spring back when pressed lightly and a skewer pushed to the bottom comes out clean with no sticky mixture.

Stand pans for 3-4 mins then lift out muffins.  Freeze muffins not required within 48 hours.

PTI August blog hop

It's a busy weekend what with Papertrey's Stamp-a-faire and the blog hop, so I thought I'd get organised early.

Welcome to this month's challenge which is to whip up a project using a sketch and colour combination that appeals. I went with this combo, mostly because I liked the sketch:

And here's my thank you card which incorporates a twine wreath and stamped flowers as well as a stamped background (realised after I'd chosen how I was going to use my colours that I don't have Hawaiian Shores patterned paper!):

Supplies (PTI unless otherwise noted)
Paper - simply chartreuse, hawaiian shores, rustic cream
Stamps - Ruby Rose, Natural Beauties, Fillable Frames 1, Polka Dot Basics II
Ink - fresh snow; Amuse various colours; Versafine Onyx Black
Accessories - button twine; rhinestone; mini brad; sewing machine

Stamp-a-Faire - sugar coated embellishments

Another of the Stamp-a-Faire challenges was to create some sweet sugar coated embellishments using glitter. You can check out the details and videos here.

I'd have liked to try out Danielle's striped die cut look, but the only sentiment dies I have are much too fine so I decided to apply glitter to the whole word instead. I layered a piece of cardstock with scor-tape and then ran the two layers through my big shot. And this is the result:

Supplies (PTI unless otherwise noted)
Paper - kraft, rustic cream, sweet blush, pure poppy; green from stash
Stamps - Tremendous Treats
Ink - Memento Tuxedo black
Accessories - wonderful words die, limitless layers dies, ribbon; copics; prisma glitter; foam tape; score-tape

Stamp-a-Faire- tea staining technique

Thought I'd have a go at a couple of projects for PTI's Stamp-a-Faire. The first challenge was to use tea to dye some fabric. You can check out the post and videos here.

All I had on hand was some vintage lace, so I popped that in a bowl with some black tea bags. I also managed to use the tea to stain some card stock. I then inked the edges of the card stock with PTI's tea dye duo. Here's my layered flower tag.  I cut apart the lace to make the leaves:

Thought I might actually invest in some muslin, so I can use the technique for making some fabric flowers!

Kiwifruit jam

Can't believe August is here already. For us that means winter and crops like citrus and kiwifruit. I have a kiwifruit vine in my garden and am always on the look for jam and chutney recipes. I do like to just eat them by scooping out the flesh or adding them to a smoothie (try a combo of baby spinach leaves, kiwifruit and banana - yum!) but a while ago I came across a great recipe for microwave jam. It's perfect for small quantities as you just do a jar at a time. (I use pint sized Ball mason jars).


So here are my kiwifruit (yes the old fashioned variety which still come with hair!):

Peel, slice into quarters and take out the white core which can be a bit hard or stringy, add lemon juice
and orange peel:

 
Cook to soften the fruit, then just add sugar and cook again until setting point is reached. And you end up with this:

Kiwifruit jam

Ingredients
500g kiwifruit (whole fruit, not prepared weight)
1/4 cup lemon juice
1 tablespoon grated orange rind
2 cups sugar

Method
Peel kiwifruit, cut lengthways into quarters and remove white core.
Chop finely or mash and put into tall microwave jug with lemon juice and orange peel.
Cook on high for about 6 minutes until fruit is softened.
Add sugar, stir well and cook for another 8-10 minutes until setting point is reached.
Pour into hot jar and seal.

(Makes about 2 cups).

Festive Friday 15

Looking for some more inspiration for making Christmas cards, I thought I'd take a look at the latest Festive Friday challenge. It's to create a project with a children's theme. You can check out the challenge here.

Thought I'd use one of my favourite sets, PTI's Tremendous Treats: Holiday for this one. And here's what I came up with.

Might not be very easy to spot, but I gave the doily a dusting of glitter. Here's the close up:

Supplies (Papertrey Ink unless otherwise noted)
Paper - rustic cream, new leaf, sweet blush, new leaf pattern pack; SU patterned paper
Stamps - Tremendous Treats: Holiday, Tiny Tags
Dies - Limitless layers, Tiny Tags
Ink - Versafine onyx black, Memento Tuxedo Black, Amuse; Tea Dye Duo
Accessories - satin ribbon; button twine; paper doily; Copics; Stickles; Doodlebug glitter; spray adhesive; sewing machine

More Project Life cards

I'm having fun taking a bit of a break from greeting cards and putting some PL embellishments together. Here are a couple more cards I came up with at the weekend:

The first card uses a cute rose die from Memory Box - the Sonora Rose. The die cuts and embosses a delicate rose which I decided to give a bit more definition by paper piecing.

This card uses some stamps and dies from Papertrey Ink. It's fun to build up little scenes like this.

Sweet Baby Supplies (PTI unless otherwise noted)
Paper - Stamper's select white, berry sorbet, limeade ice, melon berry paper pack, summer sunrise paper pack; My Mind's Eye Sweetest Thing pattered paper
Stamps - Polka Dot Parade 4
Ink - Vintage Tea Dye Duo, Versafine onyx black, Amuse
Accessories - Memory Box Sonora Rose die


Sweet Baby Supplies (PTI unless otherwise noted)
Paper - Stamper's select white, berry sorbet, limeade ice, melon berry paper pack, summer sunrise paper pack; Project Life Designer Paper
Stamps - Heart-2-Heart 6, Little Bitty Bird Additions; Market Street Travelscapes
Ink - Vintage Tea Dye Duo, Versafine onyx black, Amuse
Accessories - Little Bitty Bird & Additions dies; sewing machine

On yer bike!

Making some more embellishments for Project Life or to use on cards. Here are some bikes using PTI\s Pedal Pusher set. Love the rainbow of colours and how these turned out!

Supplies
Paper - PTI stamper's select white
Stamps - PTI Pedal Pusher
Ink - Versafine onyx black, Amuse
Accessories - Pedal pusher dies

Merry Christmas

I've made about 20 Christmas cards but need a few more to add to my stash. Found some SU Christmas paper and whipped up this card - fussy cut two lots of trees which are popped up on foam tape to add some dimension and some rhinestones add a bit of sparkle:

Project Life embellishments

Here are a few more embellishments I've been working on for Project Life. The stamps are PTI's Ruby Rose, a lovely set designed by Dawn McVey. The colours work beautifully with this My Mind's Eye paper. Can wait to see them in the album!