Sorry this is a rambler~McDonald's Coffee High

 Wow, it's been almost a week since I last posted.  It shouldn't seem so busy. Especially since we only have a couple kids in the daycare.  It has been really hard on my mom and I for the last couple months.   We will have parents come to look at the daycare, but we never get a call back.  I think it is for various reasons: old dog, wanting educational based care, cheaper care.  Whatever it is, we're hurting and wondering if we should even still do daycare.  My mom has been doing daycare for 20 years and I have helped her for at least 13.  I love being able to work with her because it enables me to also care for my son and also my dad's mom.  And who doesn't love working from home (or mom's home).

I have hope that my little online shop will flourish so I can really do what I love and not have to worry about not having very many kids.  And that in lies a bunch of stuff I not sure I can handle. 

I should be jumping up for joy because I finally made another sale.  But instead I felt discouraged, frustrated, and to tell you the truth plain stupid. 

I have been doing a lot of reading on entrepreneurship, Kelly's workshop, Deepak Chopra. There has been a lot of questions like, "If you could do anything, what would it be?", "What is the one main thing that's calling to you?" Or implying it's better to pick one thing to specialize in.  But thinking of just one thing makes me feel like I have Crafter's ADD. My mind jumps from one photo, scrapbook page, vintage item, sewing pattern, clay brick, paint bottle.........I could go on and on.  I wouldn't want to have it any other way.

So as far as etsy goes.  I would like my shop to be like a gift shop of sorts.  Some vintage items here, natural body products over there,  with my other crafty whatevers interspersed.

I became enamored at the possibility of making collaged canvases with the ton of ephemera I have collected over the years.  Some being images that I have cut out of various calendars/books/magazines.  But then came the issue of copyright, since I have no way of remembering who the images are from.  Granted I can just make them for myself but what fun is that.  Copyright laws are so obscure and hard to figure out anyways.  Anyone have any advise or a link to some that are easy to understand?

Lately I have been posting my business-type stuff to-do list here on Mondays as a form of accountability.

1. Practice driving!  (I know I am almost 30)
2. Change shipping on etsy.
3. Fix up shop page- policies, bio, what-nots
4. Work on website
5. Finish up tutorials

 I feel like I can babble on for days but I'll spare ya.

Hope you all have a good week!

This picture above in my take on the Echo challenge - Stripes.  You can visit the group here.

I have been a baking fool lately.....

First off I think I found the best chocolate cake recipe.  I am more of a vanilla lover, but this cake may make me cross over.  I made it by altering this recipe I found at allrecipes.com. With over 800 reviews it couldn't go wrong

I altered it by adding coffee and using dark unsweetened cocoa instead of regular unsweetened.

This is their recipe with my changes.

Coffee Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:
1 cup hot coffee
1 cup boiling water
1 cup unsweetened Hershey's Special Dark chocolate cocoa powder
2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter, softened
2 1/4 cups white sugar
4 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).  Grease a 9x13 inch cake pan.  In a medium bowl, pour boiling water and coffee over cocoa, and whisk until smooth.  Let mixture cool.  Sift together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt; set aside.
In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.  Beat in eggs one at a time, then stir in vanilla.  Add the flour mixture alternately with the cocoa mixture.  Spread batter in the 9x13 pan.  Bake for 35-40 min.  Allow to cool.

 

My mom and I made it for my grandmother's birthday.  I was our first time using fondant.  They make it look so easy on those baking shows.  We hand placed each of those damn little pearls all around the cake.

Oh!, I am forgetting the best part the frosting. To use underneath the fondant.

Sweet Butter frosting

Ingredients:

1 pound butter, softened
3 cups confectioners' sugar
2 tablespoons heavy cream
1 teaspoon of vanilla

Directions:
Combine everything in a medium mixing bowl.  Mix everything together on low speed until well blended.  Then increase speed to medium for another 3 minutes until totally smooth.

This recipe was actually made by mistake.  I accidentally put in a pound of butter instead of a cup.  At least it doesn't have shortening in it- *gag*.  I like it, but then again one of my all time fav foods is creamed butter and sugar. So it may not be for everyone.  It passed my families inspections though; so all is good.


My goals for this week are pretty much the same as last week.  I had a lot of other things pop up that took presidence over last weeks goal list.  Gotta roll with those punches. 

1. Finish canvas
2. Try to get stain out of dress
3. Vintage Thursday
4. Art Walk
5. Catch up on Kelly Rae's class
6. Gussy up my facebook fan page

This is the vintage dress I wanted to add my etsy site last week.  But on closer inspection I noticed that some of the red trim had bled a bit onto the fabric.  Does anyone know of a way to get that out?  Any stain remover suggestions?  Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks Mom for modeling!!

Hope you all have a nice week!