SO EASY Chocolate Bark Recipe With Chocolate Chips and No Baking

My cookie exchange this year requires over 70 pieces of sweet treats to be packaged up and passed around with care.  I just couldn't imagine an easier, quicker, and yummier way to accomplish this than with an awesome chocolate bark recipe!

What makes this awesome-r than the rest?  No need to buy chunks of chocolate bricks and chopping them down to melt.  All you need is chocolate chips, a BIG bag of peanuts, and anything else your heart desires (I have listed some delish optionals at the end of the recipe).  Oh, and did I mention it looks absolutely fabulous once you cut them up and present them?  This is definitely one of my go-to recipe hacks for anybody ready to impress.

SO EASY Chocolate Bark Recipe (makes about 24 pieces or 30 small pieces)

Ingredients:
- 6 cups of semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips
- 1 cup of white chocolate chips (for drizzling on top)
- 4 cups of plain, unsalted peanuts

Instructions:
1) Take a 17x12 large baking sheet and line it with parchment paper.  Do not grease it!
2) In a microwave safe bowl, put all of your dark chocolate chips in it and microwave at 1 minute intervals, stirring after each minute to ensure the chips are melted evenly.
3) Once completely melted, add in peanuts and stir together until fully mixed.
4) Pour mixture onto baking sheet and spread out.  Ensure even spread.
5) Now in another microwave safe bowl, melt white chocolate chips and drizzle it on top of the spread.
6) Allow to cool and solidify for about 2 hours.
7) Remove from sheet and cut into pieces.

Optional items to try out: dried cranberries, coconut shavings, pecans, almonds, and even sunflower seeds!

Shopkins Cupcakes

My girl is into Shopkins.  Really into Shopkins.  After her birthday yesterday I realized how much more her friends are into Shopkins - ravenous, impulsive, electrified little girls feasting their eyes over these tiny plastic and rubber tokens once they saw them sitting on a pillow of icing.  Just like savvy car salesmen, the moment they found their goody bags filled with more Shopkin paraphernalia, they started wheeling and dealing with each other like their life depended on just closing the sale.

"How about I trade you the Cheeky Chocolate for your Kooky Cookie?"
"If you want Gram Jam I can throw in D'Lish Donut for your Apple Blossom."
Me: "So what's the cheese's name".  Unimpressed kid: "Cheesy".  Me: "Of course it is."

The word I'm trying to find here is.... Anyways.  Enjoy these Shopkin Cupcakes!

 

 

Ombre Rosette Birthday Cake

Here it is on the big day, everyone loved the colors of the ombre and they did comment on how it could look like a wedding day cake if done up in all white or cream colors.  By the way, each slice of cake was enormous in height.  Hope this inspires you to do your own rosette cake!

 

 

Ombre Rosette Piped Icing Cake

Went to my local cupcakery shop and as I walked in I could not stop looking at this one wedding cake completely covered in rosettes with piped icing.  It looked so romantic and gave me this feeling of wanting to practice my piping techniques again.  I think I've been too obsessed with fondant lately I forgot all the things you can do with just a bag of colorful icing and a good sturdy wrist.

This also reminded me how much hard work it is to make cakes, and how much I love doing it (this particular cake is an 8" two-layer vanilla cake with a dome shaped top.... and it weighs like a brick!)  Hope you like it.

Easy Sporty Hand Warmers Free Knitting Pattern

Ok, sometimes (more often than I will admit) I just want to knit.  Like, mindless knit.  I crave easy, fast, straight forward knitting projects that I can whip up in one evening without having to think too much about it.  Please, So if you are feeling like this right now, then I have the answer to curb your momentary knit need.  Follow me ahead.....

Createry Shop’s Easy Sporty Hand Warmers - Free Knitting Pattern

Materials:

• Straight knitting needles, size 5.5mm (US9)
• Medium worsted weight yarn in Greystone (1 ball of 100g yarn is more than enough)
• Medium worsted weight yarn in goldenrod (1 ball of 100g yarn is more than enough)
• Tapestry needle
• Gauge is not critical for this pattern.

Knitting Pattern (make 2):

1. With goldenrod color yarn, CO 20 sts.
2. Knit 4 rows.  Break goldenrod yarn and switch to Greystone yarn.
3. RS: Knit 1 row.
4. WS: K3, P14, K3.
5. Repeat steps [3 to 4] until piece measures 5 inches.  Make sure you end on step 4 which is the WS.  Break Greystone yarn and switch back to goldenrod yarn.
6. RS: Knit 3 rows.
7. Bind off all sts.  Break yarn leaving a long tail.
8.  Fold piece in half with the goldenrod borders touching.  With tapestry needle, use long tail left over to sew up edges together leaving a thumbhole approximately 1.5 inches wide.  Securely tie off ends.
9. Make sure that for the 2^nd piece the thumbhole is placed properly so that both pieces mirror each other.
10. Slip on hand warmers and wow your friends by telling them it only took one evening to make them!

Super Easy Butter Cookies Rainbow Swirls

Happy New Year Createry Folks!

Starting a brand new year, everyone is full of great intentions and aspirations.  What can I say, I'm a sucker for the idea that we can mentally erase the scoreboard and start over with a clean slate on 01/01.  We all do the "eat better, live better, be happier, exercise" but I have some fun things to my scoreboard like try on a new lipstick every month, learn how to properly ski, throw out at least 1 thing from my house every week to stop the clutter nightmare, and of course, knit more and bake more.  However, after week 1 and now into week 2 I realize I need to ease myself in slowly to all my self-inflicted expectations.

So to ease on into the year, here is a wonderfully easy butter cookie recipe that really can be used as a the cookie dough base for many other cookies.  You can prep beforehand, and freeze it until you need it.  I just so happened to tint 3 batches and decided to make a swirly rainbow cookie with clear sprinkles instead of using cookie cutters.  Use this recipe all year round, have fun, be creative, it's gonna be a great year!
 

Super Easy Butter Cookies
(makes approximately 20 to 25 cookies)

Ingredients:
- 2.5 cups of flour
- 1 cup butter, softened to room temp.
- 1 cup confectioner's sugar
- 2 tsp vanilla

1) Heat oven to 400 degrees F.
2) In a mixer, mix flour and sugar together at slow speed.
3) add butter and then vanilla to mix.
4) once a dough ball begins to form, place dough onto surface and kneed until consistent.
5) For my rainbow swirl cookie effect, divide dough into 3 portions and tint 1 portion pink, 2nd portion teal, and leave the 3rd as is.
6) Rolls each dough out to a rectangle approximately 12 inches by 7 inches, give or take 1 or 2 inches.
7) Stack each rectangle dough on each other and roll it up into a log.
8) Plastic wrap the log and place in freezer for about 20 minutes.
9) Remove from freezer, take plastic wrap off, and cut into slices 1/2 inch thick.
10) Place on greased baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes.  Allow to cool before serving or decorating.

Comme Ca!  Voila!