Weekend Junk Finds

After a week stuck inside with a sick Maren, I dragged the kids 40 minutes' drive for an estate sale. I was obviously truly desperate, as taking them to an estate sale is generally just shooting myself in the foot, but The Mister had to work, I couldn't leave a sick kid with a babysitter, and I needed to GET OUT and look at some junk! The ad for this estate sale said the owner was a borderline hoarder, and I'd have to agree. There was more fabric in that house than in some fabric stores--no kidding! I was there on the 3rd day of the sale and it didn't look like it had even been touched, though it was priced to move. To give you an idea, they were going to have a second sale the following weekend of the upstairs of the house and two storage units, because they hadn't had time to even touch those while dealing with the main floor & basement.

I didn't buy any fabric because it was crowded, I had my kids, and the light was terrible in the basement. I did go into the dish room--a tiny basement room that was filled with stacks and stacks of old china, including one of my favorites: LuRay pastels. Since I got there the third day all of the really great stuff was gone already, but I managed to pick up a half dozen of these plates: 4 Sharon pink, 2 Persian Cream yellow, and a Surf Green bread plate.

I also found this vintage Christmas tablecloth wadded up on the floor in the basement room. I wish I could have gone back this weekend to see what treasures were upstairs and in the storage units at that house!

These were from the thrift store. A pretty, shabby Homer Laughlin bowl (headed to Etsy eventually),

A pair of plates with a mod leaf border decoration perfect for autumn (love the turquoise, yellow and gray!),

and some fun vintage books to use in decorating. I liked the bold black and red covers of the music books. The children's book originally had a pair of scissors attached to the cover in that funny-shaped red spot, and inside are several gummed pages of stickers that were meant to be cut out and stuck throughout the book. All of the gummed pages are still intact, so I'll have to keep an eye out for a little old pair of scissors to fit on the cover!

Meager findings this time, but I just haven't had the chance to get out much. I'm positively itching to get my hands on some vintage Christmas goodies and am anxious for my local thrift stores to start putting out their holiday merchandise!

Did you find any treasures this weekend?

Pinned it and Made it: Mars bars Rice Krispies

This week's Pinned it and Made it is from a recipe I pinned a couple of months ago for Rice Krispie treats made with Mars bars instead of the standard butter and marshmallows.

Did you know that it's nearly impossible to find Mars bars in the US anymore? I guess I never realized that they had disappeared. I looked at every store I visited that sold candy, and the only place I could find them was in a 6-pack at Wal-Mart.

What I failed to remember is that the author of the recipe is Canadian, and the Mars bars in Canada are different from the Mars bars sold here in the US! I should have known this, because I know from personal, delicious experience that the Mars bars sold in the UK are different from those in the US--they're better!

Irish Mars bars available on Amazo

The Mars bars I bought at Wal-Mart look like this in the middle:

Nougat, chopped almonds, and a little bit of caramel. Canadian Mars bars basically look like this:

Nougat, no almonds, and more caramel. The key factor in all of this is the amount (or lack thereof) of caramel in the candy bar, because that is largely what holds the Rice Krispie treats together in the absence of marshmallow glue. Because my Mars bars had less caramel to begin with, I knew I'd have a problem. Luckily, I happened to have a bag of these:

on my counter for a future Pinned it and Made it post. I took out the 1 cup of caramels that the other recipe required, and then dumped the rest of the bag into my melted Mars bars mixture. It still looked a bit dry, so I threw in a half dozen Stackermallows and a smidge more butter.

Even after all of that, once I poured the hot mixture onto the Rice Krispies and mixed it, there was not enough 'glue' to hold all of the cereal together. I grabbed my still-warm pot and melted about a dozen more StackerMallows and another tablespoon of butter and poured that into the cereal. That did the trick! I topped the treats with the melted milk chocolate chips as the original recipe suggested and put them in the fridge to set the chocolate.

They really were delicious! I took them to a gathering and they were a hit. One person commented that they taste like a candy bar, and I agree--they definitely reminded me of a 100 Grand Bar (one of my favorites!) because of the caramel, milk chocolate and Rice Krispies.

If I made these again, I'd forget the Mars Bars and use Milky Way bars instead, and I think I'd use 7-8 to make sure I have enough to glue the cereal together. These might be a fun treat to make if you're trying to use up leftover Halloween candy--you could throw in Milky Ways, Snickers and maybe even a 3 Musketeers or two!

Impromptu Etsy Halloween Sale!

I've decided to have a little sale in my Etsy shop from now until 11:59 pm Mountain Time on Wednesday, October 19. All Halloween items are 15% off when you use the coupon code SPOOKY15 at checkout!

Halloween platters 2011: Round two

I posted a while ago about the upcycled Halloween platters I made for my Etsy shop this year, but I didn't stop there! I made a few more and wanted to show them off because I love the silhouette images!

First is the Spooky Silhouette Family Gallery, all of them on vintage china platters:

Dracula

Frankenstein

Witch

Skeleton

I also found these two really neat orange dishes. They're not vintage, but they're the perfect color for Halloween!

Dracula on orange

Spooky crow on tombstone on orange

I also found one more of my favorite USA pottery oval shaped plates. I used these last year and I love them!

Spooky crow on tombstone on white

This pair of vintage white pottery urns got spookified with the addition of a pair of spindly-legged spiders.

Spidery white vintage urns

I didn't make these plates, but I love the black and white and I think they'd look nice in an arrangement with some of the silhouette platters.

Vintage Glastonbury Abbey plate

Vintage Italian villa plate

I can't resist vintage aluminum cookie cutters when I am out thrifting. Christmas designs seem to be the most common, but I've come across a few Halloween shapes so I glittered them and made Halloween tree ornaments out of them.

Glittery vintage Halloween cookie cutter ornaments

I've had so much fun crafting for Halloween this year! I've been so busy crafting, in fact, that I haven't decorated for Halloween yet. Eeek! Now that's scary. The boxes have been in the front room for a week, but I decided (once I'd dragged everything up from the basement and made a huge mess, naturally) that I really wanted to paint my china hutch, a project I've been meaning to do all summer long.

I got started on Monday and I have to admit that it isn't going as well as I'd like. Next time I decide to paint a piece of furniture with a brush and roller and latex paint, somebody slap me, mmmmmkay? You'd think I'd have learned my lesson, but apparently I'm a slow learner. Or an optimist. Or just really forgetful. It's spray paint from here on out, baby! Hopefully I'll have a finished project to show you soon. Hopefully, because I need to get the decorating DONE and the disaster that is my front room back in order because it's giving me the itchies. Time to man my sanding block!

Pinned it and Made it: Thick and Fluffy Pumpkin Pancakes

Time for another installment of Pinned it and Made it! This week's scrumptious Pin is from the blog Baking Bites. When I saw that glorious stack of pancakes, I knew I would be making them ASAP!

Thick and Fluffy Pumpkin Pancakes from Baking Bites, via Pinterest

The other morning I made them for my kids, and they were a big hit. They were indeed thick and fluffy and had a really great flavor from the pumpkin and the spices and maple syrup in the batter. I had to add a few extra tablespoons of buttermilk to my batter because it was just a bit too thick.

My un-expertly styled pumpkin pancakes

I have lots of respect for food bloggers that post beautifully styled photographs of the food they make. I stood in my kitchen, camera in one hand and plate of pancakes in the other trying desperately to find a clear spot on the counter where I could snap a quick photo. The butter kept sliding off and really, all I wanted to do was quit fiddling with the camera and EAT! I would definitely make these again.

A pancake recipe I will NOT be making again is this one for Sweet Potato Pancakes. We love Bruce's sweet potato pancake mix, but the commissary quit carrying it and it's pretty darn expensive everywhere else so I'd love to come up with my own version. I had a leftover baked sweet potato in the fridge and quickly Googled this recipe this morning. It looked great but did not taste at all like the Bruce's pancakes. Maren wouldn't eat hers, and I ended up throwing out the rest of the batter because I didn't like it either! The Bruce's pancakes are just sweet enough on their own that you don't even need syrup, but these pancakes were barely sweet at all and had a yucky flavor.

I may still be on the hunt for a sweet potato pancake recipe, but the pumpkin pancake recipe is a keeper for sure! Have you made anything this week from your Pins? Do tell!