Brides who DIY

Hi all!

I skipped a few weeks again - I know! But to make up for it, I have an exciting announcement next week and a a string of DIYs connected to that which I will be sharing. 

In the meantime, I wanted to share a really fun thing I am going to be doing in collaboration with a group wonderful, inspirational women. I am working with Hafsa of Hafsa Creates, a fellow artisan, Nicole of Nikah.ca, the go-to wedding website for Muslim brides and Sudduf of the Salam Shop. I highly recommend checking each one of therm out! 

The Salam Shop is in inspirational lifestyle boutique for modern Muslims. It is located in Mississauga, Ontario (Canada) in the heart of one of the most diverse cities in Canada (about 30 minutes west of Toronto). The shop houses products that are handmade, ethically produced, fair trade, and organic. Salam Shop takes great pride in carefully sourcing only the highest quality products from predominantly local brands and artisans. They carry home décor, art, apparel, stationery, health & beauty products, books, toys, jewelry, fresh flowers, and halal treats. They also house an in-shop café serving organic and fair trade teas and coffees, as well as baked goods. 

I will post  the DIY I will be leading on June 6th in the next few weeks, so stay tuned!

Second Annual Cookie Swap - an Entire Season Later.

I can't even start with my list of excuses reasons why this was not up in late December. I just thought to share a few photos from my second cookie swap. This one had more attendees, which meant more cookies. It also meant more recipe books to put together. I never actually ended up giving these out and they are still sitting on my desk - halfway done. I plan to get to these soon, but well see!

I used a beautiful wrapping paper I got from Target (don't even get me started on how upset I am about that...) as a table runner. I also used plain white dishes to hold the cookies as well as a cute tiered tray that I've had for some time now which coincidentally matched the themed signage. I actually printed these from the Creative Bag blog. Creative Bag in Toronto is a wonderful store to find great supplies for parties and gift-wrapping. I love putting together fun tablescapes and having it all tie into a single theme. 

I also prepared a very rich sipping chocolate and made a whipped topping in little mini cups for those who wanted to top off their drink. The whipped topping was quite easy - vanilla and whipping cream in your stand mixer with whisk attachment on high for a few minutes and that's it!  To balance all that sweet, I put together a cheeseboard with some spicy goat cheese, brie and of course - cheddar and mozzarella. 

The colours I worked with this time around were light blue, red, gold and white. Recipe for a quick and easy sipping chocolate is at the end of the post.

Enjoy! 

Sipping Chocolate

Ingredients

1.5 cups whipping cream

1 14oz can sweetened condensed milk

6 cups milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups of chocolate chips (milk chocolate OR semi-sweet depending on how sweet you like it. I have a heck of a sweet tooth, and I love the milk chocolate, but others prefer the semi-sweet)

Instructions

Stir together the whipping cream, milk, vanilla, and chocolate chips in a tall and deep pot.

Cook on low for 2 hours, stirring occasionally, until mixture is hot and chocolate chips are melted. Stir again before serving. Garnish as desired.

Kate Spade Bridal Shower

The days are about to get longer and I can't wait! This the best time to 'Spring' forward and get a jump start on all of life's goals (okay, maybe like a few!). There are so many exciting things coming up and I thought it would be great to use my favourite time of year to start blogging, crafting and enjoying patios eating again.

Last month, one of my closest friends, (who also happens to be my cousin) had her bridal shower. She wanted something classy and elegant, yet still really fun & poppin'! So we decided to surprise her with a wonderful Kate Spade themed bridal shower.

We kept games short and sweet by doing a few 'minute-to-win it' style ones and kept the rest of the bridal shower games focused on the bride! For food, we had a yummy buffet-style menu with delicious dishes supplied by her wonderful mom and also incorporated a fun 'mimosa' bar (sans alcohol, of course). We had a really cute dessert table with fun cookies and a very beautiful & quite delicious.

We had all kinds of decor for a Kate Spade theme party. With of course all the gold polka dots, hints of pink, stripes and of course, spades. I have shared a few photos below from the event for inspiration.

We also incorporated a candy table (because who doesn't love candy), gave everyone a customized deck of cards and kept with the gold, pink and stripes wherever we could, without going too overboard.

Enjoy!

   

& some more...

Paper, Plants and Provisions

Just as we hit the halfway point of Ramadan, I finally found some time to write a blog post, host a dinner and make it my kinda fancy.

I called my friends over for a small iftaar and realized that I enjoy hosting smaller groups of people now in comparison to when I was much younger and called everyone I even kind of knew to come over to my place. That was also when I was completely okay with a messy bed and tons of people cramped in a room — glad that phase is long gone.

Here's a look at how I served up a delicious meal, made a beautiful table scape and it took less than two hours to put it all together.

The Tablescape: I used scrapbook paper as placemats. This helped keep them all a little different, yet match in terms of colour scheme at the same time. I used the Dear Lizzy Neapolitan collection from American Crafts - one of my favourite lines of paper.

I cut out mason jars from another sheet of the same collection and used that as simple place cards. These stood up with clothing pegs and I hand-stamped names for each person. They were a definite hit. Everyone loved them!

I added to the mason jar love by putting candles into mini jars across the table, incorporated my mason jar potted mint into the centrepiece and used my 1920's Ball Mason jar as a vase for my flowers. I clustered my succulents onto a lazy Susan with the other elements and it looked great!

On the Menu: For the main, I made a delicious and easy baked spaghetti dish with whole grain pasta, ground beef, low fat ricotta, skim mozzarella and parmesan. I will include the recipe after the break.

For the apps, we had spicy hummus with pita and home made lavash (followed this recipe), whole grain bread & butter and puffed chicken pastries. Everyone drank San Pellegrino Limonata (my fave!) and some Bamboozled ice tea from David's Tea. We finished off with some delicious mousse desserts.

 

Baked Spaghetti:

8oz cooked whole wheat spaghetti

2 tablespoons of butter OR margarine1 cup grated Parmesan cheese - divided1 tub of low fat ricotta cheese 1 lb ground beef - browned1 can spaghetti sauce250g skim mozzarella cheese — shredded for top layer
Spices and/or herbs of choice. I used dried basil, salt and chilli flakes 


Directions:1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F and line a baking tray with foil.2.  Add butter to hot cooked spaghetti and stir until butter melts and coats spaghetti.  Add 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese; stir to coat.  
3. Add spaghetti to a foil-lined pan in an even layer.  
4. Spread ricotta cheese over spaghetti and sprinkle it with half of the remaining Parmesan cheese.  
5. Brown ground beef and burn away any water. Add pasta sauce, spices, salt and herbs. Mix well and let it cook for a bit on Medium. 
6. Evenly spoon it as the next layer on top of the cheese.  
7. Top with mozzarella cheese and remaining Parmesan cheese.
8.  Cover with foil — try to leave some space so the cheese does not stick and bake for 30 minutes. 
9. Remove foil cover and continue baking 15 minutes or until cheese is lightly browned.  Let stand 10 minutes before serving.

Enjoy!