Candy Everybody Wants

For a while now I have been thinking about how I can create some cute upcycled items for Purplelicious. At the same point that I had that thought I saw a little girl in Target wearing a Skittles headband. That was pretty much all I needed. I started asking everyone to give me candy and snack wrappers. It is funny how the people at work feel like they are making some sort of weakness confession when they hand me candy wrappers. The prize for who collected the most goes to my daughter who would bring home 6-7 snack bag wrappers everyday from school. It caught on so much that one day she was absent and her best friend collected them from her. Here is just a small sample of all of the wrappers I have collected. What's your favorite?



The first creation made with the candy wrappers were bookmarks which I talked about in a previous blog. I have recently made one for myself from a Reese's wrapper.


Then I tested out some wristlet keychains. I brought these to a craft show and I sold a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup one to a guy named Reese. The candy wrapper keychains can work for guys too!


And then of course I made headbands. The headbands have a solid grosgrain ribbon on the back which is made from 100% recycled plastic bottles. I had a few more styles of these but they sold at the craft show. Don't worry, I will make more, look at the pic above, I have PLENTY of wrappers!


I can even make custom items with your favorite candy. These were a special order for some good friends.


I am really having a lot of fun making these items and it feels good to convert trash into something fun to wear. I will slowly be adding these to my Etsy shop to keep your eyes peeled! These are a great way to enjoy your favorite candy without the calories...unless of course you are the one giving me the wrapper!

R.I.P. Iron, its been real

Anyone reading this who sews, cooks, crafts, etc knows that you work best on your home turf using the supplies and tools that you are used to. Anytime you have gone over to someone else's house to create your art, it just doesn't feel the same using their tools. There is an exception to this, when I go over to sew at my moms, I have no issue, since all of her sewing tools are pretty much the best you can buy. Though you will still catch me using my own scissors, which are inferior in quality than those at my mom's but it just feels weird using another pair.

About a year ago my sister came up to do a craft show with me and was forced to use my work area for her crafts. Well let's say this was a little difficult for her, mostly in the area of my iron and ironing board. Making my accessories requires a lot of iron use so my ironing board and iron take quite a beating. At that time there was not much left of a my ironing board cover. My sister was kind enough to buy me a new one, which was later destroyed. What I didn't know was that she secretly took a picture of my iron and sent it to my mom. Let's just come right out and say that my iron is a potential safety hazard. It is so old and it has fallen so many times that the plastic cracked at the handle where the wires are. Mind you it still works like a dream and that occasional shock when it is filled with water is normal right?

Fast forward to last month when my sister was in town again and discovered that while I did buy a new ironing board cover (purchased by me a few days before she arrived), I was still using the same iron. I arrived at my mom's one day and was informed that she got me a present! It was a Rowenta Iron!!! This is one of the tools at my mom's that I adore using and might be one of the best irons. I was instructed by my mother to stop using my old iron immediately because it is a safety hazard and start using the new one. Well old habits die hard, that new iron is still in the box but I am busting it out today...no really I am. Before you hate on me, don't act like you don't have something similar to this in your workshop/kitchen. If you do I would love to know what it is and if it is a safety hazard may this blog serve as your intervention that upgrading from a hazardous tool to a shiny new upgraded tool isn't such a bad thing! :-) Happy Creating!

Fun with Bookmarks!

Reading is something that I have always enjoyed. In fact, my ultimate happy place is me sitting on the beach, with my toes in the sand, listening to the ocean, while reading a good book. I am so happy that my daughter also enjoys reading and is slowly starting to get into chapter books. As all of these new chapter books are coming into the house, I knew that I needed to make some bookmarks for her, because buying them is a ridiculous option in my world. The idea first started as using scraps of fabric to make bookmarks and has later evolved into the use of something a little more fun than fabric. I realize we are in the technology age of e-readers and iphone apps but I would like to hope that there are still some people around, like me, who enjoy the feeling of turning the pages of an actual book. I know I can also count on kids still reading books the old fashioned way, at least for a couple more years!

I have recently begun thinking about some ways to incorporate up-cycling into my Purplelicious accessories. I have started collecting candy bar wrappers and snack wrappers. Correction: My daughter has been collecting the snack wrappers at lunch during school at the rate of 5-6 per day, it seems kids eat a LOT of Cheetos and Doritos. If you are a fan of those snacks...I will have some products coming soon for you! I think I have a future sales/marketing rep on my hands. Anyway, I have a lot of ideas for these wrappers (which I will blog about later) and initially bookmarks were not one of them, until I made a small error while experimenting with one of the accessory ideas. I was left with the Hershey bar wrapper that was the perfect size for a…you guessed it, a bookmark! I added some ribbon made from 100% recycled materials and here you have it. With the exception of the iron-on vinly on top of the wrapper this is made with recycled materials. Fun!

Then I experimented with another type of candy and created this! My daughter pronounces these “Mike a Likes”, I refuse to correct her. The reward for her cuteness, this bookmark is currently holding her place in “Where the Sidewalk Ends”. I will slowly be adding these and other candy and snack wrappers to the Purplelicious Etsy Shop so be on the look out!

Don't worry I didn't forget about fabric! In a few short weeks I will be teaming up with Michelle Ciarlo-Hayes of MKC Photography and Kicks by MKC at a booth at the Haddonfield Craft and Fine Arts Festival. We thought it would be fun to make something that was a combination of both of our talents and we came up with…right again, you must have had your Wheaties this morning. We are pairing up some of my fun fabrics with Michelle’s resin Art charms. The charm on the bookmark coordinates with the fabric but can be detached and used to accent anything that you can attach it to. Honestly I think it looks perfect as it is on the bookmark but would also make a really cute necklace! Depending on their popularity at the show, they could possibly show up at an Etsy shop you are very familiar with!


I hope all of you are enjoying gathering the books on your summer reading list. For those of you that have already been to my happy place, I am completely jealous and will try not to hold it against you. If you find you are tired of folding down page corners and/or using scrap pieces of paper as bookmarks, you know where to find me.

Hippie Chick!

The majority of the hits I get on this blog are for my tie dyed cupcake post. Which can be found here, if you are curious. When the letter came home from school that my daughter's first grade class was having a Coffee House where they would read poems and needed to dress like hippies I was immediately excited! Sometimes I feel like I was born in the wrong era because I like so many things about that time period. The kids made tie dyed shirts in school and the parents were tasked with accessorizing the outfits hippie style. The headband was simple. I have two peace sign headbands in my Etsy shop to choose from, my daughter has her own version of both. For this she opted for rainbow peace sign headband.


The kids needed to wear jeans so I wanted to make her hippie jeans. I had a pair of old jeans and I found a stash of peace sign bandannas I am guessing from another time I made a hippie halloween costume for myself. That and I am also a fabric hoarder. I cut out the shapes, adhered them to some heat and bond (also something I had "in-stock"), and ironed them on to the jeans. I think they came out pretty darn cute. Here is a picture of my hippie chick. Where is her headband, you might ask? In her desk, she completely forgot to put it on for the show. While I can't make hippie jeans for your little ones I can definitely help them channel their inner hippie with the peace sign headbands. I may even attempt to tie dye some fabric for headbands this summer, ya dig?

Bridal Accessories with a Wild Side

Let's face it, almost every one of us has a wild side, but very few are willing let everyone know about it, especially when it comes to a wedding theme. One of my very good friends recently got married and her theme was Zebra print and Pink. For a wedding you ask? Yes, and I will tell you, thanks to a lot of talented and creative people this color scheme looked amazing and was a surprising mix of fun and classy. Since I was lucky enough to attend the wedding, it was very cool to see everything come together.

When my friend told me about her theme choice, I knew she would need some custom designed invitations and luckily I had a friend who specializes in such matters. Kaleidoscope Design Studio is a graphic design company that specializes in custom design work for all of your needs from business to weddings. For this wedding, she created the most beautiful zebra and pink inspired bridal invitations, place cards, water bottle labels, and thank you notes! If you need Custom Bridal Invitations done, check this site out, she does amazing work!

Here is where I got involved. First up, since this friend is also a co-worker we threw a surprise shower for her at work. I of course was tasked with making the cake. For this I decided to do cupcakes. This friend is a huge fan of cakeballs but with the amount of people at this shower I couldn't make that happen. Instead I opted for basic vanilla and chocolate cupcakes with vanilla buttercream. To add a little fun I found black and white polka dot cupcake wrappers and I tinted the buttercream hot pink. To add an additional level of flair I used kitchen scissors to cut mini marshmallows and I dipped the sticky side in pink sugar crystals. I took of picture of them using the Hipstamatic App on my iphone and I love how the colors look so that it the picture I am sharing below.

I was so honored when the bride asked me to design the hair flowers for the bridesmaids and flower girls. Zebra print and pink seemed like a big challenge until I arrived at the fabric store and found a beautiful zebra print satin fabric. The rest was easy. For the bridesmaids, I opted for a pointy 5 petal flower using the zebra fabric as the petals. I accented the center of the flower with a hot pink rhinestone button. For the flower girls I went with my standard black satin hair flower with rounded petals. To incorporate the zebra print for them, I covered fabric buttons with the zebra satin and used them as the center. The bride and bridal party loved them. Since I was a guest at the wedding I also had the chance to see my hair accessories in action which was very cool. One of the bridesmaids was kind of enough to pose so you could see how this bridal party used the flowers. I listed the zebra flower in my etsy shop, you can find it by clicking here.



Today I have another formal hair flower design I want to experiment with. This idea was inspired by my brother's upcoming wedding where I have also been asked to create the hair flowers for the bridesmaids and flower girls. Since my daughter and I are included in that mix, be prepared for many pictures of those in action! This is not the best picture but I am going to add a twist to the red flower on this pattern.

I enjoy everything about making things for Purplelicious but designing custom flowers for weddings is my favorite. I like being able to think outside of the box, work with different fabrics, and experiment with various color combinations. Hopefully more of these custom orders will find their way to me in the future!

Caramel Apple Cupcakes!

I realize that this blog has been a little heavy on baking experiments as opposed to sewing experiments, but don't worry. I have a few new accessory ideas that I would LOVE to tell you about, if I ever stop baking and work on one of those ideas. Ok, in keeping with the cupcake theme I decided to try a cupcake baking experiment. I feel like it is time to branch out from basic chocolate and vanilla, but really I had a tray of apple slices that I forgot to put out for my daughter's birthday party that were going to go bad. I could have easily used them to make a Jewish Apple Cake which are delicious and simple but I wanted a challenge. After all the easy route is never all that fun. I immediately thought cupcakes, through the power of google and the keywords "apple cupcake" I came across something that read, Caramel Apple cupcakes. Whoa, this got my wheels churning and I wanted an apple cupcake with a caramel buttercream. Sounds easy enough! I searched through a couple of different recipes until I found two that I liked. Each component belonged to a different recipe but I like piecing different things together. It keeps things fun.

Here is the Apple Cupcake Recipe. I must admit that I have rarely made a cake from scratch, I almost always use mixes. (I guess my secret is out now). As I was making this batter I was starting to get concerned. I have made enough cake mixes to know what cake batter looks like and that was not what was in my mixing bowl. This batter almost comes out like a cookie batter. When it was done I re-read the recipe several times to make sure I didn't miss a step. My tips if you are working with this recipe: Slowly add your apples, too many will cause the "batter" to come apart which causes them to crumble in the wrapper after they are baked. Also it might not hurt to spray the liners with a little cooking spray. (I learned this trick one time I tried to make brownie bites in cupcake wrappers). Despite the less than perfect baked cake result they tasted amazing!


Now onto the buttercream. Here is the recipe I used for the Caramel Buttercream. I didn't realize what I was getting myself into here until I was about halfway into making the caramel. The recipe says to make the caramel using the microwave, this made me nervous for some reason so instead I made it on the stovetop. I cooked the ingredients over low heat. This took a while, but I was patient and I just kept stirring. I put a lot of love into this caramel. Then I realized I should have been using a candy thermometer. The recipe says its done when it is thick and bubbly which seems easy enough to decipher but it isn't. My concern was that I was going to cook it too long and end up with hard caramel that wouldn't mix into the buttercream. Fortunately I lucked out with this. As it cooled it was still smooth. If you make this I would suggest using a candy thermometer JUST to make sure you don't cook it too much. Also this recipe makes a LOT of caramel, you can probably cut the recipe in half unless you like having a lot of caramel around the house. The buttercream is very easy to make and the caramel mixes right in. I added the 1/4 cup and tasted it, I felt like it needed more caramel, I kept adding a little at a time until I felt like the flavor was there.

Here is what they look like cut in half. They are very rich and have a very buttery apple taste. The buttercream is a good compliment to the cake. At one point it tasted like apple pie a la mode. I brought them into work and they were devoured in less than 10 minutes, that makes me think they were pretty good. If you decide to make them if you have any other tips feel free to share! Enjoy the caramel apple deliciousness!

7th Birthday Cupcake Fun!

I am fairly proud of myself for getting out of having big birthday parties for my daughter. It's not that I am against them, while in daycare she just didn't have a circle of friends close enough to her. Now that she is in 1st grade, I am out of excuses and we already did the trip to American Girl Place in New York. I started to research birthday party ideas in the area but we have already been on a birthday party circuit and everything has already been done before. If you know me, I don't like to do the things that everyone else does. I came across a place that did cupcake decorating parties and a light bulb went off when I looked at the price per kid. Granted I have never taught a group of 1st graders how to do anything but I do know how to decorate a cupcake and do crafts. Isabella's 7th Birthday party was decided.

I immediately went to Etsy for the invitations. I found this adorable shop called TrinityStStudio. Her shop is filled with so many creative invitations. She also does coordinating items like stickers and thank you cards. Which reminds me, I need to order those. This is the design I ordered,Cupcake Trio Birthday Party Invitation I just LOVE the colors and they became the theme colors for the party.

My next stop was to Oriental Trading company, I ordered cupcake necklace kits, princess crown kits, and cupcake boxes. Everything was starting to come together. Then I was reminded that I needed to make birthday treats for school. I happened to be looking at my new Cake Pops by Bakerella book and my daughter saw the Cupcake Bite balls and declared that was what she wanted. Its her birthday so I said why not. They were SUPER easy to make and came out so cute, they tasted good too.

With the birthday party looming I was starting to have some doubts about what I had gotten myself into. In talking to some of the mom's at cheerleading that morning they were in so many words, saying, "Yeah good luck with that". I knew that preparation was key when having 14 1st graders at your house. I also decided that if all hell broke lose I had Just Dance on the Wii! I had spent so much time baking cupcakes, prepping necklace kits, and setting tables that I had given ZERO thought to how I was going to decorate the Giant Cupcake for the birthday cake...the biggest detail! The giant cupcake pan is a good time. The possibilities are endless with how to decorate it. I would have loved to use fondant but I know the kids don't like it all that much. I went with buttercream, sprinkles, twizzlers, and a few starbursts. I decorated it, like a cupcake. Genius right? I basically piped stars in strips on the base and then stuck the twizzlers in between the rows. Then used my giant star tip and swirled the icing around the top. The individual cupcakes had little alphabet toppers that said Isabella. I made them by softening and rolling out a few strawberry starbursts and cut them out with my letter fondant cutters.

Next time I would probably make the letters bigger and use the cherry starbursts, the letters got a little lost in the icing. I also used WAY too much of the blue coloring for the bottom, the colors were supposed to match the theme on the invitation. Like always, I am my own worst critic. The cake was a hit and so was the party. It seemed like the girls had a good time and I was able to complete two crafts and teach them how to decorate cupcakes. I did have to play my Just Dance card, with about 10 minutes left, the soda and sugar kicked in and I had lost their attention!

Here is where I run into problems with Bella's birthday, with every successful birthday idea, next year has to be bigger and better. I guess that is less of a problem and more of a challenge. Fortunately, I am always up for a good challenge! Happy Birthday to my favorite person in this universe, Isabella!