March 31st, 2012

Strawberry Chocowich

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It’s no secret that I love strawberries. Quite simply they are one of my favorite things about spring and summer. It doesn’t hurt that I grew up in strawberry country either, April and May marked the beginning and by June, we were buying a $5 flat a week at a roadside stand. And with the strawberries my mom always stopped and picked up some COOL WHIP whipped topping. Strawberries and COOL WHIP are simply a match made in heaven. I tried to capture a bit of that with this recipe. One of my favorite childhood desserts was a nod to a strawberry pie, but much, much easier. My mom would dice strawberries, mix with COOL WHIP and spread it on graham crackers – simple and delicious. My version is Strawberry Filled Chocolate Frozen Desert Sandwich, or a Strawberry Chocowich for short.

These are a great weeknight dessert because they only take three ingredients and come together in just over an hour – the prep time is only about 15 miutes. (Well, if you make your own cookies, it would take longer, but you can’t do this with warm cookies, so let’s assume you made the cookies the day before.) We’re fans of a little something sweet after dinner in this house and I love making easy everyday treats that come together in a snap.

Strawberry Chocowich (makes 4)

Buy:

Ingredients

• 10 Strawberries (3/4 cup diced)
• 8 Chocolate cookies (homemade or store bought, soft cookies work best)
• 1 cup COOL WHIP whipped topping

Make Filling:

1. Combine thawed COOL WHIP with diced strawberries
2. Mix well
3. I said this was easy :)

Assemble and freeze:

1. Take a quarter of the filling mixture (about a heaping 1/4 c) and gently spread it on the bottom side of one cookie, getting as close as possible to the edge without going over.
2. I don’t mind these looking a little rustic, but feel free to spread it out all perefectly if that is your jam.
3. Press second cookie into filling to make a sandwich. Both cookie bottoms should be facing inward.
4. Place on wax paper lined cookie sheet and put in the freezer for at least an hour before serving.
5. If you freeze for longer than an hour or two, let sit out for a few minutes before serving.
6. These have never lasted longer than a day in my house (I make small batches), but I would think they’d last about a week in the freezer. Wrap each sandwich tightly in cling wrap or foil and place inside a zip top baggie to store. Let them freeze for an hour on the sheet before wrapping.

This is such a lovely and simple dessert. I think it would be great for summer parties and barbaques. And if you don’t have time to freeze them, just put a little less filling in each one, make sure the COOL WHIP is cold and just make and serve them. They wouldn’t be a solid, but the would be just a delicious!

Enjoy! Spencer sure did.

Sponsored posts are purely editorial content that we are pleased to have presented by a participating sponsor. Advertisers do not produce the content. I was compensated for this post as a member of Clever Girls Collective, but the content is all my own.

March 29th, 2012

Easy Way To Hang a Yarn Wreath

Spring is here; Easter is just around the corner and I thought I would make a happy little yarn wreath for the front door. My original plan was to make a St Patrick’s Day to Easter convertible yarn wreath (genius, right?) but I didn’t finish in time. I had planned both the green parts and the bunny parts to be removable, so I just proceded as planned for the Easter versions, so it looks like next year, I can still do that convertible wreath post.

If I am being perfectly honest, I don’t love the wreath how it turned out, BUT I do love how I did the hanger. I don’t know why it took me so long to think of doing it this way. I suppose I could have been smart and goggled for an answer, but the wreaths are so light a structured hanger doesn’t really matter. This one looks super cute and intergrates into the wreath. It will work on any light wreath with a foam core.

All it takes is wide ribbon, a bit of yarn, and a few (I used decorative) straight pins.

To make the wreath hanger:

1. Wrap ribbon around wreath with a few inches extra laid flat on the table.
2.Fold extra ribbon up to make a loop.
3. Fold loop up, lined up with wrapped ribbon.
4. Pin in to place.

5. Thread yarn through the loop and tie in a knot. 

6. Slide knot under the loop and pin in to place.

Yay! All done! I tend to make pretty light wreaths, just a single layer of yarn with a few embelishments or ribbons and this should easily work for those, but it heavy decorations or a large amount of stuff is added, I don’t know they weight bearing capacity of this methode. Although, using hot glue instead of pins for the first (pink) set of pins would probably help.

So, here’s a better shot of the wreath. I’m not sure what it needs. Fewer decorations, some ribbon, I don’t know. Easter is two weeks so I don’t really want to fuss with it too much, but I feel like something isn’t quite right…

A note on the yarn: when I was shopping, I was looking for a yarn both springy and fairly neutral because I wanted something to work with the bright green of the shamrock ribbon and the pink and more lime green of the Easter decorations (those are precut fabric stickers, by the way) so I went with a white and yellow variegated baby yarn. I hated working with it for the wreath. It’s thinner and the wreath took forever. I will save baby yarns for mini wreaths in the future, if I use them at all.

I also had a helper this time:

March 27th, 2012

Wordless Wednesday: In the Garden

We’re getting ready to garden for the summer. Living in coastal Southern California means a lot of plants can go in the ground in March and seeds can be started for sure. Spencer and I picked out some seed packetss at the store: strawberries, corn, green beans and a lettuce mix. Possibly carrots too. We’ll get tomato plants in May.

Rather than weed the side yard (ugh), I decided to just turn the relatively weed free former herb garden into a strawberry patch. Spencer helped, with varying degrees of success. Much dirt was thrown, most stay out of eyes, so yay?

Pointy rake is pointy

Do you have a wordless wednesday post? Link up below!

March 26th, 2012

Numbers!

Thought I would link up with Show Off Your Shot this week. I love this photo of Spencer. What I love less is remaking the number grid every time it rains.