Category Archives: DIY

Orange Pomanders: A Festive Kid-Friendly DIY

Posted on December 11, 2012 by Haley | 4 Comments

One of my favorite festive scents is the combination of orange and cloves. I made orange pomanders once or twice as a little girl and decided to share the experience with my 3-year-old this year since it’s such a fun and kid-friendly activity. And because I have no crafting skill and they’re so easy to make.

Basically, an orange pomander is an orange decorated with whole cloves. They’ve been popular around Christmastide for hundreds of years. You can dress them up with ribbon to create festive, delicious-smelling holiday decor or you can use them in apple cider to give it extra flavor.

Here’s all you’ll need:

Oranges or other citrus (we used clementines this year.)
Whole cloves (Not ground. They’re cheaper in the “bulk section” if your grocery store has one.)
Toothpick to make holes for the cloves (Depending on how thick the skin of the orange is, this might not be necessary. I just stuck the cloves right in without making any holes with a toothpick.)
And if you’re getting fancy, ribbon to decorate.

Directions: Just stick the cloves in the orange (or punch holes with the toothpick first if the skin is thick) in whatever pattern you’d like. This kept my 3-year-old busy for a good 30 minutes and I just let him punch the cloves in wherever he wanted.

We displayed ours on our Thanksgiving table and used some to make hot apple cider (just drop the orange pomander in with the cinnamon sticks, etc). Easy peasy, pretty, and all natural/non-toxic. Love it. The only major clean up was sweeping up the cloves that fell off the table during assembly I’ve seen them used in beautiful centerpieces and I bet you could even decorate your tree with them if you tied ribbon to hang them up with!

Enjoy!

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Posted in Children, DIY, Green Living

Tagged cloves, DIY, holiday, kid-friendly, orange, pomanders

Surviving Summer: Icy Raspberry Tea Recipe

Posted on August 13, 2012 by Haley | Leave a comment

I love living in N. Florida. Truly. I love it. October through early May is dreamy. You can eat outside every night and avoid wintry inconveniences (AKA socks. I hate ‘em!). But by the time August rolls around, I’ve had it. I whine and cry and threaten to move. Here’s an easy little kid-friendly concoction that Benjamin and I whipped up last week that is helping us survive the misery of miseries (Florida in August): Icy Raspberry Tea!

Because we don’t really keep juice around our house (why give my 3-year-old little explosion of energy more sugar?), Benjamin mostly drinks water. But sometimes I do try to mix things up so that he can have a “special drink” and herbal tea is my go to. On this particular day, Benjamin remembered that we had frozen raspberries in the freezer and said, “Let’s make raspberry tea WITH REAL RASPBERRIES!” And so we did:

Icy Raspberry Tea Recipe

(Makes 2 glasses of Icy Raspberry Tea)

In a mug, steep one raspberry tea bag in boiling water for 5 minutes. We used this kind.

Herbal raspberry tea has a sweet, fruity flavor and the frozen raspberries add extra sweetness so adding sugar or honey isn’t necessary. But, if you do prefer a little bit more sweetness add your honey now when the tea is hot.

Fill two glasses 2/3 full with ice. Add half the mug of hot tea to one glass and half to the other. The ice will quickly melt.

To make it more delicious, icy, and pretty add a handful of frozen raspberries to each glass. Voila! Icy, sweet, and refreshing!

How do you survive summer?

For another cold summer treat, check out:

Note: If you are pregnant/nursing always check the label of your tea and make sure that it contains nothing that might be harmful to you or your baby.

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Posted in DIY, Recipe

Tagged cold drinks, iced tea, raspberry tea, surviving summer

DIY Bubble Tea

Posted on July 19, 2012 by Haley | 6 Comments

Ta Da! The perfect summer treat. And it’s soooo easy to make, way cheaper than buying it (the tapioca pearls I bought were only $2 for a big bag), and no high fructose corn syrup or nasty stuff.

I was a rather grumpy mama this morning after being up all night with poor teething Lucy (if Baby Girl only cuts one tooth from all this misery it will be absurd…I’m expecting 5 teeth…tomorrow…unreasonable?). Benjamin decided to have a new case of the Terrible Threes the past week and definitely woke up on the ornery side of the bed. Long story short, it was a bad combo. We were both at our worst. Then he came up with a brilliant, amazing, wonderful idea! “Let’s make Bubble Tea!”

I don’t think he’s had bubble tea in almost a year but my boy has a miraculously good memory of all sweet treats. And it seemed just the thing to turn our day around, or as Benjamin says, “Find a new leaf.”

After reading about how simple it was to make in this post. We picked up some decaf Earl Grey because I was NOT going to let caffeine ruin naptime, also known as “my precious” (insert Gollum voice here). And then we went to a nearby asian market and bought tapioca pearls and the giant straws big enough to slurp them up.

DIY Bubble Tea

Ingredients:

Black or Green Tea

Water

Milk or Cream

Honey

Tapioca Pearls

Step One, Make Your Tea: Boil your water and make your tea slightly stronger than you usually drink it. Add honey to taste, followed by your preferred amount of milk or cream. Let the tea cool in the fridge (or add ice, but be sure to make your tea extra strong if you plan to add ice so that it doesn’t taste watered down).

Step Two, Cook the Pearls: When your tea is nice and icy cold, get ready to cook your tapioca pearls. For a generous serving of tapioca pearls, measure out 1/4 cup for each glass of tea you will serve. Boil 10 cups of water in a pan for every cup of tapioca pearls (that’s 2.5 cups if you are doing a single serving). Gently add the pearls to the boiling water and stir (so they don’t stick to the bottom) until they start to float. Reduce heat to medium high, cover, and cook for 5 minutes. Taste them to see if they have a jelly-like texture (and aren’t still dry in the middle), but be careful as they will be very hot. Strain them and rinse in cold water (so they don’t heat your nice cold tea.) Add them to your glass and voila! Bubble Tea!

Step Three, Enjoy Your Cool Summery Treat!