Blackberry Buckle Coffeecake

My mom brought me a gallon size bag of huge blackberries!

They were begging to be made into something yummy.

And Preston loves him some baked goods...

We chose a Blueberry Buckle Coffeecake out of my "Iowa Master Farm Homemakers" cookbook.

You know the recipes are good when they come from a bunch of farm wives!

I made a few changes to the original recipe and we love how it turned out.

BlackBerry Buckle Coffeecake

1/2 cup butter (I used 1/2 cup homemade applesauce)

3/4 cup sugar

1 egg

2 cups flour

2 1/2 t baking powder

1/2 cup milk

2 cups fresh blackberries (or any type of berries)

1/4 cup turbanado sugar (or just sugar)

Grease bottom and sides of 9 inch pan.

Beat together butter (or applesauce) and 3/4 cup sugar until fluffy.

Add egg and beat well.

Mix 2 cups flour with baking powder, stir in alternately with milk.

Beat until smooth.

Spoon into prepared pan.

Sprinkle with berries.

Sprinkle with sugar.

Bake at 350 for 45-50 minutes.

Serve warm!



Getting ready for the State Fair!

The great Iowa State Fair will be here in just a few weeks!

We love the state fair.

Peighton can't wait for Cotton Candy.

Preston enjoyed the Corn Dogs last year but he was pretty young so who knows what he will pick out this year!

Of course we need cute themed clothes when we attend the fair.

We have our 4-H shirts and our "locally grown" shirts but we needed just one more...

Peighton chose a Cotton Candy shirt.

I would have done the fabric differently and had 3 different colors but she wanted just pink and blue "Because that's what color my cotton candy is!"

So, the middle remained white.

And since Preston doesn't yet have a favorite fair food we made him a show calf.

Dustin will have a calf there to be shown and I'm sure Preston will be helping out so we thought a calf would be fitting for him!

If I had a bigger machine I would have put "Ford Cattle Company" on it!

Maybe next year!

Carrot Cake Waffles .... YUMMY!!!!!

Serving my kids carrots for breakfast?

YES PLEASE!!!!

I saw THIS  picture floating around pinterest and pinned it immediately...mostly because of the picture!

We love waffles and are always trying new recipes.

And throwing some carrots into breakfast was an added bonus!

They did not dissapoint!
They were fantastic and did taste like eating carrot cake for breakfast.

We did not do the cream cheese, didn't think the kids would eat it.

We just used plain old syrup!

One thing I will do differently next time is to chop the carrots a little finer.
I chopped them up in my food processor but should have chopped a little bit longer.
I didn't mind the small chunks of carrots but Peighton thought they were a little too crunchy...

Here's how we made them:

Waffle Ingredients:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon allspice
1 3/4 cups buttermilk* or 1 1/2 cups sour cream or plain yogurt thinned with 1/4 cup milk  (I used greek yogurt, thinned with milk)
2 eggs, separated
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) butter (I used applesauce)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup raisins
1 cup walnuts, chopped (Left these out because the kids don't like them!)
1 1/2 cup finely grated carrots

In her directions you're supposed to "bloom" the butter or something like that but I skipped that entirely! 

We don't have time for that around here!!!!!

I just threw it all together and mixed-that's how we roll.

They were big and fluffy and so good!

We will for sure make these again!

Silly Cake Contest CHAMPIONS!!!!

Peighton and I entered the "Silly Cake Contest" at the fair.

And we won!

Peighton thought it was "pretty fun" to win.

We made a cute little "Pigs in the Mud" cake.

Even Dustin said he was pretty impressed with my pigs!

They are made out of fondant-which was really easy to make.

And I tried a recipe I saw on Pinterest for the cake too.

I used a box of cake mix, 1 cup of greek yogurt and 1 cup of water.

It turned out pretty good, but didn't rise like it normally does.

It did taste different but not in a bad way!

So, it was a slightly healthier cake...

All in all, a good day at the fair!

Homemade Mini Bagel Bites!

Still hot outside.

So, we decided to do  a cooking lesson!

Peighton chose Mini Bagel Bites.

Super easy and the kids did all but the cooking!

We assigned Preston the Mini Pepperoni Job...and he ate half the bowl before he actually got ONE on the pizzas!!!!!

Peighton spread the sauce and put the cheese on.

Once he found out he was supposed to put them on the pizzas and it wasn't just snack time he did a very good job and was quite serious about it!

We broiled them for a few minutes  and lunch was served!

A whole lot of John Deere Party FUN!

We spent the weekend celebrating little Preston's second birthday!

He is OB-Sessed with tractors....so of course we had a tractor theme.

I made a cute little pennant banner to hang above the food table.

Cheap green and yellow hankies from Hobby Lobby brightened up the table and tin buckets held the plates, napkins and silverware.

One of the party favors...tractor shaped crayons!

I made each of the kids a small backpack to put their pinata loot in!

Peighton had the job of picking out all the green and yellow peanut M&M's for our snack mix!

Every little farmer needs a John Deere wheelbarrow!

Mike was not working fast enough getting his tractors out of the box...note the hands on hips...

Getting all his new equipment set up.

Dirt pudding was on the menu...complete with a "Dozie"  (Bulldozer).

Jello jigglers and lemonade punch too!

Everybody got a party hat!

Getting a picture of everyone in thier hats proved impossible.

Super cute cake and a pretty cute little boy too!

He has become a professional candle blower.

he thought he should taste it...

"I have no idea who took a bite of the cake, Mommy."

No party is complete without a pinata!!!!

A great weekend celebrating a special little boy!

A Very Hungry Caterpillar shower!

We had a lovely little shower for my SIL a few weeks ago!

Every baby shower that I've thrown has been about books.

I don't believe anyone can ever have too many books.

Our theme for this one was one of my favorite books-The Very Hungry Caterpillar!

And there just happens to be fabric that goes along with the Eric Carle book. ;-)

I used my mom's Cricut machine to make some cute caterpillars to greet everyone.

The guest book was actually a large board book of The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

The book even came with a DVD of Eric Carle reading the book!

I made a cute pennant with the fabric.

It would be cute in a playroom someday!

My super sweet helper!

I also made a blankie, burpcloth and bib to match!

My other SIL made this adorable diaper caterpillar!

He's even got some cute little Cyclone socks on!

It looked fabulous on the main table!

And we made some yummy cake balls to decorate the tables too.

I used the fabric to make some soft blocks and a ring stacking toy.

My two kiddos REALLY liked the ring stacking toy...

Even the food was cute.

I made some caterpillar sugar cookies.

And oranges, apples and mini apples too-all with small holes in them because the caterpillar eats through all those things in the book!

The caterpillar kabobs were one of my favorites though!

We used strawberries for the heads and green grapes for the body...adorable.

This was a very fun shower to put together and pretty easy too!