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Homemade Pudding Pops

July 19, 2011 by Laura 122 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see our disclosure policy.

You know how all your friends growing up always had the cool snacks at their house? (Although I’m sure my friends thought I was the one with the cool snacks.)  One of my friends always had Jello Pudding Pops at her house. Visiting her in the summer was always a treat. Don’t worry – I liked her for more than just her pudding pops. I mean, she also had really cool Cabbage Patch Dolls. No really – I liked my friend for who she was – not just for her pudding pops and dolls (and cool play room and cute puppy).

I can not recreate a Cabbage Patch Doll, nor do I think my boys would want me to. But Beth at Turn 2 the Simple reminded me a few days ago with her comment on my Creamy Pudding recipe that I can recreate a Pudding Pop! I love how tasty these are, how refreshing they are on a hot day – and how they actually offer some nourishment and keep my kids full for a little while.

I simply followed my Creamy Pudding recipes and froze the mixture into pudding pops. EASY!!! I made both chocolate and vanilla. I didn’t try butterscotch, but I think I might next time just for fun!

How to Make Pudding Pops:

Make a batch (or two or three) of pudding. You can use my healthy varieties of Creamy Pudding if you want!

Yum

Pour the pudding into popsicle containers or 3 ounce sized bathroom cups.
Each batch of pudding made about 15 Pudding Pop cups.
I found it easiest to put all the cups on a large cookie sheet for easier transport the freezer.


Allow the pudding to cool and set up (about 45 minutes). Place a popsicle stick in each cup:


Put the Pudding Pops into the freezer for at least 4 hours. I was surprised that it took quite a while for these to be frozen through and through. Oh, but when they were frozen – it took me back to my days as a little girl playing with Cabbage Patch Dolls with my friend, and eating pudding pops on her porch.


Do you have any Pudding Pop or Cabbage Patch Doll memories to share? Oh dear, or are some of you too young to remember Cabbage Patch Dolls?

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Making Homemade Mayonnaise (is not my gift)

June 21, 2011 by Laura 71 Comments

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Who knew making homemade mayonnaise for the Heavenly Homemakers Recipe Challenge would tempt me to say naughty words? I held myself back though, and merely gave dirty looks to the ingredients in my blender that were not even trying to become mayonnaise and through gritted teeth hissed, “Would you guys emulsify already!?!?!?”

It wouldn’t have been such a big deal, except that I attempted to make mayonnaise at least four times before I could accomplish “mayonnaise emulsification”. We went through a lot of olive oil in the process, and subsequently, a lot of tuna.

Why tuna? Well, I wasn’t going to waste all those ingredients every time I had mayonnaise emulsification failure. Instead, each time, I stirred the runny, stubborn ingredients into a few cans of tuna, added some of my home canned pickle relish and called it lunch. It worked, all but one time. Yes, there was one time I did have to throw the ingredients out. That was the time I was so determined to whip the ingredients long enough and hard enough to become mayonnaise that the ingredients got so hot inside my food processor that the eggs got cooked, causing scrambled eggs to float in my olive oil. Mmmm. Gross as it is, I just had to take a picture – because I’m weird like that:

A perfect example of what not to do.

Regarding a healthy mayonnaise recipe, I do have one to share with you, and I’m sure that after all my previous, inspirational statements, you’re all ready to jump right in and give this a go. Based on all my trial and error, I have a few tips I think you’ll find helpful.

  1. I believe that if I had an immersion blender, this process would work much better. But I don’t have one and I refuse to buy one just to make mayo. If you do have an immersion blender, save yourself some frustration and use it for this.
  2. Pour the oil into the running blender so slowly you think you might fall asleep while pouring. About the time you think you’re pouring slowly enough, slow down.  Slow dripping oil is key for making mayonnaise.
  3. Get your eggs at room temperature before starting this process. 

Homemade MayonnaiseYum

2 egg yolks
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 Tablespoon vinegar
1 teaspoon sucanat
1/2 cup olive oil

Place the egg yolks, salt, vinegar and sucanat into a blender and run on high speed for about a minute. S-l-o-w-l-y pour the oil in while the blender is running. I’m talking, let the oil drip into the running blender at a horridly boring pace. Just stand there, with the blender running, dripping oil for several minutes. Don’t get impatient or you’ll be making tuna.

My mayo turned out very yellow in color because of our lovely free-range chicken eggs, which are rich with nutrients. 

This mayonnaise did taste very good, as well it should have after all the work it took to figure out how to make it. But I will never be known as the Mayonnaise Queen, nor will I ever be asked to speak at the Heart of Mayonnaise Convention. I’m also pretty sure I shouldn’t be your “I’m having trouble making mayonnaise” questions go-to gal. I do not believe making mayonnaise is my gift, nor do I wish to become a professional mayonnaise maker. 

But, I am pleased to say that I figured out a healthy mayonnaise recipe and now I can move on to try and conquer the remaining recipes in the Heavenly Homemakers Recipe Challenge.

Have you conquered mayonnaise before? What’s your favorite use for mayonnaise? Ever given your mayonnaise dirty looks?

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Healthy, Homemade Baby Food

June 7, 2011 by Laura 41 Comments

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(No, this post is not a hint toward what our boys’ surprise was. Oh my. I simply get a lot of reader questions regarding what to feed baby. That’s it. Our surprise was much less exciting than a baby announcement – I’ll post about it tonight!)  :)

Pureed Bananas:  Ripe bananas run through my food processor until smooth – great for baby!

Ah, the memories. I used to always make food for my babies, back when my babies were babies. I still make food for my babies, but my oldest baby is 14 now. He prefers steak to pureed veggies. He’d also like to know when I’ll stop calling him my baby. (The answer is never, but I do try to avoid saying it in front of “the guys”. I’m not that uncool.)

Before I talk about making baby food, first I’ll quickly share what I don’t recommend feeding babies (but keep in mind I’m just a mom, not a doctor):

  • Any kind of sugar before age one and really, do they need much after that?
  • Salt, unless it’s a very pure form of sea salt and then, very little
  • Grains, even the baby cereal that’s usually recommended. It fills ’em up, but their little tummies have a hard time digesting rice, oats and other grains, which can cause digestive issues now or later. I say wait on the grains if you can.

Making baby food is super simple, very inexpensive and takes very little time. One of the easiest foods to make for baby is Pureed Squash. You can read how to make pureed squash here. Making sweet potatoes is just as simple:

To Make Sweet Potatoes: Scrub them, stab them, bake them in a covered dish for about an hour, then peel them and puree them. So easy!

Pureeing green beans or peas are a little trickier as the “skin” kinda hangs around and keeps the food from being smooth. After failed attempts at making pureed green beans and peas, I found it easier to wait a little while before offering these to my babes. They made the perfect “finger food”. Frozen peas, by the way, are yummy and great if Baby is teething!

The one way I found to get green beans and peas into my little guys before they were old enough for “finger food” was to use a Kidco Baby Food Grinder. Man, I loved that thing. Whatever I had cooked or fixed for the rest of us to eat – green beans, peas, potatoes, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, apples, pears, bananas, peaches, nectarines (do I need to keep listing them?) – I’d stick it in my Kidco Baby Food Grinder and have instant baby food that my boys would eat faster than I could make! The “skin” or any difficult to eat part of the food would be “ground out” and the soft baby food would rise to the top. If you have a baby and you don’t have a Kidco Baby Food Grinder, I really, really recommend getting one!

Also, one of my very smart cousins told me about the BabyCook, which appears to have been invented after my babies needed pureed food, hmph. I’ve seen the BabyCook in action and it’s about as cool as they come. With the BabyCook, you can very quickly steam veggies, reheat food – even defrost food to make a healthy, quick meal for baby. Once the food is steamed, you can use the BabyCook to puree it to any desired consistency. Babies nothin’. I’m thinking I need one of these for me!

I used to always freeze pre-made baby food in ice cube trays, pop them out and re-warm them for a quick meal. It worked pretty well, but I’d love to hear if anyone else has a more efficient method of making baby food ahead of time?!

And, while we’re on the subject of baby food, I wanted to mention what another smart cousin showed me last week. Homemade baby food is great, but sometimes a little convenience on the go is a good thing. Have you seen these cool little Baby Food Pouches from Ella’s Kitchen? (Or here are some other ones I found from HappyBaby). Really, where were these things when my babies were babies?

Share your favorite baby food making, freezing, storing and serving tricks!

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Buttered Pineapple

June 2, 2011 by Laura 21 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see our disclosure policy.

Last week’s checklist while preparing to go on a trip with the family was:

  • Wash and fold laundry.
  • Have boys pack clothes in backpacks.
  • Load van.
  • Prepare food for trip.
  • Make butter.

Make butter? Why? Because I didn’t have enough to do?

Yeah well. I was trying to clean out the fridge of leftovers before we took off. We were going to be gone for five days after all. While I usually use up my weekly pint of cream that I buy from our local dairy farmers, somehow I had ended up with three pints of cream that needed some love.

And that is why, in the middle of laundry and packing and a slight bit of vacation preparation chaos last Thursday, I made three batches of fresh butter.

And that is also why, in my haste to take the lid off my food processor, I spewed butter-cream mess all over my pineapple.

And my wall.

Which changed my list to:

  • Wash and fold laundry.
  • Have boys pack clothes in backpacks.
  • Load van.
  • Prepare food for trip.
  • Make butter.
  • Give pineapple a bath and get greasy butter slime off the wall.

And here you thought I was going to share a recipe for Buttered Pineapple.

By the way, if you’ve never made butter, you really should try it sometime. Here are simple directions for making homemade butter. And just so you know, the butter-cream all over the pineapple and wall incident had nothing at all to do with my lovely new food processor. It really was a matter of me trying to move too fast, which in essence, caused me more work and a little more vacation preparation chaos.

But it sure did make for a fun story. Just think of the laughs we would have missed out on had I been more careful that day.

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Healthy Homemade Ketchup (finally!)

May 25, 2011 by Laura 134 Comments

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I think I’ve been working on a homemade ketchup recipe for about forty years. (I have actually not reached the age of forty yet, but I am rather fond of exaggerating and I feel like I’ve been experimenting with ketchup for like totally forever.)

It’s taken quite a bit of trial and error to find a recipe that we think tastes good. So many recipes just don’t quite taste ketchupy enough for me. This recipe I’ve finally settled on is one I found and adapted from Happy in Dole Valley. I’m happy to say that this is a very easy recipe to make. Tastes good…healthy…and easy. Yes, this is the kind of recipe I like to share with you.

During my experiments, one of the toughest challenges was to sweeten the ketchup in a way we liked. I didn’t want it too sweet, but it did need to be a little bit sweet – and not too tomato-ee. (I’d like to see the words ketchupy and tomato-ee become a part of the dictionary someday, wouldn’t you?)

I tried making ketchup with raw honey to sweeten it, and found that the taste was too strong. Regular ol’ sucanat (dehydrated cane sugar juice) is a little crunchy in this recipe, so I finally figured out a great way to sweeten our homemade ketchup:  Grind the sucanat in the blender like you’re making this healthier, unprocessed powdered sugar…then add it to your ketchup ingredients. Easy and perfect!

Healthy Homemade KetchupYum

Healthy Homemade Ketchup (finally!)
 
Save Print
Author: Laura
Ingredients
  • 7 ounces of tomato paste
  • ⅓ cup water
  • 2 Tablespoons vinegar (I used distilled coconut vinegar)
  • ¼ teaspoon onion powder
  • ¼ teaspoon garlic powder
  • ¼ teaspoon dry mustard
  • pinch of cinnamon
  • pinch of cloves
  • pinch of allspice
  • pinch of cayenne pepper
  • ¼ teaspoon sea salt
  • ⅛ cup sucanat
Instructions
  1. Whisk ingredients together until mixed well and smooth.
3.4.3177

I’ve found that if you grind the sucanat in the blender to make it less “crunchy” it works better.

Make french fries, get them nice and crunchy, salt them well with sea salt and give me a call.

Defining “a pinch”: When a recipe calls for “a pinch” of something, I usually put in about 1/8 teaspoon – an amount you could “pinch” between your fingers if you were to reach into the spice jar and pull some out. I don’t really like putting my fingers in to pinch my spices. But you go right ahead if you want to.

The true test with our Homemade Ketchup Experiment:  Did the kids like it?

All of my kids love ketchup, but one particular son of mine eats ketchup on everything:  eggs, green beans, broccoli… He’s also my pickiest kid (which is why he eats ketchup to get his veggies down). I  hesitantly put this homemade ketchup on his plate with a nice helping of homemade fries. He ate it. He loved it. He said, “Is this the homemade ketchup?” and I said, “Yep” and he said, “Wow it’s really good!”

Score! We have a winner!

Homemade Ketchup Recipe

Now that I’ve conquered ketchup, I’ll move on to some of the other recipes on the Heavenly Homemakers Recipe Challenge list. I’ve gotta say, I’ve been working on mayonnaise and it is about to kill me. I can not get a homemade mayonnaise to thicken even a little bit and it’s beginning to make me mad. Those of you who make mayo…what in the world is the secret to getting the ingredients to actually thicken into mayo? Ketchup took me forever to figure out, and now the mayo.  I apparently have condiment issues.

Well anyway, what’s your favorite use for ketchup? Please tell me it isn’t green beans, like my son.

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I Did It! I Made Fizzy Water Kefir Soda!

May 24, 2011 by Laura 43 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see our disclosure policy.

The winner of the Water Kefir Grains from Cultures for Health is:
Jane Gram  (janegram13@)
Jane, email me with your address and I’ll
forward it on to Cultures for Health for your prize!

 

Pardon the insanity of this post, although I would imagine that you’re used to my craziness by now, right? You already know that I am obsessed with jars, that I buy hundreds of pounds of wheat at one time and that I love my butter and cream. But did you know that I also really love fizz?

 

You might have had a clue that fizz is my friend if you remember my former Pepsi addiction. After I gave up Pepsi, I’ve really missed the fizz, which led me to figure out some healthier alternatives to soda. But healthier yet is making water kefir soda, which not only has fizz…it’s wonderful for your digestion!

 

If you want a little fizz in your life and you also want a healthy gut, try making water kefir soda!!! It’s inexpensive, easy and look…there’s lots and lots of fizz!!

 

If you’re not a big fan of fizz, you can still use Water Kefir Grains to make a very healthy digestive drink, just don’t allow it to become fizzy. I’ll work on a post in the future with a step by step picture tutorial of how to make water kefir, but really, if you get the water kefir grains starter kit, all of the instructions are right there and very simple to follow.

 

Now, just to prove that you can make an incredible amount of fizz with homemade water kefir soda, I took a short video of my fizz. I could have captured one of my children doing something amazing on the soccer field to show you, but no. Instead, I made a movie of my fizz. Be sure to turn your volume up so that you can hear the fizz doing it’s fizzy magic.

Weren’t the bubbles beautiful?

 

So how about the taste of this grape water kefir soda? Eh, it’s gonna need to grow on me a little bit. I can’t say that I just love how it tastes. But it’s not bad, and because I know it’s so good for me and because of all the wonderful fizz, I am drinking it happily.

 

Do you love fizz, or would you rather a drink be free of bubbles? Fizz lovers, seriously, it’s all about the burn, is it not?

 

You can find a very reasonably priced Water Kefir Grains Kit through Cultures for Health. If you purchase through this link, I’ll earn a small percentage of that purchase. But that’s not the reason I’m telling you about this great product. It’s about healthy digestion, and of course, it’s really all about the fizz.
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My Sourdough Has Been Revived!

May 3, 2011 by Laura 34 Comments

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Ever since I read through GNOWFGLINS Sourdough A to Z eBook, I have been inspired to make bubbles again. Sourdough bubbles that is. I am excited to report that over the past few days, I have worked to revive my sourdough! (Actually, I just started over with a new starter because my original one was very…dead.)

These are my bubbles. Aren’t they simply gorgeous? (Just nod and smile.)

I shared about making Sourdough Starter about two and a half years ago and was very excited to make sourdough breads a healthy habit in my kitchen. Making a sourdough starter is stinkin’ easy (and by stinkin‘, I mean that the starter really does begin sporting a mildly sour funk after a few days). But I really had no idea what to do with my starter after it was started. I played around with making bread a few times, but never got anything more than a few dense loaves that my family didn’t like. And so, my sourdough starter died a long, slow death in my refrigerator because after a few months, I stopped feeding it or trying to do anything productive with it. It’s a sad story really.

BUT, I’m all excited about sourdough again, which is why I created a new starter.  I love that not only does Sourdough A to Z eBook have very thorough instructions about how to make a sourdough starter, it has loads of recipes and ideas with directions for what to do with your sourdough starter. We’re talking cakes and muffins and pita bread and pizza crust and all kinds of great goodies. I never knew there were so many things to make with sourdough! (Forgive me for sounding like I’m writing an over-eager book review. The GNOWFGLINS ladies didn’t ask me to write this. I’m just excited about my bubbles.)

Here’s the front view of my jar of sourdough starter on day three.
Again, see my cute little bubbles?

Because all of these items are made from sourdough starter, they are so much easier for our bodies to digest. I was kinda hoping you’d get excited with me and try getting a sourdough starter going too, if you don’t already have one. Let’s make bubbles together, wanna? Think of the fun we’ll have!!! (Yes, it would appear that I’ve gone a little sourdough silly.)

If you eat a gluten free diet, never fear – Sourdough A to Z eBook even shares how to create and use a Gluten Free Starter!!!!  Yes, we can ALL play at this game!!!

This happens to be a perfect time of year to get a sourdough starter going, as the weather is warm, making for easier and happier bubbles. :)  I was eager this morning and with my new sourdough starter, made delicious muffins based on a recipe in Sourdough A to Z. They didn’t taste one bit sour, in case you were wondering. My boys didn’t even know they were sourdough and ate their typical three to five muffins each. ;)

 Tomorrow I’m going to follow the eBook directions for making a loaf of bread. I’ll share the results whether it’s pretty or not so pretty. Here’s hoping for a successful sourdough bread making experience!

If you want to create a sourdough starter, but aren’t able to purchase the ebook, please click on this link and scroll down to the beginning of the series of posts that describe day by day instructions for how to make a starter. Since the recipes in the Sourdough A to Z eBook aren’t mine to share, I’ll only be able to talk about them and show you pictures of my results, but not print the recipes themselves. 

Okay, here’s hoping for a lovely loaf of sourdough bread at our house tomorrow!!! What’s been your sourdough experience? 

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Five Minutes to Cultured Dairy

April 27, 2011 by Laura 43 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see our disclosure policy.

I’m out to prove that making your own cultured dairy products is neither intimidating nor difficult. Just yesterday, I made Buttermilk , Kefir and Sour Cream. This took me a total of five minutes. I did not break a sweat, not even when I was putting lids on jars.

Yum

I then started a batch of Yogurt . Yes, it was a big dairy day in my kitchen. Or rather, a big dairy eight minutes. Because that’s really how long it took to do all of this.

As soon as they are done culturing (which these products do all by themselves while I sleep, type, trip on legos or cut my fingernails), I’ll put them into the fridge.

Now, all of you stop thinking that you can’t make your own cultured dairy products and get started on this fun and healthy habit!! :)

Here’s a little Cultured Dairy question and answer time:

Is making your own cultured dairy products hard to do?  Did I or did I not just tell you that this isn’t hard? Okay then.

Can I use regular milk from the store to make these products?  Yep. I recommend drinking and using raw, organic, grass fed cow (or goat) milk to make these, but if that isn’t available to you, you can definitely use milk that you purchase from the store.

Do I have to trip on legos while my products are culturing?  No, in fact I recommend that you step over all legos and call your children in to pick them up before your feet get holes in them. I was just saying that to be funny, or something like that – and to prove that you don’t have to babysit your dairy products while they are culturing.

Why is there a rubber band on your sour cream jar?  I put a rubber band around my sour cream jar so that I’ll know at one quick glance into my fridge which jar is sour cream and which is regular cream. It’s quite helpful to know the difference. You’re welcome to use whatever color of rubber band you prefer. If you really think that sour cream deserves a red rubber band instead of a yellow one, knock yourself out.

What do you mean “knock yourself out”?  That is an expression that really just means “go for it”. To take that expression literally would just seem as though I were a big bully. Please, do not literally “knock yourself out”. Goodness.

Will I really have cultured dairy products in just five minutes like your title suggests?  The five minutes I was referring to was the time it takes for YOU to do any kind of work. It does take several hours for the dairy to become cultured after you’ve done your five minutes of work. Read the specific directions for each of the dairy products to know how long each item takes to become cultured. Here are the quick links:  Buttermilk , Kefir, Yogurt and Sour Cream.

Do you make your own cultured dairy products? Which ones are your favorite?

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Homemade Chocolate Chips

March 17, 2011 by Laura 30 Comments

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After talking about the Enjoy Life Dairy, Soy, and Gluten Free Chocolate Chips on sale at Amazon the other day…I decided to make a batch of my own Homemade SF, DF, GF Chocolate Chips to have on hand while I wait for the others to come in the mail.

Homemade Chocolate Chips

I made these chips with coconut oil this time. (You can use butter instead, but coconut oil is a great option if you can’t have dairy. Read more about coconut oil here.)

Can I just say…these chunks of chocolate taste incredible sprinkled into a bowl full of peanuts. Or all by themselves if you need a quick chocolate fix. Or mixed into these easy and healthier Fudge Brownies. Or in these Chocolate Chocolate Chip Muffins. Or with a glass of milk. 

Or on a Friday afternoon at 2:47 just because.

These homemade chocolate chips make yummy Chocolate Chip Cookies too…but they don’t hold together when baked as well as commercial chocolate chips. They’re just too “pure” I guess, and tend to melt into the cookie. This isn’t a problem with taste…but can be a problem with appearance. 

Just send the ugly cookies to my house. They’ll get eaten. :)

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“You’re the Bomb” Valentines – a Great Valentine Project for Boys

February 11, 2011 by Laura 22 Comments

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Pink hearts and sparkly flowers don’t quite cut it at our house when it comes to making Valentines to take to our Home school Valentine Party. I’d be making them all by myself and my boys would not be impressed.

But, tell the boys they get to make little bombs for their Valentines this year? I had all kinds of help!

I originally saw this idea at Skip to my Lou…my go to site for all things crafty. That gal is FULL of great ideas! She had actually made these bombs into “bath bombs”…but in the interest of keeping things a little more simple…we used suckers. (I just didn’t read the label on the suckers. I didn’t want to know.)

To make “You’re the Bomb” Valentines, you need:

Round suckers, like tootsie roll pops
Black tissue paper cut into 5″x5″ squares (you’ll need two pieces for each bomb)
Glittery pipe cleaners
“You’re the Bomb” gift tags (we just printed them on our computer)

Begin by placing the sucker in the middle of a TWO pieces of black tissue paper. One piece is too thin and the sucker will show through.

Wrap the tissue paper around the round sucker.

Fasten the black tissue paper by beginning to wrap a glittery pipe cleaner around the paper at the base of the sucker.

Continue to wrap the pipe cleaner all the way to the bottom of the sucker stick.

Gently bend the sucker stick so that it looks more like a “fuse”.

Print or create “You’re the Bomb” tags for your Valentines. I forgot this step until the end, but just simply pulled up the top part of the pipe cleaner and put it through the hole in the tag, then refastened the pipe cleaner.

And now we have a basket full of bombs to deliver to our friends at our home school party. I’m not sure the girls will be very impressed.

Admittedly, the “bombs” over at Skip to my Lou are more nicely done than these. But, our boys had a blast (pun intended) and I was thrilled that these were so simple to make!!

Are you making homemade Valentines this year?

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