Snickerdoodle Cake

Today I am sharing one of my favorite recipes with you. Usually, you bake a cake for a special occasion, but in the case of this recipe, the cake becomes the occasion! The recipe was inspired by a classic cookie that just about everyone loves and this cake is just as fantastic. Best of all, this Snickerdoodle Cake is easy to prepare from scratch!

This cake is gorgeous after baking and I always hesitate to cut it into slices for just about a nanosecond! But it smells divine and it has so much flavor that there is no way to not devour it! This picture does not do it justice, really! But, guys, this is the best I have for you as the cake was devoured in a flash! My husband could be heard groaning in delight. My children could not rest at the thought of this cake!

This post contains affiliate links.

Ingredients for Snickerdoodle Cake

2 cups of white sugar

2 1/2 cups of all purpose flour

2 teaspoons of baking powder

1/2 teaspoon of salt

2 teaspoons of cinnamon

1/2 cup of butter flavored shortening {I used Crisco}

2 eggs

1 cup of milk

1 teaspoon of pure vanilla extract

Cake Topping Ingredients

2 tablespoons of white sugar

2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees

Spray a cake pan (13x9 or a bundt pan) with cooking spray

In a medium sized bowl mix the flour, salt, cinammon and baking powder together, set aside

Cream together shortening and sugar until fluffy

Add eggs one at a time, mixing well

Add 1/3 of flour mixture and 1/3 a cup of milk, mixing well and repeating until all ingredients are combined

Pour cake batter into prepared pan

Combine the Cake Topping Ingredients and sprinkle over the batter 

Place in the preheated oven to bake for 35-40 minutes or until baked. 

This cake is incredible with or without frosting! I top it with my Cinnamon Buttercream Frosting. It is a huge hit with everyone that tastes it. The cake is kind of heavy, there is a simple and scrumptious flavor to it, and everyone will ask for your recipe!

What is your favorite kind of cake? I would love to hear about it in a comment!

You might also like this rice pudding recipe

Blueberry Chia Breakfast Bowl

We all know Breakfast is a meal not to be missed, but come on guys! I cannot get excited about eating a bowl of cold cereal from a box for breakfast... now at snack time some cereal is my go-to, but for breakfast? Give me something healthy, delicious and it has to have some visual appeal too!

This Blueberry Chia Breakfast Bowl is the way to go for a start to your day that is almost too pretty to eat and that is so delicious you just might hop out of bed at the thought of it!

Ingredients

• 2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries
• 2/3 cup low fat milk
• 2 tablespoons maple syrup
• 1 banana, peeled
• 1/3 cup quick-cooking oatmeal
• 1/4 cup chia seeds

Instructions

1. In a blender or food processor combine blueberries, milk, maple syrup and banana; blend until smooth.
2. Divide mixture among two serving bowls.  Stir in oatmeal and chia seeds.
3. Refrigerate for 30 minutes to thicken.

Serve with your favorite yogurt and sprinkle with more blueberries

Number of servings (yield): 2

Have you ever had a breakfast bowl like this Blueberry Chia Breakfast Bowl? This one is nothing short of incredible. I love that it is packed full of fruit and oats and that it can even be made the night before for a super easy start to the day!

Thanks to my friends over at the Blueberry Council for inspiring this post!

Upcycle Coffee Can Project

I have a big serious love of contact paper! You guys! This stuff is amazing! I have to stop myself when I get on a kick to buy contact paper because I want it ALL! I see different colors and prints and I think about all of the possibilities of projects I could work on.

You might remember that I made a DIY Blanket Box for under my daughter's crib a few months ago. That got me on a contact paper craft craze! Nothing was safe from my stash of contact paper! I created a few decorative containers that can be used for so many things!

I used mine to store markers in, as well as a really cute and simple way to organize kitchen things like wooden spoons and glass straws.

Materials needed to Upcycle a Coffee Can into a decorative storage container:
Contact Paper in your choice of prints.
Scissors
A clean coffee can or two
A utility knife

This project was so easy to do!

First, clean the interior of the coffee can to be sure there are not coffee grounds there!

Next make a measurement on how long and wide to cut your paper based on the size of the can. This is what I love about contact paper... it is so easy to measure, cut and work with!

Peel a small strip of the backing off of the contact paper and place it on your coffee can. Slowly, peel the paper back while smooting the adhesive paper to the surface.

As you cover the can, you are likely to have a little excess around the rims. No biggie, this is so easily remedied! You can use your utility knife to trim around the rims really easily! Just be careful, as those things are crazy sharp!

Everyone that sees my upcycled coffee can says "Where did you get them?" They are really cute, they used to match my kitchen perfectly before our move, and they have been surprisingly easy to keep clean {use a baby wipe}!

This upcycle project really didn't cost me anything to complete as I had materials on hand already, but I would say a thrifty shopper could find contact paper at Dollar Tree and make 4 of these {estimate} for $1.


Do you ever reuse a coffee can? I would love to hear how!

Paper Cookies A Preschool Food Craft

My kids are so cute! They always want to help in the kitchen! When I do dishes, my daughter Harper will push a chair into the kitchen and climb up to the sink. She will say "I can do this Mom!" or she will want to help make coffee and push all of the buttons. If there is cooking involved my son dashes in, ready to help! I welcome their company in the kitchen 90% of the time. But, as any mom will tell you, there are times when having small kids in the kitchen is not the best idea.

On those rare times, I feel bad to deny their help, so I came up with a few fun food crafts that the kids can make while I am occupied with a complicated recipe.  The first one we did as you might recall was a pizza craft. The kids had so much fun making pizzas! We have made several of these since the post!

Tonight I was frying chicken, a rare thing that I admit, I am not so great at. I didn't want the kids to get splashed with hot oil so I entertained them with a paper cookie craft. It was a huge hit!

This was incredibly easy for the kids to make, the materials were super simple making preparation a breeze for me, and best of all- this craft does not require anything special. Seriously, you are going to have the supplies in your house!

Materials Needed to Make Paper Cookies

Several Brown Paper Bags or brown or yellow construction paper
Glue
Sprinkles
A Paper Plate

Instructions

To begin, cut circle shapes in the brown bags or construction paper as your cookie base.
{I cut about 30 circles at a time so that we can do this craft multiple times}.


Place as many circle cookie shapes as you like on the paper plate.
Drizzle glue onto the circle 'cookies'
Decorate with sprinkles
Allow to dry.

This was so fun for the kids! We will be making these again soon I am sure! Do you like to do paper crafts with your kids? I would love to hear about your favorites!

DIY Photo Puzzle

My kids and I are really into crafting right now. On cold, rainy and yucky days like we have been having a lot of in Ohio, there is nothing better than digging into my craft cabinet and pulling out a few projects to entertain us when the weather is keeping us inside.

On one particular day, we ended up with a stack of duplicate photos and I knew that these should be put to good use instead of sitting in a photo box or ending up in the trash. After a few moments of careful consideration, I realized that a few craft sticks and some glue would take these double photos from miscellaneous junk into a treasure for the kids.

We came up with these DIY Photo Puzzles. We had so much fun gluing them together that we made a few to share with Grandparents and Daddy, as well as a stack for the kids to tinker with.

To make a DIY photo puzzle all you need is:

A photo
craft sticks
your favorite adhesive {we used glue sticks}
A utility knife

This project is so easy to make! All you need to do is:

Lay the picture side of the photo down and add glue to the back liberally.

Line up craft sticks across the back on the glued side of the picture.

Press firmly to allow the glue to bond to the craft sticks.

Flip the photo over

This step should be completed by an adult as utility knives are crazy sharp.

Carefully cut the photo between the sticks, continuing until the photo is cut into strips backed with a craft stick.

Allow the glue to dry.

Mix up the pieces and assemble the photo puzzle.

These are so much fun to give to people and they are a great challenge for my preschooler. My toddler finds them too difficult as of now, so we are going to make a few easier ones from cards we received over the 2015 holidays for her.

If you are looking for a last minute DIY gift idea or just a fun surprise for the kids, this one takes about 5 minutes tops to complete and is sure to bring a smile or two! Best of all, you likely have materials on hand to complete this project making it very frugal!