Pinspired: Easy Lemon Berry Trifle

A friend's birthday was coming up and I wanted to make her something pretty and delicious. Being a less than stellar (<-actually pretty bad) baker gives me limited options. I found gorgeous ideas on Pinterest for trifles and gave this one a try.

I adapted the recipe to suit my limitations and ended up with a super easy, super quick trifle!

The original recipe called for pound cake and whipped cream made from scratch. Uhmmm, no. Not only am I a terrible baker, I am a terrible procrastinator, so I made it like this instead:

Easy Lemon Berry Trifle
INGREDIENTS:
Berries:
1 pint of each: blueberries, strawberries and blackberries1 lemon, juiced
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons cornstarch

Lemon Cream
1 container whipped cream
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
11-ounce jar lemon curd

Cake
1 store bought lemon cream cake cut into 1/2-inch thick slices
(I used lemon cream cake, but you can use lemon or plain pound cake.The cake needs to be fairly dense in order to sustain the syrup and lemon cream layers without turning into a gooey mess)

DIRECTIONS:
Combine the berries, sugar, cornstarch, and lemon juice in a saucepan over medium-high heat. Bring to a simmer and cook just until the berries begin to break down.
Take the berries off the heat and let the mixture cool.

In a separate bowl, mix the whipped the cream with the vanilla . Fold the lemon curd into it until mixed thoroughly.

To assemble the trifle, spoon a layer of the cream into a  trifle bowl.
Add a layer of cake.  Then drizzle on about 1/3 of the berry syrup.
Spoon a layer of lemon cream over the top, smoothing to the sides. Repeat
Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

(The inspiration recipe says to finish with a layer of lemon cream, but things didn't work out that way for me...)

Pinspired: Wall Art for Non-Artists

My piece (left), which I shall call "Cottony Swirls" was inspired by a post on Two Girls Being Crafty Blog and this Pin (right)

Source: twogirlsbeingcrafty.blogspot.com via Bella on Pinterest

I was attracted to the inspiration piece because of its simplicity and multi-color composition.



Ironically, my finished piece ended up being mixed media and pretty close to monochromatic.


I started out drawing the branches on drawing paper and made the circles (aka cottony swirls) in white acrylic paint. (because my paper was not white to begin with and I wanted a sharp background)


Off in my dream world, I imagined laying down on a field of...something...and looking up  ~~~ I've never laid down on a field, so I had to use my imagination here)
So that's when I started drawing with oil pastels trying to recreate what in my mind was the 4:00 o'clock sun shining through leaves and grass.

Then I remembered many moons ago, seeing a cotton plant (bush, whatever) in a very random place like a country club. And I could swear the cotton had tiny little black seeds (it could have been bugs, IDK) And, although not as many as in my rendition, I decided to incorporate them to my painting using a fine point Sharpie.
Instead of just drawing dots, I decided to complicate (and further deviate) things by giving them a swirly motion that remind me of the sky in Starry Night and some sort of Zentangle-ish pattern.

Voila!

P.S: I still want to try a version closer to the inspiration piece: large canvas, simple and with lots of vibrant colors. I'll keep you posted.

Source: twogirlsbeingcrafty.blogspot.com via Bella on Pinterest

Pinterest Inspired: Painted Ornaments

My first post featuring Pinterest Inspired Craftiness! Hopefully blogging my projects will inspire me to create more of the ideas I keep pinning.

 'Tis the Season... to make colorful, crafty projects full of glitter and shine!!! Here we go:
 I was intrigued by the idea of making my own Christmas ornaments, but didn't want to spend the money on specialty glass paint. I was so happy when I found this great Pin featuring a technique using cheap, cheap acrylic paint.
To sum it up, you just squeeze cheap acrylic craft paint into clear ornaments and swirl them around until they cover the surface.

That's it!

I found that using contrasting colors yield more interesting results. Similar colors (like on the green one, above) also work, but look a little blah.

The glitter ornament is a little bit different. I found many Pins using liquid floor wax to coat the inside of the ornament to act as a clear, fluid adhesive. But I don't have liquid floor wax on hand, so I searched for an alternative. Instead I use aerosol hair spray.

1. I swirled it around to cover the entire ornament.
2. Poured out the excess
3. Poured a generous amount of glitter - at this point the glitter is swimming in hairspray so it is easy to spread and put it back in the ornament box to dry overnight.

How easy is that!

Because you are painting the inside of the ornament, you don't really need paint with a fancy/glossy/enamel/resistant finish.

Love this!!!