Banana Bread

As promised, here is the original banana bread recipe from our Father's Day brunch last weekend, inspired by this recipe. It takes 8 basic ingredients that even I had on-hand, five simple steps and viola!  A yummy, homemade treat...for yourself or to share. Enjoy!

Simple Banana Bread Recipe

Ingredients:

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 cup butter

1 cup packed brown sugar

2 eggs

3 medium overripe bananas

Directions:

1) Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan. 

2) In a large bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. 

3) In a separate bowl, cream together butter, brown sugar, eggs and bananas until well blended. 

4) Stir banana mixture into flour mixture; stir just to moisten. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan.

5) Bake in preheated oven for 50 to 55 minutes. Cool on a wire rack. 

Happy Baking! 

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Saturday Brunch

Bright sun, warm air, cool breeze - it was one of those rare, idyllic days weather-wise here in Ohio and the setting for the Father's Day brunch we got to host this past Saturday. Lots of yummy food, kids running around in the backyard, parents conversing on the deck and of course a bit of "party planning" on my part: all the makings for one of my favorite mornings this year!

I wanted to keep things fresh and casual...just enough to feel special, but not too formal or forced. I found these fun, retro brunch printables over at The Pretty Blog.  Spent $2 printing the various pieces at a local print shop and about half an hour putting them all together. Proof that you can add a little extra for hardly any cost or time - just what I was looking for! 

 On the menu: Mimosas, lime water, fruit kebabs, walnut strawberry salad with poppy seed dressing, squash & tomato frittata casserole, blueberry muffins and banana bread.  I had at least one bite or sip of everything and it was DElicious. I also felt overwhelmingly full the entire rest of the day. :) 

Sharing my banana bread recipe later this week, so be sure to stop back by! 

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Anchors Away! Nautical Baby Girl Shower

Every time I help with an event it becomes my all-time favorite event...until the next event comes around and then I get swept away with that one and end up with a new favorite. This precious baby girl's baby shower was no different! The navy and pink nautical theme is absolutely adorable and came together perfectly. Take a look!

As a late afternoon shower, we kept refreshments light and simple: cucumber & cream cheese wraps, pita chips & hummus, granola bars and goldfish, our "Catch of the Day". We used circle embellishments on the lids of the individual hummus cups, made cones to hold the pita chips with coordinating nautical paper and wrapped granola bars with "It's a Girl" wraps. 

We added plenty of sweets to the menu as well, including color-coordinating candies, chocolate and vanilla cupcakes and the crowd favorite, layered jello. If you missed it earlier this week, here's the recipe for this delicious jello dessert that can be made to match any event! 

Beverages included strawberry lemonade and blueberry water. We used lots of pennant banners throughout the event and decorated the "overflow" buffet with coordinating tissue paper puffs. 

One of my favorite features in this nautical printable package were the straw flags that were made to fit like sails on the paper straws. {SO CUTE}!!

Our centerpieces were hard to fully picture, but were a wonderful addition to the event hall. We "upcycled" boxes wrapped in coordinating paper and old frappuccino bottles embellished with ribbon. We filled the bottles with brown sugar to look like sand, added a few coordinating circle signs and wove a rope around the whole thing. We cut a roll of brown craft paper in half to use as a table runner and also made mini "It's a Girl" pennant banners that strung across the entire length of the table, connecting one centerpiece to the next. At each seat, guests received a homemade strawberry white chocolate chip cookie. 

Guests were greeted with a "Message in a Bottle" table where they could leave a note for the new family. Behind the gift table, we hung a clothesline with several precious nautical themed outfits for Baby Ella. More coordinating pennant banners and circle signs were spread throughout. 

Another glimpse at the main food table - isn't it the sweetest?! Definitely my favorite event...so far!! And special thanks to DimplePrints for the wonderful printable set that tied the whole event together. 

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Layered Jello

So excited to share this fun, yummy, extremely versatile dessert with you today: Layered Jello! If you aren't normally a fan of jello, give this one a try. The texture is much creamer and I think the flavor is much better than standard jello.

 This is also one of my very favorite event desserts because it can be easily customized to match almost any color scheme and is an eye-catching addition. We used them at a recent nautical baby shower I helped coordinate in blues and pinks. Here's how they turned out in individual servings:

They can be a bit time-consuming to prepare, but most of the time is just waiting for each layer to setup - so you can easily be busy at work with other prep while waiting! Here's  how to make them:

Layered Jello
2+ boxes of standard jello (you choose which & how many colors!)

1/3 cup sour cream per box of jello being used

cool whip

Follow box directions to prepare the color of jello you'd like as the bottom layer. Normally, the box will instruct you to add 1 cup of boiling water to the 4 oz jello mix. Divide the jello in half, adding 3 tbsp of cold water to one half and setting the second half aside for the moment. Pour first half of jello into serving dish(es) and refrigerate for 15-20 minutes or until set. While setting, add 1/3 cup of sour cream to second half of prepared jello mix. Mix well. This will be your second layer once first layer is set. Repeat until all layers are added. Top with cool whip. Refrigerate until serving.

Enjoy!

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A Summer To Remember: Family Fun Plan

Summer's here! For some it's a longed-for break and for others a stressful time of ansy kids and endless, I'm bored's. Whichever boat you're in, making a family fun plan is a great way to get through the summer with less stress and lots of good memories. 

This is our first year instituting our own family fun plan. My husband and I did a few hours of web browsing to come up with the list, utilizing sites like HulaFrog, our local Metro Parks, and area tourism websites. We also asked around a bit and came up with a large list of "maybes", which eventually were further researched and narrowed down to 12 weekly activities. 

Keeping our kids' ages in mind was the top criteria. Budget was a close second and obviously true fun appeal for the whole family was a must. With kids age one and two, we needed to find interactive, flexible activities. Our final list includes things like a family 5K, a trip to a local farm & petting zoo, family night at our minor league baseball stadium, State fair, area festivals and a family painting project. Here's a simple visual of the plan, now posted on our living room wall! 

Hope this brings a little inspiration to your summer plans - or lack thereof as it may be. Summer is just starting and to me, having a plan like this means a guaranteed list of memories we will have as a family and can talk about and look back on fondly for years to come. And if you know me at all, you know I savor family memories! 

 Happy Memory-making! 

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