The Apple Street Cottage

I want to share this recipe with you before all the apple cider disappears. I made them a few weeks ago and they were a huge hit. I can't take credit for this one, though, because I found it over at Baked By Rachel . Be sure to stop over and send her some love, OK? Doesn't that look delicious?  Here's the recipe: Muffin Ingredients: 1 & 1/2 C all-purpose flour 1/2 C sugar 1/2 C brown sugar 1 tsp. baking powder 1/2 tsp. baking soda 1/4 tsp. salt 3/4 tsp. cinnamon 1/4 tsp. nutmeg 3/4 C apple cider 1 egg 1/2 tsp. vanilla Topping Ingredients: 7 tbsp. unsalted butter - melted 3/4 C sugar 1 & 1/4 tsp. cinnamon Preheat oven to 350 degrees Grease muffin pan. Combine apple cider, egg, and vanilla in a medium bowl. In a large bowl, combine flour, sugars, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg.  Slowly add wet to dry ingredients with mixer on low.   Once combined, pour batter into muffin pan.  I used a 1/4 cup me...

This idea has been rattling around my brain for a while, and I finally made it happen.  I wanted to make something special for my son and since he loves to work on trucks, it had to be tool-related.  I found an old wrench at the flea-market for $1 and decided to combine it with some pallet wood. I wanted the wrench to be the handle and that was the tricky part. The ends had to be built from two pieces of wood notched to fit around the wrench.  I used my jigsaw to notch the wood little-by-little until the wrench fit.  Here's how they looked before assembly: The pallet wood was cut, dry-brushed with white paint and rubbed with dark stain.  The pieces,  in the above picture,  had just been dry-brushed. A piece of scrap wood was used for the bottom and more pallet wood was cut for the sides. Once everything was cut, sanded, dry-brushed, stained, and sanded again, it was assembly time.  I don't have pictures of this part because I n...

I recently had the privilege of participating in the Tea Cup & Mug exchange hosted by Stephanie at The Enchanted Rose .  I learned about the exchange after visiting her blog from a link party.  When I learned about it, the deadline for participating had ended, but after commenting that I'd sign-up for the next one, Stephanie e-mailed me and invited me to join this one.  I was ecstatic! After completing a questionnaire on wanting to exchange a mug or tea cup & things I liked/collected, all I had to do was wait.  Soon, this beautiful package came in the mail from Pam @ Virginia Retro . As you can see, she really spoiled me.  In my questionnaire, I shared that one of my favorite colors was yellow and my favorite teas were Earl Gray and Chai.  Pam sure delivered!  She also included some vintage linens, coasters, a creamer, and chocolate (another favorite that I listed).   I sent a package to Barbara from Texas.  I learned t...