Sunday of last weekend was all about creating; creating with someone who wanted to spend ALL DAY making one thing after another.  ”After we finish this, do you think we could make something else.”  So sweet…my 6 year old niece.  What I didn’t expect was to become sick (and I mean really sick) that night with the 48 hour stomach flu.  I haven’t been that sick in over 15 years.  So, this post is a recap of last Sunday’s fun events (minus the sickness!).

First, we set out on making chocolate dipped marshmallows with a Valentine’s Day theme.  Yeah, I know…over 20 days away, but still fun to have a theme.  These are super simple and easy to do.  First, I would prep the work space if you are going to make this a kid project.  I taped wax paper / freezer paper to the counter (shiny side up) and pulled up the stool.  I would also use small bowls to set up the different sprinkles for dipping rather than sprinkling onto the chocolate.  Dipping is easier (and less messy) than shaking the sprinkles out of a container.

Supplies you will need:

• Melting Chocolate - Assorted Colors
• Candy Sticks (in the baking section of JoAnn‘s or Michaels)
• Assorted Sprinkles
• Large Marshmallows
• Ribbon
• Plastic Bags

Steps:

• Place a Candy Stick in Each Marshmallow and set them out ready to go.

• Melt the chocolate
• Start Dipping - Either dip just the end or swirl and get the entire thing.
• Dip into whatever sprinkles you want.
• Set the dipped marshmallows onto the wax paper (stick up) to dry.
• The chocolate will set up and dry within 15 minutes.
• At the end, I swirled the red and white chocolate together to make an interesting effect.

Packaging

• My niece had the best idea to use the cone shaped plastic pastry bags in my drawer to make small bouquets out of a few of the marshmallows together.
• We placed them in the bag and wrapped a bow around them.
• You could also do singles with a bow tied on them and give them as cute gifts to accompany a Valentine’s Day Card.

All ready for delivery….she wanted to stop at every neighbor’s house along the way home to drop off a little gift.  And, last but not least, we sewed her first project.  It was a small little bag that came ready to make with her new sewing machine.  The funny part was that her new sewing machine was a bit difficult to operate and so I had to break out the instructions.  At some point, she instructed to me that this was very boring and can’t we just sew.

Needless to say, we sewed her bag using both machines (hers and mine) and had a great time.  Here’s the final result:

I am now feeling much better and hoping to get a few hours of sewing in before the end of this day is over even though I should really clean the house, knock out the piles of laundry, do some work….