freebies

September 17, 2012 4 Comments

pumpkin butter recipe + free printable!

Happy Monday everyone! There is a little hint of fall here in the Mirabelle Creations kitchen and I’m giddy! The mornings and evenings in my part of Kentucky have actually been down right chilly lately. And, I’m ecstatic! Over the last few months, my kitchen has been teeming with fresh tomatoes, corn and beans, but now that cool weather has arrived, I’ve shifted to thinking about apples and pumpkins.

My daughter’s favorite fall dessert is pumpkin pie and this fall weather prompted me to make some Pumpkin Butter for her. The spices added to this treat are the same spices added to pumpkin pie, so it has all of the flavor, without all of the fat!

It’s fantastic spread on toast and muffins, over waffles, stirred in ice cream, paired with fresh apples, or over cheesecake. As a bonus, cooking this light treat makes your entire house smell delicious!

Pumpkin Butter also makes a great hostess gift or party favor. As I entertain and attend gatherings through the fall months, I’ll keep extra jars on hand to share with friends.

And to dress up the half pint jars, I designed a “homemade” label and added some tan cotton fabric over the lid with jute twine wrapped around the lid.

Download your FREE Homemade Pumpkin Butter label!

Print them on a full sheet of white adhesive labels (available at your local office supply store) and punch them out with a 2.5″ circle punch or you can trim them out with scissors. Or, you could also print them on card stock, cut them out in squares and tie them to the jars. Either way, your guests and hosts will be delighted with this lovely and tasty little gift!

Pumpkin Butter recipe

1 (29 ounce) canned pumpkin
1 cup of apple juice
1 cup of light brown sugar
1 vanilla bean (or 1 tsp vanilla extract)
1 teaspoon ginger
½ teaspoon ground cloves
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon nutmeg

Place pumpkin, apple juice, light brown sugar, the insides of vanilla bean, ginger, cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a large saucepan. Stir with a whisk. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and cook for 30-40 minutes. Fill 4 half-pint jars with mixture. Store in refrigerator.

One important reminder about this Pumpkin Butter: it must be refrigerated. Unlike apple butter, which is acidic, this butter does not have a high enough acid content to store outside of the refrigerator. That said, you should easily be able to enjoy the Pumpkin Butter through the fall, as long as you keep it refrigerated.

As always, we hope you’re inspired to craft, bake, create and celebrate!

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FREE witch sister Halloween printables

These girls are my spooky “witch sisters” and I’m giving them away to my fabulous readers! And they’re 3-D printables! So they’re really “pop” out at your guests for a bit of Halloween fun! {grin}

The cupcake pick has two parts: the face is a 2.5″ circle and the hat. I recommend a circle punch for the face, but scissors work great too. Simply print, cut/punch and adhere the face to a bamboo or lollipop stick, both available at your local grocery or craft store. For the hat, I attached it to the top of the head with a foam adhesive dot, also available at the craft store, giving it a raised effect and even allowing it to move a bit when you pick it up!

For the cupcake wrappers, just print, cut and tape. I also trimmed the top edge with scallop scissors, but they’re adorable with a straight scissor edge too! If you want the scallop you can pick up a pair of the scissors at your craft store for about $2.

I also designed these “Have a sweet, my pretty!” {in your best witch cackle} circles, perfect as cupcake picks, or to cover sweets in cupcake liners. You could hide sweet treats like these or give your guests a fright and cover creepy crawly gummy worms! {grin}

Or maybe temp your guests with my “Try one if you dare…” tags!

Join me on Facebook and DOWNLOAD all of my FREE Witch Sister Halloween Party Printables now!

Browse around while you’re here, I have tons of Halloween inspiration and DIY tutorials including another idea Parents magazine shared in early August: my DIY Monster Pedestal Jars along with my Trick or Treat Halloween Party collection.

Or you might like my:

and more! Happy kickoff to the Halloween season everyone from The Celebration Shoppe!

back to school teacher gift + printable

Hello there! I’m Deanna, event designer and editor of Mirabelle Creations. I’m so happy to be here at The Celebration Shoppe, sharing a super simple back to school teacher appreciation craft that you can do with your kiddos!

All teachers love a little something at the beginning of the school year and these Edible School “Glue” Sticks, inspired by the traditional Elmer’s Washable Disappearing Purple School Glue Sticks, and fun “So happy to be stuck with you this year!” free printables are a great way to show your appreciation. Plus, they are easy for little hands because they’re simply filled with York Peppermint Pieces candies! But a warning, make sure you have extras because while making these as many candies went into my helpers’ mouths as did into the containers!

The idea for these Edible School “Glue” Sticks came to me last week while shopping for school supplies with my kids and a school supplies themed craft for the teachers seemed like a great way to start off the school-year.

What you’ll need:

Push-Up Pop containers (available on Amazon and Shop Sweet Lulu)
1 ½ inch orange grosgrain ribbon
York Peppermint Pieces
Glue dots or double sided tape
Scissors (scallop circle punch optional)
FREE printable back to school tags
White string or thin ribbon

And here are the simple steps:

Fill the bottom of the push-up-pops container with a layer of blue candies, about ½ inch thick. Fill the remainder of the push-up-pops container with white candies.
Tape the top of the push-up-pops container closed.
Cut two pieces of orange ribbon, the length of the circumference of the container.
Fold one piece of ribbon in half, lengthwise, securing it with glue dots. Attach it around the bottom edge of the push-up-pops container using the glue dots.
Wrap the other piece of ribbon around the top of the push-up-pops, securing to the bottom edge of the container lid. The taller ribbon at the top will mimic the cap of the glue stick.
Print the Edible School “Glue” Stick label on a full sheet of white sticker paper or regular paper and attach with tape.
Print the I’m so happy to be “stuck” with you tag on cardstock. Punch out the tag and attach with string or ribbon.

Now you’re all set to show your teachers how excited you are about this new school year! Enjoy!

And as always, we hope you’re inspired to craft, bake and create!

free back to school owl lunch box notes

Here in Ohio we’re only a week away from heading back to school. The kids are getting excited and I’m getting anxious about adhering to a strict schedule again… {smirk}. I’m also gearing up by organizing the house, setting up new ways to monitor homework and papers coming home (there is so much!).

AND, I’m thinking of fun ways to remind them how much I love them throughout the day.

Hop over to my facebook page and

DOWNLOAD your FREE printable OWL LUNCH BOX NOTES NOW

they come bundled with my FREE “MINT TO BE” back to school teacher gift printables.

And make sure you stop back in because I have a few fun things lined up to share with you this week! And as always, I hope you’re inspired to craft, bake, create and celebrate!

end-of-summer bucket list

My boys have two short weeks… just two short weeks before school starts back up and we’re making a plan! We want to squeeze a few more fun days and memories into this summer so we’re making a end-of-summer bucket list!

And since this is their summer and not mine, I’m letting them create the list… with a few parameters. I mean, I too would love to buzz off to Walt Disney World and come back and inspire you to hop a plane with tons of fun and exciting pictures, but it just isn’t in the cards this year. {smile}

Sidenote - We did go to Walt Disney World at Halloween a few years ago for Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party and if you’re considering it I strongly recommend it. It was so much fun and they even catered to my little guy with food allergies. And not just at Halloween, we’ve been a few times and they are so attentive to his dietary needs. It truly is the most magical place on earth!

So on to the bucket list! These are in no order, and this is only a partial list, but let’s just say I’m going to be exhausted when school starts and gladly so. There is no greater gift than time with my boys!

DOWNLOAD YOUR 2012 END-OF-SUMMER BUCKET LIST now!

Oh, and you can even add your own family name right in the file before printing. No special program needed!

And if you’re not sure what you’d put on your bucket list… just think about fun things, not necessarily expensive things, just things that you can do with your kids to make this the best summer ever! Let’s be honest, they want your time and attention more than any other gift you could give!

As always, I hope you’re inspired to craft, bake, create and celebrate!

FREE back to school printables

I love greeting our teachers each year with a little teacher appreciation gift from the kids. This year I made “Mint To Be” candy wrappers and wrapped them around boxes of Junior Mints! It will make them smile and breaks the ice for what will hopefully be a wonderful year of learning!

And of course I’m giving them to all of you, because I appreciate each and every one of you way more than I can ever express!

There are two versions of the candy wrappers and both can be personalized with your new teacher’s name right inside the file before printing. No special applications needed, just Adobe Reader.

The two candy wrappers say:

You were “mint to be” my teacher!
I was “mint to be” in your class!

DOWNLOAD these fun FREE back to school PRINTABLES NOW!

Oh, and I’ve included last year’s free owl lunch box notes too! {grin}

Happy Monday everyone and happy back to school planning! {3 more weeks for us… let the countdown begin!}

free Olympic party printables

You don’t have to be traveling to London to celebrate the Olympics! Deanna of Mirabelle Creations has created some lovely and FREE {yay!} party printables. She and her family are heading to the beach the same week as the start of the Olympics and they’re planning to have their own Opening Ceremony with games for her kids and their cousins all week at the beach. How fun!

Since this year’s Olympic slogan is “Inspire a Generation,” Deanna used the word “Inspire” in her designs and the red and navy diagonal stripes were inspired by Ralph Lauren’s USA Opening Ceremony Outfits.

I just love these clever watermelon Olympic rings she made using two sizes of round cookie cutters. Perfect summer Olympics snack!

And you can’t have an Olympic party without passing out a few medals! Deanna has the edible kind with these fun Oreo Olympic medal treats we shared yesterday, and she also designed some the kiddos can have as keepsakes! I’ll be making a few of both of these for my boys!

Hop over to Mirabelle Creations to download these fun and FREE London Olympic party printables! And as always, I hope you’re inspired to craft, bake and create!

host a BBQ bash with free printables

Summer is zooming by and I still have so much that I want to do! One of which is have friends over for a big BBQ with a campfire for roasting s’ mores after sunset. It’s on my summer bucket list. {grin}

As I was thinking about decor, I pulled these images out of the archive. I contributed to an article in Mom magazine a few years ago and designed these summer party printables for the shoot.

And of course I’m giving them to you.

DOWNLOAD our FREE BBQ BASH PRINTABLES

I also made these fun DIY kid aprons for the shoot, the perfect backyard BBQ favor for the little ones.

As always, I hope you’re inspired to craft bake and create! Happy Monday!

patriotic cake + FREE printables

With Memorial Day only a few days away and summer about to kick into high gear, I wanted to create a super simple red, white and blue patriotic cake that you can put together in a snap! The first thing you need to do is:

DOWNLOAD my FREE Patriotic Party Printables

The set includes cupcake rounds (the circles embellishing this cake), a four pattern pennant banner and dessert tags (seen here with other holiday recipes) that you can edit within the file before you print!

Next, bake a cake and flat ice it with buttercream. (Tip: If you’re in a hurry, or just not confident of your icing skills, order one from your favorite bakery.)

Now, punch out the cupcake rounds with a 2.5″ circle punch. Hot glue the circle to the end of a lollipop stick (cut in half) and insert the stick into the cake. (Tip: See pictures of how easy this is in my Robot Birthday Party Cake post.)

Finally, edge your cake with red sixlets found at most any candy shop. I picked these up at Party City. (Tip: If you love the cake plate, it’s from the Martha Stewart collection at Macy’s.)

Hop over to Snackpicks.com to see more Memorial Day recipes! As always, I hope you’re inspired to craft, bake and create!

FREE teacher appreciation printables

I had the best time with this one. What can I say, I LOVE chocolate and playing on words!

So this year, my boys will be taking their teachers a HERSHEY’S chocolate bar for Teacher Appreciation Day and it will be adorned with a fun wrapper that says “THANK YOU MRS. NAME FOR RAISING THE BAR!” And they will be signed ”Your fabulous student, Cole.” I know it just says “Cole” right now, but the awesome thing is you can type anything you want in that field so I’m going to change it. {wink} Oh, and I’ll print some for Alex too!

By the way, you don’t need any special applications or fonts, just Adobe Reader to open and edit the file. The fonts are embedded. Yeah! We’re cool like that! {wink} Plus, the designs come in two chevron patterns so you don’t have to give all the teachers the same one!

DOWNLOAD FREE Teacher Appreciation PRINTABLES NOW!

Enjoy! And as always, I hope you’re inspired to craft, bake and create!

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Linking to Celebrations At Home link party, I Heart Naptime’s Sundae Scoop!