Mermaids in my Garden

Mermaids are popping up everywhere this week!

Today they are in my garden -

my FAIRY GARDEN, 

and they love getting to be a part of the

action.

My friend Brianne told me that one of our

local nurseries, Cascade Nursery,

 had Mermaid Fairy Garden supplies,

so I headed on over and got the last three

mermaids.  They said they were getting more,

but I haven't been back.

Of course, when I saw the pirate ship with

the shark swimming out of it, I had to

get that for the boys.  I try to include

them in all of the Fairy Garden fun too!

I love this little leave sail boat.

and the Mermaid Wishes and Starfish Kisses

stand.  

We had to have this treasure!

This garden was made in one of my cement

flower pots.  It is so easy to make a fairy garden.

Pick any container or spot and use small rocks,

shells, glass bits and moss to create the areas.

Pop in the darling little fairies and accessories.

You can just picture the grandkids eyes when

they saw this!  I am always trying to make magic

for them, and they thought this was pure magic!

This is definitely my new favorite addition to the

fairy garden.

I will be posting this on

Mosaic Monday

Red White and Blue Strawberries

These strawberries decked out in red, white and blue have

been on my bucket list for a long time.  I was making

chocolate dipped strawberries for a dinner

 and wondered if I had

any blue sugar sanding sugar in my hoard - I mean

supply.  (I have a whole locker turned cupboard full of

sprinkles and such!)  Sure enough I had some pretty

blue ones, more than enough for a large container

of strawberries.

These are pretty, easy, but they were a little trickier than

I thought.  You simply melt your desired amount of

white candy coating discs - I used about 2 C., as I had a

lot of strawberries, and dip cool, clean, dry strawberries

into the melted chocolate.  I poured my sugar crystals

into a bowl and dipped the white coated

strawberry into the sprinkles.  The sugar pushed

the white chocolate up and created an ugly "shoulder"

between the blue and the white.

Ok, that wouldn't do! 

So I moved the sugar to a small plate and I rolled

the bottom in the sugar.  Still a little bit of a shoulder.

Finally, I dipped the strawberry, and held it, counting

to about 20, so that the white candy coating had 

started to set up a little, then rolled the bottom

portion.  That produced the pretty line I wanted

between the blue and white - not that anyone 

eating them would care - but I did!  That took a

little more time than usual for dipping strawberries,

but I thought it was worth the little wait on each one.

So hopefully, if you try making these for

the 4th of July, or celebrating going to London,

or Memorial Day, or any other celebration that

suggests red, white and blue, you will have a

little easier time than I did!

When I carried them into the dinner, there were all

kinds of gasps.  They really are striking and gorgeous!

And tasty too!  The blue does leave your tongue with a little

blue tinge, so you could tell who had one.  Definitely

a fun idea worth trying.