Blueberry Lemon Streusel Bars

   Do you love blueberries? Do you love lemon? Do you love bars? If so, you'll love these things. Heck, even if you don't particularly like blueberries/lemon/bars you'll still probably like these. They are THAT good. I can take zero credit for this recipe, it comes from the lovely Erica at  Fashion Meets Food, and you can find the original recipe here. 

    Trader Joe's had a huge carton of blueberries that looked too good to pass up- and when I got home with them I instantly started searching for recipes to use them in. I had every single other ingredient already at home so I started baking right away!

For Erica's recipe you'll need:

1 cup unsalted butter, softened

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats (NOT instant oats!)

1 1/3 cups packed light brown sugar (plus a little extra for sprinkling on top)

1 tsp. baking powder 

1 tsp. salt

1 large egg, separated

14 ounce can sweetened condensed milk

1/2 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice

zest of one lemon

 2 1/2 cups room-temperature blueberries

9 x 13 baking dish coated with either shortening or non-stick spray

Step 1: Coat your baking dish with shortening and preheat your oven to 350 degrees. 
Step 2:  Mix together your flour, oats, salt, baking powder, and sugar:

 Step 3: Cut your butter into small cubes and mix it in with your mixture- make sure it's mixed up well!

 Step 4: Set 2 cups of the mixture aside to be used as a topping and then add your egg white to the remaining mixture. Once mixed press down firmly into the baking dish and bake for 10-12 minutes.

 Step 5: While that bakes, mix the lemon juice, lemon zest, egg yolk and condensed milk in a bowl and let stiffen (takes about 5 minutes)

 Step 6: Sprinkle blueberries over the crust as soon as you pull it out of the oven

 Step 7: Evenly distribute lemony layer on top of the blueberries and gently even out with a spatula

 Step 8: Bake in oven for 8 minutes

 Step 9: Evenly distribute the 2 cups of oat mixture you had set aside previously, pinching it between your fingers to give it a chunky texture.

 Step 10: Bake for 25-30 minutes or until it's golden brown and you can see the blueberries bubbling. As soon as it comes out sprinkle it with a little extra brown sugar!

 Erica advised to let them cool fully  before cutting but there was no way I was going to stop Michael from cutting at least one bar out instantly!

 The finished product :

 They were ridiculously delicious- especially when warm and ooey gooey. I fully understand why Erica said to be patient and let them cool- those blueberries explode and feel like molten lava on your tongue.

Totally worth it.

I highly recommend these bars-super comforting and a great mix of sweet and tart!

Valentine's Watercolors

    Remember last week's DIY Chevron Art that I did as a part of Living Savvy's No Spend Challenge? Well I'm back for another round of the challenge! I've started decorating the apartment for Valentine's Day (yes, I do fully decorate for it- if you're new to the blog- read why here), and the first project I did was a completely free one!

     I usually have these state cutouts in frames on our window sills- but figured it was time to temporarily change them out for the holiday.

So I grabbed my watercolors, paper, a pencil and Sharpie and got to work.

I used the now-empty frames as guides to make sure my little paintings would fit:

I started by saturating each one with a lot of paint and water...

....and then blotted most of it off to give a lighter, tie-dye feel.

This one is my favorite- someday we'll need to get out there and properly deface a tree like that...

After deciding I wasn't such a big fan of the "XOXO" and finding yet another light wood frame, I made two more little paintings...

Aaand can you tell I took the last 2 in the bright morning light?

What do you think about FREE watercolor Valentine's art? Which one is your favorite?

Don't forget to head on over to Living Savvy if you want to take part in the challenge and grab the button!

DIY Rainbow Polka Dot Phone Case

* For those of you stopping by today from A Simple Affair- thanks for taking the time out of your day to see the blog - I appreciate it more than you know!! Hope you like today's craft!*

   **For all other lovely followers- you can find my guest post on all my favorite "E" things on A Simple Affair today as a part of her A-Z series!! **

   Okay. Enough italics. It's hurting my eyes. 

   Remember my DIY checkered phone case from last week? Well as promised, here's the second one I made! In case you haven't figured it out from my many previous posts involving acrylic paint- I have enough different colors to make the most gigantic rainbow imaginable. How? A ridiculous sale at Michael's for 19 cents per bottle on most of them- and then another huge sale with a 25% off coupon on top of that for the rest. I'm telling you people, never pay full price for ANYTHING at Michael's. Splurge elsewhere- there's always a coupon for that place! Alright, moving on to the case: 

 I found a cheap-o white case online (here to be exact) and set up my paints in rainbow order to begin the polka dotting process. After trying brushes, pencil erasers, and other assorted super-legit mediums I found the end of one of my paint brushes worked best to get the tiny dot I was looking for:

 I poured out a small amount of the first color and slowly added white as I made dot after dot- giving the perfect gradation:

 Which led to all the paint looking marbleized and cool like this:

Somehow the orange ended up looking like some terrible lava flow:

 After this point I stopped taking pictures after every single row of colors, but you get the point, right? Good.

 Aaaand drumroll please......

The finished product!!!!!!

 I love it. A lot.

 I especially love the greens and blues in the middle, but then again I'm always a sucker for a good teal or turquoise!

I ended up applying a thin layer of Mod Podge over the top of the dots so they wouldn't rub or peel off, and  thus far it's all stayed perfectly intact!

What do you think? Would you let rainbow polka dots adorn your phone's case? Any other ideas for patterns I could paint on future cases? Let's hear 'em!



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