witticisms by Jess Witty

August 07, 2009

"Friendship" Bread and Floral Fusion

So I have this friend. I'll change her name to protect the innocent guilty, so we'll call her... Mikki. Anyhow, this so-called "friend" of mine gave me a so-called "gift" a few weeks ago. This gift consisted of a gallon-sized ziplock bag of foul smelling runny dough... ah, the wonder that is Amish Cinnamon Bread. Took me right back to my college days where all my friends and I would take turns making this little Pyramid scheme of a bread that has a breeding cycle similar to rabbits. Are you not familiar with Amish Cinnamon Bread? First off, let's call a spade a spade and call this spade what it actually is - a DESSERT. Seriously, don't even bother counting up the amount of sugar that actually makes it into each loaf because it is just wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Deliciously wrong. It starts as stated above, when someone (who quite obviously wants you to put on a few pounds) gives you a bag of horrid smelling sour liquid and a list of instructions. Yummy. You leave the bag on your counter and supposidly smush it around every day (or forget half the days, as I generally do) for a few days, add some more ingredients (one of them being sugar) on the 6th day, continue smushing, and on the 10th day you pour it into a bowl and add more ingredients (yup, sugar). This leaves you with 5 batches of starter. You bake one of the batches and load the other 4 batches up into the ziplocks and deliver them to all the people who previously loved you to continue the cycle. Anyhow, this Mikki friend of mine gave us a bag which, unfortunately for my husband, was due to be baked while I was (conveniently) away at CHA. So, he bakes it all up with the help of a 5 year old and a 1 year old and at the end of it is left with 2 loaves of bread and 1 bag of starter. And then I came home. Leaving 4 bags of starter in a house... with me... who might be mildly OCD... and what do we have? (Can you see where this is going?) Well, so far we have 8 loaves of cinnamon bread, 1 loaf of butterscotch bread, 1 double chocolate bundt cake, 6 chocolate cupcakes, and 30 lemon-blueberry muffins. We will soon have 2 (or 4... depends on how ambitous I am) more loaves of lemon-blueberry bread. Yeah, it is *ridiculous* around here. Brian baked 2 loaves of bread for breakfasts, 1 baked 6 loaves for the small army of people who helped with the kids while I was gone, then came the cake to freeze for a family I'll be taking dinner to next week, and the muffins to freeze so I can take them to morning Bible study when it starts up again. The extra loaves will be just because one taste of the lemon-blueberry variety (with my own special additions, I might add) was enough for both Brian and I to forgive Mikki for the baking mess she got us into and for him to refer to it as "a little slice of heaven" so that obviously calls for more. (At this point, I feel compelled to confess that I am currently reading Julie & Julia by Julie Powell... it's altogether possible that the spirit of Julia Child herself has made me do all that I've done.) So, since it's Day 3 of the Witty Amish Cinammon Bread Bakeathon, I was beyond ready to break out the new PTI set I got at CHA. Ah, sitting and not baking... sweet relief. I've had this one in my head for a few days now. I love all the examples I've seen with this set and I wanted to try and bring a bit of a different feel to it. I used the long stem and straightened the stamp out a bit on the block first. I used a Versamark marker to ink up most of the stem and stamped it down on the card. That gave me the guide I needed for stitching. Have to admit, I'm kinda proud of that little idea! It's kind of like using invisible ink to mark fabric when sewing... the Versamark sort of disappears when you stitch over it. I stamped the flowers in Aqua Mist, Summer Sun, and I inked the 3rd flower first in Summer Sun, then in Berry Sorbet. I wanted a color that was vibrant but not quite so much as Berry Sorbet, so this is what I came up with. I was trying to come up with a way to add the sentiment but also fill up some of the empty space and ground the flowers a bit more, so I stamped the colored sentiment in the Sun/Berry mix, then drew a straight pencil line along the bottom edge of the sentiment and continued stamping it along the line with Versamark. I love how this sentiment kind of puzzles together! Repeated everything on the above two lines. I *loved* this card by Amy Rohla and am waiting on my Text Style set to get here, so I think I was trying to recreate that kind of Text Style look.

All right, everyone, if you've read this far, you deserve a medal or something! I'd give you one, but then I'd probably feel compelled to carve each one out of solid chocolate or something similarly time consuming (but probably delicious).

Thank You So Much Stamps - Floral Fusion (PTI) CS - Kraft, White (PTI) Ink - Aqua Mist, Summer Sunrise, Berry Sorbet (PTI); Versamark (Tsukineko) Other - sewing machine, circle punches (EK Success)

15 comments:

Unknown said...

Beautiful card! Love the stitched stem and the neat use of the sentiment! I played with the set yesterday and I think I'm in LOVE! :) And Amish Bread - definitely yummy and lethal!!

Amy Rohl said...

Love what you did with the sentiments, Jess! The stitching and florals ain't too shabby, either! :)

karisa said...

haha at the friendship bread! i was swimming dough & loaves last fall!

Anonymous said...

This is beautiful!

Maria L. said...

Never heard of the Amish cinnammon bread... guess that must say something about what my friends think of my baking skills! {All the baking is making me a little hungry.} Anyways, love what you did with that set - the stitching looks fun.

Jenn said...

Oh goodness gracious, now I'm VERY hungry! ;) The card looks absolutely beautiful, Jess (as always!)

Maile Belles said...

Sounds like you guys have been very busy bakers! :) Love the card!!! Beautiful idea for the flowers and the way you used the senitment is fabulous!

Mel said...

I have absolutely NOTHING to do with the Amish bread that was eventually given to you!!! :) He. He.

Heidi said...

Very cute card! I love the way you used the flowers. I enjoyed your Amish bread story! Happy Baking!

Dana said...

You are hysterical! I was in stiches the entire time I was reading this post! I too, encountered Amish Friendship Bread while in college, and I spent all my spare time baking bunt pans full of the stuff for my friend without kitchens. Once I even left a bag of the starter in my car for a few days and it exploded all over the back seat! GROSS-O! If you think it smells foul in the bag, you should smell it after it has "proofed" in a closed car for several days in a mid-summer Kentucky heat wave!
Oh, and your card is adorable too! *wink*

BethieJ said...

All I can say is YUM.. and oh so CUTE! YUM to the baking going on at your house! (my Amish friendship bread DIED at my house.. hee hee! eek!!!) and I LOVE the card.. so cute.. love how you did the thank you!
Have a GREAT weekend!

Lori said...

Your card is beautiful!! Don't you just LOVE this set!

Bonnie said...

Oh my...... I totally remember that "wonderful" bread, and throwing out the last smelly remains. However, it was very good when I first made it, but after the 7th feed.....ugh...!
Love your sweet card and don't you just love the new re-vamped ink??!!

Anabelle O'Malley said...

Love the card!!! The way you did the sentiment is awesome. Yes, Amish Friendship Bread...Can't believe Brian actually baked it for you! (Fran would have ditched the starter bag...) I was making lots of it earlier in the summer. Try using cheesecake flavored pudding, white chocolate chips, chopped pecans and chopped marachino cherries. YUM!

AJ said...

i have never heard of friendship/amish bread- but I am going to try it!!
where did you find the alternate recipes for the chocolate or lemon blueberry version for non accomplished bakers?????