Pumpkin Project #3- The Pumpkin Spice Latte

And wrapping up our pumpkin theme for this week.. Drum Roll Please dadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadada   The Pinterest Pumpkin Spice Latte!!!



How many of you have this one pinned?? I'm dying to know.. I'm gonna make a jump and say at least 90% of you who are on Pinterest had at some point planned on trying this one.. And at $4.50 a pop at Starbucks who the hell can blame you! I've seen about 5 different pins claiming to have made the exact replica of the Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte. Every single one of them is the same damn recipe so I thought, "hmm, these itches must be on to something." 

Here's what it calls for:
2 cups of milk
2 tbsp canned pumpkin
2tbsp sugar
2tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1/2 cup of strong coffee or 1/4 cup of espresso if you have a machine.
whipped cream

First brew your coffee. Then You're supposed to cook the milk, pumpkin and sugar in a saucepan on medium heat until steaming then remove from heat and stir in the vanilla and pumpkin pie spice. Next transfer that to a blender and process for 15 seconds until foamy (or whisk it till it's bubbly). Pour the mix into your coffee and top with whipped cream and sprinkle a tiny bit of pumpkin pie spice on top.

OK people listen up cause I'm only going to say this once.. DELETE! DELETE!! DELETE this pin now!! This pumpkin spice latte is NO WHERE close to the one from Starbucks!! It's disgusting and the pumpkin clumps up in it and you get a mouth full of slimy, hot pumpkin goo.. It is not good. I spit it out all over my counter. I seriously just threw up in my mouth a little bit just thinking about how bad this thing is! It's too natural tasting for me. That's the only way to describe it. I don't want my latte tasting like i just licked the inside of a pumpkin and that's what this was like. I suppose if you're one of my uber healthy vegan friends you may like this because it's made from real pumpkins, but if you don't give a shiz about any of that-- like me--you'll hate it.

Again, say it with me, Rayna hates to lose.. so I refused to not come out of my effing kitchen with something that half-way resembled the PSL from Starbucks. For about 2 hours I altered the recipe over and over again trying to get something drinkable and Finally.. FINALLY I think I got something a bit similar. ( I may have just burned off all my taste buds on hot coffee so don't get too mad if you don't think this is anywhere close.)

I mixed 2 cups of milk with 1 tbsp of vanilla, 1 1/2 tbsp of sugar (use 2 if you like your lattes sweet, in my opinion the PSL at Starbucks is a bit too sweet and strong) and 1/2 tsp of pumpkin pie spice and then heated it up on the stove until it was hot to the touch.. I used the Starbucks espresso coffee and filled my mug about half-way. Once the milk mix was pretty warm I whisked it until it was frothy (because pulling out the blender everyday ain't gonna happen!!) Then I poured it in to the coffee, added whipped cream and sprinkled the slightest bit of the pumpkin pie spice on top. I completely omitted the actual pumpkin because every time I used it the taste was still funky. I made Matt my guinea pig and he thought it was similar. He said he'd definitely drink it over spending the cash  at Starbucks every day.

So, there it is. My version of the PSL. It's still not going to be as good because Starbucks uses a thick sauce rather than a syrup or just a spice. If you love your PSL that much but hate the price you may want to just go to eBay and buy the actual Starbucks sauce for like $30 bucks and make them at home. That's what I did when they ran out of the Caramel Brule sauce last Christmas. Turned out pretty good with my cheapo little Mr. Coffee Cappuccino machine. ;)

Until next time, Happy Pinning!

XOXOXOXOXO
The Posh Pinner

Pumpkin Project #2-The Happy Fall Y'all Sign

Happy Blog Day!! Everybody ready for Pumpkin Project #2? The Happy Fall Y'all sign!



I love, love, love this one and think it's pretty easy to paint even if you are artistically challenged. This one is going to be kind of difficult to explain but I really want you guys to know how easy it is to make and cheap (much cheaper than buying one on Etsy or Ebay). I'll try to give you a play by play on how I replicated this and some helpful tips if you're not so hot at the artsy fartsy stuff.

First off, Michael's has AWESOME sales on their canvases about once a month. For one canvas at regular price, you can expect to pay up to $8.00 FOR ONE! Again, if you read my blog regularly you know I'm a huge cheap ass and refuse to pay full price for anything. That's why I always buy my canvases in bulk and on sale, whether it's at a craft store or at Wal-mart or online.  *Tip*-sign up for Michaels reward program. They'll give you a little card and you'll get emails with coupons and ads ALL the time. Usually I get a $40% off one item coupon every single week. They automatically take it off the most expensive item in your cart. When you sign up for the card you also get a 20% off your next purchase!! JIGGA WHAT?? Anyway,  I waited until they put their canvases on sale and bought a 5 pack for $11.99.. That's CRAZY good!! They also have decent prices for acrylic paint. (Wal-Mart is a tad bit cheaper) For this project I used four colors (green, brown, purple and orange) and bought a black paint pen for the writing. Trust me.. YOU WANT to do writing in paint pens if you aren't artistic.

So, to recreate this Pinterst painting all I did was draw out the shape of the pumpkins in pencil and then paint the background green. Next, I  painted the shape of the pumpkins orange (looks like a big orange blob which is fine because you'll outline the two pumpkins in black later) and let it all dry. If you can't freehand the pumpkins here's a little tip. I know you all have about 40 Tupperware bowls in various sizes in your bottom kitchen cabinet. Take the lids to a large one and medium size one and just trace them on to your canvas. Then paint them.

Next, I added the polka dots to the canvas background. I didn't like the green on green so I used purple instead. Completely up to you. *Tip* You know those  paint brushes that are just a rectangle sponge on a stick? Well, in the craft section they make those in the shape of a circle AND in small, medium, large! Is your mind blown yet?? It's Perfect for getting a Perfect circle and the paint goes on much easier!!You'll use these all the time if you start getting into painting. You just dab the circle in the paint and then stamp the circle on to the canvas and you've got your polka dot.

After the polka dots dried I wrote Happy Fall Y'all in a way that resembled the text the original artist painted. If you can't mimic this simply write it out  and add little dots to the end of the letters. (like how I did The Lettermans) It's just as cute. I painted the stems of the pumpkins, added a couple of lines down their base and added my last name.. As a bonus I took some of that baskety stuff from the Dollar Tree and glued it at the stem of the pumpkin.  Boom Goes the Dynamite!! Love it!!

And, since I had those four extra canvases I decided to make one for Halloween as well. I saw something on etsy where a crafter turned the o's in BOO into pumpkins and loved it so here's what I came up with. Check it out.

All I did for this one is paint my canvas black, free handed two pumpkins (again you can use bowls) and for the B I really just drew squiggly lines and filled it in with orange paint. Took the black paint pen and detailed the pumpkins and painted a green stem. Now, I will say the spider web was a bit more tricky. I started with a dot in the center of the B and then drew the straight lines through the dot until it looked like an asterisk. After that I simply drew upside down arches connecting the lines. Hope that made sense.

These paintings can be used year after year and I plan on making a few for Christmas. They also look great hanging on your front door instead of a wreath. You can make them, personalize them and then give them as gifts as well.

Coming up later this week, as promised, I'll tell you how the Pinterest Pumpkin Spice Latte turned out and give you a few tips for making it more Starbuck like cause Believe me, it needs some serious help!!! ;)

See ya in a few days!

XOXOXOXOXO

The Posh Pinner

Wine Glass Pumpkin Candle Holders

Hi Everyone! So sorry I haven't written in a while! I've been feeling a little bit under the weather lately. But I'm back and ready to show you the results of a couple of my latest Pinterest projects. Since the leaves are changing and Fall is upon us I thought we'd stick with a little theme for the next several posts. PUMPKINS!!  So without further ado, let's do this dang thang!!



pinterest version

 First up, Dollar Tree wine glasses painted to look like pumpkins and turned into candle holders.. Phew that was a freaking mouth full. You've seen these I'm sure. If you haven't seen the pumpkin ones you've seen the snowmen ones. They're all over Pinterest.







pinterest version



Lucky for me, I had 4 extra wine glasses left over from the project where I tried to frost them myself so I didn't have to go buy any! Score one for Rayna! I also had all the paint I would need to make them look like pumpkins. Or to TRY and make them look like pumpkins I should say.  I mean really. Look at the way these are painted. Does the person who originally  painted these snowmen or these pumpkins really expect the average Pinner to be able to paint like this?? I actually consider myself

to be a pretty dang good painter but, as you'll see, my pumpkins turn out

nothing like the one you see to the right.

OK, so this is really a simple project if you don't care that yours look NOTHING like the one's you see on Pinterst hahaha. If you do, Stop reading now and good freaking luck. OK, I took three wine glasses, two for red wine because they're rounder like an actual pumpkin and one glass for white wine. All I did was  paint the bottom half orange and then  paint the stem green as so. I let it dry and then did another coat of each. For some reason the paint doesn't go on evenly on the glass so it actually looks like it has some shading and depth to it when it dries. Pretty cool cause you don't have to go in with lighter and darker colors to create that effect (affect ?? )



Next, I just waited for the second coat to dry and then took a beige paint I already had in my art box and painted stripes vertically down the base with a very thin paint brush. I know, I know, it looks pretty crappy here when it's wet but I promise it does actually look like a pumpkin when it's all said and done with. 

Lastly,  it was time to try and decorate the stem like the pic of the original.  I, however, refuse to spend any money on this project  because 1.) I thought it was going to be a bust when I compared my pumpkin wine glass to the Pinterest one and 2.) Have you been to Michael's lately? A little strand of those leaves costs like $5 bucks!! Forget that. I had some of this stuff that's like what a basket is made of (no freaking idea what the hell this stuff is) leftover from - again- another project. So I thought that might work (remember I was HATING my pumpkin painting skills at this time). I also, for some random reason, had picked up some tea lights while I was at the Dollar Tree one day so I didn't have to go out and buy those either.. Double Score for Rayna!

 

I took three strands of the twine, bunched it together and then tied it in a bow around the stem of the wine glass. I then turned the wine glasses upside down and put a tea light on the base of the wine glass. I lit them Annnnnnnnnnnnnnd Here's the big reveal!!

TA-DA!!

 Not to bad right? I mean for something that took me maybe 10 minutes to complete they look pretty damn good. My real estate agent actually saw these on my book shelf and fell in love with them. She wanted to know where I bought them LOL! So, if you've pinned this and are thinking I can't paint like that.. Well, now you don't have that excuse because I can't paint like that either and mine came out OK.
If you didn't have any of these items at your house and wanted to make these here's what it'd cost you. (you can get most of it at Dollar Tree)
Dollar Tree wine glasses about $3.25 for all three
Dollar Tree Twine or ribbon for the stem $1.09
Paint $1.25 for two at Walmart or Michaels... so a little over $5 bucks total!

Here's a little sneak peak at our next pumpkin project! And if you're my friend on Facebook you may have heard that I attempted to make the Pinterest Pumpkin Spice Latte that claims to be an exact replica of the Starbucks Fave. That one's coming up in a few days! I promise you don't want to miss that one.
 Plus, I have some more recipes to share with you guys!

Have a great night everyone!
XOXOXOXOXO

The Posh Pinner