Gutter Ball Gurus

 These folks are having a bit too much fun!
On our bowling excursions we had hopes of maybe 30 % of this.
(side note:That little girl has a similar jelly possessed look to her!)

Last summer we went on a bowling bonanza right before school started and I got an idea for the fam to all have matching bowling shirts on the next go round.  So this summer I started working on ideas and locating plain white button up shirts from thrifts to use as the base. This proved to be harder to accomplish than I would have thought.  I eventually had to get long sleeve shirts and shorten them.  Next, we needed a fun name or "sponsor" for our team.  We have been watching The Andy Griffith Show, even more than usual lately. The show's bowling team is sponsored by Emmett's Repair Shop.  I wanted something a bit more than that....something that also involved creepy, because that is just who I am.  We then remembered Mayberry had a funeral home...combined with a TV repair shop (for when business was slow)....

Monroe's Funeral Parlor and TV Repairs!  
Free Estimates!

I had a couple of yards of this cute hearse fabric stashed back that happened to be perfect for the theme!

I sewed a panel of the hearse fabric off to one side of the shirt while using iron-on lettering for our names on the other side.

On the backs of the shirts I sewed two strips of black fabric, resembling bowling shirt vents.  I then put our team name on the back made from iron-on lettering.

Inspired by the Pfeifer's Beer Bowling Team, we posed for our own championship team photo.
(Clearly none of us know how to use a hair brush and an excuse of  Pfeifer's beer being evolved with our appearance is not the case.)

We also used character names from The Andy Griffith Show.

Because Otis had the highest score of us all, he received the addition honor of being awarded 

the King of Corn! 

After finding the white base shirts it did not take too much time to sew the fabric panels and apply the iron-on transfers.  All of which were stash busting items.  I bought the hearse fabric last year on sale and the black strips I made from some left over fabric. The iron-on letters were by Generation-T found at Big Lots (several years ago) for one buck a set.  I had bought about 6 packs, which came in handy for this project.  I regret not having enough letters to include "Free Estimates" though... too many "E"s. 

  A strikingly good time was had by all, with even a possibility of exceeding to a 32% enjoyment level.

Boyer Candies

 Mallo Cups!  Love the classic packaging!

 Big Lots has just about the whole line of the Boyer's Candy Company products: Mallo Cups, Smoothies, and Peanut Butter Cups. After further investigation and consumption I learned that The Boyer Company has been making candies since 1936. Their most popular candy is the Mallo Cup which is, for those not in the know, a milk chocolate covered marshmallow centered candy cup.

However I really think the Smoothie is the yummiest.  It is a butterscotch covered peanut butter cup.

Along with Boyer making tasty treats and having cool packaging, there is another element of fun with these candies. Inside each package of candy is a cardboard card of "play money".  The "play money"  or coin card is the printed tray on which the candy sits. The coins range in amounts from 5-50 points.  These can be saved up to be used toward prizes (ie: mallo cup t-shirt!) or just turned in for actual money.  For every 500 points you send in you can get back one whole dollar.  There are no expiration dates on the cards so they can be saved for as long as you want.  In 2004, a Mallo Cup fan turned in 100,000 points earning him $200.

The website has tons of really fun recipes to use their candies and other baking products in. We had a hard time making a decision but narrowed  it down to trying out the Mallo Cup Coconut Cake. 

Mallo Cup Coconut Cake

Ingredients

• 10 Fun-bite sized Mallo Cup candies
• 1 lb Boyer Coconut
• 1 tub refrigerated non-dairy whipped cream
• 1 lb Boyer Mallo Fluff*
• 1 can sweetened condensed milk
• 1 box Devil's Food cake mix

Preparation

1. Bake cake as directed on package in sheet cake pan.
2. While cake is warm, prick with fork. Pour sweetened condensed milk over warm cake. 

Pour Boyer Mallo Fluff over warm cake. Allow to melt then spread over cake.
3. Place cake in refrigerator until cool. Spread non-dairy whipped cream over cool cake. 

Sprinkle coconut over cream. Decorate top of cake with Mallo Cup candies!

*I used Marshmallow Fluff

The cake turned out very well.  It is very rich and honestly did not need the extra-ness of the Mallo Cup on the top.  A few other of their recipes that sounded yummy: Mallo Cup Macaroons, Elvis Peanut Butter Cup and Banana Pancakes, and Smoothie Funnel Cakes....so many to choose from, so many calories to pack on!

Super Baby!

A friend of ours just had a baby boy! They named him Otis, after a family member...not Otis Campbell, the town drunk of Mayberry. 

 I picked up this pattern at a thrift store last week with grand plans of making the zipper front bunting outfit in a Halloween type fleece or flannel. It's about 1000 degrees outside right now so I'll put that project on hold. For now, a bib will do!

The Superman vintage comic fabric was leftover from the Super Boy shorts I made for PB last summer. Bibs are a great stash busting project since they take very little material. I left off the string ties and used velcro instead.  I remember having a few cute bibs for PB that tied...those didn't get used because they aren't for real life.  Tying on bibs several times a day is just one of those things I got over the "thrill" of real quick.

 So little Otis, enjoy drooling and spitting up on this new bib made just for you!

 {I will have a hard time not thinking of a bottle of moonshine rather than a bottle of milk when his name is said.  That could be a fun project to make... a baby bottle that looks like a jug of hooch!}

Wallpaper Paste and Moulages

We love us some Andy Griffith show at my house. For reals...We watch it daily.  Certain food items are brought up in many episodes and then become embedded in my mind... kerosene cucumbers, for example. I decided to make a meal centered around a couple that could possibly be edible...A Mayberry Menu!

Main Course

Chicken A La King

inspired from : Opie's Newspaper

Season 5, episode 26

Opie makes a newspaper containing all the adult gossip he hears around Mayberry.  One piece being Aunt Bee saying that Mrs. Foster's Chicken A La King tastes like wallpaper paste.  I became intrigued with this notion and since none of the fam had ever had Chicken A La King we wanted to see what wallpaper paste tasted like.

I found a recipe in my Better Homes and Gardens cookbook 'Favorite Ways with Chicken' 1974 edition for a quick version of Chicken A La King (I added peas).  I made biscuit bowls from Jiffy Baking mix and baked them on the outside of cupcake pan cavities. I report that wallpaper paste is rich but pretty tasty!

And for dessert...

Moulage Cookies

inspired from: The Cow Thief

Season 3, Episode 5

In this episode, there is some cow thievery going on in town.  The mayor brings in an investigator, Mr. Upchurch, from the state capital to help with the case.  Mr. Upchurch notices several sets of shoe impressions and asks Barney about why he didn't make a moulage.  Moulage meaning plaster casts. Barney doesn't know what it means but says "Oh, we told a few people but we decided it didn't make sense upsetting folks running around blabbing, making a big moulage out of it." 

Later while Barney is preparing an actual moulage he comments to Andy on it, as if he has done them a million times, "I always like to make my moulages a bit on the solid side."

So, inspired by all the moulage-ing going on, I made Moulage Cookies.

I made these cookies from a gingerbread cookie mix and filled in the "moulage" with white icing...a bit on the solid side (royal icing).  

I made the shoe impression in the dough, from one of PB's large GI Joe man doll's shoes before baking.

In the episode, there are three sets of prints which are named: Able, Baker, and Charlie.  Baker and Charlie seem to be very overweight men, weighing possibly 250 pounds or more each.  Able seems to always be the front man and weighs a normal amount.  Andy then says "There seems to be one set of prints missing...Where's the prints made by the cow?" The thief (Able) had been putting shoes on the cow (Baker and Charlie) to try to throw off the police.  This story is apparently based after a real incident that happened in Andy's hometown. 

After our meal, we then washed everything down with a bottle of Colonel Harvey's Indian Elixir while hammering away at the keys on the piano..."Toot Toot Tootsie, Good Bye!"

Click below for older posts on other Andy adventures I have partaken in:

  Andy Griffith Christmas Tree 

Tour Mayberry

Floyd's Barbershop

Snappy Lunch