If you follow my Pinterest boards, you have seen me going crazy with my new Color Inspiration board.  I have been finding color palettes on sites like Décor Hacks and Design Seeds and then finding the coordinating paint colors using Sherwin Williams Chip It! tool.

Original image via Tumblr

All you have to do to use the tool is to plug the URL of any image (find the image’s URL by right clicking on it and choosing “Copy Image URL”) into the dialog box and hit enter!  The tool will automatically match the colors in the image to paint colors from Sherwin-Williams’ line.

Sherwin-Williams has no idea I am promoting their Chip It! tool.  I just thought it was such a fun site, I wanted to share it with you lovely readers.

If you find a Sherwin-Williams paint color you like, make sure you print off this 25% off coupon to save  some money.

The old becomes new again: Give a traditional Valentine’s Day treat a lower calorie makeover.

I am not really much for Valentine’s Day.  I think it’s because I resent the idea that gamble chocolates are a once-a-year treat.  I say spin the roulette wheel and bring home a box whenever your little heart desires!

This cupcake recipe isn’t mine; I think it may originally be a Weight Watchers creation.  I wanted to try these cupcakes out, with a V-Day twist, to make sure I had something yummy to snack on without giving myself a guilt-trip or getting a mouthful of maple nougat!

To make Guilt-Free Valentine’s Day Cupcakes, you will need:

strawberry cake mix

diet lemon-lime pop

light Cool Whip

To make the cupcakes you simply add one box of cake mix to a large bowl.  Any flavor works, but we picked strawberry cake mix for a nice Valentine’s Day color.

Add in 12 ounces of diet pop.  Again, any variety of diet pop will work, so experiment with flavor combinations!

After mixing, the batter will have a light, whipped consistency.  Dole out the batter into your cupcake pan, and follow the directions on the cake mix box for temperature and bake time.

Now, my math skills aren’t the greatest, but I estimate each cupcake contains roughly 100 calories unfrosted, and about 120 with the light Cool Whip topping.  A cupcake prepared the regular way would cost you about 140 calories (without frosting).

(I got 21 cupcakes from one batch of batter prepared with just the diet pop.  If you find an error in my math, please let me know!)

As you can see the cupcakes did rise up nicely.  I was concerned that not following the packaged directions would result in flat or spongy cupcakes, but that wasn’t the case at all!

The texture was similar to any other cupcake baked from a box mix.   Light, moist and very flavorful.  Not bad at all for roughly the same calories as a can of regular pop.

If you are willing to splurge on a (very) few extra calories, pop a couple of conversation hearts on top for decoration.  Or a gamble chocolate if you are feeling dangerous.

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If you have participated in a Mad Skills Tutorial Link Party in the past, you have probably gotten one of my emails.  I like to highlight a few of my favorite submissions each week, and email is a great way to do it!

 

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I love Super Bowl parties.  It doesn’t matter to me if I have a dog in the fight or not.  If there are friends, food, and funny commercials, I am a happy girl.

I have rounded up a few ideas that I have made in the past or am considering making for our Super Bowl get-together this year.