holiday coffee lovers' blog hop? yes, please!

my lovely friend amy tsuruta told me about her awesome holiday coffee lovers' blog hop, so of course i had to play along! you can, too, and i think you might like to, because there are prizes galore! all you have to do is make a new project which references coffee, (or your other favorite hot holiday beverage) link it up on amy's blog, and leave feedback for at least three of your fellow players. easy peasy, right?! now, in my opinion, NOBODY beats miss amy when it comes to rockin' the coffee-related cards, she is the queen of that genre; so i didn't even try to compete. but it just so happened that on the same day i heard about the hop, i received a christmassy catalog in the mail which had the cuuuuuuuuuuuutest holiday cocoa mugs in it, so of course my first thought was, "those would look great on a card!" for the record, i stand by that judgement.

photo of mugs from a catalog, backed w/cardstock and fussy-cut; patterned paper: studio calico, oct afternoon, dcwv and basic grey; ribbon: making memories; doily die: cheery lynn designs; adhesives: elmers brand gluetape runner, scotch gluestick, 3m foam tape, sewing machine

seeing as how i was already thinking about amy t and card-making, it occurred to me that i hadn't got to play in the last two challenges at fusion, and i was really missing that. imagine how psyched i was when i realized the colors and shapes of said cocoa mugs would let me play along pretty easily with the current challenge!

another optional facet of the blog hop is to add in a little blog candy or share a favorite beverage recipe. now i do looooooooooove me a fancy coffee drink, especially one that tastes like the kind you get at starbucks, but without a gazzillion calories. so i was pretty psyched when my sister found this recipe on the hungry girl website. my secret to making it even easier is that i always have cold coffee and coffee ice cubes on hand. does that sound fussy? well, it isn't, honestly! instead of tossing out the leftover coffee each morning i just pour it into a pitcher that lives in my fridge. then, maybe once a week, i make a tray of ice cubes* with any coffee that's left in the fridge, wash the pitcher, and start over. thus iced coffee is never more than a few minutes away!

here's my lazy-girl version of 

hungry girl's cherry bomb iced mocha**

ingredients:

1/4 c. light soymilk 

1 tbsp. hershey's sugar free chocolate syrup

1 tbsp. maraschino cherry juice

12-16 oz. cold coffee (or about 2/3 the size of your favorite travel mug)

coffee ice cubes

optional topping:

1/4 cup fat free whipped topping

1 1/2 tsp. mini semi-sweet chocolate chips

maraschino cherry

directions: 

place soymilk, cherry juice and syrup in the bottom of your favorite travel mug or large glass and stir until they are well-combined. add cold coffee and continue stirring, leaving a little room for ice cubes, and the topping if desired. enjoy at home or in the car! ps: there are a million variations on this idea, you can use any type of syrup paired with any flavor of soymilk or creamer you enjoy!

and now why not check out all the details on facebook or amy's blog and start planning your own bid for holiday coffee-loving world domination?

*it's the essential oils in coffee which give it the lovely fragrance and flavor, but they do leave a very faint residue on plastic kitchen items. thus i have one specific ice cube tray, and one specific pitcher, that i only use for coffee.

**i don't like very sweet drinks, at starbrucks i ask for HALF the amount of syrup in pretty much any beverage, so you might like to add a little more syrup than i do!