Family Night! Trip to England with Fish and Chips

This weekend our family decided to take a trip to England. Yes, British accents, royalty, fish and chips, and trifle all set to the music of the Clash. However, we didn't buy plane tickets, oh no, that's not in the family budget and the girls need to be in bed by 8pm. We transported ourselves via food, art, and a sense of silliness.

How to take a trip anywhere in the world without leaving your home:

1.Early in the day our family discussed where we would like to go. England won the vote. However, India and China were close runner-ups. Perhaps we will visit there in the upcoming weeks.

2. We chose the menu: Fish and Chips with Trifle for dessert. Mom and Dad went about finding recipes and making an impromptu deep fryer. I've never deep fried anything in my life, and boy was the deep fryer an adventure. So for courage, Mom and Dad had Guiness Stout with the fish and chips. Yes, we know it's Irish, but hey, close enough.



3. Art was created to set the mood. Our eldest daughter made a lovely British Flag and a collage of the menu items and hung them up around the room.

4. Our youngest daughter felt this occasion warranted dressing up, since Princess Buttercup would be in attendance. Dressing properly to meet royalty takes time. So it was several hours before we saw her again.



5. Dinner was prepared, art was hung, we broke out our best British accents. The girls sounded like a Harry Potter movie, my husband the chimney sweep from Mary Poppins! Add a little Clash for musical ambiance!

6. A photo op with a princess and Dinner was served.



A Lovely Trip all in all.

Perhaps your family would like to take a trip? Let us know where you would like to go or send us pix of your travels.

Keep an eye out for our next posting. We'll be discussing how to make a VIDEO HOLIDAY CARD!

Bridal Head Table Suite..... on its way

Last April Hull's Happiest Days Designs sponsored a Bridal Headtable Suite giveaway! She chose our adorable Sweethearts Design for her Wedding!





Finally it was time to send our lucky bride, Kristinia, her lovely head table suite!



We took some pictures before we sent them off.




Imagine how much more lovely they would be with a real bride and groom in the picture.





Kristinia has promised to send us pictures of her Fall wedding!

Apple trees... and how they shaped my life

Our family has a little tiny baby cottage (really, almost an elf house) in central Pennsylvania, in the Allegheny Mountains. It’s a cute little place in the middle of the woods. Really, there is no one, nobody for at least a quarter of a mile in any direction, just trees, deer, a pond, and even bears. Which at times is tranquil and at others a little unnerving.

My daughters absolutely love the place. They love the campfire, the tire swing, the wild raspberries, and the apple tree. I love the apple tree too. Our apple tree at the cottage is huge and full of apples. It hasn’t been cut back in at least 15 years. Sometimes I wake up really early, (all that quiet makes it hard to sleep) and I’ll see deer eating the fallen apples at the base of the trunk. A simple little pleasure, a stolen moment of contentment.




One thing I love about our cottage is the fact there is absolutely nothing really to do. That has a way of sparking the imagination. Last summer, I could feel change coming upon me light a freight train. I had no idea exactly what, but I could feel something coming, just this impatience, like I better get moving. Anyway, a series of coincidences began to happen, I saw an article in a magazine about a woman who had started her own business, an art and home related business and I got really excited. It was at our cottage that my husband and I discussed the possibility of creating our own business. We had some time without the distractions of TV, internet, and the telephone to really think through this business idea. That idea has turned into Hull’s Happiest Days Designs.




When we were coming up with design ideas, I thought back to the apple tree. It’s beauty, the tradition associated with an apple tree, even the saying “ an apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree.” I thought it was a great design idea. So Kevin and I decided that we would both create apple tree designs and then choose which one we would use. If any of you have ever met us, as a couple, you would know that we are incredibly different. Our differences come out in our artwork as well. So when we showed each other our designs, they were so different, we couldn’t choose. So now we offer both. A fitting homage to our apple tree.
Both are top selling designs!

Certainly, Kevin is the only one I would ever sit under the apple tree with, except maybe two little girls and a dog too!

Hull's Happiest Days Designs on Great Gifts for Weddings, Fox 2 News w/the Gift Insider/Lindsay Roberts

Life's Collection of Happy Moments....

We've had a big week last week Kevin and I were in a fantastic art show with several talented small town artists, with great big talent. There is something wonderful about living in the country, in a small town, with a small community. You get to know each other really well, share in each others lives, help each other out. Community and friendship and polite exhange of ideas. Truly a room full of artists for three days is a really good thing. I so enjoyed talking with one another, throwing around philosophical ideas of art, testing them against each other, and then sharing a slice of cake. Really good times.

Which got me to thinking about friends, family, art, and all the events that bring us together. This weekend is fourth of July. Our family will have a little barbeque, go see fireworks, generally hang out and do alot of nothing together, except chat, play some, and eat. I love all of us just being together. Life is full of these tiny happinesses.

Last month it was my niece's Birthday Party! Quite a hooplay for a one year old. We had a great time. My girls running around with their baby cousin, then doing an impromptu dance recital in the yard (which they also did at the art show-not wall flowers-go figure), and of course singing happy birthday and cake for a tiaraed, smiling, and somewhat bewildered one year old. The cake however needed no explaining!

So many happinesses all little rest stops for the velocity of life. Cocoa, our dog (first picture above) has the right idea. Sometimes all you need is a little happy nap, to rest up for your next party (she doesn't have a job) .

The china cabinet was the first major purchase Kevin and I made for our first home together. Now its filled with a collection of Hull's Happiest Days Designs Dessertware. I love that the china colors are simple and restrained, yet the images are different celebrating happy moments in time, and they all go together! I can have a party using our dessertware and have little mementos of family memories all on my table. A lovely little collection of life's happiest moments! Wouldn't you like to start your collection today?

Summer Art Show

Hull's Happiest Days Designs and fellow artists are in a fantastic Art Show this upcoming weekend (see info below)! Yummy treats will be for sale to pair with our dessertware, and all the proceeds from the Bake Sale will go to Share Our Strength, a non profit organization dedicated to eliminate childhood hunger!

Kevin and Shawn will both be displaying paintings as well as our Hull's Happiest Days Designs artwork! Please come and see our work and the other wonderful art!

Summertime Strawberries

Last weekend my family and I went strawberry picking! So much fun! We go every year it’s a family tradition. We get dressed in clothes that can handle some strawberry stains and dirt, don our sunscreen, and get the sun glasses and off we go.

The farm experience itself is worth it, trudging through the farmer’s field and being directed to which patch is yours to pick from. The girls love having their own baskets, however, they eat more than actually makes it into the basket. The real picking comes from Kevin and myself. You don’t want to pick strawberries that are too red, they get mushy fast. You need to have a trained eye just to recognize the right shade of red, no bruising, no rotting, and not too big. The big ones rot faster.

8-10 quarts later we usually go play on the playground at the farm or I sample some homemade specialties at the stand. All and all a lovely trip.




When we arrive at home, always, I make strawberry shortcakes to go with our lunch. Then after the girls have their nap Kevin and I clean and hull (pardon the pun!) We make chicken salad with strawberries, more shortcake, strawberries and whipped cream, strawberries and balsamic, and finally strawberry ice cream (recipe compliments of Ben and Jerry yes, that Ben and Jerry).

Below you’ll find the recipe for the strawberry ice cream! Since summer is here Kevin and I have been working on designs to celebrate all the happiest days for the dog days of summer. Our Personalized Ice Cream Ice Cream Man bowls with handles are the perfect size for ice cream and even cobbler!




Ice Cream Ice Cream Man bowls would make a fantastic father’s day gift. We can personalize the Truck to say : Pop’s Ice Cream or Daddy’s Ice Cream! We can even put your own super short saying in the speech balloon. But order fast, Father’s Day is right around the corner!



Strawberry Ice Cream
Recipe from Ben & Jerry’s Homemade Ice Cream & Dessert Book
Ben Cohen, Jerry Greenfield, Nancy J. Steven, Workman Publishing 1987

Sweet Cream Base
2 large eggs
¾ cup of sugar
2 cups heavy or whipping cream
1 cup milk

Whisk the eggs in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes. Whisk in the sugar, a little at a time, then continue whisking until completely blended, about one minute more. Pour in the cream and milk and whisk to blend. (Makes 1 Quart)

Strawberry Addition

1 pint of fresh strawberries hulled and sliced
1/3 cup of sugar
Juice of ½ a lemon
Sweet cream base (above)

1.Combine strawberries, sugar, and lemon juice in a mixing bowl. Cover and refrigerate at least one hour.

2.Mash the strawberries to a puree and stir into the sweet cream base.

3.Transfer the mixture to an ice cream maker and freeze following the manufacturer’s instructions.

Enjoy!