Pepper Design Blog

Grandma’s Lemon Bars

My mom and I recently had an opportunity to delve into the family recipe box and make the most deeeelicious lemon bars for Liv’s baptism reception.

My grandma has been famous for these lemon bars for as long as I can remember and they are frequently requested at family gatherings year round. In fact, she even made an extra large batch for our dessert table at our wedding four years ago – they were gone in an instant.

I took the lemon bars a different direction and packaged them in small yellow cupcake wrappers before topping with whipped cream and poppy seeds – the perfect dessert for an afternoon party!

I’m tempted to seal up this recipe in the family vault, but what fun would that be. Just don’t tell Grandma I told you .

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Grandma’s Lemon Bars

a
Crust:
2 c. flour
1/2c. powdered sugar
2 sticks butter

Mix all ingredients in an electric mixer until crumbled. Line a 9×13 pan with aluminum foil (be sure to extend up over the edges of the pan) and pat mixture into bottom of pan. Bake 20 minutes or until golden brown at 350.

Filling:
4 eggs
2 c. sugar
1/3c. lemon juice
1/4c. flour
1t. baking powder
rind of one lemon

Mix eggs, sugar, lemon juice and rind together. Mix baking powder and flour together in a separate bowl. Slowly add dry ingredients to wet ingredients, pour on top of baked crust. Bake 20 minutes or until firm.

Wait until cool, then pull foil out of pan and transfer to a cutting board. Dust with powdered sugar and cut into small squares.

Optional: add a dollop of whipped cream and poppy seeds before serving!

Yum. Yellow cupcake wrappers from Michaels.

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More from the big day:

Of course I didn’t take a shot of the entire backyard, but one of my favorite little details included garland made from a variety of different sized paper doilies.

Kevin made a delicious lunch and everyone mingled in the new kitchen and on the remodeled outdoor patio.

Here we are back at the Church, Liv’s getting dressed into a Spenla family gown that is over 100 years old and was handmade in Czechoslovakia.

Don’t worry, we were gentle.

The ceremony was beautiful; a quite, sweet, clebretory event with our local priest in our local parish.

A favorite photo of mine! You may have spotted it in Liv’s nursery.

It was a beautiful day!

Adorable! Daisy Sugar Cookie Pops

I saw this tutorial over at TomKat Studios and I can’t wait to replicate for a future celebration.

So cute, right? You could use any cookie cutter and decorate in so many different ways to customize for a kids or holiday party.

Head on over to Sweetopia for more adorable baking ideas!

In depth step-by-step directions for the Daisy Cookie Pops right here.

Mother’s Day and ‘Thank You Tea’

My first official Mother’s Day was wonderful. We had both Grandmas in town and Kevin treated us to a special picnic at the Organ Pavilion at Balboa Park in San Diego. It was cloudy and even a little drizzly out so Liv got to try out her new adorable hat:

I wanted to put something special together for Mother’s Day for my mom-in-law, Eileen, and thought of Thank You Tea.

I know that she loves tea and so I created tea tags with little thank you sayings and replaced the usual black tea tea tags with my handmade versions.

Here’s a full size blank tag if you’d like to create your own for a future birthday or holiday:

Next up were the cookies and I was inspired by an image I found on Pinterest (just starting to discover this amazing tool!).

I made lemon sugar cookie dough and cut notches out of each cookie prior to baking. When finished, the cookies will slide right onto the tea mug!

You could decorate to fit any party theme but I dipped mine in a simple powdered sugar + lemon icing and finally yellow sugar/sprinkles.

I also made photobooks for both Moms, more to come on that project.

And my gift for Mother’s Day?

She’s the best, and already four months old! New hat from Zulily.