A heart attacked yard {Valentine Peeps® inspired}

The other day I received a fun box full of a variety of Valentine Peeps®.Although this isn’t my first choice in candy, I’m always intrigued when I see Peeps because their products always look so fun and fluffy and tasty. My boys were extremely excited to see a box full of candy, no matter the kind. This is what Peeps & Company^® sent us:

Peeps chocolate dipped strawberry crème flavored chicks // Peeps chocolate mousse flavored marshmallow bears // Peeps marshmallow hearts // Peeps chocolate covered raspberry flavored hearts // Peeps strawberry crème flavored marshmallow hearts // Peeps vanilla crème flavored marshmallow hearts // Peeps sugar-free marshmallow hearts

And a few fun facts to go along them (click on the pictures to enlarge):

 

Because the boys were SO excited about the Peeps, they got to pick out one treat to eat the day we got it. They picked the chocolate dipped strawberry crème flavored chicks and they were a hit! I’ll admit, the strawberry crème flavor was good and the chocolate on the bottom was really good :

 

My personal favorite in the bunch was the vanilla crème hearts. I’m a pushover when it comes to vanilla (not as much with chocolate) so these won my heart. I did like the chocolate covered raspberry hearts too (dark chocolate, that’s my chocolate weakness!). My boys didn’t care what flavor or shape they got, as long as they got a treat! Grant’s favorite was the strawberry crème Peeps, heart or chick shape. All in all, they have some great flavors and the bears were a fun way to mix up the obvious & original shapes of the chicks and hearts, along with the mousse chocolate flavor.

Although these are a fun treat to eat on their own, sparingly, I wanted to do something more with them. Something that could be done for Valentines day, or any day for that matter, to say “I love you.” I looked online to see what other fun projects have been made using Valentine Peeps and these are the favorites that I found:

1. Peeps Bouquet // 2. “I need s’more friends like you” // 3. “Owl love you forever” // 4. Peeps pops // 5. Peeps wreath //
6. “You are one of my favorite peeps” // 7. “Happy Valentines day to all my peeps” //

I decided to make the Peeps pops and had the boys help. Call it a Valentines preschool activity! They had a blast dipping/painting the “suckers” in the chocolate & decorating them. I forgot about the sprinkles, but they would have loved that too.

My contribution to the Peeps pop stockpile. I didn’t dare try making them like I saw here & here, I wasn’t really up for a “pinterest fail”!

I decided to make this into a fun, sneaky service project for our boys (and had to share the sugar with other people besides my family!), so I had little G help me with another project. He cut out lots of hearts & stuck them on skewers.

 

With the paper hearts & the Peeps pops, we went to our neighbor friends and, as quietly as we could, “heart attacked” their front yard! I thought we had a lot more hearts than we did, so the yard wasn’t as covered in hearts as I planned, but it was fun for the boys to attack the yard with the hearts. I’m sure our friends were watching us the whole time, but I don’t care. They boys loved surprising their friends with lots of hearts and candy in the snow! We’ll see if they keep the secret ;)

 

It was a fun way to get into the Valentines spirit and a great way to use the Peeps!

================================================================================

If you’re here just for the giveaway, then this is where you want to be. Peeps & Company^®generously sent us a lot of products, so we are here to share the love!
If you are interested, you can enter to win a Valentines Peeps prize pack, which includes one package of each of the following treats:

Peeps chocolate dipped strawberry crème flavored chicks // Peeps chocolate mousse flavored marshmallow bears // Peeps marshmallow hearts // Peeps [dark & milk] chocolate covered raspberry flavored hearts // Peeps strawberry crème flavored marshmallow hearts // Peeps vanilla crème flavored marshmallow hearts // Peeps sugar-free marshmallow hearts

These Valentine Peeps make for great valentines, great treats & a great way to tell someone you love them! The flavors are awesome, but you really should try them for yourself. Here’s how you enter to win the prize pack above --

a Rafflecopter giveaway

**giveaway open to U.S. residents only**

*We received the products free of charge from Peeps & Company^®. We were not compensated
in any way to write this post or giveaway. All thoughts & opinions are our own.

Personalized Valentine Chocolates

I have dreams of becoming a Candy Maker. Granted I don’t have the patience for the meticulous detail, nor the hand for cute creativity like others do. But still, I think it’s so fun to create art with candy! Someday I’ll actually be good at it. But until then, this will do for me.

 

What you need to make your own personalized chocolates:

• Chocolate. I used both chocolate chips (and butterscotch chips) and Wilton Candy Melts (which you can get at Joann’s for pretty cheap). **wish I had pink, red, white or purple candy melts when I did this
• Squeeze bottle (or fancy decorating equipment…no such thing in my house)
• Candy molds OR silicone ice cube trays! I found these heart ice cube trays at Target, 2 pack for $1. Nice!

[Never mind about the wax paper and sharpie, didn’t work out for me. You’ll see at the end]

 

Like I said, I’m no expert at candy making and my creativity really could use some help. But to start, I melted the butterscotch chips and put it in the squeeze bottle. Those squeeze bottles I got at Joann’s for about $1.99 for a 2 pack (use a 40% off coupon). I drew some designs in the bottom of the ice cube trays/“candy molds” and don’t forget to draw the letters backwards.

I put the tray in the fridge for 5-10 minutes to make sure it hardened enough before I started on the next step, which was adding the first layer of chocolate. Melt the Wilton Candy Melts as the bag instructs then I scooped in just enough chocolate to fill 1/3-1/2 of the heart mold. Then tap the mold until the chocolate flattens out. Again, put it in the fridge to harden that first layer.

Then I did an experiment! I decided to add some fillings to my chocolate hearts. I put small dabs of creamy peanut butter, nutella and caramel in the center of the first layer of the chocolate.

 

Next I topped the filling with another small scoop of chocolate, tapped the mold again to flatten and spread out the chocolate, then put it in the fridge one last time to harden the chocolates again. I left them in the fridge for a couple hours (while I ran some errands).

They came out of the ice cube trays really easy and turned out so cute. Even my experimental filling worked out awesome! Although, the caramel wasn’t as thick as I’d have liked, but it was similar to a Caramello! Next time I’d use valentine colors – red, purple, pink and white. I didn’t have those colors on hand when I decided to make these so I just settled for what I had.

  

Because of all the steps, it did take a while. And it seemed even longer because I had my little G man (2 1/2 year old) trying to help me the whole time. But in the end, it was worth the time and effort. Now I just need a cute valentine box for these!

CANDY FAIL---> Here is what not to do (cause it didn’t work when I tried it)! I wrote letters and hearts on wax paper and let them harden, then put them in the heart molds. It didn’t work out so well because when I put the chocolate in the mold and tapped it, the letters didn’t stay flat and the chocolate snuck under the butterscotch letters. Doesn’t look pretty and you can’t tell what they are (‘B’ and ‘M’). So, just draw the letters and designs right on the candy mold.