Making easy candy and a craft project

A while back when my daughter and I first talked about me doing a blog, she suggested that I go through my cookbook collection and one book at a time try three recipes out of each book. So this morning I needed some inspiration for a treat to bring to my son's violin recital tonight. So, I pulled out a cookbook and some recipes I had torn from a magazine were in the front, so I looked through them and came up with a recipe for a no bake treat. Here's my question, does this count as one of the three recipes for this book? I think it's kind of cheating. It was a cake book, and this is more like a candy, so, I guess I just answered my own question and I still need to work on the cookbook collection!

Sweet & Salty Pretzel Candy
1 1/2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup butter
61 or so saltine crackers, or 2 cups
1 can sweetened condensed milk (14oz) can use fat-free
3 cups bite-size pretzels
You'll need a 9-in. square baking pan lined with foil (and sprayed with Pam) to extend about 2 in. above opposite ends of pan. Melt the butter and chocolate chips in a bowl in the microwave. I started out with 1 minute, then stirred and did 30 seconds, stirred and did another 10 seconds. Then add the sweetened condensed milk, cracker crumbs and 2 cups of the pretzels. Mix well. Spread evenly in prepared pan. Lay remaining pretzels on top(I didn't use all of the remaining ones). Cover and refrigerate at least 1 1/2 hours. Lift foil by ends onto cutting board. Remove foil. Cut into 6 strips, then cut each strip into 6 squares.


Now for a little crafting Project!


The other day I picked up this cute chalk board at our local second hand store (D.I.).





I wanted to put it in my dining room, but I wanted to jazz it up some, so I went to Wal*Mart and found some black gingham ribbon and some hammered gold spray paint. I masked off the chalk board and got my sweet husband to spray paint the wood for me. I'm not so good with a spray can.


Then I hot glued on the ribbon and added some little bows, layering the two ribbons and bows. I also did the eraser. Then I used velcro to attach the eraser to the chalk trough. I think it turned out kinda cute!

Here it is on my dinning room wall.