Play date!

Today I made a play date with my good friend, Michelle.  Michelle and I have been friends since Junior High {yikes, that is a LONG time} and share a mutual love of crafting, baking and anything that involves creativity.

On the docket today, decorating tote bags and making ciabatta bread!

Michelle and I took a bread making class together a few months ago and decided we would benefit from each other’s moral support attempting the ciabatta bread recipe.  Here, Michelle mixes in some water to the dough.

When making ciabatta bread, you make a pre-ferment mixture of the dough the night before.  I did this part, while Michelle gathered the materials to make our tote bags.  When playing in the kitchen, I am notoriously messy. Today was no different. 🙂

After we added in some flour, yeast, water and salt to our pre-ferment mixture, we had to do some serious kneading. Ciabatta dough is sticky and wet.

After we kneaded the dough, Michelle and I started making our tote bags.  First we made stamps from potatoes.  {WE are crazy like that!} 

The stamps came out so cute!  One lemon and one lime stamp.

I want to finish my bag with some hand written message, so left some space in the middle of the bag to fill  in later.  But seriously, love this inexpensive tote we made, don’t you?

Michelle and I worked on the tote bags while the dough was rising.  I set the timer to remind us when we needed to knead again.  Making ciabatta bread requires lots of kneading.

Here’s the  bread just about ready to hit the oven.

I take a peek and rotate the loaves…wow…not bad for our first try, huh?

The recipe I used was adapted from the Peter Reinhart’s “The Bread Baker’s Apprentice”.  In case you want to make some ciabatta bread too.

Mondays are typically  my administrative day.  Billing, note writing, all the work I can’t fit in when I am busy seeing clients.  But not this Monday, today I scheduled a play date.  What a well needed break!

It’s always great to connect with friends and do what we love to do together.

Is it time you scheduled a play date?