Happy Birthday America! Ice cream sandwiches & Hostess gift

July 4th is one of my most favorite holidays!  What is more fun is that we live close to the birth place of America "Philadelphia", and there are so many events going on to celebrate.  There is a fantastic event called Wawa Welcome America in Philadelphia that is going on full force with many free events concerts and most importantly 3 firework shows!  My favorite!  Click the link here for full details of the ongoing celebration in the city of brotherly love.

This weekend we have a few parties to attend!   I wanted to share what my hostess gift will be in addition too one of my favorite summer desserts, a salty & sweet chocolate chip ice cream sandwich!

Top your sandwich with a felt star on a novelty red, white & blue candy sticks

Everyone enjoys chocolate covered strawberries and I think that they are a great sweet to bring along with you.  Simple to make and very much so loved.  Make your strawberries festive by dipping the tips into red, white & blue nonpareils.  The ones I used are from Crate & Barrel

Decorate your white ware to add a bit of July 4th flare with the same nonpareils!  I always love how Amy Atlas lines her plates as well as many of us do now with decorative papers.  I have also seen a few features on the AAE blog in which the stylist has lined their plates with sugar, sprinkles and other edible decor.  I wanted to try something a bit different and not use paper due to it is warm out and not wanting the chocolate to melt onto the paper.  I also didn't want to fill the plates with nonpareils just in case a little hand were to sneak up there and make a mess.  So here my Amy Atlas Moment what I did & used to keep them in place~

Fill your Wilton bottle up with a a few tablespoons of corn syrup.  Line the edges of your plate or plates with the corn syrup, pour the nonpareils onto the plate to cover the corn syrup and pour the excess off into a bowl and use onto your next plate.  Let the plate sit a few hours to harden a bit to be sure everything will stay in place.  See the last picture, I am holding it down not one falling off! 

Serve scrumptious ice cream sandwiches made with salty & sweet chocolate chip cookies!  How do I make them salty?  Take a 3/4 of cup of crushed pretzels & potato chips and mix them into your pre -made Nestle Toll House chocolate chip cookie dough and bake as the direction state.  It is sort of a short cut to kitchen sink cookies!  If you like pretzels and ice cream you will LOVE this ice cream sandwich I promise! 

Check back later for FREE July 4th printables I created to share with everyone! 

Happy Birthday America ~ enjoy all your celebrations America and please be safe! 

Peace, Love & July 4th,

Stacy