Days of 47 Celebration

Here in Utah we have Pioneer day on the 24th of July celebrating the Mormon pioneers that settled Utah. So July feels like one big party with that and the 4th of July. I love it because I can get double use out of my 4th of July decorations. I put them up at the beginning of July and they do not come down until the last week in July. So when we realized that all of Ryan's siblings and his parents would be in-town for the weekend of the 24th it seemed like the perfect excuse to have a party and go all out. Here are some pictures  of what I did.

Lemonade Anyone?

The Lemonade stand went well last week with the girls. The weather cleared up just long enough for us to get a good hour of selling in. Only two out of thirteen girls showed up, but I am sure it was because a lot of them probably thought it was cancelled due to the weather. When life gives you Lemons you just make Lemonade though right? Or in this case Rosemary Lemonade and Pink Lemonade Cupcakes!

Bake Sale: Sold Out!

The Bake Sale was a big success! I sold out of everything we had by three and had to hide a cupcake for myself. I couldn't believe that I had made the perfect amount of everything. Although a lot of you wished I would have made more cookie mix jars (maybe next year). We raised a little over $300 which I thought was great for a one women small neighborhood Bake Sale! Thanks Everyone!!!

Framing the Past

Something inside of me has always been strongly drawn to the past. Growing up I was often told by adults that I had an "old soul". I contribute this to my love for all things with history and a story to tell. If it is old I want it!

Thankfully I have a Grandmother who has not only kept tons of pictures, but the items that go along with the pictures and stories. After acquiring my Great-Grandmothers dining table I knew I would dedicate that room to my family heritage. I have always dreamed of blowing up old black and white pictures and shadow-boxing long forgotten trinkets, and I am finally getting around to it. Right now I am just using what I have as far as frames, pictures, and items are concerned. In the future I hope to take a Saturday and visit with my Grandma again to see what other fun things I can resurrect. A picture of my dining-room set at my Great-Grandmothers house is top on my list of treasures to find.

I took these photos that we have of an ancestor in his produce truck decorated for the Farmington Utah Pioneer Celebration parade in 1914, and simply made copies of them and printed them at home onto photo paper. Then I framed them in this frame adding a map of the Mormon Pioneer exudes that I found and printed from online.

This picture is actually of one of my Grandmas elementary school teachers funny enough. I just could not pass it up with its more than amazing picture booth background. I then added old beads from broken necklaces that I had found at my Grandmas in an old skippy peanut butter jar.

This is a wallet size picture of my Great-Grandma Lund that I included in a frame with a napkin she embroidered ( I still have to confirm that though) I think I have a better one that she actually embroidered her initials on, but until I come across that one this will due. I also placed her sewing thimble along with the box she bought it in and wrote her name on, on the outside of the frame.

This is a picture I loved of Grandpa Lund fixing a fence at his Sister-in-laws house in California with Grandma Lund over seeing the work. The background in this photo is an old cloth seed bag I found in a tool chest my Grandma gave to my husband. It didn't belong to Grandpa Lund I am sure, but I thought it went along with the story in the picture.

Displaying old family photos and items is such an easy way to gain a sense of pride in your family history, and feel closer to those who have come before you. What family treasures have you found or displayed?

I have many more amazing family photos and items that I want to display and I will be sure to share them with you as I work on them.

Beauty Night

For activity day this next week we are doing a big "Beauty Night". I got the inspiration and tag line from this clever lady. These are the invitations I made to mail out to the girls. I usually just drop the little reminders off at their houses, but I am trying to make it a big deal for them. I thought they would be excited to get something in the mail too.

We are going to do their makeup, take their pictures, do facial masks, and have treats. I have tons of makeup from my 7 years of being a make-up artist for Macy's and Nordstom, so it is fitting this will be at my house. This party idea and invitations would be fun for any girls birthday party though. So next week I will be working on turning the basement into a day spa for nine 10 and 11 year old girls.

Good grief!

Cootie-Catchers

For Activity Days (the girls church group I am over) next week we are going to make secret message valentines cards. One will be an invisible message only revealed by spraying love potion on it, and the other will be a message only revealed by wearing special glasses that we will be making. Card ideas courtesy of Mrs. Martha. I thought it was something that 10 and 11 year olds would like to do, and different than just making regular old cards.

So I wanted to make something just as fun as the cards we will be making to invite them to the activity.

So I made cootie catchers with the activity info and valentine images on it.

Then I made a little tag to attach to it too.

I never thought at 28 I would be making cootie catchers let alone printing them off on my computer. The other thing that was scary was that my husband remembered how to fold them and I didn't.

Jackpot!

I hit the Jackpot yesterday at D.I.! For those of you who are not familiar with Deseret Industries it is both a nonprofit, vocational rehabilitation facility and a thrift store run by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. It is my favorite place to find treasures, and today was my lucky day.

I found this cute metal chair that I thought would be perfect for my laundry-room desk, but it is a little on the short side. Not to worry though I will find a place somewhere for this little guy, or I will just not put it right at the desk.

Then I also found a great school desk for Jayna Berry. I have always wanted to find one and buy it, and the stars aligned yesterday for me to do so. I am planning on painting it and putting it in the soon to be craft-room of my dreams.

I picked up this rustic looking coffee table that is luckily enough the perfect size for my family-room. It did have glass, but I told the guy helping me to just take it out because I was not planning on using it anyways. My plans for this piece are to upholster a top for it and leave it the raw rustic wood.

I also picked up some cute plates that match my house colors. Almost all my dishes except for my everyday ware are from D.I. That may gross some people out, and it even grosses me out sometimes. That is until I give them a good hot scrub down and a heavy wash in the dishwasher. I do get a little worried now a days about the whole lead thing, but most of them I do not use regularly enough to get too paranoid about it.

I also found these cute little tin buckets that I thought would be great for Jaynas' room when I do it. I am planning on using a similar shade of green for the walls.

Then I found two of these little black baskets that I am sure I will find a use for somewhere.

And this super cute globe. Everyone needs a globe. I will most likely, but this in the craft room too.

I thought this lamp was simple and cute too, so I picked it up. It looked lonely like it wanted to come home with me. I do not even know if it works, but everything is fixable.

I almost forgot about these barstools too. They were a great find, and I think I am going to spray-paint them later. They need to be cut down a little to fit at my island though so that may be a challenge to do.

The biggest diamond in the rough find though was this old gun cabinet. It is way sketchy, and needs a ton of work, but when I look at it I see an all white antiqued cabinet with bead-board-backing, little shelves, cute knobs, a little latch, and whicker baskets in the bottom where the drawers used to be. I had to get it because it was only $35, and usually things with glass like this fixed up are a ton more.

All in all I spent about $95 which may sound like a lot for someone to spend at a thrift store, but if you bought all these things finished at a home store it would cost you way more than that. You for-sure have to be willing to put in some additional money and elbow grease for some of these items, but that is the fun of it all. To see something and see it's potential and then make it happen.

I have to get moving on these projects though. I have a whole corner of the garage full of nothing but these projects. Chairs, more chairs, and night stands etc.

There is going to be a whole lot of stripping going on at my house, and it is not the kind of stripping that has anything to do with a pole.

Vinyl Framed Letters

I ordered these vinyl letters for family presents this Christmas. They were super easy to do and really cheap. I think all together with the vinyl and frame it only cost me about $10 for each of them. I got the frames at Walmart and then just centered and laid the vinyl down on-to the glass. I thought they would look even cuter if you put scrapbook paper behind the glass. I of course made one for myself and now I just need to get decorating and find a place for it.

Side Note: Lets not talk about how I tripped and stepped on the one for my parents the day after Christmas and shattered it. Oh, well I will just have to get them another one.

Sorry for the lack of posts. I have company until after New Years.

Christmas Bells are Ringing

I made these simple bells last year for our ward to hand out to the elderly at a retirement community while caroling. They were bells from the Dollar Tree that came in a pack of four for a dollar of course (which I did see that they had again this year). I swapped out the cheap silver thread they had on the bells for a thin blue ribbon. Then I made these little tags with a verse from a Christmas song and a warm holiday wish from the ward to attach to the bells. You could make a much cuter tag to go on the bells with die-cuts etc. I had to make over a hundred of them so I kept it very simple.

I will probably skip posting tomorrow since we will be out of town. We are going up to Park City for the night to enjoy the snowy mountains. We may possibly get to go on a real "one horse open sleigh" ride too. I hope we do because I think little Jayna would love it.

Pie Pops

For activity day the week before Thanksgiving we made pie pops with the girls. They were really excited to bake and even more excited that they all got their own rolling pins. I found the rolling pins in the dollar section at Joann's and had to get them for the activity. I found the pie pop idea through a blog of a blog that linked to bakarella. The girls loved them and were excited that it was easy enough that they could make them again at home. We used box pie crust mix to keep things simple and I gave them several choices of filling. I had fresh berries mushed and tossed in cornstarch and sugar, apples chopped and sprinkled with sugar cinnamon and a little nutmeg, and several canned pie filling that to my surprise were very fresh and tasty. The only thing I think we did wrong was not place our sticks further up in the pies. Some of the girls pie pops were a little to top heavy to stay on the sticks.




I think I am going to make some of these for my Christmas party without the stick. The scalloped cookie cutter made these mini pies look super cute.

Funeral- Memory Cards / Life History

Sorry for the lack of interesting posts these last couple of days. We had a death in the family over the weekend and the funeral services were Tuesday. So the only projects I have to post about today are the memory cards I made for the funeral and the life history I printed up. I am so use to doing baby shower invites or birthday party themes which are so fun, bright and happy. It seemed like no matter what I did to these cards they still seemed gloomy and drab, but here they are. If you would like to read more about the funeral and circumstances head-on-over to Hutchings Home for the whole scoop. I will be posting a part II of the story soon.

Spider-Web Cupcakes

These turned out way better than I expected and they were a big hit at the church party. I made the spider webs a couple of days ahead of time and then made the cupcakes themselves yesterday and assembled the spider webs on them when I got to the party. I found this stand at my favorite little restaurant supply place, and attached a fake spider to the top of it. I think it added a nice Halloween touch and fit in with the spider webs great. My husband also won the chili cook-off at this party. We were competing though so it was bitter sweet.

* If you want further instructions or tips on making these spider webs feel free to contact me.

Fear Factor Activity

Here is what is on the schedule for today. Tonight I am in-charge of the 10 and 11 year old church girls activity. Since it is Halloween time I have planned a Fear Factor activity for them. I took them these flyers on Monday night inviting them to come to the activity and their response to the idea was pretty good. To be honest I was worried they were too young to even know what Fear Factor was, but thank goodness they seemed familiar with the show. So tonight I have conjured up some gross events for them to compete in. I am just hopping and praying that more than two girls show up, because if we are short players that means me and the other leader will have to do some of these gross games. Cross your fingers for me. There will be mystery shake drinking, baby food taste testing, and dog bone relays to name a couple of the things I have planned. I really hope the girls have fun. I am trying really hard to get them excited about Activity Days. To tie the activity into something spiritual I am going to give a mini lesson at the beginning about the difference between fear and faith, and how we can take our fears to God and be comforted by our faith in him.

*Side Note- Little Jayna Berry has been scared to go in the laundry room ever since I made these invitations because she could see the "bugs" on my desk in there. They are just little bugs I bought at the dollar store and hot glue gunned onto the invitations. She would run in there and then back up while she pointed at the desk and said "bug, bug, bug" It was too funny.

Scrappy Pumpkins

These were really fun to make and so easy and cheap. In-fact we made them as an activity with the 10 and 11 year old Activity Day girls. All you need is some seasonal scrapbook paper, modge-podge, and those cheap little plastic pumpkins that you can find at the dollar store or Walmart.

Instructions: First tear your scrapbook paper into appropriate sizes for the size pumpkin you are working with. Second squeeze some glue onto a scrap of paper and use your fingers to rub the glue all over both sides of your piece of scrap paper. Third place the scrap piece of paper that is now covered in glue onto your pumpkin and use your fingers to press it down and smooth it out so that it forms to the pumpkin. Continue with these steps until your entire pumpkin is covered. Then let it dry and you will have a cute little pumpkin all dressed to impress.

I have only had time to make one so far, but I would love a whole little pumpkin patch of these guys on my fireplace mantel.

Activity Day Welcome Baskets

I have a new church calling as an Activity Day Leader for the girls ages 10 and 11 at my church. I put together these cute little baskets full of taffy to give to the girls when I go and visit them to introduce myself.

I found the baskets at the dollar store and they actually came in sets of two for a dollar. Then I just took scrap fabric and ripped it into strips to tie on the corners of the baskets. I copied the tag idea from another website and just made my own on the computer, cut out the circles and glued them to toothpicks to stick in the corners of the baskets. I hope the girls enjoy them.