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.

Play with Your Food

Even though the play kitchen still needs to be finished, and the hour glass to Christmas Day is quickly running out of sand I couldn't help but make these for Jayna's Kitchen.

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!

Daddy O Ideas: Video Flip Book Tutorial

Fathers Day is coming up soon so I wanted to share some fun gift ideas I found via Martha. I added my own little twist to some of them and a tutorial so 
"Read On".

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.

Cocoa-and-Candy-Canes!

So I did in-fact manage to pull off my Christmas party even with all the chaos that comes with the Holidays.

The baking of all my treats was made a-lot easier with my early Christmas gift too. I am in love with this beauty and have to pinch myself that I even have it in my kitchen. So you may be wondering what I was using to mix and make all my goodies for parties before I got this wonderful piece of machinery. Just about nothing! A small hand mixer my sweet grandmother bought me off of QVC (even that I have only had for three years), or a good old wooden spoon. So I am thankful Santa saw my talent and need.

I did all desserts for the party along with a hot cocoa bar. I made little food signs for everything and tried to make them tie into the winter snowflake Christmas theme I have going on throughout the house and on the island. I picked up the light blue snowflake dollies at the dollar store and they looked great scattered under all the trays and platters. The tall jars filled with marshmallows and scented pine cones added a nice touch and some height on the table to balance out the cupcake stand.

For the cocoa bar I put out jars with assorted flavored cocoas that had little tags letting guests know what flavors were theirs for the choosing. I stacked all my milk-glass teacups and their saucers (which I purchased years ago from a thrift store) behind the cocoa jars all shiny and nice like. Before hand I tagged each cup with a little tag that had a word associated with winter or Christmas on it so that guests could tell their cups apart throughout the evening. Then I just made sure to have a nice big pot of hot water going during the party so guests could help themselves to as much cocoa as they would like.

I made cupcakes of course and sprinkled them with edible glitter to make the frosting look snow like, and found cupcake liners to go along with my color theme.

In the center of the island I placed a yummy Devils food pound cake that I cleverly label to describe the touch of vanilla glaze and sprinkles that I topped it with.

I also made mini bundt spice cakes and drizzles blue frosting and snowflake sprinkles on them for a fun look.
These are fun little cookies for a party too. They are s'more cookies made with homemade graham cracker discs that you then bake with half a large marshmallow a-top the cookie and dip in chocolate. They are a little messy for your fingers, but just right for your sweet tooth.

Most the guests were late do to the snow storm, but what could go more perfect with a Christmas party (let alone a snowflake themed one) then freshly falling snow outside.

Hope everyone has a Merry Christmas. I will post again soon when the festivities of the big holiday are all over and done with.

Dr.Seuss Playroom

Santa's elves are all done with Jayna's Dr. Seuss playroom. It has turned out really nice. I was shocked at how well the toys fit. I thought for sure I would need double the storage, but I didn't. In the future I will probably add another bookcase or two, but for now the storage is perfect. I didn't even use one of the white baskets and three of the pop-up storage bins.

Here are before pictures of the playroom. It was just a basic plain white room with no closet and a little alcove.



Out in the hall I hung this picture of Dr.Seuss books above the door going into the playroom. I love how it looks so much that I am now planning on putting little frames above all the doors in the hall hinting to what rooms they are. Kinda like on imagination movers. lol. You stay-at-home moms know what I am talking about. It will look so much better once I paint the hall too.

We painted the room Tembleque from Kwal paints. It is a really pretty blue with a little hint of green. I think I may even paint my craft room downstairs this same color. The table, stools, baskets, and bookcase are from Ikea and were really good prices. I found the blue trunk forever ago at a thrift store and even consigned it, but no-one bought it so I ended up with it again. I have kept it all this time hoping to find the perfect home for it. I am glad I did because it looks great in this room and holds tons of toys. The red chairs are the medium size Pottery Barn Kids everywhere chairs. I think they are even on sale right now. The curtains are also from Ikea and where really cheap, and the Dr. Seuss hats I bought at Target for the Dr. Seuss baby shower I did awhile back.

Here is the finished playhouse. It turned out super cute and I am very proud of myself for whipping it out as fast as I did. I still need to trim the door a little and we are going to make a miner adjustment in the frame. I love it. I think this will be Jayna's favorite part of the room so I am really glad we thought of it.(click for playhouse frame how to)

I made these little labels for all the toy baskets. I thought it would be a good teaching tool to help little Jayna learn how to put her toys away. To make them I just took pictures of some of her toys on top of a white piece of paper. Then I loaded them into photoshop and adjusted the levels of the colors a little, printed them out onto photo-paper, and used self-laminate sheets to make them kid durable.

On one of the walls I but a large magnet board I picked up at Ikea. I placed it really low so that she could use it while sitting on the floor. I have not found any good magnet letters for her yet, so I turned the buttons I used at the Dr.Seuss baby shower into magnets. I just took the pins out and added little strips of adhesive magnets to the back of them. I had picked these bags up at Target too and decided they would look cute hung on hooks in the playroom. Jayna loves filling up little bags with toys and treasures so I thought she would enjoy using these.

So the only thing left to do is paint the huge Dr.Seuss murals. Who knows when I will get around to doing that. I am just glad I was reasonable enough to know I could not do it before Christmas.

Well my Christmas party is tomorrow so I better get baking.

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.

Birthday Party Favor Bags

These may look like little kid birthday favors, but they were actually for my husbands 29th birthday party that we had on Saturday. He is married to Miss party planner, but every year he does the same thing on his birthday. We go to the nickel arcade with his closest friends (and every 7 year old that has their birthday on the same day as him), get hot wings, and play at the house for the rest of the night. So each year I sneak a little cuteness into the boy event by making them party favor bags that have fun treats in them that they can snack on while they play video games. The boys, I mean men really like them and look forward to what will be in the bag each year.



This year I made these cute little labels that can be printed out and cut to fit plain brown paper lunch sacks. I thought they looked fun, and fit in with the nights activities.

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.

You Have Been Booed

I remember as a kid packaging up plates of pumpkin cookies to go ditch on neighbors doors. We would leave a cute little note that explained that they had been booed and were to pass it on to other neighbors.We also would leave directions for them to place a boo sign we had left them in their window. Then we would beg are parents each night to drive us around the neighbor hood so that we could see how far are booing had spread. This year my mom booed me by mail, so I had to pass it on. Here is my new take on an old favorite halloween tradition. I hope no-one I booed sees this post!




I made the boo sign and tags on the computer, and bought the cute little buckets at Walmart. The pumpkin cookie recipe is my mom's. She created it by combining several recipes years ago, and now it is a family staple and favorite during October. They are the best pumpkin cookies by far.

Welcome Home

This summer a friend of mine bought a new home and I put together a house warming gift for her. I didn't think it was anything too special, but she loved it, and a couple of the guests commented on it so here it is.

I got this idea from a Jewish tradition I had read about where they would take symbolic gifts to new neighbors to help them bless their homes. Or you may recognize it from the scene in "It's A Wonderful Life," when Mary And George Bailey welcome the Martini family to their new home with three symbolic gifts and a brief, heartfelt speech. "Bread, that this house may never know hunger," they say. "Salt, that life may always have flavor. And wine, that joy and prosperity may reign forever." I got a cute little basket at the store and bought some cute jars.




This is a wonderful gift to give to hosts that will be throwing all those holiday parties we will all be attending.

The Symbolism:

Bread- that your home will never know hunger.
Broom- that you will be able to sweep out the old to bring in the new
Candles- that light will always prevail in your home.
Flour- that your home will always have plenty
Salt- that your home will be a small sanctuary
Sugar- that your home will hold sweet memories

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.